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Dispute

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user:RK's aggressive editing tactics in the Wikipedian community of reverting articles, engaging in personal attacks in edit summaries, trying to goad editors into flaming him, trying to goad editors into wasting time engaging in edit wars over his reverts, and RK's use of editing tactics that should be classified as vandalism, even if they are currently not classified as vandalism. -- John Gohde, aka Mr-Natural-Health 05:22, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Suggestions for resolution of dispute

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  • Try asking Robert (user:RK) to discuss editing conflicts on the various articles' talk pages and to avoid reverting others' changes unilaterally.

I have notified Robert of the new 3x/day revert policy. I'm not sure anyone's told him that MNH isn't (currently) banned. --Uncle Ed 14:31, 16 Apr 2004 (UTC)

==Problem Areas== Feel free to expand this list of problem areas by adding problems or grievences of your own.

  • Users certifying the basis for this user conduct dispute:
    1. John Gohde, aka Mr-Natural-Health 06:20, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
    2. Based on his aggressive editing of Chiropractic medicine over an extended period of time. Fred Bauder 14:37, Apr 12, 2004 (UTC)
    3. Based on his aggressive editing of Israel over an extended period of time. Jonesy 15:19, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
    4. Based on attacks, bias, and heavy handed editing. Martin 16:02, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
    5. As above, and Palestinian views of the peace process too. --No-One Jones 18:36, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
    6. His harassment at Palestine is pretty annoying. He even removed the reference to this page from Palestine's talk page. That's pretty pathetic. --Rei
    7. Although I have had no recent incidents with RK, that is in large part because I have quit editing. When I did edit, RK was extremely rude and frequently in violation of any rules which might govern appropriate conduct. Lirath Q. Pynnor
    8. He has been disrupting the traditional Chinese medicine article, using the word "religion" as an insult (which he seems to believe invalidates the entire subject) and has been insulting towards and seemingly paranoid about some of the other editors there. I've never had a direct run in with him, but I've lurked a bit and posted a few comments on the article's talk page. He seems to take changes to his editing very personally, and to very often have an all-or-nothing approach to his personal POV (which he denies is POV). He will at least need some counselling as regards NPOV and his interpersonal skills. Fire Star 05:58, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)
    9. RK is not civil, and wikipedians have long endured his incivility. Although I have not interacted with RK recently (I've tried to stay away or ignore him), nearly everytime I have interacted with him it has been a negative experience. He must be disciplined until he becomes civil or ultimately be banned permanently. I'd rather see RK reform rather than permanently ban him because RK goes after a lot of wikipedians who contribute mostly nothing but crap. However, wikipedians must insist that its editors be civil on the whole, and RK's LONG history has showed that he is not. B 21:33, Apr 13, 2004 (UTC)
    10. My perception is that RK makes of point of making inflammatory edits, which may or may not be considered vandalism, depending on your perspective. He then follows any revert or negative response with personal attacks. I experienced this directly in regards to editing Traditional Chinese medicine. I consider all his edits to this article to be inflammatory and vandalism, and have begun to simply revert his edits to this article. He has responded with name calling and personal attacks, which I made a point of asking him to stop. I feel like dealing with him is a big waste of my time, which could be better spent editing the Wikipedia, or directed to other projects in my life. His abusiveness is unprofessional and intolerable to me. I have found his attacks against me to be offensive. If he is allowed to continue wreaking havoc of this nature, I am likely to expend my energies on other projects. I simply don't believe I should have to put up with his treatment of myself or articles which I consider important and valuable to Wikipedia, and I think he is damaging to the project as a whole. User:Heidimo 18:25, 13 Apr 2004
    11. I second Heidimo whole heartedly! - irismeister 22:42, 2004 Apr 16 (UTC)
    12. I have been away from the Wiki for quite a while, and mainly because of the RK incidents, and the continued personal attacks and actions that were taken whenever I added something about the Arab or Palestinian dispute with the Zionist state. In every article, and even some that were exclusively Palestinian he chose to insult, edit, cut, and cause me great troubles. I got so angry so many times, that I gave up. Just look at the Palestine/Commentary section, and one will see numerous incidents and attacks. I believe that this behaviour dissuades people from participating, and contributing. As a library professional, I believe in free speech and non-censorship, however, when that behaviour insults and causes unneeded extra work to others, I believe that some action should be taken (not sure what). Compare the way User:Uriyan and I tried to resolve issues, and note the differences. I have nothing against RK or any other Jewish/Zionist person, but let the facts speak for themselves...I am a Palestinian by birth, and cannot go back to the land of my birth, that is a fact and non-disputable. I believe I can speak for some NOT ALL Palestinians, and so my views should be useful to the Middle East/Palestinian issue and other areas. Note I never once changed the Israel pages or any issue of which I know nothing, RK has though; and I even added things like the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) links, and others. Just my thoughts, and reasons for what happened. I now would like to work on the project again, and I look forward to serious scholarly debate without insults, flame wars, or lack of respect to others. Let us continue to build this great project.User:Joseph E. Saad (August 5th, 2004)

Responses / Comments

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  1. User:RK terrroizedAlternative medicine 9 times on 11 Apr 2004 with his reverts that caused an edit war and the page to be protected; again on 20:45, 8 Apr 2004; on 13:04, 27 Mar 2004; and also on 15:34, 6 Jan 2004. All of these reverts consisted of personal attacks directed specifically against me. His attack on 20:45, 8 Apr 2004 in alternative medicine occurred about the same time as his attack on Traditional Chinese Medicine. -- John Gohde, aka Mr-Natural-Health 06:14, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  2. User:RK has been waging a protracted campaign to make the articles on both Israel and Palestine as sympathetic to his Zionist principles as possible. Now, clearly we all have our political opinions, strongly held or not, and there is no problem with that. It only becomes a problem when Wikipedia is used to further political agendas, violating the policy on NPOV by editing articles in favour of ones own sympathies. This is precisely what RK is guilty of. The fact he is a staunch Zionist is evident if you read this article on his user page: User:RK/A_Liberal_Defense_of_Zionism. He continually edits articles relating Israel according to this POV, reverting or deleting when others users include facts that he as a Zionist finds uncomfortable or hostile. Thus, he continually erases references to "occupation" of Palestinian areas, despite the fact the United Nations, international law, most of global public opinion, and even Ariel Sharon describe the situation as such. Furthermore, when someone included in the Palestine article the fact Israeli settlements are "illegal" - which they are, being condemned under international law and the United Nations Security Council - he changed the information to claim they were merely the resurrection of Jewish communities that left in 1948 (i.e. the Zionist POV). When I reverted, he then wrote: This is not the proper place for diatribes against Israel as a criminal state. Cut it out; place discussions in their proper articles, or leave Wikipedia. It should be noted that there was no reference to Israel being a criminal state, merely it had been written that settlements are illegal. However, even though I had merely restored the original version as written by someone else, he then suggested I leave Wikipedia. Should we allow those of militant political persuasions to purge Wikipedia of those they consider their political enemies? RK must be stopped from editing articles in order to make them more sympathetic to his political opinions, and from intimidating those defending objectivity. Jonesy 15:16, 12 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  3. I don't think any "action" is required. RK feels strongly about things and doesn't mince his words. Good for him, I say, even though I vehemently disagree with many of his opinions. GrahamN 15:29, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Then you'd condemn us to more endless edit wars. There is room for his opinions, of course, as well as room for everyone else's, but with some balanced NPOV, not impatient insult. Respect for the opinions and contributions of others, or "word mincing" as you like to call it, is desirable so that our group endeavour won't devolve into anarchy. That may be what floats your and RK's boat and fine for a message board or chatroom, but I for one don't think it works at Wikipedia. I have a background in traditional Chinese medicine and martial arts as well as Western medicine, I know the differences and the correspondences, I know how and why Chinese medicine works or doesn't work as well as how or why Western medicine works or doesn't work, and I am up on the metaphors both use to describe their methods. I am doing a lecture on TCM tomorrow morning for fourth year medical students at a major university in my hometown. According to RK's black and white POV, I shouldn't even exist! Therefore, what RK is publishing here stridently and repeatedly is indeed offensive to myself, my teachers and to my students, and yet I don't insult him in my turn. The present discussion is in aid of holding him responsible for his statements, from which HE may learn something, which is a much more satisfying outcome for me than simply insulting the poor guy. Fire Star 19:19, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I'm not sure what "floats your boat" means. I don't want edit wars, but I'd rather have them than authoritarianism and censorship, which is what you are advocating. I'm fighting a battle here that was lost long ago, I know. GrahamN 22:54, 14 Apr 2004 (UTC)
"floats your boat" means "makes you happy". In this context, "That may be what floats your and RK's boat" means "That may be what makes you and RK happy". HTH. Martin 14:47, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  1. RK does make some good edits, and sometimes improves articles. He can also be civil -- check out Talk:Sadducee. But he's often very aggressive, impolite, reactionary, and goading. I can't tell if he's trying to get a rise out of people, or if he's really that angry of a person. Either way, if he doesn't chill out, he'll end up doing more harm than good here. I really don't know if the good he's done on articles like Sukkot outweighs the harm he's done on articles like Anti-Semitism. Quadell (talk) 23:21, Jul 22, 2004 (UTC)

Comments moved from Vandalism in Progress

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User RK is persistently attacking pages on natural medicine. He is initiating a revert war on traditional Chinese medicine, as well as making personal attacks. He has been asked to stop vandalising this page. heidimo 02:17, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)

  • RK is also vandalising Alternative medicine in the same manner. His personal attacks are becoming more heated (not to mention that he calls me "he" when I am in fact a "she.") heidimo 16:12, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)
User:RK vandalized Alternative medicine in 2004, to date, on 20:45, 8 Apr 2004, 13:04, 27 Mar 2004, and on 15:34, 6 Jan 2004. Furthermore, all of these reverts consisted of personal attacks directed specifically against me. His last attack on alternative medicine occurred about the same time as his attack on TCM. -- John Gohde, aka Mr-Natural-Health 16:55, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)
The following quote is from User talk:RK
RK, please be reminded that personal attacks such as this one you entered as an edit summary to your last edit of alternative medicine, "# (Removing nonsense from an internet vandal. Mr-Natural-Health is on the verge of being banned for his harassment)" is counter to well established Wikipedia policy. Fred Bauder 19:36, Mar 27, 2004 (UTC)
RK is NOT vandalizing the pages. Discussions need to go on the various talk pages; if you insist on pushing the concept that "facts" need not be supported by screaming vandalism and reverting, the pages will be locked down with RK's changes intact. I have been attempting to review his changes, to see if both POVs can be accomodated in an encyclopedic format. But heidimo insists on reverting changes that she does not agree with and has been cautioned that is approach cannot be used. - Marshman 23:54, 9 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Excuse me, but I know vandalism when I see it. And, I would classify what RK did in Alternative medicine as vandalism. Editors like RK should be banned. -- John Gohde, aka Mr-Natural-Health 03:18, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Non-"isolated instances of text deletions and replacements intentionally ... offensive .... systematic attack on several articles" (namely both alternative medicine and TCM within about one hour of each othert and 3 attacks in 2004 alone in alternative medicine constitutes vandalism by the rules. -- John Gohde, aka Mr-Natural-Health 05:33, 10 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • There is an Edit War currently going on in Alternative Medicine because of RK's vandalism. -- John Gohde, aka Mr-Natural-Health 15:32, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Apparently Marshman was recruited by RK because they share a belief system, and he is now "taking over" at Traditional Chinese medicine, chastising me. I stand by my original post that I consider RK's edits to be vandalism. Marshman has apparently done nothing to address my questions regarding RK's unprovoked personal attacks against me. Since I posted a request to RK's talk page about this, he wrote that John Gohde claimed to be a Nazi, that all editors on TCM are my "allies" as if I recruited them, and implying that all of us who edit the TCM article are guilty by association with Mr. Gohde. I am deeply offended by this attack, associating me with Nazism. Does anybody care to intervene here? Is there a better place to present this issue? heidimo 16:01, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • RK is also waging an edit war over Israel and Palestine, in an effort to make these articles as biased in favour of Israel as possible. Furthermore, he suggested I leave Wikipedia for attempting to preserve more accurate and balanced information. Jonesy 21:54, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It's pretty clear to me that this is not a debate about vandalism, but about POV. Please don't call it vandalism when you're having a debate about the content, no matter how much you disagree. Is it a trend to accuse people of vandalism when there's a dispute about content? No matter how nasty this dispute evidently is, it doesn't appear to be vandalism. Is there a page to report fights that got nasty? Martijn faassen 23:14, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)


Response by RK

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