User:Wyndallin/Archives/HPA1

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Harassment (policy in the works)

Comment on this on my talk page.

Definition of Harassment

In Canada, harassment is commonly accepted as "...as any incident of abuse or threat directed against an individual, group or institution."

In Australia, harassment is commonly accepted as "...unwelcome verbal or written comments, conduct, or gestures directed toward an individual or group of individuals that the harasser knows, or should reasonably be expected to know, is insulting, intimidating, humiliating, malicious, degrading or offensive."

In the United Kingdom, harassment is commonly accepted as "...unwanted conduct which has the purpose or effect of violating the victim’s dignity and of creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment."

In the USA, harassment is commonly accepted as, "a person engag[ing] in a course of conduct or repeatedly commit[ting] acts which alarm or seriously annoy such other person and would serve no legitimate purpose."

Furthermore, Wikipedia has a few articles on the subject.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harassment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harassment_by_computer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_abuse

Opinions

Cyberbob240 and I asked Zaruthustra for his opinion, and here is how he feels harassment is defined: "To deliberately pester or annoy in a willful and systematic fashion, so that it cannot be reasonably ignored."

Author Opinions:
Cyberbob240: Harassment is "any action or set of actions designed to cause insult, embarrassment or harm to another person or group, that cannot be reasonably ignored."

Wyndallin: I define harassment as "any persistent behavior that promotes hostility, is unwanted in nature, is difficult to avoid, and may or may not necessarily be directly abusive."

Proposed Wiki Definition

Harassment is any behavior, whether percieved by the harasser as 'just' or not, which:

• both cannot be ignored within the boundaries of reasonable behavior, and
• impedes a person's enjoyment of the wiki through edits, statements or responses, and in addition, either:
  • causes embarassment or personal insult to any member of the wiki, or
  • defames a person or group in an unconfirmable or blatantly untrue manner.

Clarifications

• Reasonable behavior includes, but is not limited to:
  • Avoiding the Talk Pages and Group Pages of people that offend you.
  • Removing, instead of responding to, comments placed on your Talk Page which offend you.

Repeatedly commenting on someone's Talk Page when they have expressed that they do not wish you to do so would be considered harassment.

Procedures

• When a person feels they have been harassed, they obtain a link to the edit (from the History of the page).
• Then, they create a new Case on the Moderation/Harassment page. This Case will be a new section at the bottom of the page, with Complainant vs. Accused in the title (as the Arbitration page works now). In this case, they will post the evidence as to the harassment. They must make one non-inflammatory comment as to why the harassment is, in fact, harassment.
• A Moderator will rule as to whether the Case would be Harassment, Non-Harassment, or a False Accusation, in the eyes of a reasonable person.
  • If the Case is deemed to be Harassment, the Accused will be called upon to defend themselves.
    • If the Accused cannot defend himself in one edit, responding to the concerns of the Complainant to the satisfaction of the Moderator, a Harassment warning will be issued.
  • If the Case is deemed to be Non-Harassment, it will be dismissed and the Accused will not be required to take any action.
  • If the Case is deemed to be a False Accusation, the Case will proceed to the False Accusations subsection.
• Regardless of the outcome, the Case will be deleted from the Moderation/Harassment page.

False Accusations

A 'False Accusation' will be deemed to have been made when:

• it is demonstrable that the Complainant is aware that the Case is not actually harassment under the wiki definition, and
• does not retract it within twelve hours of making the Case.

When a False Accusation is confirmed, the Moderator will warn the Complainant. A False Accusation warning is worth half of a Harassment warning; when accumulated at the same levels as the harassment violations, will earn the same punishments with the exception of the 'warning for harassment'.

For example, a Complainant who has made three False Accusations has received three formal warnings from Moderators. Upon another False Accusation (their fourth), the Complainant will receive the first temporary ban, as if they had committed two incidences of harassment.

Reasoning

The reasoning behind this is that if some counterbalance is not put in place for the use of this policy, harassment will be committed through the very policy intended to prevent it.

Punishments

First Violation
Warning for Harassment.

Second Violation
Temp-ban lasting no less than three days, and no longer than one week, at Moderator's discretion, depending on the severity of harassment.

Third Violation
Temp-ban lasting no less than two weeks and no longer than one month, at Moderator's discretion, depending on the severity of harassment.

Fourth Violation
Permanent ban.

Addendum

• If this is ratified, Moderation/Vandal_Data will be moved to Moderation/User_Data and will also be the page where Harassment warnings are reported.
• Three members of the community, on an entirely voluntary basis, will be promoted to Moderator status on the condition that the only abilities they have are to rule on Cases, and ban when appropriate. Use of any other Moderator ability would be Misconduct, and would result in de-modding and a three day tempban.
• Moderators will not be permitted to rule on Cases in which they are personally involved. Doing so would be considered Misconduct on the part of the Moderator.
• Moderators would be expected to work through the list in a descending order, following the First In, First Out system.
• This policy could potentially work in tandem with the Arbitration system, with harassment having to move through the Arbitration system first.

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-Wyndallin 13:20, 23 April 2006 (BST)

-Cyberbob240^{CDF - Arb - W!} 13:20, 23 April 2006 (BST)

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