RuneScape:Requests for adminship/Joeytje50

Joeytje50
First Nomination

Second Nomination

I'm nominating Joey for adminship because he is an active countervandal in a time where we don't have as many. He has also proven himself as a valuable member for maintenance, and giving him the sysop rights would allow him to do this more easily and quickly. His time on the wiki may not have been the easiest, but I believe it has made Joey better because of it. He isn't perfect and has said a few things that will haunt him, but he can be trusted to use the tools.

''I accept this nomination for adminship. I have read the policies concerning administrators. I realise that this nomination may fail. If I do get community consensus, I promise not to abuse my tools because I realise that this is a serious offence. If the community finds that I have done so, my tools will be revoked, and in extreme cases I could be given a community ban. Signed,'' 21:49, January 29, 2012 (UTC).

Questions for the nominee
1. What administrative work do you intend to take part in?

I think I would mainly be blocking vandals and deleting pages when necessary. Also, because I know quite a lot of coding, I will be editing the MediaWiki namespace when necessary. Because I would be one of the few admins active during UTC midday, I would likely be dealing with a lot of antivandalism and requests on the wiki itself, Special:Chat and IRC.

2. What are your best contributions to the RuneScape Wiki, and why?

I think my best contributions are the images I made when I had my computer with AA on it, and my antivandalism. I keep an eye on the recent changes whenever I am on, reverting vandalism when needed.

'''3. Have you been in any conflicts over editing in the past or have other users caused you stress? How have you dealt with it and how will you deal with it in the future?'''

I haven't had any problems on the wiki itself for a long time now, but I did have a conflict about the 9/11 attacks with a few other users on IRC last September. I said some things I shouldn't have. I realise that I offended these users, and learned from that mistake I made 5 months ago.

3.1 A more detailed explaination of the conflicts I had on this wiki The first summer after I started editing here, I got in a conflict with Degenret01. It started with me telling Dead evil84, who was creating articles in a very fast rate, that he should not make more then 5 edits a minute to prevent filling up the RecentChanges too much. Degen replied to me about this, and because I left that message just to help, with good intentions, so I replied to degen. This got us in this discussion. Because Degen kept ignoring me, his only reply was higly sarcastic and all other people who were involved were mocking me or telling me I was totally wrong, I kept getting angrier. When Degen archived without replying again I had no idea what I could do to reach him and just talk to him, so I decided to put spam on his talk page. This got reverted, then people left messages about it on my talk, and then Andorin blocked me for 3 days. I asked Ajraddatz via Special:EmailUser and his talk page on my wiki to unblock me, and he decreased it to 1 day.

Like I have said a lot before already, I know I shouldn't have become that angry, and I should have taken a break before it got as far as me spamming him and getting blocked. I know apologising doesn't make anything right, but I did learn from it and I didn't get this angry again. The reason why I did it was because I felt mocked and I didn't know anything else I could do. Since that moment, I have changed a lot, and if a case like this would ever occur again, I would step out of the situation for a moment before continuing.

The next major conflict I had was Forum:De-op Andorin from IRC. There, the main problem was that I didn't drop the subject in the discussion on IRC when I was told to by others, and kept going. After that, I talked to Megan and she convinced me to make the thread. I did, because I thought what Andorin did was wrong (it was a situation like the one that caused Forum:RS:IRC and the impersonation rule, other than in that case it wasn't one user against others, but the other way around). I know I should have a personal opinion instead of listening to what others say and then just do that because they asked, and then I learned that I should reconsider things others tell me to do before I do it. I know saying this might make you think the fact I still have contact with Megan is indeed a threat to the wki, but I learned from the mistake I made with the de-op forum, and I saw the result. I won't do it again, and reconsider things with the policies of the wiki before doing it.

Then there was Forum:Patrolling pages. I suggested this major change to the wiki's systems, and when Soldier replied, he was talking about something that wasn't my proposal (he acted like I wanted a kind of change that would make it easier to find an admin creating spam pages). I replied, and Soldier told me he did understand what my proposal was. Then there was some more discussion where we both completely missed each other's points, while further down the thread was a lot more discussion. I kept replying to people's comments with replies that didn't explain what I meant well enough, and I saw an increasing amount of people who didn't understand what I meant, talking about something that wasn't what I proposed. Because of that, the situation kept getting more heated up and in the end I withdrew it. In that thread, I should have stayed calmer and took more time to explain myself, and try to understand what exactly others were asking. After this thread, I haven't had cases like this anymore, and when people disagreed with me, I didn't jump on it like I did in that thread.

The next conflict I had was the one in IRC about 9/11. I admit I shouldn't have said people were "herp derping" about the deaths, and after I realised that, seeing people tell me to stop, I stopped talking about it. Cook and Liquid kept on arguing about it, while I had already dropped it. The next day, I was browsing the imgur gallery, and found a couple of images related to 9/11. I posted one in the channel as a joke, and made another joke about it after that. After a while, Evil posted my line "or r u such a merkan who mourns about this one thingy that happened 10 years ago too" again in the chat to comment on something else (apparently related to it), and Warthog got angry. I posted some more images about 9/11 in the chat, and then Warthog got angrier. I think in the chat that followed, I only compared the 9/11 attacks in a quite reasonable way, staying calm. It can be argued about if I am right or not saying what I said there, but that is not what this discussion is about. In conclusion of this, I admit I should not have said the things I have said in such an insensitive way, but I think the reaction the others had to that (this and the reaction of Warthog to that one thing I said) made the situation a lot worse than it would be if we would all stay calm. In the future I will watch the way I say things more carefully. 18:23, January 30, 2012 (UTC)

Additional questions (asked by the community if necessary)
Joey, besides seeing you as an inspiration to image-makers like me, and being a very understanding person in times of distress, you are a perfect candidate. But besides those, in your opinion, what makes you significantly different from other active users within our community? -- 22:40, January 29, 2012 (UTC)
 * I think the biggest difference between other active users and me is my experience in different languages that can be used on the wiki. I've made quite a few complicated templates and scripts in my time here, and I think my experience would be useful in the MediaWiki namespace and AbuseFilters too. 12:22, January 30, 2012 (UTC)

Discussion
Support - As the bringer of life to this thread to eat this poor man's soul. 21:46, January 29, 2012 (UTC)

Support - Not having been really active on the wiki when the last Rfa took place, I think joey has come a long way from what I read about in the last rfa to what I see from him today. For me, the #1 most important question that I always ask myself before responding to any rfa/rfcm is can this user be trusted with the tools?. I think that he can be, and has demonstrated that time and time again in his contributions to the wiki. 22:25, January 29, 2012 (UTC)

Oppose - You're a good editor and you've been around for a while and you know how things work around here. However, you are much less active than you were when you did your last two RfAs, and there are a few things that worry me. I know you mentioned the 9/11 conversation in answering your question, but saying something like "amg I so mad so many people died herp derp derp" is so out of line I don't really know how to respond to it. It's also problematic because you've said you changed before September. You can't just keep saying you've changed, screw up, and then a month later say you've changed again. Maybe you said that because Megan was there, which brings me to my second point -- I am nervous that your continued friendship with Megan could cause some harm to the wiki. She may be the worst thing to happen to this wiki in the last year, and the fact that you still talk to her (and paste logs of IRC to her) not only makes me question your judgment, but it also would keep me up at night wondering whether she managed to get you to do something stupid on the wiki; I can't really trust you. I'm not sure whether it's proper for me to take your personal relationships into account here (and I'm sure you don't want your RfA to end up being about Megan), but I think it's something that needs to be addressed. Feel free to respond to this if you want to. 22:31, January 29, 2012 (UTC)
 * Thought about it some more, changed to oppose. I had forgotten about some of the more recent things like the CheckUsers thread Proof brought up. 00:19, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, I am less active in general on the wiki than last year, but I am not less active in antivandalism. My editcount goes up less quickly because I don't make images anymore because my computer doesn't have AA. That doesn't mean I am less active on the wiki, or do less antivandalism. I'm still as active in those things than I was back then. About that 9/11 incident, I think everyone who was involved wasn't at his best. That happens, everyone has his moments where it doesn't go that well, and I wasn't the only one who was being less mature at that moment. I already said I agree I should not have said those things like I said it, but I don't see why this one off-site incident should affect this RfA so badly. Like I said, everyone makes mistakes, admins included. Also, doesn't the fact you can only think of one case where I was being immature since my previous RfA mean that in those 7 months I made one mistake, and that I haven't made any mistakes for over 5 months now? If being mature for over 5 months isn't enough to show that I am ready for this, what is? I can't change the past, but I can show you these 5 and a half months I have been mature enough.
 * About your point of me still talking to Megan regularly, I think that argument holds no weight at all. Why would contact with users in private ever affect anything on the wiki. I can think by myself well enough not to blindly do what someone else says, and the fact I talk to Megan doesn't mean that makes me any less trustworthy. What I do in my time, completely seperated from the wiki, has nothing to do with the wiki, so I don't see how this would have anything to do with this RfA. 09:51, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * Just wanted to add to the point about Megan. I also talk to her regulary and she knows that I am administrator at the cod wiki but she has not tried to do anything to the wiki via me. 12:07, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * The problem with the 9/11 isn't so much the content of the argument, but the timing. You tell everyone all the time that you've changed and that you aren't the person you were before. You've said that a lot before what happened in September, and quite a bit since. It's clear to me that you hadn't changed between your second RfA and September (even though you've said time and time again that you have), so why should I believe you've changed in the last five months? You've screwed up too many times in that regard for me to assume good faith here. I am also still not happy with your answer to question three; while it's extensive, you're still blaming everyone else more than you're taking responsibility for what you did.
 * As for what happened with Megan, I need some more evidence before I say anything concrete about it. 21:28, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * In my 3 RfAs I have been doing what people suggested me to do. They sait it would be best to bring up those conflicts, and apologise for my behavior. I did that 3 times, but when Liquid asked me to give a more detailed explaination, I decided to say everything I know and think about it, about experiences during the conflicts and what I think of them when looking back.
 * Indeed, I do blame others for making mistakes in the conflicts I mentioned too. And they did. You can't say I was the only one who made mistakes in those. Indeed, I did make some big mistakes, but if the admins I had conflicts with (all of those conflicts were with admins) would have been at least as mature as everyone in here expects me to be, the conflicts wouldn't get as bad as they did now (an exception is the conflict with the de-op Andorin thread, where I admit I should definetely have dropped the subject a lot earlier, but in the other conflicts I had this does apply). In all of those conflicts I had, I learned something, and I changed my behavior after them to prevent such situations from happening again.
 * If you want more evidence, Megan still has contact with ZamorakO_o (RSW admin), N7 (CODW admin) and Xd1358 (Wookieepedia admin). Neither of them had any problems with Megan doing any harm to the wiki they're admin at through them. I think Megan is more of a threat agains people she dislikes than people she does like, as she wouldn't DDoS me if I refuse to do something I don't want to do, while she could (and did, once on CODW) DDoS admins she dislikes if they refuse to do something for her. My friendship with her can't possibly do any harm to this wiki. 10:19, January 31, 2012 (UTC)

Support - I think Joey is very helpful and responsible. He brings the wiki (mainly chat though) back to life when it's dead. I think that he can be trusted with the tools, and the caek. I wish you liked ponies though. 22:38, January 29, 2012 (UTC)

Neutral - Not really happy with your answer to the third question. How have you changed? I see no evidence other than your statement that you have changed. Also, in reference to the 9/11 incidents, the first time you may not have started it, but the second time the next day you defiently did, making jokes about the incident happening, which to me isn't really the sort of thing I'd really want to see in an admin 22:39, January 29, 2012 (UTC)
 * Changed to Weak oppose - As proofreader pointed out, you have been using unconstructive comments such as "hurr" and "durr", as well as the occasional "tl;dr". I took a stand against another admin who used comments such as that. That does not really show maturity, nor is it necessary 23:20, January 29, 2012 (UTC)

Oppose - I've been reading this over, and the thing I was most interested in seeing was a reflection of how you've changed since you blew up and were blocked for it. Then, there's Forum:Patrolling pages (which I believe was cited on the previous RfAs), among other things, in which you displayed quite a hostile attitude.

In your second RfA, you said you've learned to stay calm and changed a lot during the last two months (which would be the time period from roughly mid-April to mid-June of last year at the time of writing). For a bit, I was able to believe that, as you were fairly calm and professional in your conduct. However, then the 9/11 episode came along, and, there's no other way to put it, I was absolutely disgusted by your conduct. It was exactly the same type of behavior that I've seen previously on the crap page and on the Patrolling pages forum. You've said that you've changed in the last RfA, but yet here we are again with another one of those episodes. Have you really changed that much?

The last point I'd like to make is that I'm severely unimpressed by the answers you've given to Question 3 (the one about conflicts) in all three of your RfAs. For someone who's had a history like yours, who's been blocked (a serious block) for it, you should know better than to just act like it never happened. I was expecting a more thorough explanation. For comparison, Ajr didn't even do that much and he wrote a much better explanation. Your explanations above make me feel like you are trying to dodge the issue, which does not exactly make me feel comfortable about trust.

I may change my opinion later, if I feel a satisfactory explanation has been given, but as of now, I will have to oppose. 22:47, January 29, 2012 (UTC)
 * I am fairly disappointed at the quality of the response given. I must agree with what Cook said, and hence will affirm my opposition. 03:37, February 1, 2012 (UTC)

Neutral - Per Cook. However, if you continue to demonstrate that you have improved and that you can handle the responsibilities and tools that come with being an admin, then I'll definitely support you next time. Good luck, Joey. 22:53, January 29, 2012 (UTC)

Weak support - Your image contributions and counter-vandalism work, as well as your work for the site in general such as Forum:Calculators in infoboxes and bringing my attention to Forum:Filenames so I could attempt a file move bot, are a great asset to the wiki. You can contribute very well, as well as get others to contribute very well. However, I have a few bones to pick.

Using "herp", "derp", "durr" etc. in edit summaries for reverting edits made by other editors is not very editor-friendly. I would suggest using more relevant edit summaries that accurately describe the reason for undoing an edit, or just "undid revision" or "reverted edits". (I understand that you can rage at your own edits and curse at yourself, though.)

You get angry at people on forum threads far too easily it seems, holding some grudges and/or sometimes answering in an uncivil manner. Since your last RFA nomination, I have only seen one example; I don't know if there are more. Otherwise, your Yew Grove behaviour is good.

I have not seen your contributions to Special:Chat as I almost never visit it.

These arguments average to a weak support. 23:04, January 29, 2012 (UTC)
 * Regarding 3.1:
 * Then there was Forum:Patrolling pages.
 * That one seems more like a genuine misunderstanding, though the argument did get heated. It was also in March 2011.
 * I don't know enough about the other conflicts to change my position. 18:47, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * About the summaries, I haven't heard anyone complain about it before, so I didn't realise people thought that makes the wiki look less friendly. I will use your feedback to change, and I won't use such summaries again. I hope everyone who used that argument considers that in their comments. 21:48, January 30, 2012 (UTC)

Weak Support - Have seen some cases where it would be helpful, nothing other than that. 23:37, January 29, 2012 (UTC)

Oppose - Initially, I would have supported this RfA, citing your maturity since your previous RfA in June. However, I was recently told about the 9/11 IRC incident as well as your private conversations with Megan. It's good that you acknowledge that what you said was in the wrong, and offensive, but your attitude during the incident was a little concerning. I'm not sure if in future, if multiple users disagree with you and get offended, whether you would respond like you did during the IRC incident, or with more maturity. Then there's the usage of "herp", "derp", "hurr", etc. which doesn't amount to maturity at all. You pretty much tick the boxes in everything else though, you have shown a need for "the tools" and I believe you are active enough. If you can show us that you can be reasonably mature without occasionally displaying behaviour such as 9/11, that's everything I look for in a potential sysop; I can be certain of supporting you next time. 00:04, January 30, 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, but I can't support this request. There has been too much of a pattern of behaviour going on here, and no real signs of long-term improvement to the qualities that I'd like to see in an admin. Per above. 00:53, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * To expand on my vote, the 9/11 incident isn't something that really concerns me. People here often express opinions, political and otherwise, and that isn't a bad thing. Insensitive means different things to different people, and so long as comments like that aren't being displayed on-wiki, we shouldn't be attacking them. As an example, the Christian vs atheist arguments come up quite often on IRC with both admins and non-admins. I agree he could have dropped it, but he is also entitled to his opinion. 20:12, January 30, 2012 (UTC)

Support - From what I can see from irc (and stalking yo cvn) Joey would really benifit from the tools administrator brings. 12:07, January 30, 2012 (UTC)

Support - A great inspiration, very sociable, and gets the job done. -- 15:26, January 30, 2012 (UTC)

Oppose - Per my 9/11 incident evidence, you will NEVER be an admin until you lose that kind of attitude. You're meant to be representing the wiki, and acting like a complete idiot cabbage, just like the troll cabbage that is now banned from the irc, is not going to help your chances. 19:38, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * Let's be nice. 19:48, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * Ok :( 23:10, January 31, 2012 (UTC)

Comment - Just to be clear, please specify whether or not you're attaching CC admin to this. 21:12, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * And IRC op. 21:22, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * And the highlight 11:15, January 31, 2012 (UTC)
 * CC admin: no, I am not active enough for any need of any higher rank than recruit in CC; IRC op: yes, but there isn't a rule that admins don't get it if they don't mention it, which is why I didn't say anything specifically about it; Highlight: no, per my comments on the threads that discussed highlights. 12:19, January 31, 2012 (UTC)

Oppose - I may not edit here much anymore, but I do check RfAs and the Yew Grove every day in case I see something that I can add my two cents two (and occasionally recent changes). This is definitely one of those things. I just read what Joey said about 9/11, and I can't think of how else to describe it besides disgusting. And if that wasn't enough, the fact that Joey seems to be trying to play it off here as not such a big deal and "everyone makes mistakes" is unbelievable. I would NEVER trust sysop tools with ANYONE that says something so disgusting. Oh, and Joey, if you haven't figured it out yet, the reason the IRC evidence is carrying so much weight here is because it's a big indicator of your character. And one more thing..we don't like it when people try responding/arguing with everyone that opposes their RfA. Just accept the criticism and watch. You really shouldn't say anything unless someone has a question. 23:05, January 30, 2012 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you shouldn't that assume all of us do not like being replied to in an RfA. As far as I've seen, you are usually the only user who complains when the nominee wishes to place a comment underneath an opinion. Others, such as myself, do not mind further elaborating when given a legitimate counter-argument or understanding that we may not have actually known the entire sequence of an incident. Instead of a blanket "we", which is slightly misleading, please use "yourself" in future. Yes I understand this is not entirely to do with Joeytje50's request, but I hope it is of benefit to him, and for others to know that not all users hate a reply. 05:34, January 31, 2012 (UTC)
 * Seconded what Brains said, plus responding to 2 people isn't "responding/arguing with everyone that opposes". 06:13, January 31, 2012 (UTC)

Comment - I'm not American, nor do I have any irl ties to those who are so I can't say I was particularly emotional regarding 9/11. Yes, my emotional range is exceeded by a teaspoon and apparently my personality type is can come across as insensitive, but even I know there are certain topics you don't touch regardless of who's company you're in. In fairness I do think the responses to your comments were a little over the top, but being detached from such an event will convey that impression. All things considered I'd have to say I was disappointed by such an incident, and I'd hope a lesson in tact was learnt.

The Forum:Patrolling_pages 'incident' I'm not particularly bothered by either. Granted I don't understand quite what the thread is about, but the discussion does seem to imply some sort of tit for tat event, curiously largely with the person who opposed just above me. 02:50, January 31, 2012 (UTC)
 * This isn't a wiki related question, more a chance for me to see how you react to another controversial event 9/11 so I'll put it down here instead. Your reaction? 02:30, February 2, 2012 (UTC)

Oppose - you're still arguing with your opposers. That's not admin-level behaviour. 22:01, January 31, 2012 (UTC)
 * That's just ridiculous. How's a nominee supposed to correct/clarify things someone said then? Per Brains, some of us actually are interested in what the nominee has to say in their defence. 09:58, February 1, 2012 (UTC)

Support - I understand that Joey made some mistakes during his time here, but I feel that he has learned from them, as emphasised in his comments above. Moving on, I feel that he would have tremendous use for these tools, whether it be to block vandals, delete images, or edit locked pages. He's constantly reverting nonconstructive edits, and requesting pages be deleted. Smithing (talk | contribs) 16:45, February 1, 2012 (UTC)

Well - I don't really know what to say. You're a fairly active anti-vandal, and you are one of the few non-administrators who kind of know how to work the abusefilter, and you seem to know quite a bit about the mediawiki framework. There was also a time where I was considering nominating you for adminship (the second time you did an RfA), but I eventually decided to let you nominate yourself and see how it played out. However, in the course of the last few months, I have seen your demonstrated need for the tools decrease considerably. Previously, you were highly active in undoing/reverting vandalism and tagging articles and files for deletion. While you still do this, it is definitely to a lesser extent. Furthermore, your responses are a bit... unsatisfactory. The impression I got was that you grudgingly accept that your actions were wrong. While this is good, it seems to me that you are additionally trying to highlight the fact that other users that were involved with your conflicts were administrators, and therefore the incidents should be glossed over. Sure, not everyone was acting perfectly, but you have to remember that this RfA is solely about judging you and your actions. I do remember these incidents, and I do remember that you attempted to drop it (the 9/11 account) after being given several warnings. Sure, some of the other users continued to yell about how insensitive you were being, but the fact that you were unable to drop it immediately still stands. I'm sure you learned a lesson from this, but we really can't have situations like this being repeated indefinitely. It's not that I don't trust you, I just don't know if you will always be able to react accordingly and make the right judgement call. 17:43, February 1, 2012 (UTC)

Strong support - and you're about to see why. First of all, I will address the most recent incident, and as a warning before you read this, the below is not meant to spark a huge argument about whether 9/11 was bad or not, neither do I have any intention to. My first argument is not opposing that 9/11 was horrible, nor supporting it, but rather discussing Joey's involvement and intent in the argument itself; after all, that's what matters here, even if he was seen as "wrong". Also, as apparently Joey the "fucking idiot" has been using "unconstructive comments" such as tl;dr, please don't be a "fucking idiot" like him and actually read this.

Exhibit A - http://pastebin.com/uXGL30ZF, a chat log on pastebin, referred to before in this RFA, but placed here for even easier reference. Please do not take any account of "Megan and Joey being fucking idiots"; I suspect I might know who wrote that.
 * That would be me... That was written and Pastebinned about 2 minutes after the actual incident. I apologise if I hurt anyone's feelings by breaching RS:UTP, you can always take a rewrite of the whole thing and retitle it if you so please. 00:19, February 4, 2012 (UTC)

I scrolled through all that (read every single bit of it), and my logic below is assuming there were no directly prerequisite small incidents to this, which is entirely plausible due to the fact that the log was precisely cut to match the incident, even going over to the next day, and judging by the title the compiler was very much anti-Joey. What I saw there was very different from what I've heard so far from this argument. First, it wan't Joey's actual intent that sparked the argument; it was his opening sentence that lit the touchpaper. If Joey had phrased that a little better, which I do admit he still needs to work on (but don't we all, e.g. Andorin on my talk, not targeting anyone but using him as an example. For an example of Joey being quite nice and helpful scroll down a couple of sections). From what I gather, the intent wasn't nearly as malicious as the first sentence implied. He did try to calm down the mood after he saw what happened:

Exhibit A.1: (20:50:10)  are you seriously suggesting that they should have died? (20:50:14)  = way worse death (20:50:20)  no of course not

Now, if Helm and Cook (very important - this is not a flame of them) were peacekeepers who tried to calm down the argument, then they would have realised that swearing and slagging wouldn't be the best thing to put there:

Exhibit A 1.1: (20:51:06)  that was one of the most dickish things I've ever heard you say. (20:51:56)  herp derp Joey don't be such an insensitive prick. (20:53:19)  and if you want to be an insensitive dick, then go do it somewhere else. (20:53:26)  +1 (20:53:31)  Gas: I completely agree it is terrible this happened (20:53:39)  So shut up about it. (20:53:45)  just not so terrible to go herp derp about it every year again (20:53:58)  You'd feel a fucking bit differently if your friends had been in those buildings.

And blatantly ignoring all the constructive comments that do in fact follow the "peacekeeper" cause, e.g.

Exhibit A 1.2 (20:54:34) <@Gaz> could we not just drop it (20:57:57)  stop trolling each other, and shut up (20:58:12)  let's get back to RS wiki stoof (20:58:17)  and fite teh vandles  (21:01:02) <@Gaz> y u no stfu

They carried on escalating the argument, going further with "Dutch assholes". Now, if somebody called me a "Russian asshole" (and if I knew they meant it), then I would be pretty offended and the chances of me "blowing up" with a similar comment back would have spiked. Joey, however, kept his cool, despite a comment that matched the intent of his initial argument. This is very much converse to the ridiculous amount of "Choleric" stuff I've heard about Joey and about him being a bomb waiting to explode, or "blow up", wording more commonly used to describe him by others. Now, over to one of the things I would not say in this case, which is, frankly, quite ridiculous:

Exhibit A 1.3: (21:01:16)  I'll shut up if Joey leaves us in peace.

Joey replied by simply stating that he hasn't spoken for 3 minutes. He dropped the argument very soon, while Helm did not:

Exhibit A 1.4: (21:06:55) <Joeytje50> but difference is (21:07:07) <Joeytje50> I dropped it when 5 people told me in this channel (21:07:12) <Joeytje50> now 6 people tell you to do it (21:07:14) <Joeytje50> and you keep going Now, I could go into a very deep analysis of the rest of the chat log, which would give everyone a perfect excuse to tl;dr this. I would now like to go on to my second argument, stating Joey's importance and help to the wiki.

Exhibit B - My talk page. Note: this is a personal example only, i.e. only outlining the argument using me as an example.

I actually believe the people reading this would have not difficulty finding more "Exhibits", and contrary to my love of sourcing, I will leave that all to you. What I would like to say here is that Joey is an unaggressive and helpful editor, who knows what he's doing to say the least.

Example - Recently he has actually been flamed by me for changing his avatar from the long-lived helm of neitiznot avatar, which became a trademark/figurehead and even a cliché of Joey, to the santa hat, which is his more common choice of headgear nowadays. I messaged him on his talk page, effectively mirroring what happened in IRC with 9/11 - one intent and a different interpretation emphasis; albeit obviously on a smaller scale. What I said sounded very malicious (at least I thought it did) and would have definitely provoked a serious response from me had someone said the above to me. I then went on to pester him in chat about that, with similarly malicious comments. Guess what? Joey is probably thinking (if he managed to read up to this point) something along the lines of "What on earth is he talking about?". That's because, contrary to the image (and now a stereotype of him among the ungrateful in our community) of him being immature and even autistic, he'd calmly replied to my comments, and forgot all about this.

Incidentally, he was the user who welcomed me to this wiki, which brings me on to my next point. He is by far the most active welcomer, and he is a very active antivandal, having beaten me and many other users on reverting repeatedly. He would be able to do a lot more with the tools, not to mention his proficiency with CSS and JavaScript code, e.g. helping other users with their own .css and .js pages (which is one of the minor ways his skills can be used). I haven't even mentioned stuff like this.

Exhibit C - User:Karlis/A_message to the community

The message I'm trying to deliver lies mainly in the bottom section of Karlis's argument. What I'm saying here is that we should stop being pedantic and leave the past in the past - the more often we bring something bad that happened in the past up, the more bad memories we get, the more anger, agitation, tension, sadness and annoyance. I got scammed for 13m in RuneScape. I try not to bring that up because whenever I do, I get really upset and annoyed. And so far, I have tried my best to avoid entering the argument of whether 9/11 is "bad" or not, but the above goes for that as well - if my family member died in there, I wouldn't commemorate, but on the contrary, try to forget about it. And there is some truth to that: my father's brother (uncle) was there and saw it with his own eyes. Some would say he is scarred for life; I would say he is trying as hard as he can to forget. I could mention several family links to the Soviet army in the second world war, being in which is definitely more life-scarring and horrifying than any terrorist attack (I'm treading on thin ice here, I think I'll stop now). We should forgive and forget (to an extent of course). If, and this will almost definitely not happen, Joey abuses his powers, they can be stripped.

If this were a speech, you would all be bored to death by this so far. I could double the size of my text wall, however I believe that I already doubled the size of this page anyway, that my point has been made and that this is quite enough, but do bear in mind that this is just part of my case for him, and out of all people on the wiki he should be sysopped next, as he is a contributor who has been around for a while, knows his way around the community and knows what he's doing. Give him another chance. Peace. <Wow - no edit conflict> 22:07, February 3, 2012 (UTC)
 * My only argument is, this isn't an isolated incident, this user has had multiple concerning conflicts over time, and whilst you may claim that the damage is tiny and what not, does that mean that people such as myself become good candidates for RfAs? I don't think so. 00:19, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * Don't have time to write a textwall of this magnitude right now, so I'll just respond to some individual points:


 * No, Joey wasn't the only one at fault with the 9/11 incident. I don't think anyone is claiming that he was. However, he and Megan were the ones who fanned the flames in the first place, and the responses were in-kind. The entire RfA does not rest on this particular incident; it's merely the latest one (that I am aware of) that shows the continuation of his pattern of behavior. Attempting to partially debunk the argument by saying that other people were acting poorly, or that Joey tried to drop it after 20 minutes, doesn't really fly with me. Under no circumstances is saying "amg I so mad so many people died herp derp derp" acceptable to me, especially when it was completely unprovoked. It's not a problem with the phrasing.
 * No one is arguing that Joey isn't good at countervandalism, doesn't help people, or doesn't know his way around JavaScript. That's not the reason people are opposing (although he is considerably less active than he used to be). People like Parsonsda and Cakemix were also good editors, but they had maturity and attitude problems like Joey does. In this case we have to decide whether what he does in the positive makes the risks of sysopping him worth it. In my estimation, it doesn't.
 * I can't tell you how much I disagree with Karlis' quote there, and I hope it doesn't end up being de facto policy. I think it's ridiculous to say that we should support candidates who are not ready for adminship, so things can be more "pleasant". I also would strongly disagree with the notion that out of all of the editors here he should be the next one to be sysopped; there are plenty of very strong, active potential candidates who don't have the problems he does. 00:48, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * Joey lit the touchpaper, you poured oil on it. 16:50, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * You can hardly turn Joey into a victim here. 20:58, February 4, 2012 (UTC)

Weak Support-ish - Let me preface this by saying that Joey is a very helpful person, who I've never seen try to harm the wiki. He's been nothing but friendly and helpful to me since I met him. He's made many good scripts that I actively use, and has helped me with coding issues on several different occasions.

However, I realize that he can be immature. He's said he's worked on it numerous times before, but then the 9/11 incident happened. What I would've liked to seen on Q3 was you taking responsibility for it; just saying that you screwed up. Instead, you more or less say "it's not my fault, I wasn't the only one." That's really not what I like to see. Yes, it wasn't smart of you to say those things, and you probably regret it, but it happened and you need to deal with the fallout. You're going to need to learn to take responsibility for shit that's happened, and not try to find a way out of it.

I am pretty sure that you can be trusted with the tools. While you do get into some heated arguments with people (very very heated arguments), I couldn't imagine you blocking them out of frustration or other misuses of the tools. I would have supported you, but on your last RfA you said that immature incidents wouldn't happen anymore, yet they did. I don't quite oppose you, because you could use them well, but I also can't really support you. 22:50, February 3, 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, I do admit I have done some things terribly wrong, but what I put in the 3.1 section of my answers is what I think what went wrong in those incidents. I do admit, I did indeed do a lot of things wrong, but I wasn't the only one who did things wrong. I did indeed do a lot of things I shouldn't have done, and that is completely my fault. I do not say it wasn't my fault because I wasn't the only one. I am still just as wrong, no matter what the others did. What I am saying is just that if the others would have stayed calmer. Again, it's still my own fault, but that's what I meant. Not that I wasn't wrong because others were involved. 14:09, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * Joey's right. Per Chess below, and per me above, his line was not the only major factor in the explosion in IRC; it was also due to Liquid and Cook's response. I'm not saying that Joey has the right to pop into IRC, say some shit and then imply it's not his fault because somebody said "Fuck off"; rather, I am saying that his initial argument wasn't that malicious on its own, however the fact that Cook and Liquid responded with swearing, flaming (and Joey wasn't flaming) was (apparently) the perfect environment for Joey to explode like he did before (from what I've heard so far from you guys), however he kept his cool, and in about 5 minutes the opposition was fuelling the fire while Joey sat in silence. Again, per Chess, I think that shows a mature side of him. Someone immature would have carried on arguing and trying to get his point across. Per Karlis's message (which I'm not saying is a policy, just food for thought), adminship is not be a huge deal, and it shouldn't be. Administrators can stop people from editing and delete pages. If an administrator goes rogue, it literally takes 1 minute for another admin to reverse all his actions and even to block him if possible/required. If Joey abuses his powers, they can be stripped in a matter of seconds, and I'm sure, with that at risk, he will think twice before stepping on thin ice. Right? @#$%^& conflict  15:00, February 4, 2012 (UTC)

Weak Oppose - If the admin flags only covered technical aspects like locking and deleting pages then I'd be ok with you having these flags, since you know your way around everything pretty well. However, from the many links above and from dealings I've had elsewhere (inb4 RuneScape:Off-site), while you may have learned some lessons I can't say we'd know how you'd react to any future obstacles. Like Nex said, I couldn't imagine you blocking opponents in an argument out of frustration (from experience you tend to leave instead), but there's the worry something else may happen that could end up warranting further discussion. Simply put, intentionally or not, you're far too easy to flame and are far, far, far too defensive, and so I wouldn't be comfortable with you as an admin on the community side of things. 00:59, February 4, 2012 (UTC)

Oppose for now - Per discussions above. I think you're really cool, I enjoy conversations with you, but seeing the 9/11 threads, and learning more about things I didn't know about, has made me think a little differently, not about you, but about you being an administrator on this Wiki. I've no doubt you'd be a fantastic choice for technical operations of this Wiki, as you're definitely experienced in that field, but on the community side of things, like people above me have said, you're not quite ready to assume a position like this, and neither am I. I, personally, noting how keen you are on proving that you've changed since the 9/11 chat logs were taken, and other off-wiki things (also inb4 RuneScape:Off-site), I suggest you prove it to us. Give it a few months, prove you can be calm, mature, and not get yourself into situations like the ones posted above, and stay cool, and I'm sure many of the people who've opposed you on this RfA will support. I know I will. I'll admit I'm not ready for an RfA, and won't be anytime soon, and I have things to work on, so do you. So does everyone else here. Don't take offence to the postings here, take them as constructive criticism, and before you know it, you mught just get what you want. Good luck. 04:35, February 4, 2012 (UTC)

Support - I think we all agree that he would actively use the tools, so I'll only elaborate on him being 'unstable'. From what I can tell, the only recent example of this is the 9/11 issue. However, I strongly disagree that this issue shows his immaturity, he was only stating his opinion that you should not mourn after people after 10 years has passed with absolutely no intention of trolling or flaming. However, it quickly turned into flaming by other users (who I'm not blaming, they were just sensitive on the issue) even though Joey stopped. In my honest opinion, stopping quickly in order to avoid a flamewar shows maturity rather than immaturity. All the other incidents mentioned in this thread happened AGES ago, and I find it somewhat ridiculous to use them as arguments at this point. Also, I disagree that his friendship with Megan is relevant to this discussion. He isn't going to just go block everyone because Megan told him to. Oh, and one last thing: if he were to abuse his powers in any way, we can easily strip him off his powers. I think the opposers are making a way too big deal out of adminship here, it is just some extra powers. Just my two cents, 13:55, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you, Chess. At least someone either understands or agrees with my point (or both). 14:00, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * Just posting this, but people can disagree with your points regardless of how large a paragraph you write. For instance, if he gets powers and abuses them we could easily strip him/replace what was broken, but then again, why give him those things in the first place if such a thing were at all brought into question? I admit, I don't know enough about Joey to make a personal decision, and while there's ample evidence on both sides of the argument, I refuse to support or oppose since I barely remember or have experienced anything of Joey. That being said, please don't shortchange those that disagree with your points, as just about every point made here has been quite valid. It's not fair to other posters. 14:54, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not shortchanging. Your first sentence was talking to me like a mother would talk to her arrogant 6 year old kid explaining how not everything is as he wants. I do realise that people can and will disagree, which is why I a) wrote a textwall and b) thanked Chess. 16:19, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * I think it's clear that neither Bluefire2 nor me believe that Joey will abuse his tools. The part where we said he can be stripped off his powers if he abuses them constitutes a significantly minor part of our support, and sadly, you seem to have ignored the rest. 16:24, February 4, 2012 (UTC)
 * First of all, posting via phone so excuse any errors. Secondly, I think we all need to relax a bit. I know construing meaning from something written online is difficult, and I fully admit I may not have worded my last post properly or well enough to get my point and meaning across. I had no intention of ruffling your feathers about writing a wall of text; is seemed to me that by commenting 'at least somebody...', you were throwing an underhanded jab at anyone who dared to oppose your viewpoints. As to my example, that is me playing Devil's Advocate and using a simple counterargument - if the discussion of whether or not we can strip a potential admin of powers even comes up in a rfa, that person may not need admin in the first place. Please note that's not my personal thoughts, but something that but someone else who opposes could say. Regardless, what happened here is most likely a disconnect on both our parts in terms of understanding and making clear what we say, for which I apologize. I also am hopped up on meds, and didn't think to double check what I posted for clarity. 17:42, February 4, 2012 (UTC)