Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2023/Candidates/Sdrqaz/Questions

Arbitration Committee Election 2023 candidate: Sdrqaz

Individual questions[edit]

Add your questions below the line using the following markup:

#{{ACE Question |Q=Your question |A=}}

There is a limit of two questions per editor for each candidate. You may also ask a reasonable number of follow-up questions relevant to questions you have already asked.

Thank you for standing :) ArbCom makes a lot of tough decisions in user conduct cases, often with potential for community blowback. What's the toughest (or, one of the toughest) decisions you've made with the admin tools? Preferably a situation related to user-conduct, although anything'll do. Talk about the way you approached the situation, the weighed factors, how you came to a decision, any fallout that came as a result, and if you would have done anything differently. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 00:12, 22 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
A recent tough conduct-related decision is last month's block of Jay Sanvictores. Jay had been making many edits in the mainspace and talkspace that looked like test edits, but none of the edits seemed malicious or in bad faith. As I've noted before, it's a lot harder to shut the door on a good-faith disruptor and this is what the Committee sometimes has to do, for the greater good of the project. Jay had received a welcome message about test edits and a notice that they should not have been creating blank articles. At that point, I think that a block for disruption or not being here build an encyclopaedia would have been within administrative discretion – not that I would have done so myself, but certainly within policy.
However, to give them a second chance, I left a handwritten message explaining why their behaviour was disruptive and nudged them to projects in other languages, since they were perhaps unable to communicate effectively in English. I watched the page that I had deleted and their talk page to see if there was any response or any further disruption. They unfortunately did the same thing again and I blocked them, leaving a handwritten note again. Given that their first language probably wasn't English, I tried to keep the messages as simple possible, while balancing the need for friendliness and the need to communicate the risks of a block.
I didn't receive any fallout for it, but Jay has not responded to my messages, nor have they edited any other projects. I think that there's not much I would've done differently, though I could've simplified my messages further or made the block time-limited instead of indefinite, but there would've been the risk of Jay causing more disruption after the block's expiry. Ultimately, I think that I did what I could to give them a "way out" from being blocked, but wasn't successful and had to block them to reduce disruption to the project.
This year's committee has had trouble maintaining a healthy quorum of active arbitrators. What experience do you have, particularly on Wikipedia, with doing work you've agreed to do even when that becomes hard? Thanks, Barkeep49 (talk) 00:45, 22 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think that my administrative work is the prime example of doing work that I've agreed to do, even when it becomes hard, averaging nearly 400 logged actions per month (this does not take non-logged administrative actions into account, such as declining requests for protection or for speedy deletion). Administrative work becomes hard when you feel obliged to make decisions that will not be popular, even if they are right. I am, of course, aware that the need to have active members of the Committee is far greater, given that when I am inactive I would only be able to rely on 14 colleagues instead of 878 and there would be many decisions that can only be made through the consensus of the Committee.
As you know, Barkeep, I take adminship and my duty to the Community seriously. Hundreds of people took the time to evaluate the information they had, regardless of whether they voted; as a result, I have tried to stay active as an administrator because I view it as an obligation to the Community. That obligation would be even greater as a Committee member. When I can only put a limited amount of time into Committee matters, I will seek to prioritise those that require participation from as many members as possible and will communicate those difficulties to my colleagues. When I am unable to participate at all, I would seek to be marked as inactive so that business can proceed without the Committee needing to wait for my input. If these periods become unacceptably frequent or unacceptably long, I would resign so that editors can choose a replacement who can serve the Community with the energy and dedication that it deserves.
Do you think ArbCom should be more transparent about the outcomes of private inquiries, especially regarding admins and functionaries? This question is motivated by the admin meatpuppetry situation in September, but it's up to you whether to discuss that situation in particular. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|she) 06:26, 22 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Assuming that you mean inquiries as 'investigations' and not just as 'questions', yes. I'm reminded of Beeblebrox's answer to one of my questions at ACE2021: when we keep matters completely private, decisions may be perceived as carrying less weight than in public. Measures to increase transparency, such as quarterly updates on block appeals, are good first steps. Speaking more specifically regarding that case, I think that having other layers of scrutiny to the Committee's actions is a Good Thing – while the Committee is made up of experienced people with diverse viewpoints, it is still fallible and should welcome feedback from the Community where possible, both to decrease the chances of things falling through the cracks and to increase the chances that the decisions being made are for the good of the project. The Committee may be unable to delve into specifics when the transparency principle conflicts with obligations under privacy policy, but where possible we should push to keep people accountable, especially since they hold positions of trust.
The majority of ArbCom's workload is in handling private matters, not public ones such as cases. Can you please elaborate on how you will handle the large volume of private work the Committee receives? CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 17:52, 22 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
With regards to the volume of work, I would make sure to triage the information that I receive to ensure that the Committee can continue running smoothly – some will be "core" Committee work, while others will be peripheral work. That does not mean that they are unimportant, but that we sometimes have to make hard decisions that will result in imperfect outcomes on what issues are more pressing and demanding of our attention and must take care that as little as possible falls through the cracks. If I am unable to cope with the volume of work due to personal issues, I would communicate with my colleagues to ensure that they aren't waiting for my input (as stated above) and will seek to stay active on the essentials of Committee work where possible so that my absence will not be as deeply felt. Please clarify if I've misunderstood or focused on an unintended aspect of your question.
In one case this year, ArbCom themselves served as the "filing party", accepting a case that had not immediately been brought to them. What are your thoughts on ArbCom taking actions via full cases when they don't have a request from the community to do so? --Tryptofish (talk) 01:04, 23 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Purely as a matter of policy, the Committee is certainly able to do so. Whether it should have done so is a thornier question: the short answer is that the Committee should be very wary of doing so, as it may lead to a perception of bias and of pre-determined outcomes. In many situations, that is enough to stay with the usual methods – we have seen individual Committee members recusing to file a case request as an individual editor. With regards to this case specifically, Barkeep said in February 2023 that the Committee had received "multiple private requests to do something in this topic area" and I said at ACE last year that a case should have been opened for the area in January 2022, predicting that the Committee's solution to the initial Warsaw concentration camp request would not lead to meaningful change. From a philosophical point of view, I think that the fact that the Committee was willing to propose the case sua sponte showed that it was willing to be more proactive than reactive – I know that it is simply not possible most of the time – and perhaps points at how pressing the Committee thought the matter was.
Arbcom seems to limit itself to a very narrow range of responses to admins, with nothing in the gap between admonition and desysopping. What sort of things should it do when admonition isn't enough but a desysop is too much?Ϣere SpielChequers 10:00, 23 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
This strikes at the heart of the tension between my belief that holding administrators accountable is absolutely crucial and my belief that nuance is needed in Committee proceedings (see my statement), so thank you for posing it. I'm not sure that the Committee has completely closed the door on intermediate sanctions (such as in 2019 and in 2020), but it is certainly rare.
The short answer is that it depends on how the administrator reacts to the feedback and criticism that they receive, and how likely the behaviour is to recur. Quite frankly, good administrators should be responsive to criticism and should work to improve after being told of their errors. One could say, therefore, that if an administrator is unable to take on the feedback given prior to an arbitration case, they are not fit to continue being one; that the situation has escalated to a Committee case should be more than enough as an indicator that something has gone wrong. This hardline view, however, does not take into account the tendency for editors to petition the Committee much more quickly in administrative misconduct cases, and the tendency of Committee members to accept them. Since administrators in these situations tend to be desysopped, this is not encouraging, as it gives an air of inevitability and does not incentivise them to participate in the case.
I'm sympathetic to the position that since administrators are supposed to be trusted by the Community, restrictions are indicators that they are no longer trusted and should not continue being one. However, the dangers are that we are too unforgiving: it is too simplistic to tell them that they can seek Community reinstatement after removal of their tools because nobody in our modern history has successfully done so – multiple people have tried that route and failed. While those results can be construed to mean that the Committee's decisions were right, the Committee is composed of fallible humans and it would be too reductive to conclude that.
Thinking deeper, I would say that editorial restrictions are generally more acceptable for me than restrictions on tool use, and I could see myself supporting narrow restrictions if it is clear that their misconduct is only in that area – once they get more complicated, it begs the question of why they should remain an administrator. I unfortunately don't view the 2019 restriction as being particularly successful: while striving for nuance is absolutely commendable, the Community and Committee do not have the sufficient energy and motivation to ensure that such complicated restrictions are being followed.
There has been tension between the volunteer community and the WMF in the past, and there may be more with the universal code of conduct now in force. Tension on the talkpage of the Elbonian civil war has spilled out into an acrimonious RFA for one of the protagonists, and the press have reported demonstrations about this article in the capital town of Elbonia and in several villages during the current visit of the US president to Elbonia. Cases being filed with Arbcom include: You should desysop the longstanding admin who briefly fully protected the talkpage for the Elbonian civil war, we have already desysopped him on the Elbonian Wikipedia for senility; Your new admin is too young to write about rape in the Elbonian civil war and should stay away from such topics until she is at least a teenager; Many of the voters in that RFA only otherwise vote "Keep" or "delete" in various Elbonian related deletion discussions, they may be admins on the Elbonian Wikipedia but several lack sufficient English to participate here, especially when they write entries on talkpages that consists of nothing more than rows of squares. Which bits of the Universal Code of Conduct have been breached in this kerfuffle and what if anything should Arbcom do about it? Ϣere SpielChequers 10:00, 23 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
There have certainly been tensions, including due to the rollout of the Vector 2022 interface. I think that it's worth noting before answering this question that while the Code does apply to the English Wikipedia, we can indirectly enforce it through our policies and guidelines in nearly all circumstances – the Foundation intended for it to be "the most basic standards for conduct across the movement. Projects with well-developed policies typically meet or exceed the UCoC expectations" and said that it was intended for projects with few behavioural policies. I think that it is very unlikely that we will be perceived as having not enforced it properly, especially since the Fram affair.
Given that this is a very tense situation in real life and on-wiki, the Committee should be careful not to inflame these emotions further. Accusations of senility and being "too young to write about rape" would be insults based on age, and disclosure of personal data; bringing issues across from the Elbonian project into the English one may be "following a person across the project(s) and repeatedly critiquing their work mainly with the intent to upset or discourage them" (also 3.1). The "nothing more than rows of squares" comment may be an insult based on ethnicity and race (3.1), but I think a more likely explanation is that the Elbonian language characters are not rendering properly (my devices, for example, give me error codes for some of the scripts listed here). If users from other projects are voting at RfA here without being active editors here and having the proficiency to read/write basic English, it may raise questions of how they were aware of the RfA and whether there has been any off-wiki canvassing.
The Committee has a responsibility to examine the evidence in the case requests. For the first case, unless there is further evidence to support the idea that the administrator has fallen short of the standards of this project, it may not be viable to have a case based on their conduct. It is very rare to fully protect talk pages unless they are redirects or archives, but it may have been justifiable if there was consistent vandalism/disruption from extended-confirmed accounts. On smaller projects, the safeguards for retaliation against administrators may not be as strong – it is important not to take the desysop at face value. The Committee may have to issue warnings for importing issues from other projects.
The assertion that someone is a minor is usually suppressible for their protection, as it is a disclosure of someone's personal information. Unless the new administrator is breaching editorial or behavioural expectations, she is free to edit in whichever topic she wishes; it is not for the Committee to rule that based on her purported age, she cannot or should not go into certain areas. That is the same for other users – unless they have actual violations of policy, they cannot be excluding or hounding someone out of a topic area because of their age.
If it is clear that the situation is untenable and has become too complex to handle for the Community (it can usually deal with RfAs by itself), The Committee may need to open a case on conduct in relation to the Elbonian civil war to address harassment and possible off-wiki canvassing/meatpuppetry. Designation as a contentious topic may be necessary and it should keep Trust and Safety aware of the evolving situation, given the real-life implications and possibility for harm and harassment.
I love to sing the music of Mozart and Pärt, Requiem and Da pacem Domine. What does the RfC about an infobox for Mozart tell you regarding WP:CT infoboxes, and can you offer ideas towards peace? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:22, 24 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think that my comments at last year's elections still apply: "while there are strong feelings on both sides of the dispute, the issue isn't as unmanageable as it was ... as with most disputes in contentious areas with many participants, there were some unpleasant statements being made about editors' motivations and stances". The Mozart discussion seemed better-tempered than the Laurence Olivier one that you asked me about last year. While there haven't been any logged enforcement actions this year, El C's comment about the presence of the "contentious topics" designation being a good deterrent is worth noting.
Thanks for standing as a candidate for the ArbCom. You maybe be familiar with a recent Law and Social Inquiry article titled "Canceling Disputes: How Social Capital Affects the Arbitration of Disputes on Wikipedia" that was the subject of the current article on the Signpost. In addition, a previous paper from 2017 in International Sociology also examined similar trends from the ArbCom. In short, these papers argue about the existence of external factors influencing ArbCom decisions such as editor tenure, and raise concerns about canvasing among others. Are you concerned about the issues presented in the articles, or do you have any other concerns about the structure or operations of the ArbCom?
Pre-emptive followup if you do have concerns: If selected as a member of the ArbCom, would you (and if so, how) use your term on the ArbCom to assuage any concerns that other editors may have in dealing with active cases before the committee? Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. — microbiologyMarcus ^{(petri dish•growths)} 16:56, 24 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

For the 2023 paper, I am concerned by the considerations the Community gives to social capital, and the responses it gives to people trying to hold others accountable. While I haven't experienced the edit-warring factions it talks about, I have seen legitimate concerns raised at people's talk pages or at community noticeboards be effectively disregarded. The Community has the ability to sanction administrators and other users with social capital, but whether it wants to or will do so is another question. In other words, unblockables exist.
This is to the detriment of the project and to those users. Others get discouraged and disheartened, and may leave the project. Some people in privileged positions don't feel like they've done anything wrong because friends tell them that, but true friends don't let their friends get sanctioned.
For the 2017 paper, I am concerned that drafters have an overly disproportionate influence on how the case is decided – while I think it is unsurprising given the format of how cases are conducted, point five of Guerillero's guide to arbitration says that most non-drafters will follow what the drafters have proposed.
If I am elected, I would continue listening to different perspectives, even if I disagree with them. If I feel that an issue is falling through the cracks because of our biases as a Committee – members in the modern era have all been administrators – I will work to ensure that we have placed ourselves in someone's (figurative) shoes. As a drafter, I will work to ensure that such perspectives are well-represented in the proposed decision, even if I would not vote for it; as a non-drafter, I will work to come to my own conclusions based on the evidence and, if necessary, propose alternatives.
I feel like there's a substantial difference in the tone of your platform from last year (what I would say is presenting an optimistic vision) and this year (what I would say is presenting a "arbcom needs to be shaken up" vision). Given this and the value I know you place on privacy (where arbs often will reveal things about themselves to colleagues that they often don't share even onwiki), how, if at all, do you plan to build relationship and trust among your colleagues? Barkeep49 (talk) 04:00, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'm surprised to see this characterisation. My statement this year was intended to make a stronger and more proactive case for why I feel that I should be elected and that even if you disagree with my opinions, they are still needed on the Committee.
I hope to continue building relationships and trust with my colleagues through honest and professional communication – policy or philosophical disagreements do not have to become conflicts, and if I commit to something, I will work to the best of my ability to ensure that it is done. Crucially, if real life gets in the way or if it turns out that it is beyond my ability, I will communicate that to the Committee. Humility is key – as I said in my statement, "Part of being a Wikipedian is the need to always listen and learn: that did not change after I became an administrator and will not change if I am elected." Please clarify if I have focused on the wrong part of your question, because I am not sure how the value I place on privacy is connected to the rest of it – I will be extremely careful not to disclose any of that to non-Committee members.
Thanks for giving me the chance to clarify. First, I should have noted in my original question that both positive and shake things up platforms have been successful. But to answer what seems to be where I wasn't clear, wisdom that was passed down to me, and which has proven true during my time on the committee, is that a sense that all the arbs are in it together, even, or especially when, you disagree is a crucial aspect to a functioning committee. One way I think that happens is that many arbs share a little more of themselves as people than they do onwiki. This ranges from functional - what time zone are you in, do you use IRC and/or Discord? - to a bit more revealing - arbs share something about their interests, jobs, and/or families. So while the list is on the whole very professional in tone, it's been my experience that the personal elements that help smooth some of the hard parts that come from the work that has to be done. From what I know of you, it seems like you may not be comfortable with any of that personal side and so combining that with what I read as you anticipating that you will fight hard for the things you believe in (for instance, I read I will not be obstructionist or contrarian for its sake as saying you will be willing to resist decisions and be the only one to hold a position when there is a point to doing so) it seems like you might have a vision of you standing apart from others on the committee. Or maybe that's wrong and you have other ideas about this, hence my question. Barkeep49 (talk) 01:03, 26 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the clarification and for your intriguing thoughts. For what it's worth, I still have a positive vision for the Committee. I think that there are many different ways to achieve an environment in which we feel "a sense that all the arbs are in it together, even, or especially when, you disagree" – in addition to what I said above, constant recognition that my colleagues are all human and have different priorities both on- and off-wiki that demand their attention in different ways is important. Sometimes being willing to listen to someone sharing their difficulties goes a long way. I also do not see myself standing apart from others on the Committee – we will be working together for the greater good of the project and it would be naïve to think that I can accomplish that alone.
In your opinion, what is the single worst remedy or finding-of-fact that the Arbitration Committee has voted in support of during a case or motion that was resolved in 2022-2023? — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 04:04, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I have criticised the motion that rejected the Warsaw concentration camp request in both last year's elections and on this page, so I think that that is certainly close to the worst, if not the worst. Obviously, my criticism this year is taken with the benefit of having watched the World War II and the history of Jews in Poland case unfold, so perhaps it isn't completely fair.
In your opinion, what is the single most important thing that the Arbitration Committee has needed to improve upon throughout the 2023 term, and how will you improve upon it when you are elected to the committee? — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 04:04, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Given the six retirements/resignations in 2023, which is a 50% increase from 2022, I'm concerned by Committee burnout and inactivity. I have seen complaints from various Committee members about how inefficiently information is presented to them and how much of it is fragmented. Solutions may be to reform the way in which the Committee processes its business or to devolve some processes to trusted members of the Community; I will approach these proposals with an open mind.
what is the most important type of editor? ltb d l (talk) 07:02, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
One who works for the greater good of the encyclopaedia and listens, always seeking to improve themself and others.
do you support mandatory registration for wikipedia editing? why or why not? ltb d l (talk) 07:02, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Not at this time. Although I have never edited Wikipedia without an account, I understand that having a requirement to create an account is yet another barrier to editing. It remains to be seen how the Foundation implements IP masking / temporary accounts – the English Wikipedia will probably revisit and discuss this issue when we know more.
Would you care if an article for a kids tv show got vandalized with false information? Scoophole2021 (talk). 07:24, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, as vandalism damages our body of work and the encyclopaedia's credibility. Unfortunately, working at AIV and RfPP have told me that it's not always immediately clear to uninvolved administrators if unsourced changes to those articles are actually vandalism.
Consider the hypothetical where the English Wikipedia community comes to a consensus under WP:IAR that violates WP:CONEXCEPT. The English Wikipedia community attempts to enforce that consensus but the WMF pushes back, resulting in wheel and edit warring. If an ARBCOM case was opened on this matter would you sanction editors attempting to enforce the consensus, and would you support the English Wikipedia's right to come to that consensus? BilledMammal (talk) 11:48, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I am a strong believer of stopping disruption through discussion (A12). I hope that the Foundation would not inflame the situation further by reverting the administrator that carried out the Community's will, and hope that the Community would give the Foundation reasonable time to react to its consensus before enforcing it. The Community has every right to come to consensuses and when they come to ones that are contrary to what the Foundation believes, the Foundation should take the time to listen to the Community and make adjustments to their approach where possible.
Going back to the Fram affair, my understanding is that the Committee's relations with the Foundation have improved significantly and there is a great deal more dialogue between the two bodies. My approach would hew closer to 2019's Reversion of office actions motion than to 2014's Kww admonished motion – in the former, the Committee acted as the Community's representatives, discussing extensively with the Foundation. The Foundation, in turn, deferred the outcome of both the immediate and larger cases to the Committee. I hope that we would be able to come to a similar resolution in your hypothetical scenario. My answer assumes that you are asking about the Foundation-related aspects of the policy and not the Committee-related elements, so please clarify if that is not the case.
The roles of checkusers and oversighters are currently managed at the pleasure of the sitting arbitration committee. What, if any, conditions would be necessary for you to support divorcing checkuser and oversight functions from the arbitration committee, making these roles managed by the community instead? — xaosflux ^Talk 18:42, 25 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I will try to keep an open mind, but the Committee is well-equipped to deal with private evidence, while the Community at large cannot access CheckUser and suppression logs – this means that it is in a disadvantaged position when trying to hold functionaries accountable. The current system of making appointments with input from functionaries and the Community is probably the best system we can have, given the balance given between getting information-rich input and involving the Community. This does not mean that it is perfect – the applicants' questionnaire is a place where we can improve and it remains to be seen how successful the recent reform is – but unless there is a pressing need or widespread desire (an RfC where the Community expresses the desire to take over the process, for example), the existing one is good enough.
In my time on the committee, I have proposed, implemented, and then regretted changes as well as presented changes that could not command a majority of the committee. I noticed in your statement a desire to refine the committee. Could you please explain the changes you would like to make and how you propose working with your colleagues to pass them? --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 21:05, 26 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
When I wrote my statement, I was concerned that voters may view it as a desire to be consistently uncooperative when working with my colleagues, which is not the case. My promise to "speak up to refine and strengthen the Committee" was linked to the point before it: "As a deliberative body, the Committee needs diverse perspectives to make the best decisions". I therefore meant that I would refine the Committee's decision-making process by ensuring that it was well-informed and fully considered all viewpoints – this would refine the Committee as an institution too. Sorry for not making that clearer.
As for changes I would like to make to the Committee, I've written about cultural and structural changes in my answers to MicrobiologyMarcus (greater recognition of social capital, the role of drafters and non-drafters), to Tamzin (greater transparency), to WereSpielChequers (how we should deal with administrative conduct cases), and to Red-tailed hawk (burnout and inactivity). I've also written about how I will work with my colleagues through honest and humble communication in my answer to Barkeep49. I'm not under the illusion that these changes will be easy, but I'm certain that whatever happens, we will be working for the greater good of the project.
At what point does WP:STONEWALLING escalate beyond just a content dispute into disruptive behavior that is appropriate for ANI or AE to act on? Sennalen (talk) 04:09, 27 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think that it escalates into disruptive behaviour when it becomes a pattern, be that over various pages or over time. Like I said in my statement, an important thing to consider is "how they respond to feedback and scrutiny – do they listen and improve, or do they scold the person that was brave enough to call them out?". It should also go without saying that AE would only be appropriate when the various contentious topics requirements are met.
A completely optional question. I was interested to see that you created the Good Article shadow docket, which happens to cite the related article in-chambers opinion that I created (and should update and improve). In the spirit of my Final exam for wikilawyers, and without taking ourselves too seriously, can you analogize any aspect of the U.S. Supreme Court's shadow docket practice to the Arbitration Committee's current procedures? Are there any lessons that ArbCom should learn from the Court's experiences with increased shadow-docket activity in recent years? Newyorkbrad (talk) 18:07, 27 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the fascinating question. For those who are unaware, the shadow docket is a U.S. Supreme Court practice of making decisions on an accelerated timeframe, frequently with little or no explanation. Probably the most important analogy is not strictly a procedure of the Committee, but a practice instead. The Court has been criticised for effectively short-circuiting processes in the lower courts by issuing emergency orders before cases on the merits are decided. As I said to WereSpielChequers, administrator misconduct cases tend to be accepted much more quickly than other cases by the Committee and wrote in my answer to MicrobiologyMarcus about the Community's ability to deal with administrators and other users with social capital – by accepting an administrative misconduct case early, there is a danger that the Community does not get adequate opportunity to discuss the possibility of intermediate sanctions (or no sanctions at all) and escalates the matter too quickly. There is also a danger of having a bias towards sanctions once a case is opened: while some may feel that closing a case without sanctions would have wasted time, that is not true.
There are many other analogies that can be made, but I've chosen to focus on the one above (please note if you'd like me to go into more detail): some Committee decisions do not disclose how members voted; some Committee decisions with private votes come with minimal explanation unless a member chooses to elaborate more on the noticeboard talk page; some Committee members do not give explanations for why they've voted the way they did in on-wiki votes; how desysops can sometimes take place with votes of a few members instead of a majority (compare that with the role circuit justices play in the shadow docket).
Lessons to take from the Court's experiences are that increased use has (among other factors) led to increasing doubts in the institution due to the lack of transparency and accountability. When decisions are made without parties having sufficient opportunity to defend themselves and without sufficient information, they lose legitimacy. The Court has also caused great confusion in the lower courts when it has short-circuited decisions that were pending before the lower courts – is the Community less willing to deal with administrative misconduct cases when it knows that it can refer cases to the Committee? (I know that these experiences aren't perfectly translatable in this instance).
If we were to complete the Supreme Court analogy, I think that a real danger is that the Committee becomes complacent and reflexively ignores criticism, feeling that the instinct of the Community should be to give it deference. There have been recent essays in Slate and Vanity Fair that warn of the dangers of not properly scrutinising the Supreme Court. I don't think that we currently have an issue of being too deferential to the Committee – talk pages of proposed decisions and the committee noticeboard tend to have probing questions and criticism – but we may, if we're not careful enough, have issues of instinctively brushing off feedback.
I have recently finished a rewrite of Genghis Khan. What is the worst problem with the article at this revision, and why? Please reference relevant policies or guidelines. I am asking this question to candidates whose ability to evaluate/write content I am not immediately convinced by. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 22:52, 27 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think that my ability to write content can be assessed through the content work that I've highlighted in my statement and on my user page (I've also written congressional office lottery, which has not gone on the Main Page yet). In addition, my ability to evaluate content can be assessed through my thorough and comprehensive content reviews at Dear White Staffers, Lisette Olivera, Grant Hermanns, Daniel Larsen, and Skyrush. All of them involved reviewing all the sources present for accuracy and text-to-source integrity.
Where in the world are you based? BirgittaMTh (talk) 10:28, 28 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Given that I do not feel that this is directly relevant to my candidacy for the Committee, I respectfully decline to answer the question.
Are you aware, that English is de facto world language and English Wikipedia is used by vast number of global population, not only from English-speaking-countries (as (mostly) most trustworthy of all wikipedias)? And thusly, e.g. Point Of View of e.g. US of A might not be Neutral Point Of View in things, that occur all over the globe, like measles or climate or cars :) BirgittaMTh (talk) 10:28, 28 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I am aware of that. As an administrator, I frequent assess speedy deletions and deal with pages that were either not written in English or written in English, but by a writer whose first language is not English (see also my answer to theleekycauldron). We also had four related findings of fact passed in the recent World War II and the history of Jews in Poland case, as well as a failed source language restriction. I would also point to my substantially expansion of Raed Ahmed, an article about a weightlifter who represented Iraq at the 1996 Olympics.