User:Slrubenstein/Case Against CheeseDreams

Complaint

I (Slrubenstein) would like to add a request for arbitration, specifically concerning two articles: Cultural and historical background of Jesus, and a set of articles entitled Jesus in a cultural and historical background and Historical reconstruction of the sort of person Jesus would be.

Concerning the first article The first article was originally a section of Jesus [1]; when the Jesus article became too long it was made a daughter article. I am one of several editors who has worked on it. In late October or early November CheeseDreams began working on the article. I questioned many of her edits, which I believed were inaccurate or unverifiable; she began reverting my changes. During this period she often called for votes -- in my opinion, substituting votes for discussion (there is a clear pattern, when a vote supports her view she demands that the vote be considered established consensus; when the vote does not support her position she explains that votes do not determine the truth). By November 2 we were in a revert war. Many of the differences between our versions were stylistic, but some were substantive: CheeseDreams refered to the area as "Palestine" although at the time in question Romans and Jews refered to Judea and the Galilee separately; CheeseDreams insisted that there were many messianic groups, among them Mandeanists, but there is no evidence for this and when I asked CheeseDreams to verify her claims, she refused. Here are the two versions: [2]. On Nov, 3 the page was protected. On Nov. 18 it was unprotected, and a new editor, FT2, revised the article and attempted to incorporate as much material from the discussion as possible [3]. I felt that FT2's version was a good start given the previous conflicts on the talk page, but was poorly organized and included many claims that were inaccurate; moreover FT2's article had explicit gaps where FT2 did not know the appropriate information. Striving to keep as much material from FT2's version as possible, I revised the article: [4]. I spent the better part of the day Nov. 19th working on the article and made over 50 edits, using the edit summary for each one to explain what I was doing [5]. During this period CheeseDream periodically reverted all of my edits without any explanation. On Nov. 20th FT2 made a series of edits which I believe left the artice in even worse condition -- very poorly organized, and replete with factual inaccuracies. I posted a list of over a dozen problems with FT2's version on the talk page [6], went back to my last version, and spent the better part of the 22nd working on the article making substantial additions of verifiable and NPOV content, leading to this version [7]. At that point, CheeseDreams and Amgine took turns reverting my work -- with the effect of deleting much content I had added -- and without any explanation or justification. They did not respond to my list of problems with FT2s version, and did not post any specific criticisms of my version (Amgine did provide some explanations/examples of problems at one point). Here is John Kenney's analysis of the revert war: [8]. Fundamentally, FT2s version was replete with inaccurate and unverifiable information; I have done considerable research and added verifiable, accurate content which CheeseDreams and others kept reverting. Theresa Knott protected the article on Nov. 23. Since that time, I have continued to try to suggest substantive, verifiable, relevant changes to the article (e.g. [9] and [10]). CheeseDream simply rejects every edit I have made or proposed. CheeseDream never provides any substantive reason for rejecting my work (she simply doesn't like it), and CheeseDream refuses to justify her changes to me, or to provide evidence or sources. In short, FT2 and I simply disagree about organization (he prefers topical, I prefer chronological), but most other contributors prefer my organization. CheeseDream rejects any work I do and reverts it.

On November 14 I requested mediation in my conflict with CheeseDreams, Amgine, and FT2 [11]. Amgine and CheeseDream would nat accept anyone I nominated as mediator. They choose Llywrch. Llywrch attempted mediation, but Amgine and CheeseDream expressed dissatisfaction and then rejected him as mediator. By this time I was communicating more constructively with Amgine and FT2, but still could not communicate with CheeseDreams. I made a second request for mediation [12], but no one volunteered to be mediator, and CheeseDream (who had stated that she would not accept anyone I nominated) did not nominate anyone. Llywrch suggested we go to arbitration. CheeseDream has often suggested arbitration, as has John Kenny.

I would like CheeseDreams banned from the article. I can find no good contribution to the article by her -- she has never improved the clarity of the prose, and has never added verifiable content; she only disrupts mine and others' attempts to improve the article.

Concerning the talk page of the first article Wikipedia talk pages often get too long. Wikipedia policy is to archive material. We archived a good deal of the discussion. CheeseDreams summarized this discussion and placed it back into the article. This is bad for two reasons: first, her summary is biased; she rewrites what others said and condenses arguments to support her views. Second, her summaries are very long and defeat the purpose of archiving. I archived her summary. Over the past several days she continues to move archived material back into the article; I put it back in the archive; she puts it back in the article. This defeats the purpose of the archives, and makes the talk page excessively long (160 kilobytes long!).

Concerning the other two articles In the second article, CheeseDream simply copied the first (protected) article and gave it a new title, Jesus in cultural and historical background. Someone put in a redirect to the original page Cultural and historical background of Jesus. CheeseDream reverted that and eight other attempts to redirect it. When I redirected and protected the redirect, CheeseDream accused me of abusing my sysop powers. At the request of another editor I unprotected it. CheeseDream reverted it and instituted a complaint at RfC against me. See [13], and [14]. John K. redirected and protected the page, and CheeseDream created a new namespace (Historical reconstruction of the sort of person Jesus would be) with the same old article content that is Cultural and historical background of Jesus. I redirected and protected the page. She claims that this creation of two or three separate namespaces for the same article content is in the spirit of compromise, and I believe that this is laughable on its face. Presumably, the compromise would be that the original article (Cultural and historical background of Jesus) would be reverted to the form she likes, leaving me to enjoy the form I like. There are three reasons why this is not a good-faith compromise. First, I know of no example in wikipedia where a conflict over an article was resolved by having two versions of the article. Our goal should be one verifiable NPOV article for one topic or issue, not several articles on the same topic, different only in representing the views of a different editor. This smacks in the face of everything Wikipedia stands for and is a bad precedent. Second, CheeseDreams' move is disingenuous because she added all sorts of tags (neutrality and accurcacy under dispute) to the second copy of the article. In other words, she simply wishes to continue the arguments she has had with me over the original article, at a second space. Third, the article she favors is still, in the mind of me and several other editors, deeply flawed and will continue to be questioned and worked on.

I do not know if this is a bannable offense -- it certainly is in my opinion trolling. I believe it requires some sort of strong disciplinary action. Slrubenstein

Evidence presented by Slrubenstein

Evidence pertains to three complaints: first, that CheeseDreams is generally obstructionist; second, that she refuses to verify her work; third, that practically speaking she wishes to block me from the article Cultural and historical background of Jesus. She accomplishes this in two ways: first, by refusing to accept anything I write on the talk page, and second, by reverting my work.

1-8 December

These provide evidence of general obstructionism.

00:05, 8 Dec 2004
00:07, 7 Dec 2004
07:15, 6 Dec 2004
19:30, 5 Dec 2004
19:27, 5 Dec 2004
12:41, 5 Dec 2004
22:57, 4 Dec 2004
21:46, 3 Dec 2004
21:42, 3 Dec 2004
21:13, 3 Dec 2004
20:36, 3 Dec 2004
19:42, 3 Dec 2004
19:14, 3 Dec 2004
21:50, 2 Dec 2004
00:37, 2 Dec 2004
18:55, 1 Dec 2004
01:12, 1 Dec 2004
- In each of the above instances, she repeatedly put large summary into article. The particular summary in questioned had been archived because the article was over 130 kb. CheeseDreams reverted the archiving of the summary. This went on and on. [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] ... there are more, I am just getting tired of looking for each example. Surely, you get the idea!
- There was discussion about the summaries [32]; everyone except CheeseDreams felt that the summaries at best wasted space, and at worst disrupted the process of improving the article. There are three problems with the summaries.
  - First the "summary" is a way for CheeseDreams to put my words, and the words of others in dispute with CheeseDreams, into different words. This allows CheeseDreams to control the representation of the discussion and the participants of this discussion. She often uses this control to editorialize about the discussion, to misrepresent people she disagrees with, and or slander other editors.

Example: Part of the discussion involved how best to translate words and names. FT2 mistakenly claimed that "John" is English for the Hebrew name Yonatan. I objected to this error, and explained that "Yohanan" is the Hebrew version of the name "John." FT2 wrote, "I like this: "Yohanan" is not Hebrew for Jonathan; the Baptist's name was "John" (or it's Hebrew equivalent, Yohanan). Does anyone else spot the illogic?" I tried to explain again what FT2's error was (and it really is a big error in that it reveals tremendous ignorance about the Bible and Jewish culture, i.e. the general topic of the article). When FT2 wrote "Remember Davids friend "Jonathan"? David and Jonathan? Universally called "Jonathan" not John? Yohannan? Check it out. "John" is not hebrew......" (21:45, Nov 22, 2004 (UTC)), I lost patience at his combination of ignorance and sarcasm.

My response to FT2, as I wrote it (04:23, 23 Nov 2004; see [33]):

What on earth are you saying? There are two Hebrew names: Jonatan and Yohana. Yonatan is represented in English as Jonathan. Yohanan is represented in English as John. Are you making fun of me? Ar eyou yanking my chain? Waht does "Jonathan" have to do with "Yohanan? John the Baptist was not names Jonathan -- Jon is not John. Jesus, are you seriously trying to argue this? Do you know anything? I am seriously starting to question your competence here and I really am serious, not trying to be rude, because I know you have made some reasonable edits to other articles. But what you are saying here is a charicature of a nut, you must be making fun of me somehow ... Slrubenstein

CheeseDream's "summary" (see [34]):

Slrubenstein disputes translating "Yohanan" as "Jonathan" rather than "John". FT2 points out how David's associate "Jonathan" is "Yohanan" in Hebrew, to which Wesley states that the New Testament is Greek. Slrubenstein states that "Yonatan" is "Jonathan" and "Yohanan" is "John" (4). Slrubenstein states that FT2 is a nut, and questions whether FT2 is masturbating Slrubenstein (5).

I find the remark about masturbating offensive; I said so (see for example [35]) and deleted it. Another editor explained to CheeseDreams that it is an erroneous paraphrase (see [36]). That CheeseDreams persists in restoring or creating new summaries to repeat it (see [37]) is a sign of willful spite. CheeseDreams often editorializes in her summaries; this summary was really just a vehicle for her insulting me.

- - Second, the main way that CheesDreams summarizes is by cutting any explanation, reasoning, or evidence -- in other words, material that could constructively go into the article. What is left in these "summaries" is only the worst part of any discussion -- a list of editors who have taken opposing positions, and a record of conflict. The best part of the discussion -- a process by which people come to clarify their understanding of the topic, or in the course of dicsussion bring to light more facts or explanations -- is gone. This is certainly unhelpful.
  - Third, the summaries waste too much space (note in the example above, the summary is almost as long as what is summarized!) Each summary is itself over 30 kb. long -- long enough to be archived -- and should be archived.

I want to be clear that my objection is not merely to the many times that CheeseDreams has inserted the summary into the talk page -- a series of acts that wastes space on the page and the time of oother editors. The summary is symptomatic of more general and profound problems with CheeseDreams -- it reveals her intent on hijacking a page; her complete disregard for the views of other editors and their reasoning; her bias in reporting what others have said; her malice, as she seeks every opportunity to slander other editors through editorializing (e.g. when she explains, in the text itself, or in the edit summary, that the reason she is summarizing is that other contributors are verbose and obscure) or misrepresenting others (e.g. claiming that I have questioned whether FT2 is masturbating me). It is this general pattern of destructive behavior that is the real issue, not the fact that she reverted the archiving of the summary x number of times.

3 December

My second main complaint against CheeseDreams is that she refuses to verify her work. I have done considerable research on the topic and believe her claims to be false. When I offer her an opportunity to verify her claims, she mires me in a miasma of meaningless dialogue. This exchange provides a good example: [38].

28 November

Another example where CheeseDreams refuses to verify claims, this time from the Koan discussion on the Jesus page: [39]. I admit the header reflects my irritation; be that as it may, there was an endless discussion about whether Jesus used Koans (CheeseDreams being the only advocate of this view) and I pointed out simply that if some scholar has made this claim we should include it -- if not, we needn't argue it. CheeseDreams has continued to revert any deletion of this material from the article, and her only contribution to the talk page continues to be defensive or offensive -- but she still hasn't provided any verification at all to support this highly contested claim.

22 November

My third main complaint is that she rejects all of my work. By late November there were two versions of the article -- one that I had crafted, and one that FT2 had crafted. See my complaint for the general context and sources. I had explained in the talk pages that there were many mistakes in fact in FT2's version, and that it was poorly organized, and explained that my version was better organized and fully verifiable.

15:43, 22 Nov 2004
- Reverted my work; explanation was that I am arrogant and POV. [40]

Here is a more recent example (I put it here because it makes the same point as the Nov. 22 example):

21:07, 17 Dec 2004
- Provides an explanation of why she prefers FT2's version over mine. Her explanation reveals that she has not read my version at all, or if she has she read it in a careless fashion and that she is ignorant of the topic. From this example I conclude that she reflexively argues against anything I say even if it means she has to misconstrue what I wrote, or make up facts without any evidence. [41] (Note: in many cases in this excerpt, I simply identify claims she makes as ignorant or wrong. If any arbitrator likes, I would be happy to explain in detail what is ignorant and why she is wrong, and provide verification.)

It is true that I have rejected most of CheeseDreams' work. But every time, I have provided substantive reasons. In most cases I believe that CheeseDreams' additions are either not based on any research at all, or based on a distorted understanding of the scholarship. I have always made my objections clear and have asked CheeseDreams to provide verification.

20 November

00:19, 20 Nov 2004
00:00, 20 Nov 2004
- repeated reverts [42] [43]

19 November

20:04, 19 Nov 2004
- reverted work [44]

6-7 November

These exchanges provide good examples of my difficulty discussing changes constructively with CheeseDreams. Whenever I raise a verifiable problem of fact or interpretation, CheeseDreams effectively dismissed any contribution I could make: [45] [46]

1-3 November

There is only one discussion I recall in which CheeseDreams claimed to verify her position. It was on the Jesus talk page: [47]. Here we perhaps get to the root of my conflict with CheeseDreams. In this example she does provide sources -- but in a way that makes me even more skeptical of her research. I say this because none of the people she cited were important contemporary scholars; because several of the people she cited were not scholars on Jesus, critical Bible studies, or history of 1st century Judea; and because in at least one case she was entirely wrong (she provides Albert Schweitzer as an example of a scholar who claims that Jesus never existed, when in fact Schweitzer most definitely believed Jesus existed). Moreover, I provided sources to verify my claim, that scholars (meaning, critical scholars -- PhD.s who have academic appointments and publish in academic journals) believe that Jesus did exist (Crossan, Vermes, Bartman, Fredriksen, Sanders, Meier). CheeseDreams not only utterly disregarded my claim and evidence -- she seemed utterly unaware of these scholars. It is very hard to believe that anyone could do anything close to serious research on 1st Century Jewish history, early Christian history, or critical Bible studies, and not be familiar with at least a few of these names. The problem is, you have to know something about these issues to be sure that I am right and she is wrong. All one has to do is go to a few websites to see that A. Schweitzer really did believe in Jesus. A little work on the web would provide you with the c.v.s of most of the people I cited, or reviews of their books. One problem with earlier attempts to resolve my conflict with CheeseDreams is that others, like FT2 and Amgine, didn't know and didn't do much research on this period. What concerns me even more is that when CheeseDreams and I came into conflict on the Historical and cultural background to Jesus article, they did not insist that CheeseDreams provide sources for her claims. Indeed, Amgine felt that my demanding verification was a sign of bad faith on my part [48].

To be blunt, I think many people have been fooled by CheeseDreams. She makes her points so firmly, and sticks to them, and in some cases provides the names of authorities, and others assume she is correct. These people are acting "in good faith" and were I ignorant of critical Bible research and 1st century history, I too would have assumed CheeseDreams was acting "in good faith." But I have done considerable research on these matters and all of my research gives me reason only to question CheeseDreams' research.

Final Note: the Nature of my Complaint

I have requested arbitration not because CheeseDreams has violated specific wikipedia policies -- she may have, but my complaint is more complex. She has accused me of pretty much everything I have accused her of. Moreover, much of the evidence can be interpreted either way. For example, below Amgine provides evidence of my abusing CheeseDreams. In fact, I am proud of almost every example Amgine provides -- I believe that they show a pattern in which I contribute well-researched, verifiable material to an article; in which I provide explanations for my changes; and in which I demand that CheeseDreams do the same. This is not merely a situation where the process has broken down. If it were, then perhaps RfC and mediation would have worked. This is a case where two different people have different notions of what "NPOV" and "verifiable" mean. CheeseDreams (and Amgine) and I fundamentally differ on matters of content, and in many cases I believe the conflict between us can be understood only by looking at the content and the reasons we give, respectively, for the changes we make. Slrubenstein