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Correction

I was reverted here if we want to clean that up, fine, but a talk page discussion that endorses a block is NOT a substitute for a formal ban discussion. Current practice is not as such, nor do I remember it every being that way. Rather than get in a revert war over semantics, I would prefer the community clarify that sentence and normalize it with the community consensus. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 23:10, 20 June 2013 (UTC)

• I support your edit, but I do agree that this needed discussion first (just to ensure it is indeed what the community wants to be applied.) Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 07:53, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
• I think the hang up was "may or may not". My main point is that a ban discussion has always been and should always be a different discussion than a block discussion. This has causes some confusion at AN recently. I think that consensus is already established by ample precedent, it is just a matter of phrasing. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 11:02, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
• I've looked again at the reversion, and not sure of the problem since I still think it reflects the consensus view and the reverting party hasn't joined us here to explain. Discussion doesn't trump practice. Maybe there is some point I missed, but the section I corrected was:

In some cases the community may have discussed an indefinite block and reached a consensus of uninvolved editors not to unblock the editor. Editors who remain indefinitely blocked after due consideration may be considered de facto banned after enough time has passed that it is obvious that neither the community nor any admin will unblock them. A de jure ban requires a separate discussion and consensus by the community, usually at WP:AN, or a decision by the Arbitration Committee.

De facto banning (something I'm not fond of but is an accepted practice of the community when handling reverts of socks) isn't an official ban. Maybe that is the sticking point. My main goal is to make it clear that a blocking discussion is NOT the same as a banning discussion, and a ban discussion must be held as a separate event, or at least in a fully declared event. We can't assume that a discussion to uphold a block is the same as a ban discussion, when no one has mentioned the word "ban". I strongly recommend always having them as separate discussions because they are two very different things. If combined, I might oppose a ban while supporting an indef block, so that muddies the waters. I am confident I am not alone in this. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 13:43, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't think I've yet to see any clear explanation of the meaning of the various terms. As far as I can make out, in terms of practical effect, a "ban" is essentially an instruction to admins not to unblock the user until the ban is lifted by whoever imposed it (the "community", or Arbcom). So if you were to oppose a ban while supporting an indefinite block, you presumably believe that the user should not currently be permitted to edit, but that you're happy for a future decision to the contrary to be taken by one administrator, rather than necessarily through community discussion. Is that how you understand it, or is there some other difference? Victor Yus (talk) 09:40, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

See the actual policy page for the difference. There is a big difference in theory. Banned editors are not considered part of the community, indef blocked editors are. How their edits are handled are also different. Banning is supposed to be considered "permanent", while an indef block simply means "we don't know for how long". The bar for an indef is very much lower than for a site ban. That is why the discussions are almost never combined, as some can support an indef but not a ban, so you end up with mixed consensus. In practice, we do these discussion separately, which is the purpose of the changing of the wording, to make it more clear. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 01:01, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

What practical effect does "being part of the community" have? And what is the difference in how their edits are handled? Victor Yus (talk) 09:16, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• I agree that the meanings of the various terms including "enough time has passed" and "obvious" are unclear.  The policy states, "...individual editors, including administrators, may not directly impose bans."  By extension, we don't want individual administrators to make subjective conclusions long after a discussion that result in a ban.  Even if these conditions of "enough time has passed" and "obvious" are certified to exist, the proposed text states that the ban "may" exist.  How are editors to know if the ban does or does not exist?  On this page, the proposer asserts that even such a ban exists, it is not "official".  What is the difference between an official ban, and one that is not official?  The statement about "de jure" is applicable to the previous bullet point, so IMO is confusing as stated.  Unscintillating (talk) 02:22, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

On 2009-07-10T02:22:13, the bullet point stated,

This differs from the current policy page with the text, "and listed on Misplaced Pages:List of banned users."  Another part of the edit history for the policy page shows that there is a WP:DENY concern such that some administrators don't want to list all cases on WP:List of banned users.

The proposer states the concern, "We can't assume that a discussion to uphold a block is the same as a ban discussion, when no one has mentioned the word 'ban'."  An obvious fix is to restore the clause, "and listed on Misplaced Pages:List of banned users", as this provides timely clarity as to the meaning of the discussion.  To satisfy the WP:DENY concern, I propose that we add an alternative that the ban can be listed in the block log.  Unscintillating (talk) 02:22, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• Dennis and I nearly align on this, which I suspect will surprise Dennis. I've unblocked editors that were indefinitely blocked by me or by other admins based on a discussion that led me to believe that the user finally had a clue as to how to get along. I cobble up some editing restrictions designed to head off the issue the editor has difficulty with, enter into an agreement with the editor that he would follow them, unblock the editor, and then monitor him extremely closely for violations of those restrictions. That's part of what an admin is supposed to do, and no one lifts an eyebrow when I do that. If I were to do the same with a formally banned editor, people would be screaming at me, and rightfully so. The purpose of that discussion isn't to make it clear to the user that we've had enough, it's to make it clear to any admin that might be sympathetic with the user that we've had enough. The time to do that is when there's a history of admins unblocking and trouble recurring: Science Apologist, MartinPhi, A Nobody, and others all come to mind, as they polarized the admin community to the point that we had difficulty moving forward.

The issue that people seem to object to is something that Dennis didn't write, but other people seem to be reading: block evasion is still block evasion, and edits created by block evaders can still be reverted on sight, no questions asked. Dennis didn't write anything to contradict that, and I don't think he intends to.—Kww(talk) 02:30, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• I'm not shocked we agree, we agree on most things. Everyone has good points here, actually. The real sticking point is the "de facto" ban, a term I hate but the community seems to support. To me, a ban is a completely separate discussion and act and should be always treated as such. It has to do with blind reverting edits by socks of indef blocked users who aren't banned but are treated as such. My main point that I want to be clear in the policy is that a ban can NOT be assumed to be de jure simply because a discussion was had at ANI that supported an indef block of an editor. The wording I proposed was vague (like most policies), but that just allows the community the flexibility to adjust to each situation. I'm infinitely open to a solution, but the current wording makes it sound like if the community indef blocks someone, you can just automatically consider them banned and add them to the list, and that is not the case. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 12:09, 23 June 2013 (UTC)
• Put another way: Banning can not be a passive act, assumed by the fact that community doesn't want to unblock someone. It must be declared and discussed formally. We are banishing someone from the community, after all. Practice reflects this and the policy should. De facto clouds this, unfortunately. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 12:13, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• But banning generally is a passive act where we rely on good judgement. We expect our admin ranks to show good judgment and recognize those users that should never be unblocked without having a formal discussion. Only the difficult cases require formal discussion.—Kww(talk) 15:07, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• Then we disagree on that point. True banning shouldn't be so wishy washy. We might treat the editor's edits as if they were banned by removing them (de facto) but since a de jure ban means they are no longer part of the community, that takes a clear declaration by the same community. If needed, and RFC can be started, but my explanation is how I perceive the existing practice to be. Most of these formal declarations are nearly unanimous, so I would argue that they are seldom "difficult". No single person should be allowed to simply declare someone "banned" simply because a group of people didn't want to unblock them. That is also counter to the idea behind the WP:STANDARDOFFER. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 15:12, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• It seems to be that possibly the only disagreement is over terminology. If someone is blocked and is "obviously" not going to be unblocked, do we apply the word "ban" to describe that situation? If that's the question, then my preferred answer would be no, I think - on grounds of clarity. We can then unambiguously use the word "ban" to refer to an explicit decision that someone is not to be unblocked (until that decision is explicitly reversed). I think this is effectively what Dennis is saying. (That said, I also agree with Kww that obvious cases don't need formal discussion.) Victor Yus (talk) 19:57, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• It is a little bit more than that. Based on an interaction I had with a good faith action, there seems to be a lack of clarity as to when an editor can be added to the list of banned users. I maintain only when a ban discussion is formally held. It should never be done because of an unblock discussion, or when a single admin just "thinks" someone is more or less banned. That removes the power from the community and puts it in the hands of an individual. For bans, which again are considered more or less permanent, that isn't proper. There is no advantage for allowing a single admin (or non-admin, for that matter) to make that determination. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 20:40, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• OK, so I agree with you on that, too. (In fact, why do we need a list of banned users at all?) Victor Yus (talk) 20:53, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

• It is for reference only. Personally, I think logging the ban in the block log is a better solution, but this way we have a list for whatever purpose that serves. Logging Arb bans makes sense, as a form of accountability I suppose. The problem is logging other editors that one might think is banned, but arent, and they may be denied a standard offer in the future because of it. I also think our culture is a bit too preoccupied with "banning" and the grave dancing that is associated with it. Very few people really need to be banned formally. You can still revert at will any edits from any sockpuppet if they aren't banned. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | © | WER 20:59, 23 June 2013 (UTC)

Dennis' edit to this policy was a good one. The previous wording caused me to think someone was community banned because an indefinite block of them had been brought up for consideration at AN/I and had received overwhelming consensus. Dennis pointed out to me that an actual ban, as opposed to an indefinite block that nobody sees a reason to lift, needs explicit discussion. I agree fully with that; as he says above, true banning shouldn't be wishy washy. The new wording of the policy expressed the difference well, and should be restored. — Scott • talk 00:24, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

• To give specific text for the previous proposal, change

to

Unscintillating (talk) 03:16, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

• In the most situations bans are not necessary and are used not to make a person to leave the project, but to bully and humiliate him especially so called community bans. Let me please quote a Wikipedian on the subject "What this sort of thing comes down to is how many supporters you can line up vs. how many opponents they can line up. It's like World of Warcraft, sometimes there's just too many orcs and not enough humans".
• Also what do we know about human qualities of users who are frequently supporting the community bans and opposing the appeals. Let's see a recent example with user:Russavia. A former arbitrator says about Russavia "It's not only a matter of Russavia's lack of judgement, but an utter lack of human decency." A current arbitrator endorses the comment,yet Russavia who lacks human decency and the judgement used to be a frequent supporter of community bans, and just a few days ago opposed another user's appeal. Do we know how many Russavias who lack human decency are supporting these bans? No we do not. That's why so called community bans is a sick practice that should be stopped.76.126.142.59 (talk) 22:07, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Proposal

I'd like to propose a few changes to the policy, and asking Wikipedians to discuss my proposal and to change the policy accordingly. The changes I am proposing are simple and fair. Please help me to make Misplaced Pages a better place!

1. Every subject of the ban discussion is allowed to take a part in the discussion as long as he complies with Misplaced Pages policies like no outing, no legal threats, etc.
2. Users who are involved with the subject of the discussion are allowed to take a part in the discussion,but they should clearly state their involvement, and their votes should not be taken into account. 76.126.142.59 (talk) 02:51, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

On what grounds are these changes needed? AFAIK, we usually allow editors to participate in discussions about themselves, indeed we require that users are notified of such discussions so they may participate. Secondly, what do you mean by "involved" and why does that invalidate their votes? --Jayron32 04:42, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

"Usually allow" is not good enough. It should be not "usually" but "always" and that's why it should be written in the policy. Every editor should be allowed to take a part in the discussion concerning him as long as he behaves politely and does not violate Misplaced Pages policies. Doing otherwise is simply inhumane and unfair. Under "involved user" I mean any user who "may have, or may be seen as having, a conflict of interest in disputes they have been a party to or have strong feelings about. "just like it is explained here. Why the involvement should invalidate the votes? Well,it is just a common sense: the community bans should not be used as a tool to resolve disputes, and to retaliate to opponents. 76.126.142.59 (talk) 05:07, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

• A case in point is this ban discussion, in which the editor was blocked from editing one hour and twenty-six minutes into the ban discussion, the ban discussion was closed short of 24 hours, and a !voting admin was one of the closing admins.  Unscintillating (talk) 01:39, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

• It is counter-productive to bloat policy with wikt:truisms. People should assume that they may do reasonable things without need to find a specific rule. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:04, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

  Expert frequent and even not so frequent supporters of the community bans usually don't do reasonable things.The community bans proceedings as they are executed now look more like mobbing. 76.126.142.59 (talk) 05:17, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

• Mobbings? Maybe you'd like to propose a standard formatting for a ban discussion, to provide for a defined space for the subject to have their say, and separation of comments from uninvolved and involved parties? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:49, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

• Well, at least one admin feels that AN/I discussions look as a mobbing, but the community ban discussions are even worse especially, if their subject is not allowed to respond. I do not believe there should be any separation of comments from uninvolved and involved parties. Everybody should be allowed to comment and to respond the comments made by others at the same place, but I do believe that each and every "evidence" presented by anybody should be supported by at least one on-wiki diff and the closing admin should check the evidences before he's closing the discussion. 76.126.142.59 (talk) 16:29, 10 July 2013 (UTC)

• I agree that, generally speaking, people should be able to comment on things that concern them personally. Reyk _YO! 03:06, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

  Thanks, and what do you think about the second point ?76.126.142.59 (talk) 16:39, 11 July 2013 (UTC)

  I disagree with any blanket rule for deciding who gets their opinion taken into account and who doesn't. Reyk _YO! 04:51, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

  To clarify I did not propose to ignore any opinion. I only proposed to ignore votes by involved users, and I meant both "support" and "oppose" votes. Otherwise what the community bans comes down to "is how many supporters you can line up vs. how many opponents they can line up. It's like World of Warcraft, sometimes there's just too many orcs and not enough humans" The community bans is a very harsh and in the most cases absolutely unnecessary punishment, and I use the word "punishment" in purpose. I believe that in many situations the community bans are used to humiliate the subject of the discussion, but if the community really cannot live without the bans,at least there should be some policy changes to make the procedure fairer.76.126.142.59 (talk) 15:34, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Proposed changes re: category deletion of banned users

I propose to add the following language re: deletion of categories created by banned users:

"Since categorization can impact many pages, and deletion of a category without merging can leave pages orphaned, any categories created by a banned user should be tagged for discussion and possible merging using the WP:CFD process instead of deleting them outright."

Please provide your comments below. This was the result of recent mass category deletion which caused quite a mess in the LGBT categories, as the resultant articles weren't even merged up to the parents, and in some cases, users believed the categories should be retained. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:25, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

A further refinement is now proposed:

"Since categorization can impact many pages, and deletion of a category without merging can leave pages orphaned, you should carefully consider what to do with categories created by a banned user. Blatantly useless categories can be speedy-deleted, as well as any categories which clearly violate existing category standards. Care should nonetheless be taken to see if articles need to be merged to a parent category before the speedy deletion. Other categories should be tagged for discussion and possible merging using the WP:CFD process instead of deleting them outright."

--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:51, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

I generally approve of this revised wording. I might still tweak it a little bit, for example to be a bit more specific about what kind of "other" categories the final sentence applies to, but for the most part I approve. Bearcat (talk) 22:34, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

proposed change from bulleted list to numbered list

I propose changing various bulleted lists to numbered lists. An example of the changes I propose is here. I have been guided to comply Misplaced Pages:Lists_(embedded_lists)#Bulleted_and_numbered_lists and the changes would comply to policy declared therein. Yogesh Khandke (talk) 14:21, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't have strong views on this matter, but I was the one who reverted Yogesh's change, and we had a very civil discussion about it on my talk page afterward. Per the guideline, I favor bulleted lists unless there is a reason to have numbered lists, and I don't see any reason to do so here. Therefore, I prefer not only not to change the pre-existing bulleted lists to numbered, but also to change the one numbered list to bulleted. I believe Yogesh wants the numbered lists so we can cite the number at some point in the future, but I see that as too speculative a reason to make the lists numbered.--Bbb23 (talk) 01:07, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

These are policy pages, prone to be cited during discussions, I'd be very surprised if they've not been cited before. The purpose of them being in place is for them to be used in disputes. Sections and subsections get automatic numbers, a numbered list would give us for the next level down. Yogesh Khandke (talk) 03:47, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Authority to ban

I was surprised to see that item 4 in the list of groups or persons who get to ban an editor was "Jimbo Wales reserves the authority to ban editors". I've removed it, because it's surely obsolete. Jimbo shouldn't reserve that right, and I don't believe he does. His name in the sentence was linked to the page Misplaced Pages:Role of Jimmy Wales, but that page doesn't say anything about Jimbo reserving such a right. On the contrary, if anything: the page mentions that he gave up his right to even block editors in 2009. Bishonen | talk 09:07, 14 August 2013 (UTC).

Blocking is not banning. Wales continues to hold the right to ban. Binksternet (talk) 14:27, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Right, Jimbo has exercised this right quite recently too. The Arbitration Committee has affirmed this right in their "TimidGuy ban appeal" decision. I have undid your edit because of this. Michaelzeng7 (talk) 14:16, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

User talk page restrictions

The policy states "Indefinitely site-banned editors may be restricted from editing their user talk page or using e-mail." In a separate section there is a chart that said that access to talk page is "Usually not allowed". Bishonen changed the chart to match the earlier text. I am going to revert that change as I think it needs discussion first. One could just as easily take the position that the earlier text should be changed to match the chart. As an aside, I believe this issue is coming up because of the ongoing use of Kiefer's talk page after his site ban. As a general principle, I'm not happy with the idea of "changing" policy in light of current events.

I can't speak to the historical perspective. In other words, I haven't researched the history of this policy to see if this issue has been discussed before in any significant way. My personal feeling is the policy should be clearer, and I would favor moving in the direction of not permitting a site-banned editor to use their talk page. I don't get how someone who is no longer considered a member of the community should be free to edit their talk page as if they still are a member of the community.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:21, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps even better would be to get rid of this stupid "not a member of the community" status of site banned editors. But I suppose inertia would prevent that. --Floquenbeam (talk) 16:58, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Heh, that would require even more discussion, and inertia would be the least of our problems. Melodrama comes to mind.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:47, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Do you wish to imply I changed the policy to gain an advantage in a dispute or express my personal opinion, Bbb23? Really? Anybody interested might wish to weigh in here. (Well, so I say, but admittedly it's not my talkpage.) Bishonen | talk 17:55, 21 August 2013 (UTC).

I was unaware of the discussion you linked to. I'm vaguely aware of the Kiefer issue without knowing who thinks what, so the answer to your question is no. Thanks for the link, though.--Bbb23 (talk) 18:27, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Support change, and support changing (in current section 1.1) "The only exception is that editors with talk page access may appeal in accordance with the provisions below." to "The only exception is the editors talk page." NE Ent 21:13, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

I favor restricting the use of the talk page by banned editors to issues relevant to appealing their ban. Banned editors are pretty much virtual nonpersons, and we don't need to encourage martyrdom.—Kww(talk) 01:19, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Generally speaking banning should stop once and for all. In most situations a simple block will do just fine. I am not going to comment on the talk page restriction after the ban, but at the very least every editor should be allowed to defend himself during the ban discussions, of course, if he does it politely and without violation of the policies. Until then I personally prefer to be a nonperson on Misplaced Pages than to be somebody who sees its purpose in supporting bans of defenseless people. 71.198.215.156 (talk) 01:51, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

• Re: User talk:AGK#Are banned users allowed to use their talk page as a blog?, WP:BAN, and this current discussion: I also favour restricting the use of the talk page by banned editors to issues strictly relevant to appealing their ban and that any other comments by the banned user should be procedurally removed. I also feel that the withdrawal of talk page access should be the default setting for site banned users - there are plenty of other channels for appealing a ban. Also, IMO, in most cases, it would also be appropriate to fully protect the talk page of a site banned user. That said, I also believe that any changes to major policy should not be carried out by WP:BRD, but should be started in the very first instance as a major RfC. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:56, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Another current, unremarked use of a talk page of an indefinitely banned user is to direct proxy editing. See User talk:Russavia for an example. Bielle (talk) 01:59, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

A classic example of why talk page access should be revoked and the page locked down.

Another current practice by blocked and/or banned users is to continue editing as IP users, sometimes from dynamic IPs where imposing a range block becomes the inevitable solution, especially when the range emanates from a clearly identifiable single location.. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:21, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Actually there is a better solution than range blocks. Wikipedians should learn to let its nonpersons go, which at the very least means stopping templating their user pages and stopping listing them in the shameful banned user list, I mean shameful not for the banned users, shameful for the Misplaced Pages community that not only tolerates, but supports medieval excommunications. 71.198.215.156 (talk) 03:10, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps the 'non persons' would do better to leave Misplaced Pages, its policies, its editors, and its staff go rather than constantly returning and harping on old issues. Hence range blocks for ban evasion, and eventual talk page blocks. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:34, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

• I favor the rule of reason rather than one-size-fits-all draconian restriction. If a blocked or banned user is problematic on their talk page, it seems that any administrator could shut it down with a click. If the discussion there is not problematic and advances the cause of an accurate and comprehensive encyclopedia, the harm to the encyclopedia is shutting it down, not letting it continue. The whole "unpersons" mentality is offensive to many thinking people, frankly — medieval, vindictive, and juvenile. If there are problems, slam the door. If there are not, tolerance. Carrite (talk) 04:51, 22 August 2013 (UTC)