Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Mr-Natural-Health

Case closed

Please do not edit this page directly if you are not a participant in this case. Comments are very welcome on the Talk page, and will be read, in full. Evidence, no matter who can provide it, is very welcome at /Evidence. Evidence is more useful than comments.

Statment of complaints

Complaint by David Gerard

After many running edit wars and extensive talk page discussion on Talk:Alternative medicine and Talk:Iridology, I tried asking User:Mr-Natural-Health if we could sort this out otherwise, or at worst get it mediated [1]. He refused abusively (reply and edit summary). So, with all other avenues of resolution refused, asking the AC if their previous attempt to moderate MNH's posting behaviour worked is what's left. Or should I take it to Wikipedia:Requests for comment first, if you think that would be productive?

MNH appears not to grasp NPOV [2] [3] [4]. He is given to combative discussion on talk pages - he appears to see his mission as pushing one side, rather than improving an article [5] [6]. He seems to actually believe that those of differing view are "trolls" [7] talk page and "liars" [8] [9] [10] rather than being people who disagree with him.

He takes questioning his edits or edit summaries and asking for explanation as being "personal attacks" [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] but makes personal attacks on others [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] and maintains pages of personal attacks on others on his user page (User:Mr-Natural-Health/2wB1g9Gq, User:Mr-Natural-Health/6pV1g8Gq). Even when his abusiveness is deleted from talk pages, it's still in the edit summaries ([http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Alternative_medicine&action=history Alternative Medicine history], [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Iridology&action=history Iridology history]). Apparently, getting into a disagreement with him warrants comparisons to Hitler and Nazis [21] [22].

He seems to believe he can take ownership of articles and enforce his views on who should be allowed to edit them [23]. He views article editing as a battle with winners and losers [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30]. His combative attitude has already discouraged others from contributing to articles he edits (Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Theresa_Knott#Response). The analysis there is that his behaviour represents attempted enclosure of alternative medicine articles on Wikipedia; I am inclined to concur. He has constructed a personal style guide for alternative medicine articles (Wikipedia:Wikiproject:Alternative Medicine/Standards of Quality), which is far from an objectionable idea in itself, but he represents it as enforceable Wikipedia policy [31] [32] [33] [34] [35], removes edits of others using it as justification as if it's hard Wikipedia policy [36] [37] [38] and removes others' questions as to it being used like this [39].

He encourages gross disrespect for Wikipedia bans on other users, offering to proxy for them [40]. When asked not to do this [41], he removes the request with an abusive edit summary [42].

• As a side issue, a lot of medical article are getting a footer "See also:category alternative medicine" by Mr. Natural health. The comment is not relevant to the articles. It would be about as relevent as putting "See also: Category Metalworking" in all articles regarding woodworking. When a reference is made it implies there is something specific to the article at hand in the referenced article. That there is merely a general article is not sufficient reason to direct the readers attention to another place in Wikipedia. Stephen Holland, M.D. Kd4ttc 04:26, 3 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• • On further review, there are actually two problems. The category entry on many articles of alternative medicine is just wrong. Cholesterol is not a type of alternative medicine, for example. The second problem is that a number of articles are being described as being part of the CAM project when those articles were never created by anyone involved in said project. They are simply being annoted to imply that there is a group interested in an alternative medicine POV that worked to author those projects. Where inappropriate these links should be removed. Given the large number of misidentifications, the process should be conducted by a bot. Kd4ttc 21:47, 3 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The following comment was deleted from the Response to Additional Complaint section below by MNH ([43]). Although it was posted in the wrong section of this page, it should be retained rather than merely deleted, though [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|MNH] comments in a later edit summary ([44]) that he will "continue to delete any comments made in my responses section by someone other than [him]".

Comment - the Category:Applied CAM popped up one day after a I deleted a number of inappropriate categorizations that were made. Category Category:Applied CAM then popped up. The request to M-NH was to stop adding the category, not create a new category. Additionally, the discussion about why the category was not appropriate pointed out that for his purposes, creating a list of related articles was appropriate. That an article with a list of CAM related articles is different from adding a category label to a bunch of articles has been a reality that Mr-NH has refused to accept. Actually, it doesn't strike me that alt med is a category of medicine, but I can see others having that view and it makes for a better medical article for having the alternate viewpoint. Thus, I can see that that link is OK because a general comment about alt med is a reasonable link in a general article about medicine. Still doesn't justify having see also alt med bringing readers to a general statement about alt med in articles like Mineral and Walking. Kd4ttc 00:11, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Additional Complaint

A number of Wikipedia contributors have disagreed with placement of categories in a number of locations regarding alternative medicine. Many of the categorizations as alternative medicine have not been edited. this suggests to me that the editors of the articles are using discretion in judging if the alternative medicine categorizations is appropriate. In the case of Clinical depression a number of individuals have disagreed with the categorization of that article as Alternative medicine. This was discussed in the Talk page for that article. Mr. Natural Health has posted the following appeared in Talk:Clinical_depression:

• Since these science people have only demonstrated bigoted, obnoxious, time wasting behavior towards this WikiProject they are clearly more interested in trolling then in improving Wikipedia. Everywhere we have actually bothered to state our views, our ASBs etc. have been deleted / vandalized. Everywhere where we have wasted time doing what you people have asked for our ASBs etc. have been deleted / vandalized. Do you really think that I am going to waste my time wading through the above garbage that was written by a bunch of ignorant bigots? ::-- John Gohde 14:29, 6 Jun 2004 (UTC)

His comment is inappropriate. Kd4ttc 16:03, 6 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• • I find your bigoted behavior totally inappropriate. A bigot is: "One who is strongly partial to one's own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ." And, I find this bigoted, obnoxious, time wasting behavior of yours totally inappropriate. -- [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|John Gohde | Talk]] 07:55, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)
    • Furthermore, you do not even have the legal standing to make this complaint. Please stop, wasting more of my time. -- [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|John Gohde | Talk]] 08:51, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)
      • This is a website not a court. No one needs a legal standing to make a compliant. theresa knott 08:55, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)
        • Good, I want to complain about you. -- [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|John Gohde | Talk]] 09:17, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Requested relief

It's hard to put this in terms of specific actions. He knows a huge amount about the area and could possibly contribute brilliantly. What I really want is for MNH to:

• grasp the concept of NPOV, and not see his mission here as pushing a POV
• learn how to work better with others
• understand that the people disagreeing with him are not therefore liars or trolls
• assume good faith
• learn what a personal attack is or isn't and stop making them.

All of these are necessary but difficult to quantify.

Can anything reasonable be done short of asking him to go away again? - David Gerard 09:44, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

I think David is living in cloud cookoo land if he thinks the AC can get MNH to to stop pushing a POV and start to work cooperatively with others. All attempts so far by anyone to reason with MNH have fallen on deaf ears. A month long ban did not work. I'd like to request something much simpler. A year long ban. theresa knott 11:46, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Please leave me my idealism! *sob* - David Gerard 12:05, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

More seriously: well, yeah. A month time out made the personal attacks less voracious, but didn't affect the grasp of NPOV, add understanding of how to work with others, add understanding that people could legitimately disagree with him, add any tendency to assume good faith or add any understanding of what is and isn't a personal attack. A month didn't do it. Would a year? - David Gerard 07:42, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Probably not, but I bet it would give Wikipedia enough time to undo MNH's damage and improve the articles substantially before the people inclined to work on these articles have to take a while off to go through the AC again. Snowspinner 20:13, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

It would also go a long way to showing that the "constant edit wars on AM articles" are because of his presence and not because the AM articles need special treatment or extra rules. theresa knott 08:50, 11 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Response by Mr-Natural-Health

Starting at the beginning, David's request for arbitration was made on 31 May 2004 [45]. Thus, his request for arbitration was intentionally made after his attempts to goad me into more conflict and wasted time dealing with David failed [46] by 27 May 2004 . I did in fact informed him in talk that I wished to stop editing these articles effective immediately on 25 May 2004 ([47], [48],[49]). My last edit to Iridology [50] and my last intended edit in alternative medicine [51] was made prior to the commencement of David's arbitration request was made on 25 May 2004. However, in alternative medicine a few unexpected events happened. I reverted [52] a revert made against User:Heidimo by David who is a participant of the Wikiproject on Alternative medicine (I feel that I should support the active participants of our project). Then User:Geni tried to add links to professional wrestling on 30 May 2004, so I had to do 2 separate edits [53] before Geni figured out his mistake. I also did one copy edit. All of this unexpected editing, took place on 30 May 2004.

Thus, I submit that David's request for arbitration was in fact just another cleverly disguised attempt to goad me into more conflict and wasted time dealing with David.

It is my position that David Gerard, and his ilk, are the ones who have created the never-ending spiral of editing in alternative medicine. They are the ones constantly changing the definition of alternative medicine. They are the ones who are constantly trying to stir up controversy and goad me into attacking them in Talk:Alternative medicine. How many times do they need to add controversy to alternative medicine? Currently, they are trying to encourage a new editor into stirring up an issue that was resolved months ago. This is their tactic. They are constantly trying to bring up old issues in talk and goad me into attacking them.

David Gerard stated that: After many running edit wars and extensive talk page discussion on Talk:Alternative medicine and Talk:Iridology, I tried asking User:Mr-Natural-Health if we could sort this out otherwise, or at worst get it mediated [54].

The facts are that there were no edit wars in either Alternative medicine or in Iridology articles during this time period.

My edits of Iridology were relatively minor and were strictly made in regards to the objectives of Wikiproject on Alternative Medicine. A section was added in order to add citations to research with a standard format which at the time was not currently being used. It was viciously attacked and changed all around. It, however, is still essentially a part of the article [55]. I, also, attempted repeatedly to clean up the introduction to this article, but eventually gave up. I was harassed by David throughout my edits on Iridology and on talk. I am still waiting for David to respond to a simple question of mine on talk [56]. My experiences on Iridology were so negative with David, that I dropped the requirement of the Wikiproject on Alternative Medicine to add research citations to the branches of alternative medicine articles and to drop the standards of knowledge classifications from our infoboxes. As I have yet to conduct a compliance audit on this article, I am unable to quantify how this article rates per our standards of quality guidelines [57].

Contrary to the protests of David, the project's standards of quality guidelines [58] do in fact comply with all NPOV requirements of Wikipedia [59].

My recent edits of alternative medicine were few in number, but were very productive [60], [61]. I repeatedly resisted David's attempts to add a quote to the article by Dawkins [62]. There were a number of threads on this in talk. Having given up on this project, I responded by adding my own quotes [63]. David made numerous attacks on this in talk [64], [65]. David basically carried on an edit war attacking me on talk. He generated enough verbiage to create archive #7 in approximately 10 days of posting [66]. I have yet to conduct a compliance audit on this article, so I am unable to quantify how this article rates per our standards of quality guidelines [67]. but, overall, I have been very happy with the current layout of alternative medicine for quite some time, now.

My recent accomplishments in alternative medicine was to reorganize the support section in terms of recommending complementary medicine over alternative medicine by dropping the bulleted lists, adding section headers and moving various paragraphs around [68]. I added a couple of quotes [69]. And, concluded after Wikipedia went down for approximately 2 days and after David stopped his viscous attacks with making a profound observation on placebo treatments [70].

I decided to stop editing these articles and posting on talk because it was totally non-productive due the tactics of David.

David Gerard, and his ilk, are trolls: plain and simple.

Trolls use attitude to intimidate those who would dare disagree with them. Trolls with very minimal effort, force others into wasting their time. A troll often expects you to do their thinking for them, for the troll is too important to use up their own time. The aim of the troll is to intimidate you into doing all the work, or better yet flaming them. There is nothing about the correct definition of troll that requires volition. As this is a correct characterization of David, it is more of a complement than a personal attack. And, as it is factually correct it certainly is not a personal attack. To state that it is not a complement means that David's behavior has indeed been wrong.

David is simply excessively hostile. And, David never communicates what the problem is. And, he fails to make constructive suggestions. For example, in his complaint David Gerard stated that: I tried asking User:Mr-Natural-Health if we could sort this out. What in the world is this supposed to mean? I have no idea. It is not good enough for me. And, I am not going to waste my time trying to figure out what this troll is babbling about, plain and simple. In other words, I would not knowingly engage in an open ended discussion on Wikipedia because that is what trolls do on newsgroups. If you cannot articulate your point, point-blank, in plain English do not expect me to do your thinking for you. Editors have one shot to convince me to continue talking to them on talk. If they fail, that is their problem not mine!

David Gerard, and his ilk, are bigots by the book: plain and simple.

Quoting the dictionary a bigot is: "One who is strongly partial to one's own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ."[71] David is indeed a person strongly partial to science and is strongly intolerant of any activity or person who promotes alternative medicine which he incorrectly, of course, defines as quackery. As this is a correct characterization of David, it is more of a complement than a personal attack. And, as it is factually correct it certainly is not a personal attack.

David started a thread [72] in Talk:Alternative medicine that only a bigot could possibly comprehend.

I am not going to waste anymore of my valuable time on this farce. -- [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|John Gohde | Talk]] 04:26, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Response to Additional Complaint

Per page histroy of Category:Applied CAM, 17:30, 5 Jun 2004 Kd4ttc (Specified Applied CAM to avoid overlap wit conventional medicine,) [73] who wrote: Any article in Wikipedia that provides information that may be important to persons seeking information on alternative medical care approaches to personal health issues.

As you should recall [74], I created Category:Applied CAM in order to statisfy a request made by Kd4ttc. Kd4ttc response to it was to delete the handful of articles that I had added to it. This request of Kd4ttc and my responses to it is shown indented immediately below.

Automobiles get you to grocery stores, but grocery stores are not in the category Automobiles. Physicians read electrocardiograms, but electrocardiograms are not part of the category physicians. Gas stations are places where trucks go to get fuel, but trucks are not part of category Gas stations. Now, if there was a list like List of Conditions treated with Alternative Medicine Approaches, Hypercholesterolemia could be put there. Kd4ttc 19:36, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Not at all necessary, but if that will make you happy; I will do. -- John Gohde 19:49, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

My implementation is category:Applied CAM. If you complain about this one, I will indeed use your exact spelling above, which will of course take up half the page on top of each science article. The choice is yours. Either this shorter version or your spelling that will take up half the page. -- John Gohde 20:30, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

As totally expected Kd4ttc went through and deleted the handful of articles that I added to category:Applied CAM which I made to please him/it. Therefore, I conclude that Kd4ttc's only objective is to waste my time. I did precisely what Kd4ttc asked for, and he/it still deleted every article that I added. Kd4ttc is not interested in improving Wikipedia. All Kd4ttc wants to do is waste my time. My conversations with Kd4ttc are hereby terminated, forever. -- John Gohde 03:11, 6 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Further, clicking on category:alternative medicine, {{CamBottom}}, or {{CamTiny}}: a detailed generic explanation is provided as to why any of these some 200 articles are part of category:alternative medicine. As per the above edit of Kd4ttc, Kd4ttc is clearly aware of this detailed generic explanation.

Further, these same people keep on insisting that category:alternative medicine must be a sub-category of category:medicine. If category:alternative medicine is really as bad as these people are complaining about, why is it a sub-category of category:medicine? -- [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|John Gohde | Talk]] 04:30, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Regarding:

As a side issue, a lot of medical article are getting a footer "See also:category alternative medicine" by Mr. Natural health. The comment is not relevant to the articles. It would be about as relevent as putting "See also: Category Metalworking" in all articles regarding woodworking. When a reference is made it implies there is something specific to the article at hand in the referenced article. That there is merely a general article is not sufficient reason to direct the readers attention to another place in Wikipedia. Stephen Holland, M.D. Kd4ttc 04:26, 3 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I shall direct your attention to a survey released in May 2004 by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, part of the National Institutes of Health in the United States, found that in 2002, an alternative medicine section indeed belongs in quite a few conventional medicine, diet, etc., articles not normally associated with alternative medicine by some uninformed editors. This study is in pdf file format [75] and is 20 pages of public domain data that I will use to add an alternative medicine section in quite a few of these articles. What I have stated up front to these people is totally correct. They are the ones who are confused, not me! -- [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|John Gohde | Talk]] 20:37, 18 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Parting statement

My original objective on Wikipedia was accomplished on day one before, I selected my user name. Wikipedia:Wikiproject:Alternative_Medicine has proven my mental superiority to those of the science bigots on Wikipedia. My work on this project is done. If the other participants let this project die, then they deserve their fate. In my opinion, category:alternative medicine has progressed too far for these bigots to ever regain control of alternative medicine. While I would love to continue wasting huge amounts of time dealing with morons and bigots on Wikipedia, I happen to have a life. My original characterization of the gang of thugs on Wikipedia has been proven correct over and over again. Every where the topic of alternative medicine comes up, such as in past requests for comments regarding TK, a number of science bigots always manage to lace their comments with offensive quips regarding alternative medicine. I have been trying very hard to drastically cut back on my edits, here. But, every time that I do some troll rises to the occassion. -- [[User:Mr-Natural-Health|John Gohde | Talk]] 04:25, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Votes and comments by arbitrators

1. Accept Fred Bauder. Negotiation or mediation was requested at [76]. MNH made these responses [77] 12:38, May 31, 2004 (UTC)
2. Accept James F. (talk) 17:42, 31 May 2004 (UTC)
3. Accept - we should work fast on this one. --mav 02:03, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)
4. Accept. Martin 09:42, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)
5. Accept --the Epopt 03:24, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC)

There's obviously unhappiness and frustration among the participants but things seem to be getting better here. I have to say I think the Category system--as it currently stands-- is a bucket of worms which just about guarantees unresolvable taxonomic disputes. I hope to be wrong. --The Cunctator

Principles

Wikiquette: Insulting and intimidating other users harms the community by creating a hostile working environment. All users are instructed to refrain from this activity. Admins are instructed to use good judgement while enforcing this policy. All users are encouraged to remove personal attacks on sight.

Accepted 4-1 with 1 explicit and 1 de-facto abstention

Findings of fact

1) The findings of fact expressed at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Theresa knott vs. Mr-Natural-Health have not changed. This user still behaves inappropriately on a consistent and excessive basis, makes personal attacks in violation of Wikipedia's policy, and uses edit summaries in an effort to intimidate other editors.

Accepted 7-0 with 1 explicit abstention

2) That Mr Natural Health has willfully propositioned Irismeister about using him (MrNH) as a proxy editor for Irismeister in contradiction of Irismeister's ban on editing an article. [78]

Accepted 6-0 with 2 explicit abstentions

Remedies

1) Since it is evident that the previous 30 day ban of Mr Natural Health did not attain the intended result, we rule that this user shall be banned from editing for a period of three months.

Accepted 7-0 with 1 explicit abstention

2) For attempting to circumvent Irismeister's ban on editing Iridology, we rule that Mr Natural Health is hereby forbidden from editing that article or its talk page indefinitely and also add a week total ban from editing any page.

Accepted 6-2 with 0 explicit abstentions