Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Mr-Natural-Health

Original response to MNH 2

The above comments of David Gerard are absurd! For one thing, David has never asked me about mediation.

This is factually incorrect. Substantiating links, as listed in first para above: Request, reply, deletion of reply, abusive edit summary - David Gerard 15:20, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Point number one, unless you first define precisely what these disputes are you have done nothing but engage in a trolling activity to waste more of my time. I am not going to waste my time on a troll who is unable to articulate what in the world they are talking about.

Point number two, my response was as follows.

Perhaps, you could elect to stop your trolling? -- John Gohde 15:38, 28 May 2004 (UTC)~

Other than periodically removing personal attacks, I previously stated that I will not be wasting more of my time dealing editing Alternative medicine and Iridology. That goes triple for talk pages. So, there is no problem other than in your own mind. Please, STOP wasting my time. -- John Gohde 15:41, 28 May 2004 (UTC)

Therefore, I stated point-blank that there was no problem. And, you clearly never responded with a clearly articulated definition of the problem. That is precisely why you are a troll, David. There is nothing about the definition of a troll that requires volition. People like you are the worst kinds of trolls, IMHO. --John Gohde 16:01, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

I find it hard to believe that you could know of the edit histories of Alternative Medicine or Iridology or their talk pages and have to ask what conflict I could possibly be talking about. You also appear to be using a private, rather than conventional, definition of troll in the Internet sense - presumably this was the definition you were using all the time you called people trolls? - David Gerard 21:52, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

the term is perhaps more safely applied to insubstantial irritation without contributory content that merely derails discourse and erodes civility. - Yep, that definition sounds like it was talking about David Gerard to me. -- John Gohde 23:11, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Frankly, he has not even been able to state why I should waste more of my time on his trolling activities.

David is a troll just trying to waste my time. And, he has made more than enough comments in Talk:alternative medicine that clearly shows his intent to waste my time. He is the one who consistently has violated NPOV in regards to articles on alternative medicine. I on the other hand created the Wikiproject on Alternative Medicine as a constructive way to deal with the issues David has been talking about.

It is my position that alternative medicine is in a constant state of edit wars precisely because of people like David. How many times are they going to change the definition of alternative medicine? How many times are they going to add controversy to the introduction? How many times are they going to change the criticism section?

I am totally happy over all with the present layout of alternative medicine. And, I wish that people like David would stop trying to create edit wars over absolutely nothing.

His latest activity in alternative medicine of calling a direct quote of a physician with 2 years of advanced training in Integrative Medicine as tabloid is well documented, while he praises a grossly out of date quote of some professor making an obviously false statement as high quality clearly identifies David as biased. David seems to be just interested in trolling. David wants to draw me into a stupid edit war over his agenda to push his own private point of view. I have better things to do with my time. It is as simple as that. There are no unresolved issues in alternative medicine or in Iridology. I would prefer just to ignore David trying to constantly goad me into washing more my time. Now David wants to waste more of your time. I want nothing to do with any mediation / arbitration process. -- John Gohde 14:53, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

Here is evidence of David's trolling activities. First he creates archive #7 in Talk:alternative medicine. Then he starts out Talk:alternative medicine with the following question.

That anecdotal evidence (the newspaper quote) looks desperate. Is there anything better as a 'for' argument? - David Gerard 11:58, 30 May 2004 (UTC) (See [1])

This is nothing but of a repeat of a thread he started in archive #7 (See [2])

The definition of a troll is a person who engages in activities in order to waste peoples time and / or goad them into flaming them. In fact, I would say that archive #7 Talk:alternative medicine was created in only 10 days precisely because of David's trolling activities. My only mistake was allowing myself to be sucked into David's trolling activities. -- John Gohde 15:41, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

This is a content issue. (Your statements here serve as an example of taking a content issue as a personal attack.) I do not demand its removal - I state an editorial opinion (that as "support" it's extremely weak) and ask if there's anything better. That's the sort of thing people do on talk pages. Is this to be declared unacceptable? - David Gerard 21:52, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

As I have already stated in talk, it is far from being weak. I could not have come up with a better quote than if I wrote it myself. And, as I have already stated it delivers a knock-out blow that the critics will not be able to recover from. Of course, that is precisely why you are now trolling. -- John Gohde 23:06, 31 May 2004 (UTC)

I will save responding further to Mr-Natural-Health until the case is accepted or not. Apologies for fogging things up so far with the above - David Gerard 07:42, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The following text were deleted by Mr-Natural-Health from "Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Mr-Natural-Health":

Constructive Suggestions for Mr. Natural Health ??? Here's one: PLEASE STOP putting links to CAM on Wikipages that have nothing to do with CAM (yet). As a user of Wikipedia as an online encyclopedia (more of a viewer than a contributor), I have to say that your links to CAM on pages like Atherosclerosis, HDL & LDL, when you have no CAM-related information on those topics, are annoying and distracting. I clicked on the 'category' link on those pages, hoping to read about CAM-related materials on the topics and learn, but I got frustration instead. Please actually post the CAM-related contents rather than just sprinkling the CAM links onto various Wikipages. The links right now are simply functioning as an advertisement, telling people that pages on CAM exist in Wikipedia. Just like those links to "WikiMD.org". Most of the links are not useful at all right now. They are not as bad as pop-up ads, but getting closer after every encounter. I shall remove each bad link when I see them.

A second Constructive Suggestion: PLEASE EXPAND the CAM project with NEW Wikipages on various topics. I believe conventional medical science and CAM can co-exist in Wikipedia. Both have encyclopedic value, and a simple See also: on each parallel Wikipage would be useful. But please don't put up the link when there is no relevant CAM-related content on the new CAM page for the topic. I like what I find on Clinical depression, but splitting the CAM stuffs to a new page will improve readability (if I press 'page down' 5 times and the page is still not done, it's too long !) Another reason to have separate pages on the same topic, one with CAM POV and one with conventional medicine and basic biological science, is to help separate Wikipedians who aren't getting along that well.

A third Constructive Suggestion: PLEASE STOP posting comments like "I will continue this edit war in medicine on the next day, the day after, the week after, the month after and the year after." [3] Such belligerent behaviour should not be tolerated in Wikipedia. If you find "the science people have always been obnoxious, if not hostile, to (you) regarding (your) CAM activities", please ask yourself what you have done to end the hostility, and what you have done to propagate it.

I grew up with herbal medicine (which fixed up my leg when I broke it as a teenager) and I am now studying cell and molecular biology at the university level. I find both conventional medical science and CAM interesting. Can we get back to making interesting Wikipages and stop this silly 'edit war', please ? Sigh .... -- PFHLai 09:12, 2004 Jun 6 (UTC)

Good on you PFHLai. I personally endorse your three suggestions, although I suspect your youthful leg healled itself. Personally, I have had limited contact with John. But overall I have found I have been able to come to aggreements about the rare times I have found a nonPOV comment on a page he holds dear. My main disagreement with John would be the CAM advertising links as articulated by others. Other than that, in my limited dealings I have found him able to do pretty good NPOV. John, my advice is: stay calm - we are not out to get you even though we don't agree with you. (Just to make my views crystal clear, I wouldn't let a CAM practitioner near my cat let alone anyone I new). My view: wikipedia would be poorer if John cops a long suspension. best wishes to all Erich 14:27, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

But John, you really must stop insulting people - especially relative newcomers. Erich 03:43, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Here's my reply to Dr. Gasboy:

Dr. Gasboy, thank you for endorsing my suggestions. I hope Mr-Natural-Health has read them before deleting.

You are right in saying that my leg healed itself. However, I believe the daily application of stinky herbal pastes, plus the massage I got from my "therapist", speeded thing up quite a bit. I will never know why and how, but I won't be surprised if the herbal treatments and massage sessions enhanced the healing capacity of my broken leg. IMHO, while alot of CAM out there are not useful, some may be even detrimental, there will be some CAM that indeed works. (See how we got aspirin from some willow leaves centuries ago ....) It will take a long time for clinicians and scientists to find out what works and what doesn't, and understand the mechanisms of therapeutic actions of those that work. In the meantime, there will be crocks selling quackery to desperate/gullible people, which is very sad, not to mention dangerous to the patient. These crocks give non-conventional medicine a bad name. I was hoping that the CAM Wikiproject could shed some light on these stories and bring us some informative wikipages useful to the general public. Unfortunately, the driving force of that Wikiproject, Mr-Natural-Health has been wasting his time on edit wars lately. As much as he can deny it, his User Contributions the past few days (weeks ?) would clearly indicate that not too many of his recent edits were made to enhance the content of the CAM Wikiproject -- so many edit summaries start with 'rv' or 'remove' ([4].) I agree with you that it would be a loss to Wikipedia if Mr-Natural-Health got booted out. I sincerely hope that Mr-Natural-Health would calm down, find a way to get along with fellow Wikipedians and start building the materials for his Wikipages on various aspects of CAM.

Mr-Natural-Health, I hope you understand that your name-calling and other combative/belligerent behaviour are doing yourself and your good cause a big disservice. I wish you Good Luck at the Arbitration.

-- PFHLai 03:09, 2004 Jun 9 (UTC)

Any chance of you fellas addressing this a little more quickly? I know you're unpaid and everything but he's back in full flow: [5] So any time you can invest in this is time the rest of us can save on the endless task of monitoring his edits. --bodnotbod 23:30, Jun 24, 2004 (UTC)

post decision discussion

Thanks to the AC for making a decision. you've got a tough job and I wouldnt fancy it. My respectful comments are:

• I think it is important that MNH be given a probationary mechanism to express himself. Personally I'd like to see that happen in a month. (dependant on him being able to avoid personal attacks and bullying behaviour) if he remained civil perhaps he could be allowed to suggest revisions on the talk pages? If he misbehaved, it would be one warning then resuspension for a week, doubling each time he was resuspended. just a thought...
• likewise I wonder if offering to proxy edit is necessarily a misdemeanor. see this discussion for the background

best wishes Erich 05:00, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Probation would have to be now, surely? Probation is before a sentence (not "in a month"). And I strongly advise against, since MNH has already had the opportunity to express himself/argue his case.

In fact, MNH expressing himself has been the problem. You might mean parole. But I'm pretty sure that probation is instituted because someone may be felt to see the error of their ways having been foolish or unwitting once. Whereas this is MNH's second censure.

Parole is half about rewarding good behaviour (again, this is the second ban) and half about saving tax payer's money on prison dinners and toiletries (there's no such thing as a prison lunch or bucket in Wikipedia).

What most concerns me now is the 3 months we have to examine precisely which articles need to be edited to remove his influence. And I say that - in all seriousness - because undoubtedly with his scatter gun approach there are times when he hit the right articles with the right content. --bodnotbod 05:26, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

Hi Bod, yes I think you're right - i do mean parole. Erich 06:27, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

An important matter to consider: last time, MNH came back and continued right where he left off, in the same manner, and it took months to stop him. If he comes back in three months and continues in the same manner, is there some way to keep it from taking months to stop him a third time? - David Gerard 09:26, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

well the thing about parole is that you don't need a twelve-peer jury to send you back to jail! Erich 10:55, 26 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Attempts to subvert ruling

[from user talk:Mr-Natural-Health]

Also note that each time you try to subvert this ruling that your ban clock may be reset by the AC. --mav 01:35, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I thought the ban clock was automatically reset. That is how it was handled in Wik's case. Guanaco 01:39, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Last edit attempt: 00:42, 1 Jul 2004, Cyrius blocked #6609 (expires 00:42, 2 Jul 2004) (unblock) (Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Mr-Natural-Health". The reason given for Mr-Natural-Health's block is as follows: "Arbitration Committee ruling".)