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User:Yozzer66/userboxes/Antifa

These infoboxes are not just an endorsement of Antifa, but an endorsement of political violence. Per WP:POLEMIC and WP:UBCR, this is not really conductive for building an encyclopedia and I don’t find this acceptable, as threats or endorsements of violence are not generally a good thing here. Toa Nidhiki05 16:56, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Yikes. My own opinions aside, I would agree with this nomination. If this was worded like, This user supports antifa and thinks all Nazis should be blocked from Wikipedia. Then we'd have a case that could be made this doesn't endorse physical violence. Tbh, users are free to do whatever they want relative to the laws of their jurisdiction, but let's avoid taking those kinds of measures here; a project to build an internet encyclopedia. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 17:47, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
This !vote was only for the first one. I make no comment about the others. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 20:57, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
All three inboxes have the same text and similar images. Toa Nidhiki05 02:32, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
That isn't true. User:Supersheep/Userboxes/Antifa is completely broken and even links to a disambiguation page. I also don't think it's as much of a problem for User:Life in General/Userboxes/Antifa. You say these are explicitly endorsing politically violence, but I'm not seeing it here. See my comment below. The context matters. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 13:20, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep (typical of all three related nominations). The userbox is neither polemic nor does it endorse violence, despite the statement in the nomination to the contrary. "This user supports antifa" is not a statement that attacks or vilifies groups of editors, persons, or other entities, and opposition to fascism is not divisive or offensive. VQuakr (talk) 18:18, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This is inaccurate. If the infobox just said “this user supports Antifa”, there is no threat or endorsement of violence. However, it also says it supports them in “combating fascism in both word and action”. That is an explicit endorsement of political violence, which violates WP:UBCR (“Userboxes must not be inflammatory or divisive“) Toa Nidhiki05 18:34, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That most certainly is not an "explicit" endorsement of violence. I don't view it as even an implicit endorsement of violence; the phrase "and action" is too general to draw such a conclusion. Direct action is not synonymous with, or even a strong connotator of, violence. WP:AGF applies here. VQuakr (talk) 18:42, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

What direct action does Antifa do other than violence? If you want argue they engage in other forms of direct action like property destruction or harassment, I guess you can do that, but the former is illegal and the latter is either illegal or immoral and arguably a violation of Wikipedia policy. Regardless, how does this inflammatory and divisive userbox help the encyclopedia? There’s no actual benefit to keep this. Toa Nidhiki05 18:48, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Doxxing, protesting (but like the Milkshaking kind), praxis, etc. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 19:21, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Protesting and mutual aid come to mind. I can't help but think this nomination may be partially rooted in ignorance. See WP:NOGOOD re "There’s no actual benefit...". VQuakr (talk) 06:43, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hold off on the personal attacks, please. Entirely unwarranted here. I’ve said these violate WP:POLEMIC and WP:UBCR and the response has been generally quibbling over what “direct action” (a phrase the userbox does not use) means. None of this is a compelling reason to keep a userbox that is clearly inflammatory and not conductive to building an encyclopedia, which is why I said there has been no benefit given to keep it. It serves no value on its own and actually violates policies. Toa Nidhiki05 12:49, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Toa Nidhiki05: you missed the mark a bit. It's not combating fascism in both word and action; it's combating fascism in both word and action. The fact that there is an emphasize on the "and" part, it reads implicitly as something someone might otherwise object to. The context is key. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 19:19, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

~~Neutral~~ - Action includes legal non-violent action, such as the counter-protesting at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, which ended in violence that was entirely the fault of the fascists. I agree that usually antifa involves, at a minimum, provocation, but it can be in the Gandhian tradition; it just very seldom is. I do not like antifa, but its action is not necessarily violent. It is just often violent. Because of these subtleties, I can neither say Keep or Delete. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:55, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I have started bundling these three nominations, since they are all the same and should be treated as one nomination. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:55, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Thanks. Is there any way to close the other two and import their comments here? Toa Nidhiki05 20:11, 9 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Toa Nidhiki05: As you created the other two, you can tag them with {{db-g7}}. – Athaenara ✉ 02:27, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Done Toa Nidhiki05 02:32, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - This MfD is apparently inspired by this ANI post. I do protest not being informed of this discussion (only saw it when trying to edit my userpage). And I do think the 37+23+45=105 users who display this userbox should be informed as well. Tsu *miki*⧸ 🌉 04:25, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - The userbox is merely a positional statement, similar to other leftist userboxes we currently have. Conservative people would certainly argue that even a declaring oneself a socialist means endorsement to molotov cocktails, gulags and mass killings and the like. The "antifa" part in these userboxes only link to Anti-fascism in general, not to specific varieties of antivist groups. To conflate anti-fascism and direct action to violence only highlight an absurd amount of ignorance or misunderstanding on the subject, and to insinuate, without evidence, that contributors sharing the sentiment in theses userbox tend to be polemic and NOTHERE, would be an insult to all the 105 Wikipedians who chose to exercise their right to express themselves. Non-fascists view steadfast opposition to fascism as extremely offensive is a sad reality we live in. Tsu *miki*⧸ 🌉 04:46, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It’s not simply a political statement because it actively and explicitly endorses political violence. If these infoboxes simply said “this user supports Antifa”, it might be acceptable, but the fact it endorses violence is the problem here. The fact that many users have this infobox is irrelevant - it violates WP:POLEMIC and WP:UBCR. There is no reason to have this in an encyclopedia. Toa Nidhiki05 12:38, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

You're repeating your argument. You may need to read my comments and the keep and neutral !votes above again. To equate "action" - which entails from peaceful citizen protest, mutual aid, online activism and community defense to vandalism and physical altercations, all of which practiced by antifascist activists per article - to explicit act of violence, i.e. murder, lynching, gang violence, etc, is irresponsible and factually wrong. You're pushing an extremely dangerous false equivalence. This is no more polemical than infobox "I identify as a democratic socialist", you know, the kind that want to get rid of all planes, per US Republicans. Tsu *miki*⧸ 🌉 14:49, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete: These boxes are stating support of a group widely accused of domestic terrorism. It's one thing to claim a general support of those who are speaking out against fascism (though what exactly is fascist seems to be poorly defind). It's quite another to support the actions of people who are willing to resort to mob violence, assault journalists etc. I think we would have no issue removing a "I support the KKK" box. This is no different. Springee (talk) 12:55, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Read the article. This is completely opposite to what experts and reliable sources said on the subject. How many people did antifa kill in the last five years? Isn't that zero? And how many Jews alone did white supremacists murder in cold blood in the same period? How many black people did KKK lynch? Those are actual acts of domestic terrorism. "Widely accused of terrorism" by some fragile white hearts I suppose. Tsu *miki*⧸ 🌉 14:21, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Your straw arguments aren't convincing. You are an editor who has an Antifa support box on your home page. Are we going to assume that your view on the subject is largely objective or biased? Springee (talk) 18:17, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete. Wikipedia should steer clear of WP:Advocacy. And WP:Userpages should not be used as Billboards. Bus stop (talk) 13:11, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The nominator would do well to brush up on the meaning of "explicit". It doesn't mean "apparent to me" or even "apparent to any reasonable person". It means, rather, clear, indisputable, apparent, opaque, requiring no interpretation, and so on. In this case what's at stake is the meaning of "action": it might well imply violence, but it in no way explicitly signals violence. "Action" is a very common and very broad word that refers to many things; the variety of non-violent actions it could (and I think does) refer to in this context have been outlined above. (And if we're deleting infoboxes that imply support for political violence, we're throwing ourselves open to deleting almost all political infoboxes: liberals think socialism is intrinsically violent, socialists see liberalism as founded on the violence inherent in the system; infoboxes like User:The Ministry of Truth/Userboxes/Totalitarian, User:UNSC Trooper/Userboxes/Anti-Nazi National Socialism and User:Gr8opinionater/Userboxes/Italian Fascist are obviously fairly overtly problematic; and that's before we even get on to any or all of those listed at Wikipedia:Userboxes/Military.) – Arms & Hearts (talk) 14:15, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I’d have no issue deleting more userboxes. In fact, the Totalitarian, Nazi, and Fascist ones should all be nominated for deletion as well. Our policies on userboxes are very clear on what is or is not acceptable. Toa Nidhiki05 14:18, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I have nominated these fascist userboxes for deletion as well as these ones. Thank you for bringing these to my attention. Toa Nidhiki05 14:34, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think the operant question has anything to do with whether or not violence is being suggested. It is a strident advocacy relating to a contemporary and contentious issue. I don't think our User pages should be used for such purposes. We share with others our individuality on User pages. Beyond that limited usage everything else represents a questionable use of User pages and is therefore open to revocation in a discussion such as this. Bus stop (talk) 14:24, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That political infoboxes should be avoided is a reasonable position to take, but it's not the position advanced by the nominator and it's clearly a position held by a minority of editors (in this discussion, only by you), so I don't agree that it's the most salient question here. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 14:44, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The most salient question is what promotes collegiality and what causes arguments. Bus stop (talk) 15:21, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete There even is an argument for deleting all political userboxes, but certainly one that supports a movement routinely involved in street fighting and which by definition opposes fascists or perceived fascists with militant means including violence and vandalism meets WP:POLEMIC and more broadly WP:UPNOT. Since the template uses the German-originated abbrevation "Antifa", it perhaps is of interest that the German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution tracks the movement and has this the say about it in their profile Aktionsfeld „Antifaschismus“: The field of "anti-fascism" has for years been a central element of the political activity of far-left extremists, especially violent ones. Far-left extremists within this tradition only superficially claim to fight far-right activities. In reality the focus is the struggle against liberal democracy, which is smeared as a "capitalist system" with "fascist" roots. (courtesy of Tataral) --Pudeo (talk) 14:42, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid that source isn't relevant. Contemporary American antifa share have no organizational connections with German counterparts, and antifa being opposed to liberal democracy also isn't supported by other reliable media sources and experts as well. And we weren't talking about particular nation variant either - the userboxes in question was clear that it meant opposition to fascism in general. This is distraction at best. Tsu *miki*⧸ 🌉 16:17, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The template says nothing about "American Antifa". Antifa is primarily a movement originating in Germany. Is the so-called "American Antifa" fundamentally different from its German roots? I don't know, but I haven't seen any convincing evidence in support of that, and they've even adopted the same logo and the same rhetoric. There is a large body of expert literature that echoes the assessment of German authorities of this movement, so this is a very mainstream assessment. Antifa is certainly not equal to "opposition to fascism in general", it's a specific movement/ideology that brands non-fascists (even social democrats) as "fascists", in line with Soviet propaganda (cf Anti-Fascist Protection Wall), and that merely uses the word "fascism" as a misleading smear against people mainly for being opposed to communism and/or the Antifa people themselves. --Tataral (talk) 17:30, 12 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Goes deep into WP:POLEMIC and a violation of WP:UBCR which says Wikipedia is not an appropriate place for propaganda, advocacy, or recruitment of any kind, commercial, political, religious, or otherwise, opinion pieces on current affairs or politics, self-promotion, or advertising. Or, inverted, if we allow this, where do we stop? Britishfinance (talk) 15:27, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Question. Are Fascist and Nazi userboxes forbidden? They are arguably much worse, at least for Americans, as Americans not only took the same side as Antifa, they actually fought a war and killed Nazis, not just protested against them in the streets. (I am not justifying their violence in the streets, just their opposition to neo-nazis, fascists, and anti-democracy forces. The two sides are not equal. There are not "good people" on both sides.) -- BullRangifer (talk) 15:46, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Open Nazis are basically forbidden from Wikipedia for obvious reasons and fascist/Nazi userboxes are deleted as they are found AFAIK. Toa Nidhiki05 15:48, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I fully support eradicating all the Nazi, fascist, Stalinist and totalitarian userboxes, but opposition to fascism, especially under the current political climate, is suddenly viewed as propaganda is beyond me. Even if we're talking about the American antifa movement, the ADL clearly states that "it is important to reject attempts to claim equivalence between the antifa and the white supremacist groups they oppose."[1] Editors who endorse white supremacy must not be treated the same way as editors who is transparent about their opposition to fascism. Above slippery slope arguments aren't useful. Tsu *miki*⧸ 🌉 15:59, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral – I’m not keen on any user boxes along such lines, and I don’t like Antifa. But, if support user boxes like this are allowed; I’m not seeing where the line is or how this could cross such a line. Nelson Mandela’s organization committed far more violent acts than Antifa. And then he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Besides, Antifa isn’t even an organization and any “member” can pretty much define what they think it is. O3000 (talk) 16:00, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Americans and their allies "committed far more violent acts than Antifa" to Nazis during the war. The two sides are not equal. -- BullRangifer (talk) 16:06, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. No more violent than the fascism userboxes, and it's a slippery slope to delete only some political userboxes. wumbolo ^^^ 20:18, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We aren't targeting all political userboxes. I'm guessing that we're only after those which espouse violence. That would also include communism. What about that? -- BullRangifer (talk) 02:39, 11 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't dismiss Social conflict theory, Monopoly on violence and the rest to have some baseless consensus. What about the many countries that have capital punishment, torture, excessive use of force etc. as measures against political foes? What makes direct action/revolutions different? wumbolo ^^^ 13:22, 11 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Violence isn't really the only problem. Contentiousness is the problem, however difficult that may be to define. But any definition of contentiousness has to take into account the nature of this project. We are here to collaborate on the compilation of documents (articles) that are composed of on-topic and reliably-sourced material. That requires seeing from the perspective of an editor with whom we are engaged in a fierce disagreement. How can we see from another editor's perspective if they are using their user-page to promote a view with which we disagree? OK, you can see from their perspective, no matter what. But it makes it more difficult to do so. Strident user-boxes in general are counterproductive to the collaborative environment that we should want to foster. Bus stop (talk) 15:10, 11 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Weak Delete - The issue here is not antifa as such, but antifa userboxes, and this discussion is demonstrating that these userboxes are not only divisive but are encouraging stupid comments (as well as wise comments) and are polarizing. Robert McClenon (talk) 20:27, 10 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete It appears they only cause disruption. Same would go for userboxes declaring a person is a fascist. In this context they are the same. PackMecEng (talk) 04:19, 11 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep If people want to humiliate themselves by posting such userboxes, let them. Shinealittlelight (talk) 19:15, 11 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with you even though we are weighing in with opposite opinions on the outcome. To me it is so wrongheaded that any person with such sentiments displayed on their User page should want to remove those sentiments. To me it is showing that they do not understand that an aim of Wikipedia is to collaborate to write well-balanced articles. Bus stop (talk) 22:11, 11 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Observation: I don't like Antifa, for the same reasons that (in historical retrospect) I don't like the brownshirts of the 1920s-1930s: their vicious tactics and the injuries they inflict on the vulnerable and unarmed targets they choose. The massive dishonesty, which intellectuals daintier than I may prefer to call irony, in being fascist while claiming to be anti-fascist beggars belief.

I toyed with the idea of creating a userbox with a presidential pic and the statement that this user likes DJ Trump, but I haven't pursued it because Wikipedia is neither a means of recruitment nor a social forum: it is an encyclopedia.

I probably care less than I should about whether or not some editors choose to post userboxes like these. All that said, I'm moved neither to welcome such userboxes nor forbid them. but the temptation to say something here was irresistible. – Athaenara ✉ 10:00, 12 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Template:User Donald Trump and Template:User pro-Trump already exist, but you're free to make another I suppose. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 10:06, 12 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Arms & Hearts: That's interesting. I could also work up a userbox for this user suddenly began liking chocolate and coca cola after years of being indifferent to both and her health hasn't suffered a bit, but it seems as disconnected as the political ones from our encyclopedic mission here. – Athaenara ✉ 11:02, 12 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

My reluctance is to single out this one editor for this one user-box because as I see it the problem is pernicious. It manifests itself in many different ways. Strident user-page messages only exacerbate the argumentation that is part and parcel of hammering out articles that truly embody a neutral point of view. Bus stop (talk) 13:54, 12 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete per rationales by several users, including WP:POLEMIC and WP:UBCR. The userbox is certainly "inflammatory or divisive", as Antifa is a far-left movement that is described as extremist e.g. by the government of Germany and that is noted for using violence and branding non-fascists they disagree with (up to and even including social democrats) as "fascists". --Tataral (talk) 17:30, 12 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - Although userpages technically aren't supposed to be used for any form of promotion or advocacy, we generally tolerate a certain level of personal expression through userboxes, short bios, etc. A long screed advocating violent overthrow would cross the line but a simple userbox is well within reason. Since the proposal to ban political userboxes failed, we should not be in the business of deciding which political views or groups are permissible. According to the User pages guidelins, "'Acts of violence' includes all forms of violence, but does not include mere statements of support for controversial groups or regimes that some may interpret as an encouragement of violence." –dlthewave ☎ 22:02, 12 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment Also note that these userboxes talk about action, which does not necessarily mean exercising violence towards other. Action in the antifascist movement usually involves many forms of protest. --MarioGom (talk) 10:38, 21 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We should be concerned with what is conducive to collaborative editing. Obviously we should not use our User page to advocate violence. We have articles such as Antifa (United States). It is not unheard of for disputes to arise on its Talk page. Is the presence of user-box language such as "This user supports antifa in combating fascism in both word and action" conducive to collaborative editing? Such a message puts an editor that disagrees with that sentiment on alert that reasoning and dialogue are of secondary importance because a firmly held position has already been articulated on another editor's User page. And it gets worse. If they point out that this declared position exists on another editor's User page, they are liable to being blocked with the understanding that they are commenting on the other editor instead of the content under discussion. And it is even construed as a personal attack. Isn't the solution to not have such strident declarations about contentious issues on one's User page? Bus stop (talk) 02:53, 22 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, per Dlthewave. Mark Schierbecker (talk) 10:43, 24 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Reminder that this is not a vote and that personal opinions about whether all userboxes should be allowed or inconsistent enforcement of userbox policy does not matter here. The only thing that matters in determining consensus here is if these userboxes violate Wikipedia policy. Toa Nidhiki05 12:19, 24 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Weak Delete as it does not just merely state a political stance, but rather declares association with a political organization. An organization which is considered to be terrorist by quite a few people according to our own article on the matter. Which probably has some bad implications for the declaration of "combating" people with "action" in that userbox. A declaration that can easily be interpreted to be the intention to commit violence is not acceptable on Wikipedia according to our guidelines, even if it is against people like fascists and nazis. Do your political battles elsewhere. A userbox that merely states "This user is anti-fascist" would be acceptable as long as userboxes with political stances are acceptable, as there is no clear principle speaking against it. --Hecato (talk) 13:24, 24 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Our article on the matter in no way describes antifa as an organisation. In fact it says precisely the opposite: "Antifa is not an interconnected or unified organization, but rather a movement without a leadership structure, comprising multiple autonomous groups and individuals." – Arms & Hearts (talk) 13:56, 24 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

As I understand it, and correct me if I am wrong, I am certainly no expert, Antifa is organized along the lines of a cell system, which makes the issue of there being no overarching unified organizational structure a matter of technicality. Also the people who think it is a terrorist organization do describe it as an "organization" according to the article. We could get into the weeds here and have a long discussion about what an organization is, but that was not really my point. Declaring association with Antifa is certainly not the same thing as just declaring a political stance. --Hecato (talk) 14:10, 24 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Where are you getting this from? O3000 (talk) 14:15, 24 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 76: / Line 76: @@
 *:Our article on the matter in no way describes antifa as an organisation. In fact it says precisely the opposite: "Antifa is not an interconnected or unified organization, but rather a movement without a leadership structure, comprising multiple autonomous groups and individuals." &ndash;&nbsp;[[User:Arms & Hearts|Arms & Hearts]] ([[User talk:Arms & Hearts|talk]]) 13:56, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 :::As I understand it, and correct me if I am wrong, I am certainly no expert, Antifa is organized along the lines of a [[Clandestine cell system|cell system]], which makes the issue of there being no overarching unified organizational structure a matter of technicality. Also the people who think it is a terrorist organization do describe it as an "organization" according to the article. We could get into the weeds here and have a long discussion about what an organization is, but that was not really my point. Declaring association with Antifa is certainly not the same thing as just declaring a political stance. --[[User:Hecato|Hecato]] ([[User talk:Hecato|talk]]) 14:10, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
+::::Where are you getting this from? [[User:Objective3000|O3000]] ([[User talk:Objective3000|talk]]) 14:15, 24 July 2019 (UTC)