Forum:CT:User conduct policy refinements

Forums > Consensus track archive > CT:User conduct policy refinements
This page is an archive of a community-wide discussion. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made in the Senate Hall or new Consensus track pages rather than here so that this page is preserved as a historic record.
The result of the debate was Support proposals. Ayrehead02 (talk) 16:46, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

August already! This proposal on refining our user conduct policies has been a long time coming. A big thank you to everyone who has provided input and feedback. The directly affected policy pages are the User conduct policy (WP:UCP) and the Fandom anti-discrimination policy (WP:DISCRIMINATION). Practical changes regarding how the Wookieepedia administration enforces policy and our stance against discrimination, should this proposal pass in full, would be relatively limited. Here is a brief rundown of discussions relevant to this CT:

  • Relevant to subvote 1: {{Usernameban}} was created in 2006, referring users banned for their username to Wookieepedia's username policy. To my knowledge, Wookieepedia has never had a username policy, and this old tutorial page (2008) refers to Wikipedia's username policy.
  • Relevant to subvote 2: the creation of the Fandom anti-discrimination policy page was announced by the Wookieepedia administration in November 2022. No community vote took place. It is a localised guide maintained by admins that highlights a part of Fandom's Terms of Use.
  • Relevant to subvote 3: a number of users were blocked by admins for severe discriminatory behaviour over time, and a few were likewise blocked for egregious off-site behaviour, including multiple users involved in workshopping WP:DISCRIMINATION.
  • Various existing policies were consolidated via a CT vote into the new User conduct policy in May 2024.
  • Relevant SH discussion on consolidating WP:DISCRIMINATION into WP:UCP in June and July.

This proposal is split into three sub-votes. If they all pass, the "Unacceptable behavior" section (WP:NPA) of the User conduct policy will appear like so: (permalink) — (diff)

OOM 224 (he/him/they) 18:00, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

1) To keep things simple, I don't think we need a separate username (or user image) policy. Admins should take action if the content is not in keeping with WP:UCP's "Unacceptable behavior" rules, so I propose adding the following line immediately after the list in the "Unacceptable behavior" section:

Usernames and images should likewise be in line with this policy. A user with an unacceptable username should rename their account or create a new account.

Support (#1)

  1. The {{Usernameban}} template can then be modified accordingly. We could also look into using the AbuseFilter against registering accounts with plainly awful usernames. OOM 224 (he/him/they) 18:00, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  2. Ayrehead02 (talk) 18:24, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  3. 01miki10 Open comlink 18:25, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  4. CometSmudge (talk) 23:53, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  5. Cade GalacticRepublicEmblem-Traced-TORkit Calrayn 00:01, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  6. - Thannus (DFaceG) (he/him) (talk) 06:33, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  7. Xd1358 (Talk) 07:32, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  8. Imperators II(Talk) 14:13, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  9. Zed42 Wolfpack emblem (talk) 22:00, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  10. —spookywillowwtalk 23:17, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  11. JediMasterMacaroni(Talk) 05:12, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  12. Braha'tok enthusiast Hello there 11:15, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  13. Booply (talk) 15:02, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  14. Master FredceriqueCommerce Guild(talk) (he/him) 16:33, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

Oppose (#1)

2) Wookieepedia should not have to rely on Fandom's Terms of Use, which can be changed by the company at any time and be interpreted by Fandom staff as they see fit. Admins here are are elected by the Wookieepedia community and responsible for enforcing the community's policies rather than Fandom's policies, and it would be more credible for admins to enforce an anti-discrimination policy that the wider community has voted for—particularly since the existing page was made in consultation with only a select group of users, a few of whom are now banned from the site, and the current table of further reading is a rather ambiguous resource at best.

I therefore suggest deleting the Wookieepedia:Fandom anti-discrimination policy page and replacing the following WP:UCP paragraph (which was approved by CT when WP:UCP was created, but it refers to WP:DISCRIMINATION):

Comments that are discriminatory based on age, disability, ethnicity and culture, gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, variations in sex characteristics, etc. additionally violate Fandom's Terms of Use. Disagreement over what constitutes a race, religion, gender identity or sexual orientation, etc. is not a legitimate excuse for discriminatory behavior. Please see Wookieepedia's Fandom anti-discrimination policy page for more information.

—with these three new paragraphs instead under a "Discrimination" subheader within the "Unacceptable behavior" section, plus moving them down to immediately before the paragraph starting "There may be a reason for such unacceptable behavior":

Wookieepedia's website host, Fandom, regulates discriminatory behavior on the site through its Terms of Use, violations of which may result in Fandom staff issuing a global block for the offending user across the Fandom platform. If Fandom does not find a particular case to be actionable, Wookieepedia administrators still have the responsibility to take appropriate action regarding any case of discriminatory behavior by a Wookieepedia contributor in accordance with this policy and any other relevant policies, such as the Blocking policy.
Users should not engage in discriminatory behavior based on another person's or perception of another person's physical or social characteristics. These include using hate speech or hateful symbols, even when not directed at a specific person, about age; disability of any form; ethnocultural background; family structures; gender (including misgendering, deadnaming, and gender essentialist discrimination against non-binary and transgender identities); race and skin color; romantic and sexual orientation (including discrimination against aromanticism and asexuality); and variations in sex characteristics. Discrimination based on another person or group's religion or irreligion is likewise unacceptable.
Disagreement over what constitutes such personal identities and social groups is not a legitimate excuse for discriminatory behavior. All discriminatory content can be removed from Wookieepedia, including those on talk and forum pages in accordance with the Talk page policy. Certain parts of a page's history can additionally be hidden from public view by the administration in accordance with the Deletion policy.

Support (#2)

  1. Relevant policies such as WP:USER's rule 2 that refer to the current Fandom anti-discrimination policy page should of course have the wording updated accordingly and the links should be changed to Wookieepedia:User conduct policy#Discrimination. OOM 224 (he/him/they) 18:00, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  2. Ayrehead02 (talk) 18:24, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  3. 01miki10 Open comlink 18:25, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  4. CometSmudge (talk) 23:53, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  5. Cade GalacticRepublicEmblem-Traced-TORkit Calrayn 00:01, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  6. - Thannus (DFaceG) (he/him) (talk) 06:33, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  7. Xd1358 (Talk) 07:32, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  8. Imperators II(Talk) 14:13, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  9. Zed42 Wolfpack emblem (talk) 22:00, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  10. —spookywillowwtalk 23:17, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  11. JediMasterMacaroni(Talk) 05:12, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  12. Braha'tok enthusiast Hello there 11:15, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  13. Booply (talk) 15:02, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  14. Master FredceriqueCommerce Guild(talk) (he/him) 16:33, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

Oppose (#2)

3) Additionally, to better define the extent to which this community's user conduct standards apply to behaviour outwith the site proper, I propose removing the following lines from the User conduct policy:

Wookieepedians should adhere to the guidance on this page whenever communicating with others, no matter whether they are present on this wiki or if the discussions take place on the Discussions forum, Discord, or off-site where Wookieepedia acquaintances meet.

—and adding the following lines to the end of the policy's "Unacceptable behavior" section:

Egregious behavior occurring beyond the site's wiki, Discussions forum, and Discord server that involves and impacts other Wookieepedia contributors—including posts on public forums and private messages (the sharing of private content is within the purview of Wookieepedia's Discord and Privacy policies)—will result in administrative sanction. While expressing opinions itself is not a ground for administrative sanction, Wookieepedians should neither engage in intimidation, harassment, or threats nor share grossly insulting or degrading discriminatory material.

Support (#3)

  1. This will be followed up by another proposal specific to our policy for Discord. OOM 224 (he/him/they) 18:00, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  2. Ayrehead02 (talk) 18:24, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  3. 01miki10 Open comlink 18:25, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  4. CometSmudge (talk) 23:53, 1 August 2024 (UTC)
  5. Cade GalacticRepublicEmblem-Traced-TORkit Calrayn 00:01, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  6. - Thannus (DFaceG) (he/him) (talk) 06:33, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  7. Imperators II(Talk) 14:13, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  8. Zed42 Wolfpack emblem (talk) 22:00, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  9. —spookywillowwtalk 23:17, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  10. Seems like the above defines that the conduct must be both egregious and about/affecting the site to apply, which seems fair since folk can still act as they like in any non-Wookieepedia context that isn't explicitly harassing editors.Booply (talk) 15:02, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  11. I'm supporting cautiously based off OOM's interpretation of the policy, as it is his proposal. If we can reasonably determine that the off-site actions are directly harmful toward members of the community, I have no reservations with us taking action. But anything beyond that I feel needs clear guidelines to prevent admin overreach. Something to consider in a future proposal perhaps. Master FredceriqueCommerce Guild(talk) (he/him) 16:33, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

Oppose (#3)

  1. As I mentioned on Discord, I am vehemently opposed to extending the reach of Wookieepedia policy and administrative sanctions to actions outside Wookieepedia. Unless the off-site conduct is harassment of individual Wookieepedians or groups of Wookieepedians, Wookieepedia policy does not apply outside Wookieepedia (and its official platforms like Discord). Actions here on the wiki are in the public record and can be vetted by anyone, whereas external conduct is much harder to assess. Furthermore, the proposed wording includes private messages — something trivial to fake. Given the administrative issues we've seen over the years, allowing administrators to make ultimately subjective calls on actions that don't even happen on the wiki is opening a can of worms that will no doubt come back to bite us sooner or later. Xd1358 (Talk) 07:32, 2 August 2024 (UTC)
  2. Per Ecks pretty much. Not everyone's perfect, but we owe any editor (new or old) a chance to become a better person within our community regardless of how they might have been elsewhere, otherwise we're just going to become a bubble. Unless they take their behaviour here, it shouldn't be our business reaching at things beyond the bounds of our own community. Braha'tok enthusiast Hello there 11:15, 6 August 2024 (UTC)
  3. Artemaeus-Creed (talk) 17:10, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Discussion

  • Before voting, as it pertains to #3, can I get some examples of what "that involves and impacts other Wookieepedia contributors" means, exactly? I want to know how those lines are being drawn before I vote, because that's how I can determine whether or not I feel this is administrative overreach. Master FredceriqueCommerce Guild(talk) (he/him) 05:43, 10 August 2024 (UTC)
    • Learning from previous incidents, I think any administrative sanctions should respond to the severity of someone's behaviour occurring off-site specifically in terms of community impact—for example, DMs or private servers on Discord with conversations including other Wookieepedians would probably have more of an impact directly on community members than general social media posts. Obviously, users should not be policing other folks' Twitter or the like anyway, and admins should take special care when assessing allegations beyond the site. The general rule of thumb I'd say would be to invoke this rule only for recent, repetitive, and Very Bad Actions that are clearly coming from a member of the community and which—not simply cause discomfort or potentially offend, but intrusively and significantly affects—other Wookieepedians, like DM'ing vile and insulting messages to someone or making real-life threats and posting inciteful content. OOM 224 (he/him/they) 14:21, 13 August 2024 (UTC)
      • I think my issue with this part is that the scope is made too ambiguous and can easily be extended to assuming that someone is indirectly affecting others elsewhere with stuff that has nothing to do with the Wook. If we give ourselves the power to assume bad faith in people towards our community before we give them a chance to be better among us then how much better are we than former figures on this site that we have had to challenge and remove the authority of? Braha'tok enthusiast Hello there 09:13, 14 August 2024 (UTC)
        • You've mentioned people having a chance to improve themselves a few times but I'm not sure how this prevents that since there's no suggestion that every ban resulting from this would be a permenant one. As with most bans it'd be taken on a case by case basis, with warnings issued if we believe they'd be effective or temporary blocks in cases where we believe that the user can learn and improve upon their return, something we have good examples of working in the past. I'd hope that in most instances users can indeed return and improve, but sometimes a short block can be an important part of that and this means it'll be something avaliable as an option. It also means in the most severe cases where a permenant block is the best solution for the community that we have the ability to make one rather then being left unable to take action. Ayrehead02 (talk) 09:36, 14 August 2024 (UTC)
          • I don't doubt that temporary measures could help as well, but I think that that those measures should happen when the individual's behaviour comes to the community, which is the issue I have with this proposed change. Braha'tok enthusiast Hello there 12:42, 14 August 2024 (UTC)
            • The problem is that the community doesn't exist in a bubble, if a user in the community regularly posts hateful or discriminatory content on social media but avoids saying it on the site or in our Discord, that doesn't mean that they don't still hold those views when taking part in the community, including in their voting or interactions with other users. There's plenty of ways to subtly act out those kind of views by blocking nominations or through interactions with others while avoiding anything that will get you banned. Meanwhile users in whatever group is being discriminated against fully know the user is bias against them and have evidence for it, but all the admins can do is say "well aslong as they don't explicitly say it in this space then there's nothing we can do." If someone is discriminatory on social media and a member of the community, then they are already discriminatory in our community, and while we are unable to take action against that then I'm not sure how we can call ourselves a safe space for anybody. Ayrehead02 (talk) 13:20, 14 August 2024 (UTC)
            • Somewhat echoing above though also noting that, more or less, Fandom's TOU and/or Fandom's offsite policy guidelines will trump whatever we have here (by force, as it would happen) regardless of whether this clause passes; more of whether we list it here ourselves or not. I do think that (some) specific actions offsite do firmly count as "comes to the community" ie doxxing incidents, retaliation against admins/authority leaders by threatening them with either doxxing or physical threats for actions or votes they've done on Wook as part of their jobs, deadnaming and/or heavy harassment of LGBTQ+ Wookieepedians on the sole basis of them making that info known onsite to mock their contributions… which as was brought up in Discord; sure, yes, these actions can technically be carried out offsite, but it would be a tough claim to say they haven't any affect solely being not in an edit history. Personally, and somewhat of a hot take, I'm not sure I care too much what someone is saying off Wookieepedia so long as it doesn't have any tie to us. But, the proposed wording does say related to Wookieepedia, and since we've seen several/all of the example incidents noted within the last calendar year, not really too much of a stretch to say it'll happen again and again. Mostly responding to Braha here with this: because to his point I don't agree really with banning people that we stumble on or stalk things they say that we might disagree with, but often, a lot of the stuff we deal with would be a disservice to not call affecting the community when it is, in the vast majority of the cases we've banned for, someone a) genuinely being a creep b) causing severe trauma to community members, specifically c) to either retaliate against or harass—not just random people online or broad general categories of people—but specific Wookieepedians, often by name. There's actually been several cases in recent history in which the admins specifically did not ban people despite long-knowing about their activities offsite that would be bannable if done onsite; it's out of our purview, and this proposal doesn't affect their free speech because it's not-related to Wookieepedia. Those bans were then later only issued when the individuals in question started doing severe offenses to individual Wookieepedians, which is, irregardless of whether this passes or not, still definitely going to fall under Fandom's offsite platform guidelines for Fandom account owners. Apologies for the long comment, but do want to firmly clap back on how this has been used in practice this last year: it's usually the worst of the worst, almost always repeat offenders (thus, cannot say never been warned), and I do genuinely find it silly to say that any of the bans issued this year haven't benefitted the community's health as a whole and firmly believe those offenses affected Wookieepedia itself (ie, mainly to counter the waving away of severity (by just saying we'd ban someone for something minor) or assumption that admins sit around hunting for things to ban people for (we don't, nor do any of us have the time to do so or wish to)). It's also, in a good lot of the cases we've had this year for retaliation, disrespectful to the victims—in very extreme circumstances—to keep giving second chances and chances to learn again and again to people who definitively go out of their way to harass the community and expect those community members to then endure the sorrowful treatment more reminiscent of the Tope era, back when admins never did anything to protect victims of abuse. It's something I think the admin team will likely remain fundamentally torn on, but I do hope enough people that did suffer during that era back when rampant severe harassment was allowed in IRC dms, solely because it wasn't in an onsite edit, can realize that there are some very limited and extreme circumstances in which a person might be removed from the community for offsite actions. It's been brought up by ecks and others in the Discord that, naturally, everything is subjective, even the worst of things we've seen folk go-bye for on Wookieepedia such as creeps toward children. But at that point, if we want to call even that subjective (as was said in the Discord) solely because it happened offsite; then yeah ultimately Fandom does currently actively globally-block people for that so… if one cares to fish around, Fandom did just that for a years-established Wookieepedian just this month based solely on offsite Discord messages, so unless we make a policy prohibiting reporting to Fandom for actions such as this, which would be dodgy as hell (and against US law, and Fandom is a US company/their TOU is upheld according to US law irregardless of where the offender(s) live)…admins can/probably will continue to get these people banned anyway even if they don't issue the hammer themselves, which results in the same end result but would hand a lot of power over to Fandom once they get too comfortable banning anyone they like for any small or minor infraction, so arguably one could say it's better to leave the banning to our admin team, so that our community isn't at the mercy of corporate whims more than we already are.—spookywillowwtalk 06:26, 15 August 2024 (UTC)