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Fastily

Petition set to expire on 12:40, 4 December 2024 (UTC)

Fastily (talk · contribs · they/them)

Links for Fastily: Fastily (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi)

Please keep discussion constructive and civil.

Numerated (#) signatures in the "Signatures" section may only be placed by editors with an extended confirmed account. All other comments are welcome in the "Discussion" section.

Signatures

per WP:ADMINACCT.
In the ongoing ANI thread, it's been demonstrated that Fastily has a history of using their admin powers to remove drafts they believe have been created by editors with a conflict of interest. While it's true that many of these subjects are non-notable, or the draft is so poorly written as to be eligible for a G11, Fastily has instead chosen to decline G11s, bypass our normal methods of deletion for questionable userspace content and use the vague, one could say slightly opaque and unquestionable, U5. In fact, since regaining their tools in 2016 they have rarely if ever used anything but U5. While this isn't really a big deal (we all have slightly different ways of interpreting the CSD criteria), their response when other people ask them about it,(you're wasting your time[1]) or ask them to be more precise in their deletions, is concerning.

Fastily has made clear that they believe the ends justify the means. Or, to use their own words Sure, I could edit the exact reasons, but that wouldn't change the end result. [2][3][4]. But I suppose that's not a completely irrational world-view. It's common. So long as they respond politely to people who question those deletions, it should all be good, right?
And ironic that you're advocating for this page given that you yourself have doubts about the subject's notability[...]get off my talk page[5].

Fastily has taken on a noble task in their attempts to remove spam and undisclosed paid editing. But they've taken an overzealous approach- an approach which runs the risk of driving off good-faith newbies, and an approach which has seemingly led them to feel justified in ignoring WP:ADMINACCT by writing off any concerns from their fellow admins and editors as abuse[6] from people looking to pick a fight[7].
Now I know many of our policies have changed since Fastily first became an administrator, back in '09. I'm not looking to penalise anybody based off a misunderstanding of our esoteric-slash-dynamic deletion policy. But, like I said, Fastily's understanding of accountability has been a few standard deviations outside of community norms for a very long time. Taking a quick trip down memory lane reveals that they've been brought to ANI at least half a dozen times for the way they used their tools, especially as it related to unilateral deletion:
Looking through the above threads, especially the 2012 ones, will reveal that Fastily is not always wrong. They might not always be right- but that's irrelevant. What's more concering is how they respond when people questioned their actions.

Fastily sometimes admitted they'd made mistakes, but more often they've prematurely archived the thread, called the other arguments stupid [8], accused people of attacking them/acting in bad faith [9][10], claimed that the only recognition I receive for my efforts are spurious trips to AN[11], or (as in the 2010 ANI thread and the second 2012 ANI thread), just failed to respond. The ANI threads stopped when Fastily resigned their tools. (To be clear: this wasn't under a cloud. The sanctions, tbans, and RFC/U floated in the [12][13] ANI threads hadn't actually gone anywhere).

However, these ANI threads were all still a decade ago, and ideally irrelevant. That is, they would be irrelevant, had Fastily not resumed the exact same behaviour. Their historical pattern of refusing to understand WP:ADMINACCT just removes any excuse they could have for their modern day refusal to abide by it (or possibly understand it?).

I believe that, at this time, an R-RfA is needed to establish whether or not they still have the community's trust. Because, to be quite frank, when two individual editor raise concerns about your editing and you respond saying Ok that's utter nonsense and you know it, accusing them of canvassing, conclude by saying your inability to understand the issue is not my problem?[14]. That's an issue. The fact that they view this behvaiour as patient and cordial[15] is troubling. And, as editors pointed out back in 2012, AN/ANI couldn't solve this before. [16][17]. The modern thread has already started to detour into the history of American presidential elections. Why should we expect it to get back on track now?

I know this comment has been long. I'm sorry about that. If anybody needs a TL;DR, then I'll leave them with this last comment, made by Fastily themselves in today's ANI thread.
Having fun twisting the narrative there? I suppose this will also be a shock to you: baseless accusations of bad faith aren't constructive feedback. I've been both patient and cordial with you, yet you have exclusively responded with vitriol and hostility. Well cool, I'll do the same, or wait, it's only okay when you get to be the one that does it huh. I called you out on it above and I guess that stings because it's the truth. Here's some friendly advice, don't run around throwing stones at others' houses when you live in a glass house yourself.[18]

So yeah. Per WP:ADMINACCT. GreenLipstickLesbian (talk) 12:40, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
They run a script to batch delete per U5 ([19]), leading to inevitable problems. SerialNumber54129 14:28, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Was this meant to be a signature to support the petition, or meant to be included in the discussion @Serial Number 54129? My 2 cents is that I read that as they review U5 noms as a batch, not to batch delete them per se, but I could be wrong. Hey man im josh (talk) 15:49, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Hey man im josh: Well, Iridescent pretty much formed my thinking sometime ago: "since (with the exception of the abusive admins who run "delete all" scripts on CAT:CSD) an admin needs to read every single page tagged for deletion and in each case consider if there's a viable alternative to deletion, and the time that takes adds up very quickly". This is time that is not, I believe, being spent: a glance at a few U5 deletions on 3 Nov shows three in one minute ([20], [21], [22]) and four in another ([23], [24], [25], [26]), and how about ten a minute ([27], [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33], [34], [35], [36]). Considering the extra consideration that ought to be going into U5 deletions... I'm just not seeing it. SerialNumber54129 13:55, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for clarifying that you meant to vote in this instance. I'll have a take a look to better understand what they meant by the batching process. Hey man im josh (talk) 13:57, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
For the record, I review pages manually in browser tabs before using a script to batch delete eligible pages. Yes, it may appear in the logs that I've deleted 10 pages in 2 seconds, but what you don't see reflected in the logs is the 15 mins I spent prior reviewing said pages. -Fastily 17:05, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't agree with every point Serial makes here, but I do think that RRFA is warranted here. Speedy deletion is an area where admins should be conservative in their use of tools, because non-admins cannot see deleted materials. If they wish to use said tool in a manner not clearly sanctioned by policy, they should ask for reform at WT:CSD, not misuse their privileges. I am not opposed to the occasional WP:IAR deletion where a good reason is given, but this is a consistent pattern of overstepping. Mach61 17:58, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
(Noting that GreenLipstickLesbian wrote nearly everything above and so you are most likely agreeing with them not SN. I have tried adjusting the indenting to make this a bit more clear). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 18:03, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yngvadottir (talk) 03:03, 5 November 2024 (UTC) ([37] - immediately self-reverted, but I don't decline speedies means on its face that Fastily deletes everything without considering whether it meets the speedy deletion criterion.)[reply]
Yngvadottir, the way I'm reading that diff is that if Fastily thinks a page shouldn't be deleted, they just leave the tag up rather than hitting the decline button to avoid long discussions. Sincerely, Dilettante 03:12, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That is the case from what I've seen. Fastily will delete the obvious ones and then leave questionable CSD nomination tags in place, which sometimes get declined by other admins. I do not believe that Fastily deletes CSD tagged pages without first considering whether the nominations meet CSD criteria, regardless of whether his interpretation of said criteria is a bit expansive. Nythar (💬-🍀) 03:57, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Nythar, based on my experience, I don't agree and think that is a sweeping conclusion based on a handful of diffs. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 06:31, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure which part of my comment you're disagreeing with but to be clear, I haven't arrived at any conclusions yet; just noting my observations. Nythar (💬-🍀) 07:37, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I read Fastily's comments in that diff in the same was as Dilettante and Nythar - Fasily was responding to someone who observed that they never challenge speedies, so they just said that they don't decline speedies by removing the tags because it leads to too many lengthy conversations with disgruntled taggers. I don't have a view on whether there are mistakes amongst the ones they opt to delete, but it would not be fair to imply that this comment was intended to mean 'I just delete everything'. Girth Summit _(blether) 11:01, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
For what it's worth, that was my read of things too. I've seen a lot of admins say that about U5s in the past 48 hours. I think Fastily's approach involves deleting more than what others would, but I don't think they're doing it out of malice or because they don't care about the rules. That's why I was hoping discussing things with them would help. Things escalated quickly but yeah... the hope was that things would get better. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 11:54, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't enjoy receiving and responding to nastygrams from angry taggers, so I ignore bad CSD tags. This *is* a volunteer website after all and there's no requirement for me to take on work I find unpleasant. Also this may be a surprise to some folks, but I actually think a lot of the pages that end up in CAT:CSD aren't eligible for CSD and shouldn't be deleted. -Fastily 00:27, 6 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Per all of the points made above Iggy pop goes the weasel (talk) 15:48, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There is a serious WP:ADMINACCT/WP:ADMINCOND concern here that merits a community discussion. -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 16:02, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm probably an outlier in my interpretation of ADMINACCT, but this seems to be a persistent issue. Sincerely, Dilettante 16:47, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've given this some thought. I want to make it clear that me signing this petition isn't necessarily equivalent to an oppose at RfA. But I do think enough has happened here to warrant an RfA. I'm not the first one to bring up concerns about Fastily's speedy deletion. I'm a bit concerned that their deletion batching appears to require them to use U5, which other editors have inquired about before (see User talk:Fastily/Archive 7#G11/U5 and promotional user pages and this quarry that shows 103,299 deletions under that criteria). Other inquiries include: User talk:Fastily/Archive 6#User:Williamtyan deletion U5, User talk:Fastily/Archive 6#U5 for almost all userspace deletions?, and User talk:Fastily/Archive 7#Speedy deletion CSD U5s. While I'm sympathetic that Fastily has been having a rough time recently, that doesn't really excuse their behaviour directed at me and Fathoms Below. We haven't even received an apology. I don’t think this is compatible with ADMINCOND. I do think this might be indicative of a larger issue given that many admins have recently expressed that they no longer patrol U5s because they see too many incorrect taggings. There's also Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Archive 84#Can we talk about the fact that almost all U5s are against policy?. I find it confusing that there's a difference between what's been decided by consensus to be part of the CSD criteria and how individual admins enforce it. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 20:16, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This was posted a few hours ago at ANI by Fastily. Perhaps that indicates there's a way to resolve this and move forward without anyone needing to be recalled. -- Marchjuly (talk) 20:43, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I saw that before I even started writing this and it's why I wrote: While I'm sympathetic that Fastily has been having a rough time recently, that doesn't really excuse their behaviour directed at me and Fathoms Below. WP:ADMINCOND is a higher bar. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 20:52, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You also posted We haven't even recieved an apology which made me think you hadn't yet seen the post; so, my apologies to you for mistakenly assuming otherwise. Anyway, what Fastily posted seemed sincere to me. Do you see it as a "non-apology apology" because it didn't mention specific users by name? -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:02, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I see this as someone saying they were having a tough time and that's why they acted the way they did. I don't see a clear apology, even if I do see some regret. They say "I apologize to anyone I may have offended". This comes across as I'm sorry your feelings got hurt, so I do not see that as equivalent to acknowledging wrongdoing in itself, even if there is a sentence about how this doesn't excuse their actions. That next sentence feels like a start, but it also doesn't feel like enough. I do think what was said to both of us was severe enough that direct apologies would be a reasonable minimum to have. I've been through some pretty horrible things myself, but I don't take it out on other people. That's not acceptable behaviour even if it's a mitigating factor. ADMINCOND says that "Administrators should lead by example and, just like all editors, should behave in a respectful, civil manner in their interactions with others at all times". Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 21:10, 5 November 2024 (UTC), edited 21:52, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I want to be very careful about this, and I kind of feel like I'm walking on eggshells by posting at all. I've looked carefully at what Fastily said at ANI. I agree, in a technical way, that his comment was not a formal apology to Clovermoss or to anyone else. On the other hand, it is clearly an explicit recognition of community concerns, clearly an expression of regret for what he acknowledges to have been errors on his part, and clearly a statement of intent to do better in the future. In terms of administrator accountability, that's probably a good thing. Accountability does not extend to making personal apologies that satisfy the person who is requesting them, so I'm not sure that the lack of a personal apology is a sufficient reason to desysop. (I recognize that there are other issues here, and some of them do seem to me to be worthy of discussion, but I'm just commenting about apologies.) --Tryptofish (talk) 23:36, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Tryptofish, I don't think you need to at all feel like you're walking on eggshells. Part of the reason I started this petition was because I feel that we have, somehow, ended up with an admin that other people do feel the need to walk on eggshells around. And I'm going to come down in between both you and Clover on the apology thing. It's an improvement, especially compared to the "Having fun twisting the narrative there?" rant that started this. And I'm grateful that Fastily has, in their own way, decided to come forward and make some attempt at an apology.

But that being said, the part of the apology I'm more concerned about is that fact that their first response to criticism was to lash out, and that their second was to state that they'd stop handling these (as in G11's/U5 deletions). This "when criticised, either lash out or leave the area entirely" dichotomy Fastily has created for themselves is unhealthy - for them, and for the community. If I tell an administrator or a fellow editor that I feel they mistepped, I want to feel like I'm able to do that without being attacked and without feeling that if I saw something, the other person is just going to quit the area/the project. GreenLipstickLesbian (talk) 00:14, 6 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Response

Cross-posting/linking to my response at ANI. -Fastily 23:44, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

This needs a list of all the deletion reviews where Fastily's U5s have been overturned.—S Marshall T/C 13:31, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It's going to be a subset of quarry:query/87651 (I haven't looked at them yet). I'd say there's surprisingly few there, but it's really not surprising - U5 by its nature targets only the pages of users too new to know how to formally contest the deletion. —Cryptic 14:05, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like, as broadly interpreted as possible, two of the nine pages at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2019 March 15#User:The Ministry of Truth/Userboxes; Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2019 November 9#User:ADilbert/Eazdeals (self-reversed and sent to mfd), Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2020 June 10#Rona De Ricci (a U5 was a side issue there); Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2020 July 22#User:NuggetAreFood/sandbox. —Cryptic 14:18, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm. That's pretty far from being a RHaworth-type situation, isn't it?

When I supported the recall proposal, RHaworth was the case I had in mind. His deletion decisions were egregious and he wouldn't listen. A lot of them were right, but the error rate was just too high. Fastily (clearly) isn't anywhere near RHaworth's level, and all we've got apart from the speedies is a recent ANI and several threads from the early Cretaceous. I wouldn't countersign this.—S Marshall T/C 15:47, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Append to Cryptic's list: Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2020 June 10#1 Pavilion, which I'd forgotten that I closed myself. Fastily flagged it as a U5, should've been a G11. I don't think it's a big deal.—S Marshall T/C 16:58, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I deliberately left that out, since the deletion itself wasn't overturned. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2020 August 27#User:Gitanjali-JB is similar and even clearer. —Cryptic 17:07, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I am bemused as to why this has been started before the ANI thread has concluded, especially given that pretty much all the evidence apart from the current dispute is over a decade old. Starting one of these is a big deal - why could it not have waited a few days? Black Kite (talk) 14:09, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

There is an element of urgency which seems strange. For example, the arbcom action against another admin has arisen out of nowhere and has rapidly escalated. In this case, a disagreement between two admins has been accelerated with words of bad faith, all because we're in a freakin' hurry. Wikipedia isn't wide open to disruption if we calm down. BusterD (talk) 14:20, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not saying this is necessarily the case here, but I really hope we don't get to the point where when someone complains about an admin at AN and doesn't get the answer they want, drags them through this process instead. Black Kite (talk) 16:16, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That's basically exactly what recall is, except replace "someone" with "lots of people." (Right now we're defining "lots" as 25, but that might change.) Levivich (talk) 16:21, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm. Sounds very much like forum-shopping to me, but YMMV. You would expect that recall would be a last resort, not a first one. Black Kite (talk) 16:24, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't a first resort here (or in the other petition). The first resort was the user talk page. The second resort was ANI. Recall is the third resort, and it was specifically created for when the first two resorts don't work. If that's forum shopping, then filing an arbcom case after an ANI is also forum shopping. In fact, neither are, because escalating dispute resolution methods is not forum shopping. Levivich (talk) 16:37, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, you're missing my point. If an ANI discussion decides there isn't a major problem, that should be it, not "well, you didn't agree with me, so I'll try recall". Again, not saying that's what happened here, because the ANI discussion hasn't even concluded, but ... Black Kite (talk) 19:04, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not missing your point, I'm disagreeing with it. We have legions arbcom cases that followed ANIs that concluded there wasn't a major problem.

But I think you're missing my point: a long history of admins not holding other admins to account at ANI is why we have consensus for a recall process. The whole point of recall is that neither ANI nor Arbcom is enough. You can expect many more recall petitions that follow ANIs that decided there isn't a major problem. Levivich (talk) 19:08, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

No. I would expect recall to be for admins that have shown a major issue with ADMINACCT and I would expect that those issues would have been discussed thoroughly at ANI/AARV/wherever and there was still an issue outstanding. I would not expect it to be halfway through an initial ANI discussion which hasn't yet concluded. I'm not sure how you're not getting this point. Black Kite (talk) 19:12, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You know how some of us think that recall is a complete failure, or that it should be changed, even though we haven't yet concluded even one recall petition (and zero RRFAs)? And those folks say "I've seen enough, I don't need to see more before making up my mind"? Welp, that logic applies to ANI threads, too...

In reality, I'd prefer that in both cases, folks slowed down and had more patience. This petition could have been filed later (or hopefully not at all), and it's the reason I haven't signed it yet (I'm waiting to see how Fastily responds) (thankfully I have the luxury of 30 days to wait and see, I don't have to decide in a week). But, the logic of "I've seen enough already" applies equally to ANI threads as it does to recall petitions. Levivich (talk) 19:15, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, that was my initial point up there ^, that I thought this was premature, although I suspect we agree for different reasons. Black Kite (talk) 19:18, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The ANI thread has already had several admins weighing in. Fastily was chastised by some admins, and defended by others. The thread itself will end in no consensus for any actions against Fastily, especially given that it has already shifted into a mini-lecture series on American history and the usage of U5 in a wider context. But that's not what I'm concerned about.

No, I'm concerned by an active administrator who, upon being questioned about their decisions, sees fit to respond by saying things such as:

I take enough abuse from vandals/spammers/LTAs, the last thing I need is abuse from my colleagues [38]

Having fun twisting the narrative there? I suppose this will also be a shock to you: baseless accusations of bad faith aren't constructive feedback. I've been both patient and cordial with you, yet you have exclusively responded with vitriol and hostility. Well cool, I'll do the same, or wait, it's only okay when you get to be the one that does it huh. I called you out on it above and I guess that stings because it's the truth. Here's some friendly advice, don't run around throwing stones at others' houses when you live in a glass house yourself.[39]

I wasn't the one who went around looking to pick a fight in the first place[40]

These are very unkind things to say to a fellow editor - accusing them of picking a fight, accusing them of abuse (which....no), and whatever the "Having fun twisting the narrative there?" rant was. If a newbie editor had come into an ANI thread with statement like that, they would have been escorted (ideally politely) off of the thread, and maybe put in time out. That has not happened here. I have no reason to believe it will. Fastily's behaviour is not so egregious that it merits an arbcom case. However, it is unbecoming of an administrator. I have lost faith in their ability to abide by the basic principles of WP:CIVIL and WP:ADMINACCT. I said that. A few people have agreed with me. Some others have not. In 30 days, this petition will expire. Ideally, Fastily will have come to their senses before then. However, given the fact they're had 14 years to figure this out, I am not confident that an enlightenment will be forthcoming. If I'm wrong- then this expires, and no harm no foul. Maybe a bit unpleasant for them to deal with, especially given the fact they view regular questions as "abuse", but not everything can be pleasant. GreenLipstickLesbian (talk) 21:56, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It seems like much of what you posted above is just a repetition of what you posted when you created this page. Is it necessary to repeat the diffs and quotes? Are the links to the ANI discussion and diffs you provided above insufficient for some reason? Couldn't you just reference your post above if you're concerned others might've skipped over something? -- Marchjuly (talk) 00:23, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I wish Fastily would label his deletions properly - I've said as much at the current discussion at ANI and in several of the DRV discussions found by my query above - and I really wish WT:CSD would get its collective head out of its ass about updating policy to allow deletion of the obvious products of paid editing and self-promotion, which are speedied by the hundreds every day despite not meeting the letter of the criteria. But stopping these deletions in the meantime would overwhelm Wikipedia solely to make a point, and I can't support that. The irritability and accountability issues are more concerning, but I don't think we're at the point where this is necessary, and if anything it's counterproductive to improving the issue. —Cryptic 14:32, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Honestly the biggest thing I've learned in the past 24 hours is that a lot of admins don't actually follow what the CSD criteria states. It's like some unwritten rule or something, to the point that not following it is considered problematic. I don't understand why it would disrupting Wikipedia to not delete things that the community by consensus has decided not to delete. I probably would have phrased things differently, but I do think Tamzin raises an interesting point about the state of U5s in general. [41] Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 17:24, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the good news is that you've already hit rock-bottom - U5 is both the most-often and most-severely misused speedy deletion criterion, so you're not going to get even more amazed if you start auditing G1's or A3's or such. The bad news is that it's difficult to correct for, as sort of alluded to above: new users, which the criterion deliberately targets, don't know to go to DRV even when the deletion is incorrect (which they wouldn't recognize anyway); and since while these aren't good speedies, they overwhelmingly wouldn't be good restorations either, so they don't get to brought to DRV by experienced third parties either. User:Pealoei from ANI makes for an almost-ideal example of this - while I was outspokenly critical of the deletion and the only part of U5 that it met was that it was in the userspace of a user without non-userspace contribs, with its creator blocked and the sorry state of its sourcing, at best it'd would've just gotten deleted again in six months as a G13 after being moved to draft. (I say "almost" ideal because we already have Provincial Electricity Authority in mainspace, which makes the whole thing moot.) —Cryptic 18:49, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

From what I see the biggest issue seems to be that Fastily sometimes doesn't have enough good faith, especially when dealing with newcomers. And that makes it seem like some of his deletions are wrong. If true, then those could've been brought to Administrative action review (which I think would be the right place instead of the ANI discussion). In the end I wouldn't consider this WP:TOOLMISUSE and not WP:ADMINABUSE to the level that I think a desysop is needed. Nobody (talk) 14:53, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm on the fence about signing. Regardless of whether the deletions are correct (and the volume alone makes me think probably not), the adminacct/admincond issues are glaring. What I don't know is whether this is just somebody having a bad day or if it's a regular habit, and thus the likelihood of repeating in the future. Levivich (talk) 15:29, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comment (non admin, not involved). I have no opinion on the substance of this case. However, everything that I have seen of WP:RECALL strikes me as an utter disgrace on the encyclopedia and nothing more than a WP:PA free-for all. Narky Blert (talk) 16:14, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Absolutely on the money here. I'm no admin, none of my best friends is an admin. But a SECOND one of these stupid 'petitions' before the first - also deeply questionable - one is settled? This whole process sucks and how on earth it ever got made into a 'thing' still defeats me. It needs to stop, honestly. Right here. Wikipedia works on consensus, everything is based on consensus - except this 'first past the post' race to gather signatures. A pile-on without the need to even argue the merits. It's woeful. Best (in a usually quite mild-mannered sort of way) Alexandermcnabb (talk) 16:30, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Where in either petitions do either or you see either PAs or a pile on? Levivich (talk) 16:39, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

If you two would like to continue your discussion on the general merits of admin recall, WP:VP and WT:Administrator recall are in that direction. Thank you. GreenLipstickLesbian (talk) 16:40, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That's a tad too dismissive, IMHO. We're entitled to comment - where we want, when we want. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 16:46, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That's not at all true, and I don't know what in the world makes you think that. Disruptive editing includes commenting in the wrong place or at the wrong time. Levivich (talk) 16:55, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Levivich, discussing opposition to this process is absolutely not disruptive editing, and to characterize it that way is such an astonishing lack of good faith that it borderlines on an aspersion. The disruptive editing guideline concerns gross, obvious and repeated violations of policies, not subtle questions about which reasonable people may disagree. Nowhere within that guideline does it include "commenting in the wrong place or at the wrong time". ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 18:59, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Somebody commenting "keep" in every AFD because they disagree with deletion policy would be an example of disruption, we have a whole guideline about this called WP:POINT. Same for recall. Levivich (talk) 19:04, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

And yet we never dealt with an entire project whose members did just that. Black Kite (talk) 19:07, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yes we did. We TBANed them. (And some were even CBANed or indef'd.) Levivich (talk) 19:11, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Only after they'd done something else egregious. In some cases that was years later. (By the way, we are probably off topic now). Black Kite (talk) 19:14, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Nope, Andrew and LB were TBANed for disrupting deletion discussions. Levivich (talk) 19:20, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

My point exactly. That was in 2021. ARS-related ANI threads go back to 2007. Black Kite (talk) 19:26, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I've been following the ANI thread and I'm not sure how deep these concerns might lie, but I'm not going to sign this right now since I'm wary about recall in general and I think it might be too long of a process. The civility concerns matter, but as a user who has had problems with civility before, I'm going to go light on this since maybe this can be resolved by an apology for casting aspersions and perhaps going deeper into their rationale behind the deletions next time? People can have a bad day and there's still time for this to be de-escalated. The deletions by script concern me as well but I haven't looked fully into that either. Fathoms Below (talk) 16:15, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not going to opine here either ways just yet, but I must ask: why are we already at RECALL even as the matter plays out at the AN/I thread? This feels awfully premature at best - I can't see any calls (or even mentions!) for recall from before this petition was opened. GLL, I feel, should have instead waited for a bit to see how the thread runs out before starting this petition (especially in light of the absolute mess that has happened in the Graham87 petition). Java Hurricane 16:47, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It's worth pointing out that Fastily is the fourth-most-active human admin of all time, and also the third-most-active human admin in the last month too. We would lose a lot of admin work if Fastily would be recalled. And while unlike with Graham87 where a decent chunk of that work is something that nobody would other do, probably Explicit or Liz would pick up most of the deletion slack, but still don't throw away the baby. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:45, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This bus factor argument cuts in the other direction for me. When I see someone deleting 18,000 pages in a month, that makes me think they should stop, not that they should continue. Because nobody can read 18,000 pages in a month (600 a day). And I don't know exactly what kind of pages those are, e.g. if it's a page+talk, you might not need to read the talk page, but cut that in half, and still nobody is reading 300 pages a day. No doubt not every page deleted is a page that needs to be "read" in the traditional sense; some pages are just a few words (e.g., redirects). But I don't believe a human could read even 18,000 page titles in a month (600/day, every day, no days off).

So 18,000 pages a month tells me this person is deleting pages without reading them. And deleting a lot of pages without reading them, like hundreds per day. That alarms me; I can't help but think that we have no idea what's being deleted or whether it's good or not, because not only is the deleter not reading the pages, but no one else is, either. Nobody is going to audit 18,000 pages or anything even close to that. So I'm pretty convinced, just by the volume, that we have a problem of an admin deleting thousands or tens of thousands of pages they never read.

And then there is the larger issue: if our system, in order to function properly, requires someone to delete 18,000 pages a month, then our system is very broken. We cannot have a system that relies on someone deleting-without-reading. Nor can we have a system that relies on somebody spending all day every day reading and deleting pages. This is a separate reason, in my view, for this sort of large-scale deletion to stop: we need a system where the number of new pages created is not so great that nobody can read them. And if ~~Fastily~~ an admin stopping the mass-deletion means that we get overrun by new page creations, then so be it: let us fix that problem (too many new pages) without relying on a single person to do a hundred thousand deletions a year. Maybe that means making other reforms, like not allowing new users to create new pages. But the status quo is alarming. Levivich (talk) 17:10, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

For the record the 18,000 pages a month is done by Explicit, not Fastily. Fastily is deleting 3,000 pages a month. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 17:12, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for pointing out my mistake; fixed. Fastily's 100/day average (37k over the last year [42]) is of course not as alarming as 600/day; I'm not sure exactly what the "right" limit is. But my comment was intended as more of a general point about bus factor and high-volume admins: it applies just the same to the admins with very high numbers of blocks, protections, etc., as it does to non-admins who perform extremely-high-volume tasks. Levivich (talk) 17:29, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) I've deleted a total of 77,222 pages, which I thought was considerably higher than most admins. The number you've cited for Explicit and Fastily are staggering in comparison. I'm not saying that they're wrong, either, just, um, unexpected. My view has always been that the bar to page creation is way too low but unfortunately in keeping with the culture of Wikipedia. We already have enough crappy articles and yet we keep creating more and tout our high numbers. As long as I'm venting, I'll finish with I think the recall process is a complete failure now that it's been implemented. Nor am I surprised.--Bbb23 (talk) 17:32, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

RHaworth deleted more than half a million pages.—S Marshall T/C 17:48, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I'm pretty high on that list, too, but it's mostly CSD G13s and we have 150-200 of those that need to be deleted every day. I like to work with G13s and PRODs because they are both forms of deletion that can be reversed upon editor request and I like having that option be present. RHaworth was notorious among admins patrolling CSD categories because he would delete any page that was tagged without evaluating it himself. And we have some patrollers who kind of long for those days when their taggings wouldn't be questioned. On the adminstats list he used to be right behind MZMcBride who, unfortunately, used a bot for mass deletions and lost his bit over it. But RHaworth didn't lose the bit for his indiscriminate page deletion but for the terrible way he treated editors, mostly new editors, who questioned these deletion on his User talk page, he was dismissive and condescending. Explicit is our current Czar of Page Deletions but a high percentage of their deletions are emptying daily file categories which, for some reason, no other admins handle.

I wouldn't pick up any extra CSD U5 deletions because I avoid evaluating those tagged pages because so many of them are inappropriately tagged. I got tired of untagging so many pages and having patrollers upset so I just leave them for other admins to review. Yes, you can call me conflict-avoidant. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 03:37, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

High levels of admin activity are welcome and they do you credit, Liz. It strikes me that we could and likely should set up an admin bot to prowl for empty categories.

RHaworth and MZMcBride were both at the intersection of very high activity levels and a cavalier attitude to the boundaries the community has set on deletion. That's a toxic combination. You are very much not in the same place.

I'm appalled to have discovered the WP:BASTARD redirect today. There's an opportunity for you to use the delete tool, if you want.—S Marshall T/C 11:19, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The history of that redirect shows that the user it targets is aware of it, reverted a request to delete it and, a few years later, requested its undeletion (a request the deleting admin granted) so it isn't a straightforward G10. I have not yet found why they wish it to exist. Thryduulf (talk) 11:40, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, they discussed it on their user talk page less than 3 weeks ago. Thryduulf (talk) 11:42, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Judging by how many editors have told me they take their CSD taggings to be correct if other admins eventually come around and delete the thing, we've got a terrible case of confirmation bias going on here. Admins who have given up on declining speedies (not just Liz!): please, get in there and start declining them again! -- asilvering (talk) 15:43, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Non-admins can remove speedy tags. I have no qualms about this. This also reduces admin workload. A. B. ^{(talk • contribs • global count)} 21:53, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone (other than, in some cases, the page author) who sees an incorrect speedy tag should remove it. Admins are human‹The template Fake citation needed is being considered for merging.› ^{[citation needed]} and so we will make mistakes from time to time. If non-admins remove incorrect tags then it reduces the chance of the error being incorrect speedy deletion. Thryduulf (talk) 22:15, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Fastily's work in file copyright is the much more important issue, in my mind. We don't have many admins who do file deletions and discussions, and it would be a shame to lose one of the few we have with expertise in the area. But that doesn't excuse gross violations of WP:ADMINACCT. GreenLipstickLesbian (talk) 22:03, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. I think there are only about 4 admins who regularly handle file deletions. Fastily and Explicit do the bulk of the work here. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 03:46, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I don't agree with the way admin recall petitions are being used - I think that they should only be started if there has already been discussion, there isn't any ongoing, and the admin has demonstrated that _whatever the problem is_ is still ongoing even after the latest discussion. There is an ongoing ANI where people are attempting to resolve this in a satisfactory way - why would anyone there come here to sign this petition? This is a petition to give an admin an ultimatum, a 'prove to us that you can be trusted, or no admin tools for you', this isn't a good solution to a problem, it's a last resort - and I don't think it's being used with the care that it should be. At least, that's how I see things. – 2804:F1...86:83AA (::/32) (talk) 17:23, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

30 days for this? I need say nothing more. Daniel (talk) 17:32, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Unless the period is shortened, retrospectively, then yes. 30 days. CNC (talk) 19:43, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There is a real problem changing the rules mid-stream. There is an RfC on changing the duration of the process, but RfCs are normally expected to run 30 days, and even when it closes, I do not see how it would apply to petitions that are open. Donald Albury 20:02, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The repeated invocations of ADMINCOND and ADMINACCT, as if the incivility in this situation was one-sided, are embarrassing. Using recall as an attempt to punish an admin when there is serious support for his actions (or at least a lack of support for sanctions) is blatant weaponization of a process meant to protect the community. "I didn't get my way at ANI, so I'll just initiate a recall" is exactly the worst-case scenario that established editors have worried for years would be the misuse of such a process. Thanks for living down to expectations and ensuring that this process will never be the positive safeguard it was meant to be. Grandpallama (talk) 01:14, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That's because it is one sided. I implore people to actually read the discussion that Fastily is describing as "abuse": User talk:Fastily#U5s. An apology to me and Fathoms would mean something to me, at the very least. All we did was raise concerns that an admin was deleting things outside the consensus of the CSD criteria. Politely and well within the bounds of ADMINCOND. Telling us to get off their talk page for that is alarming. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 02:06, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That's because it is one sided. That is a complete and utter falsehood, and repeatedly stating an untruth doesn't make it a truth. You owe Fastily an apology for your incredibly poor behavior and this "I'm an innocent victim" charade.

Politely and well within the bounds of ADMINCOND Do you think you were being polite when you declared Fastily was engaging in bad faith? If someone says "pardon me" while punching me in the nose, does that make the punch civil? This pretense that if the words are polite, a statement is de facto polite is farcical and calls into question your fitness as an admin.

Telling us to get off their talk page for that That is not why you were told to get off Fastily's page, no matter how many times you falsely claim so. Grandpallama (talk) 03:02, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There is a difference between acting in bad faith and assuming someone else is acting in bad faith. -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH) 08:55, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Can you please be more civil? Comments like this and the comments you made at ANI like [43][44][45][46] are not accomplishing what you think they are. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 12:15, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The ANI threads seem slightly more relevant when you consider the fact that Fastily was pretty much inactive from 2012-2016. See xtools: [47]. Out of all these, I'd say the 2011 Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive229#admin Fastily overusing their admin bit? is the most relevant to their argument that this is a historical pattern. Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 18:00, 4 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How to oppose this recall?

A lot of fun old names here, hi. :-)

I'm confused by this recall process. There seems to only be a section for supports, but how do I oppose this recall and indicate support for Fastily's tireless volunteer cleanup efforts? Surely this page cannot be structured in such a way that people are only allowed to dogpile an admin. --MZMcBride (talk) 18:30, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You have to wait a month (!!) and then you can support at the RFA if this gets 25 signatures. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 18:31, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

If it gets 25 signatures (which as SFR notes is allowed for up to 30 days) then Fastily has up to 30 days to start the Re-RFA. It's at the Re-RFA you could express support for Fastily. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 19:33, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hey MZMcBride, nice to see another fun old name here. :)

There is not a section for opposes, because for the purposes of recall, there are no opposes. The intent behind this process has been "If 25 people all find a problem, then it probably needs an RFA", not have an up-down vote before an up-down vote (RFA). There have been concerns raised about the process. Proposals at Wikipedia_talk:Administrator_recall#RfC:_Should_we_add_text_prescribing_just_signatures,_no_discussion? and Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#RfC:_Shorten_the_recall_petition_period? are attempting to fix parts of it.

As a sidebar, perhaps these discussions should all be centralised somewhere like WP:RECALL/RFC or WP:RFA2024/Phase III/Administrator Recall instead? Finding the RFCs is going to be a hassle Soni (talk) 21:07, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Started it at Wikipedia:Administrator recall/RfCs so we can have them all in one place. Chaotic Enby (talk · contribs) 23:45, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 45: / Line 45: @@
 #:I read Fastily's comments in that diff in the same was as Dilettante and Nythar - Fasily was responding to someone who observed that they never challenge speedies, so they just said that they don't decline speedies by removing the tags because it leads to too many lengthy conversations with disgruntled taggers. I don't have a view on whether there are mistakes amongst the ones they opt to delete, but it would not be fair to imply that this comment was intended to mean 'I just delete everything'. [[User:Girth Summit|<span style="font-family:Impact;color:#006400;">Girth</span>&nbsp;<span style="font-family:Impact;color:#4B0082;">Summit</span>]][[User talk:Girth Summit|<sub style="font-family:Segoe print;color:blue;"> (blether)</sub>]] 11:01, 5 November 2024 (UTC)
 #::For what it's worth, that was my read of things too. I've seen a lot of admins say that about U5s in the past 48 hours. I think Fastily's approach involves deleting more than what others would, but I don't think they're doing it out of malice or because they don't care about the rules. That's why I was hoping discussing things with them would help. Things escalated quickly but yeah... the hope was that things would get better. [[User:Clovermoss|<span style="color:darkorchid">Clovermoss</span><span style="color:green">🍀</span>]] [[User talk:Clovermoss|(talk)]] 11:54, 5 November 2024 (UTC)
+#:::I don't enjoy receiving and responding to nastygrams from angry taggers, so I ignore bad CSD tags.  This *is* a volunteer website after all and there's no requirement for me to take on work I find unpleasant.  Also this may be a surprise to some folks, but I actually think a lot of the pages that end up in [[:Category:Candidates for speedy deletion|CAT:CSD]] aren't eligible for CSD and shouldn't be deleted.  -[[User talk:Fastily|<span style="font-family:'Trebuchet MS';color:Indigo;font-weight:bold;font-variant-caps:small-caps;font-size:120%;">Fastily</span>]] 00:27, 6 November 2024 (UTC)
 # Per all of the points made above [[User:Iggy pop goes the weasel|Iggy pop goes the weasel]] ([[User talk:Iggy pop goes the weasel|talk]]) 15:48, 5 November 2024 (UTC)
 # There is a serious [[WP:ADMINACCT]]/[[WP:ADMINCOND]] concern here that merits a community discussion. <b style="font-family:Monospace">-- [[User:Maddy from Celeste|Maddy from Celeste]] ([[User talk:Maddy from Celeste|WAVEDASH]])</b> 16:02, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

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