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I would just make the change myself, but this page seems heavily contested. In the Falun_Gong#Organization section it has this text twice.
To start the section off:
"Falun Gong embraces a minimal organizational structure, and does not have a rigid hierarchy, physical places of worship, fees, or formal membership.[53] In the absence of membership, Falun Gong practitioners can be anyone who chooses to identify themselves as such, and practitioners are free to participate in the practice and follow its teachings as much or as little as they like.[54] Falun Gong also does not accept or solicit donations, has no initiation rituals, and no constitution or governing documents, aside from the teachings themselves.[55]"
And then in a paragraph below it:
"According to Anthropologist Noah Porter, Falun Gong embraces a minimal organizational structure, and does not have a rigid hierarchy, physical places of worship, fees, or formal membership.[53] In the absence of membership, Falun Gong practitioners can be anyone who chooses to identify themselves as such, and practitioners are free to participate in the practice and follow its teachings as much or as little as they like.[61]" — Preceding unsigned comment added by Booster4324 ( talk • contribs) 20:02, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
There is a dispute over inclusions of material in the Controversy paragraph. Specifically, should a New York Times article be used [5] on controversy over interracial children and the "Dharma Ending Period".-- PCPP ( talk) 06:05, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
New York Times falls under WP:RS, and you have not demonstrated nor provided evidence on why the claim is disputed by other authors. An attribution to primary source, as you claimed, is certainly not needed.-- PCPP ( talk) 06:37, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
Sean, thanks for providing the original source. As Olaf said, Craig Smith's wording that PCPP has fought to preserve (ie. "spawn") is nowhere found in the primary source. I'll propose a solution here (Olaf, please tell me if my summary is acceptable from your perspective). How about something to the effect of "Li Hongzhi posits in his teachings that there are distinct heavens for people of different races, and as such, "once races are mixed up, one does not have a corresponding relationship with the higher levels, and he has lost the root." In a lecture to his students in Australia, Li describes interracial children as a phenomenon unique to the Dharma ending period, an era of moral decline described in Buddhist scriptures, but adds "If you are an interracial child, it is, of course, neither your fault nor your parents' fault...If you want to practice cultivation, I can help." Homunculus ( duihua) 20:20, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
This is clearly just an ideological war, the same ideological war that has been fought in the last five years or so and never got resolved. I applaud all of you for your persistence, but I do suggest (with all due respect) that the involved editors all leave this page, pass this entire article to a totally neutral third party, and let them take it from here. Colipon+( Talk) 02:26, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
I am going to disregard the red herrings that now litter this discussion, and recap. The original Craig Smith quote was not a scholarly interpretation of Li Hongzhi's writing; it was a half quote, half paraphrase that Smith attributed to Li Hongzhi. PCPP did not appear to care about having the actual quote in the article; he was fighting to include Craig Smith's paraphrase, which was inflammatory and of disputed accuracy. Given that "the accuracy of quoted material is paramount and the accuracy of quotations from living persons is especially sensitive. To ensure accuracy, the text of quoted material is best taken from (and cited to) the original source being quoted", Sean and Homunculus referred to the primary source. The conclusion was that Smith's paraphrase was not accurate. Homunculus proposed a summary of Li Hongzhi's actual words, which Olaf (who is now our only resident expert on Falungong teachings) found agreeable.
PCPP has tried to argue that Wikipedia is built on secondary sources, not primary sources. In general, this is true, but an exception holds when a primary source is describing what the primary source says; in that case, primary sources are superior. PCPP then tried to argue that Homunculus's summary was original research. I would ask him to reead the original research policy; Homunculus was not offering an original interpretation of the primary source, but was quoting and carefully summarising it. This is not in violation of WP:No original research I would also note that the guideline PCPP highlighted itself recommends using additional secondary sources to ensure that there are no novel interpretations of primary sources (by secondary sources). Craig Smith's paraphrase was, evidently, a novel and sensationalised reading of Li Hongzhi's original statement, and his reading is not supported by Falungong experts (in fact, Falungong scholars don't seem to care much about these teachings at all). This is to be expected; Smith is a journalist with his own point of view, not a scholar of religion or an expert on Falungong. We do not have any other, neutral and scholarly sources who would corroborate Smith's paraphrase, and it has now been definitively shown to be wrong through a comparison with the primary source. It simply cannot be included.
Now, my comment: I am glad that Homunculus and Olaf tried to hash out a solution, and if it turns out that mine is a lone voice in the wilderness, I would support their proposal as a middle ground. But I still don't see the notability. PCPP appears to have thrown onto the page every critical statement he could find about Falungong (and rejects any attempt to discuss the neutrality or due weight that should be accorded to these things). Yet he has not explained why Falungong's views on race and heaven are a notable controversy. All religions have novel beliefs that some people will invariably find strange or unappealing, but the presence of these beliefs does not, itself, make a 'controversy.' If that were the case, the article on Judaism would have a lengthy criticism section about the implausibility of auto-combusting bushes. To Quigley, your first statement suggests that Smith's interpretation is germane because it illuminates the question of whether Falungong's leader is deluded. That is not at all the question here, and it is not the place of an encyclopedia article to weigh in on the validity of religious beliefs. WP:Criticisms emphasis the importance of not overemphasising criticisms or controversy, but that is exactly what is happening here.—Zujine| talk 14:41, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
I've just been watching, not writing. I'll make one observation on the behavior of the editors. It looks to me like there are some neutral editors (Homunculus, Zujine, Sean Hoyland) who seemed to be engaged in substantive discussions and are willing to collaborate and compromise while being civil. They have different points of view on the subject, but their engagement with the discussion is fair, at least as far as I see it. Then, there are then some editors who are intent mainly on making attacks and accusations against others, which ends up derailing the discussions with politically and ideologically charged rhetoric, and remarks that don't seem to have anything to do with the content on the page (i.e. Quigley, Colipon, PCPP). Isn't Wikipedia meant to be edited by consensus? I would consider getting involved and editing if it did not seem so political. I'm not familiar with the policy, precisely, that decides what is included, but if there are serious and legitimate disputes about content, shouldn't they be discussed before changes are forced onto the page? That's all. -- 69.181.25.248 ( talk) 17:09, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
Comment - I provided the primary source above because I wanted to verify for myself that the quoted material in the NYT article, "The yellow people, the white people, and the black people have corresponding races in heaven", was accurate. It was accurate or at least it was consistent with that source. It doesn't mean I care about the primary source or even regard it necessarily as a reliable source for what Li said. The secondary source takes precedence, that is the source being quoted and the NYT is an RS for what living people have said. It's use is consistent with mandatory policies WP:V and WP:BLP no matter what the content guideline Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources says about quotations. When editors argue at length to exclude a report in the New York Times from an article covered by discretionary sanctions because they disagree with the way the journalist interpreted and presented the information available to them, even describing it as a propaganda piece for the CCP, inflammatory, not notable etc, there is a problem. Would any of us have written the article in the NYT using the same terminology and interpretation ? Probably not but it doesn't matter, we aren't RS. We can discuss details about wording, attribution, rebuttals etc but excluding material from the NYT is not an option that policy minded editors have available to them. Sean.hoyland - talk 10:58, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
Olaf has clearly stated the policies and guidelines that you contravened with your addition of this and several other items, yet you appear to be refusing to get the point. For your convenience, I will post some of the relevant policies and guidelines below. Given that you are the one insisting that the content be in the article, it seems to me that the burden of arguing for its compliance with policies is on you. Per the policies below, I am going to provide a proper inline citation, and a rebuttal, in order to bring it in line with WP:V. The NPV issue of due weight is still likely going to be a problem, however, as it is for much of the other content you added from marginal scholars and journalists.
The statement that you put in the article 1) does not have an inline citation, in contravention of WP:V. 2) It is a statement made by an isolated reporter, and is neither corroborated by or found to be notable by reputable scholars on the subject. Inclusion, therefore, seems to contravene WP:NPV. 3) It does not present the statement by a living person in a responsible, impartial tone, contravening WP:BLP; and 4)It is a paraphrase of a quote attributed to a primary source, but the primary source does not contain the wording. The WP:RS guideline says it should be quoted directly from the primary source. Is that clear enough? Can you explain now why this statement should be considered notable? Homunculus ( duihua) 18:25, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
Really so much fuss over nothing. Go ahead read the teachings you'll see how important this issue is, I found the word interracial it only in 3 questions/answers, and it was talking from the point of view of how heavens are structured (as far as I understood). Best Regards, -- HappyInGeneral ( talk) 21:55, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
Eight thousand words later, shall we call this RfC as resolved? Homunculus ( duihua) 04:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
I just updated the organization section of the page, adding in a sub-section on organization within mainland China. This is one facet of Falun Gong that has been thoroughly expounded upon, and we have available to us a number of high quality, peer-reviewed academic sources that discuss the topic. Also fortunately, there is very little substantive disagreement among these scholars on the features of Falun Gong organization (reading the previous version, one might think there is a lively scholarly debate. There is not). On account of that, there is no reason why the section should rely so heavily on selective quotations and inline citations; this is not a literature review, after all. Instead, it is possible for us to make neutral, widely agreed-upon statements of fact. I hope that is what I have done here. In addition, I added a new paragraph expanding on Falun Gong organization outside China (here, I mainly drew on Burgdoff, Porter, Palmer, Ownby, and some others), and also expanded the discussion of the organizational evolution within China in the 1990s (James Tong being the authoritative source here). There is now considerably more content, but I think it's also tighter and more clearly stated than before, so the length is actually quite comparable. If anyone has a divergent interpretation of the sources or other feedback, I would be grateful to hear it. Homunculus ( duihua) 05:12, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
Under the authority of WP:ARBFLG#Discretionary sanctions, pending final disposition of a related AE request, this article is placed under a 1RR/week restriction. All editors are restricted to one revert per rolling 168 hour period, excluding reverts of IP edits and clear vandalism. Violations of this restriction will be dealt with by escalating blocks, starting at 24 hours. T. Canens ( talk) 08:29, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
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AgadaUrbanit ( talk) 23:03, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
I have reverted edits by user:Rwityk. Those changes appear massive and substantial, so might require gaining a consensus on the article talk page first. AgadaUrbanit ( talk) 10:32, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
I made some recent edits that involved matters of judgement about the relative importance of matters of how Falun Gong is presented in an encyclopedic treatment. Such decisions are always fraught with caveats and second-thoughts. As far as I can tell I was cleaning up some of the mess from a recent POV-war about how Falun Gong's beliefs are represented. Some of the information was incomplete or oddly sourced, leading to a skewed presentation. At least, that is the impression it gave me, and going by my memory of reading everything on this subject some years ago. My memory is not extremely fresh. One could consult with Ownby on it, I suppose, but I tried to prune what I thought were gratuitous details that had been inserted as part of making a point. I could be wrong. If there's a problem we should discuss it (said to the invisible reader). Overall a very professional treatment synthesizing a vast number of sources. People I work with get paid a lot of money to do that--and here Wikipedians are, giving it away for free. The Sound and the Fury ( talk) 05:50, 28 November 2011 (UTC)
Hey everyone, I am a grad student doing a semester Wikipedia project on Chinese propaganda. I picked the FG controversy as a case study. My aim is to describe the CCP's propaganda campaign against FG, which is why I used official press releases and academic research as sources. I'm not here to make an anti-China or pro-FG point, nor am I interested in a Wiki war. I'm going to repost my changes because I'm doing a presentation tonight on my research, save a PDF of that version, and send it to my professor. So feel free to delete what I wrote after 9:30 pm EST 12-1-11. Until then, I will continue to reverse your edits. Discuss away, and Cheers! Rwityk ( talk) 01:10, 2 December 2011 (UTC)
My directions were to create a Wikipedia page or contribute to an existing page, on the topic of foreign propaganda. I believe I have satisfactorily completed the assignment. I'm getting the feeling that the biggest problem with my contribution is that I invaded some editors' "territory" and didn't consult with anyone before posting. So, I extend my condolences for anyone's pride that was bruised during the process, and wish the offended luck with their control complexes. Conversely, I also appreciate the sincere advice I've been given here, and if I ever get the urge to update a Wikipedia page again, I'll keep your comments in mind. 96.231.119.96 ( talk) 05:32, 6 December 2011 (UTC)Rwityk
In 1992, Li Hongzhi introduced Falun Gong and along with teachings that touched upon a wide range of topics, from detailed exposition on qigong related phenomenon and cultivation practice to science and morality. In the next few years, Falun Gong quickly grew in popularity across China to become the most popular qigong practice in Chinese History. [1] Falun Gong was welcomed into the state-controlled Scientific Qigong Research Association, which sponsored and helped to organize many of his activities between 1992 and 1994, including 54 large-scale lectures. In 1992 and 1993 he won government awards at the Beijing Oriental Health Expos, including the "Qigong Master most acclaimed by the Masses" and "The Award for Advancing Boundary Science." [2]
According to academics, Falun Gong originally surfaced in the institutional field of alternative Chinese science, not religion. The debate between what can be called " naturalist" and " supernaturalist" schools of qigong theory has produced a considerable amount of literature. Xu Jian stated in The Journal of Asian Studies 58 (4 November 1999): "Situated both in scientific researches on qigong and in the prevailing nationalistic revival of traditional beliefs and values, this discursive struggle has articulated itself as an intellectual debate and enlisted on both sides a host of well-known writers and scientists — so much so that a veritable corpus of literature on qigong resulted. In it, two conflicting discourses became identifiable. Taking “discourse” in its contemporary sense as referring to forms of representation that generate specific cultural and historical fields of meaning, we can describe one such discourse as rational and scientific and the other as psychosomatic and metaphysical. Each strives to establish its own order of power and knowledge, its own “truth” about the “reality” of qigong, although they differ drastically in their explanation of many of its phenomena. The controversy centers on the question of whether and how qigong can induce “supranormal abilities” (teyi gongneng). The psychosomatic discourse emphasizes the inexplicable power of qigong and relishes its super-normal mechanisms or which causative factors which go beyond wht canbe explained by presentday scietific models, whereas the rational discourse strives to demystify many of its phenomena and to situate it strictly in the knowledge present day modern science." The Chinese government has generally tried to encourage qigong as a science and discourage religious or supernatural elements. However, the category of science in China tends to include things that are generally not considered scientific in the West, including qigong and traditional Chinese medicine.
David Aikman has written in American Spectator (March 2000): "Americans may believe that qigong belongs in a general category of socially neutral, New Age-style concepts that are merely subjective, not necessarily harmful, and incapable of scientific proof. But China's scientific community doesn't share this view. Experiments under controlled conditions established by the Chinese Academy of Sciences in the late 1970s and early 1980s concluded that qi, when emitted by a qigong expert, actually constitutes measurable infrared electromagnetic waves and causes chemical changes in static water through mental concentration. Qi, according to much of China's scientific establishment, for all intents existed." [3]
Li Hongzhi states in Falun Buddha Fa Lectures in Europe:
"Since the time Dafa was made public, I have unveiled some inexplicable phenomena in qigong as well as things that hadn’t been explained in the qigong community. But this isn’t the reason why so many people are studying Dafa. It’s because our Fa can truly enable people to Consummate, truly save people, and allow you to truly ascend to high levels in the process of cultivation. Whether it’s your realm of mind or the physical quality of your body, the Fa truly enables you to reach the standards of different levels. It absolutely can assume this role."
Andrew P. Kipnis is quoted as stating: "...to the Western layperson, qigong of all sorts may seem to be religious because it deals with spiritual matters. Because Li Hongzhi makes use of many concepts from Buddhism and Taoism in his writings, this may make Falun Gong seem even more like a religion to the outsider; bur Falun Gong grew initially into a space termed scientific [in China], but was mostly insulated from the spaces formally acknowledged as institutionalized science in Western countries" [4]
The term 'qigong' was coined in the early 1950s as an alternative label to past spiritual disciplines rooted Buddhism or Taoism, that promoted the belief in the supernatural, immortality and pursuit of spiritual transcendence. The new term was constructed to avoid danger of association with ancient spiritual practices which were labeled "superstitious" and persecuted during the Maoist era. [1] In Communist China, where spirituality and religion are looked-down upon, the concept was "tolerated" because it carried with it no overt religious or spiritual elements; and millions flocked to it during China's spiritual vacuum of the 1980s and 1990s. Scholars argue that the immense popularity of qigong in China could, in part, lie in the fact that the public saw in it a way to improve and maintain health. According to Ownby, this rapidly became a social phenomenon of considerable importance. [1]
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Maunus ( talk • contribs) 18:29, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
Sociologist Susan Palmer writes that, "...Falun Gong does not behave like other new religions. For one thing, its organization - if one can even call it that - is quite nebulous. There are no church buildings, rented spaces, no priests or administrators. At first I assumed this was defensive [...] now, I'm beginning to think that what you see is exactly what you get - Master Li's teachings on the Net on the one hand and a global network of practitioners on the other. Traveling through North America, all I dug up was a handful of volunteer contact persons. The local membership (they vehemently reject that word) is whoever happens to show up at the park on a particular Saturday morning to do qigong."
In his thesis, Noah Porter takes up the issue of Falun Gong and finance in Mainland China. He quotes and responds to some of the allegations of the Chinese Communist Party that Li benefited financially from teaching the practice. Porter writes that when teaching seminars, there was an admission of 40 yuan per new practitioner and 20 yuan for repeat practitioners--with the repeat practitioners making up for 50-75% of the admissions. He goes on to say with respect to the CCP's claims: "...but the Chinese government figures for the profits of the seminars counted all attendees as paying the 40-yuan fee charged to newcomers. Also, the Chinese Qigong Research Society received 40% of admission receipts from July 1993 to September 1994. Falun Gong's first four training seminars took in a total of 20,000 yuan, which is only 10% of the 200,000 figure cited by the Chinese government. Finally, from that 20,000 yuan, they had several operating expenses..." [5]
Ian Johnson points out that during the greatest period of Falun Gong book sales in China, Li Hongzhi never received any royalties because all publications were bootleg. [6]
James Tong writes about the competing claims by Falun Gong and the Chinese government in 'The China Quarterly' journal, 2003. He writes that the government has attempted to portray Falun Gong as being financially savvy with a centralized administration system and a variety of mechanisms for deriving profit from the practice. He also looks over Falun Gong's claims of having no hierarchy, administration, membership or financial accounts, and that seminar admission was charged at a minimal rate. [7] Tong writes that it was in the government's interest, in the post-crackdown context, to portray Falun Gong as being highly organised: "The more organized the Falun Gong could be shown to be, then the more justified the regime's repression in the name of social order was." [8] He writes that the government's charges that Falun Gong made excessive profits, charged exorbitant fees, and that Li Hongzhi led a lavish lifestyle "...lack both internal and external substantiating evidence" and points out that that despite the arrests and scrutiny, the authorities "had disclosed no financial accounts that established the official charge and credibly countered Falun Gong rebuttals." [9]
Li Hongzhi stipulates in his books Falun Gong and Zhuan Falun that practitioners should only voluntarily help others learn the exercises and that this could never be done for fame and money, and also stipulates that practitioners must not accept any fee, donation or gift in return for their voluntarily teaching the practice. According to Falun Gong, Li's insistence that the practice be offered free of charge caused a rift with the China Qigong Research Society, the state administrative body under which Falun Dafa was initially introduced. Li subsequently withdrew from the organization.
Falun Gong website often state on their pages that "All Falun Gong Activities Are Free of Charge and Run by Volunteers" [10]
In an interview in Sydney on May 2, 1999, mentioning his financial status, Li said : "In mainland China I published so many books, but added together, they haven't exceeded twenty thousand Renminbi (equivalent to US $ 2,469). This is what the publishing company gave me. When publishing books in other countries of the world, you know there is a rule, which pays 5 or 6% royalties to the author, so each time I can only get a little bit, a few hundred, or a few thousand dollars." [11]
References
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Maunus ( talk • contribs) 18:29, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
I found a citation at Falun Gong#Death Toll, where an article "According to Ethan Gutmann of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies" suggests "a likely death toll based on refugee testimony is approximately 65,000"(The number in the original article is 70000). After checking this article, I was doubtful about the validity of its opinion on the death toll: firstly, the main focus of the article is not Falun Gong but the overall Chinese political situation; secondly, the article provides neither citation of the "refugee testimony" nor any possible sources of them. Though this article provide some useful opinion, I think this article is not enough credible for claim of such a great number.-- Inspector ( talk) 08:07, 1 January 2012 (UTC)
On second thought, we might want to consider depicting these estimates within a table, which would cite the numbers, source of the estimate, publishing date, and a brief account of the methodology employed (if available). Homunculus ( duihua) 03:30, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but the Weekly Standard, Jewish Policy Center, and National Review are not primary sources. They are solid, reliable sources, and Gutmann's articles within them would have needed to pass muster with some strict editorial boards. I included the blog because Wikipedia policy permits the use of self-published sources when the author is an established expert on the subject on which they are writing, and the blog provides a detailed explanation of Gutmann's methodology. If you want yet more sources that cite Gutmann's research, I suggest you check these: [18] [19]. I'm very curious how you are defining a primary source. Homunculus ( duihua) 21:12, 9 January 2012 (UTC) I'll elaborate: I assume you're defining Gutmann as a primary source because his conclusions were based, in part, on his own investigative research and interviews. He is a journalist. Conducting interviews and publishing the resulting findings is what journalists do. Gutmann's research has been reliably published on multiple occasions by reliable sources, cited in U.S. Congress, and lauded in the New York Times. Where his findings are provided on the page, they are given an inline citation. I'm really not clear on what you're objecting to. Homunculus ( duihua) 21:28, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
References
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 30 | ← | Archive 33 | Archive 34 | Archive 35 | Archive 36 | Archive 37 | → | Archive 40 |
I would just make the change myself, but this page seems heavily contested. In the Falun_Gong#Organization section it has this text twice.
To start the section off:
"Falun Gong embraces a minimal organizational structure, and does not have a rigid hierarchy, physical places of worship, fees, or formal membership.[53] In the absence of membership, Falun Gong practitioners can be anyone who chooses to identify themselves as such, and practitioners are free to participate in the practice and follow its teachings as much or as little as they like.[54] Falun Gong also does not accept or solicit donations, has no initiation rituals, and no constitution or governing documents, aside from the teachings themselves.[55]"
And then in a paragraph below it:
"According to Anthropologist Noah Porter, Falun Gong embraces a minimal organizational structure, and does not have a rigid hierarchy, physical places of worship, fees, or formal membership.[53] In the absence of membership, Falun Gong practitioners can be anyone who chooses to identify themselves as such, and practitioners are free to participate in the practice and follow its teachings as much or as little as they like.[61]" — Preceding unsigned comment added by Booster4324 ( talk • contribs) 20:02, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
There is a dispute over inclusions of material in the Controversy paragraph. Specifically, should a New York Times article be used [5] on controversy over interracial children and the "Dharma Ending Period".-- PCPP ( talk) 06:05, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
New York Times falls under WP:RS, and you have not demonstrated nor provided evidence on why the claim is disputed by other authors. An attribution to primary source, as you claimed, is certainly not needed.-- PCPP ( talk) 06:37, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
Sean, thanks for providing the original source. As Olaf said, Craig Smith's wording that PCPP has fought to preserve (ie. "spawn") is nowhere found in the primary source. I'll propose a solution here (Olaf, please tell me if my summary is acceptable from your perspective). How about something to the effect of "Li Hongzhi posits in his teachings that there are distinct heavens for people of different races, and as such, "once races are mixed up, one does not have a corresponding relationship with the higher levels, and he has lost the root." In a lecture to his students in Australia, Li describes interracial children as a phenomenon unique to the Dharma ending period, an era of moral decline described in Buddhist scriptures, but adds "If you are an interracial child, it is, of course, neither your fault nor your parents' fault...If you want to practice cultivation, I can help." Homunculus ( duihua) 20:20, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
This is clearly just an ideological war, the same ideological war that has been fought in the last five years or so and never got resolved. I applaud all of you for your persistence, but I do suggest (with all due respect) that the involved editors all leave this page, pass this entire article to a totally neutral third party, and let them take it from here. Colipon+( Talk) 02:26, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
I am going to disregard the red herrings that now litter this discussion, and recap. The original Craig Smith quote was not a scholarly interpretation of Li Hongzhi's writing; it was a half quote, half paraphrase that Smith attributed to Li Hongzhi. PCPP did not appear to care about having the actual quote in the article; he was fighting to include Craig Smith's paraphrase, which was inflammatory and of disputed accuracy. Given that "the accuracy of quoted material is paramount and the accuracy of quotations from living persons is especially sensitive. To ensure accuracy, the text of quoted material is best taken from (and cited to) the original source being quoted", Sean and Homunculus referred to the primary source. The conclusion was that Smith's paraphrase was not accurate. Homunculus proposed a summary of Li Hongzhi's actual words, which Olaf (who is now our only resident expert on Falungong teachings) found agreeable.
PCPP has tried to argue that Wikipedia is built on secondary sources, not primary sources. In general, this is true, but an exception holds when a primary source is describing what the primary source says; in that case, primary sources are superior. PCPP then tried to argue that Homunculus's summary was original research. I would ask him to reead the original research policy; Homunculus was not offering an original interpretation of the primary source, but was quoting and carefully summarising it. This is not in violation of WP:No original research I would also note that the guideline PCPP highlighted itself recommends using additional secondary sources to ensure that there are no novel interpretations of primary sources (by secondary sources). Craig Smith's paraphrase was, evidently, a novel and sensationalised reading of Li Hongzhi's original statement, and his reading is not supported by Falungong experts (in fact, Falungong scholars don't seem to care much about these teachings at all). This is to be expected; Smith is a journalist with his own point of view, not a scholar of religion or an expert on Falungong. We do not have any other, neutral and scholarly sources who would corroborate Smith's paraphrase, and it has now been definitively shown to be wrong through a comparison with the primary source. It simply cannot be included.
Now, my comment: I am glad that Homunculus and Olaf tried to hash out a solution, and if it turns out that mine is a lone voice in the wilderness, I would support their proposal as a middle ground. But I still don't see the notability. PCPP appears to have thrown onto the page every critical statement he could find about Falungong (and rejects any attempt to discuss the neutrality or due weight that should be accorded to these things). Yet he has not explained why Falungong's views on race and heaven are a notable controversy. All religions have novel beliefs that some people will invariably find strange or unappealing, but the presence of these beliefs does not, itself, make a 'controversy.' If that were the case, the article on Judaism would have a lengthy criticism section about the implausibility of auto-combusting bushes. To Quigley, your first statement suggests that Smith's interpretation is germane because it illuminates the question of whether Falungong's leader is deluded. That is not at all the question here, and it is not the place of an encyclopedia article to weigh in on the validity of religious beliefs. WP:Criticisms emphasis the importance of not overemphasising criticisms or controversy, but that is exactly what is happening here.—Zujine| talk 14:41, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
I've just been watching, not writing. I'll make one observation on the behavior of the editors. It looks to me like there are some neutral editors (Homunculus, Zujine, Sean Hoyland) who seemed to be engaged in substantive discussions and are willing to collaborate and compromise while being civil. They have different points of view on the subject, but their engagement with the discussion is fair, at least as far as I see it. Then, there are then some editors who are intent mainly on making attacks and accusations against others, which ends up derailing the discussions with politically and ideologically charged rhetoric, and remarks that don't seem to have anything to do with the content on the page (i.e. Quigley, Colipon, PCPP). Isn't Wikipedia meant to be edited by consensus? I would consider getting involved and editing if it did not seem so political. I'm not familiar with the policy, precisely, that decides what is included, but if there are serious and legitimate disputes about content, shouldn't they be discussed before changes are forced onto the page? That's all. -- 69.181.25.248 ( talk) 17:09, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
Comment - I provided the primary source above because I wanted to verify for myself that the quoted material in the NYT article, "The yellow people, the white people, and the black people have corresponding races in heaven", was accurate. It was accurate or at least it was consistent with that source. It doesn't mean I care about the primary source or even regard it necessarily as a reliable source for what Li said. The secondary source takes precedence, that is the source being quoted and the NYT is an RS for what living people have said. It's use is consistent with mandatory policies WP:V and WP:BLP no matter what the content guideline Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources says about quotations. When editors argue at length to exclude a report in the New York Times from an article covered by discretionary sanctions because they disagree with the way the journalist interpreted and presented the information available to them, even describing it as a propaganda piece for the CCP, inflammatory, not notable etc, there is a problem. Would any of us have written the article in the NYT using the same terminology and interpretation ? Probably not but it doesn't matter, we aren't RS. We can discuss details about wording, attribution, rebuttals etc but excluding material from the NYT is not an option that policy minded editors have available to them. Sean.hoyland - talk 10:58, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
Olaf has clearly stated the policies and guidelines that you contravened with your addition of this and several other items, yet you appear to be refusing to get the point. For your convenience, I will post some of the relevant policies and guidelines below. Given that you are the one insisting that the content be in the article, it seems to me that the burden of arguing for its compliance with policies is on you. Per the policies below, I am going to provide a proper inline citation, and a rebuttal, in order to bring it in line with WP:V. The NPV issue of due weight is still likely going to be a problem, however, as it is for much of the other content you added from marginal scholars and journalists.
The statement that you put in the article 1) does not have an inline citation, in contravention of WP:V. 2) It is a statement made by an isolated reporter, and is neither corroborated by or found to be notable by reputable scholars on the subject. Inclusion, therefore, seems to contravene WP:NPV. 3) It does not present the statement by a living person in a responsible, impartial tone, contravening WP:BLP; and 4)It is a paraphrase of a quote attributed to a primary source, but the primary source does not contain the wording. The WP:RS guideline says it should be quoted directly from the primary source. Is that clear enough? Can you explain now why this statement should be considered notable? Homunculus ( duihua) 18:25, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
Really so much fuss over nothing. Go ahead read the teachings you'll see how important this issue is, I found the word interracial it only in 3 questions/answers, and it was talking from the point of view of how heavens are structured (as far as I understood). Best Regards, -- HappyInGeneral ( talk) 21:55, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
Eight thousand words later, shall we call this RfC as resolved? Homunculus ( duihua) 04:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
I just updated the organization section of the page, adding in a sub-section on organization within mainland China. This is one facet of Falun Gong that has been thoroughly expounded upon, and we have available to us a number of high quality, peer-reviewed academic sources that discuss the topic. Also fortunately, there is very little substantive disagreement among these scholars on the features of Falun Gong organization (reading the previous version, one might think there is a lively scholarly debate. There is not). On account of that, there is no reason why the section should rely so heavily on selective quotations and inline citations; this is not a literature review, after all. Instead, it is possible for us to make neutral, widely agreed-upon statements of fact. I hope that is what I have done here. In addition, I added a new paragraph expanding on Falun Gong organization outside China (here, I mainly drew on Burgdoff, Porter, Palmer, Ownby, and some others), and also expanded the discussion of the organizational evolution within China in the 1990s (James Tong being the authoritative source here). There is now considerably more content, but I think it's also tighter and more clearly stated than before, so the length is actually quite comparable. If anyone has a divergent interpretation of the sources or other feedback, I would be grateful to hear it. Homunculus ( duihua) 05:12, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
Under the authority of WP:ARBFLG#Discretionary sanctions, pending final disposition of a related AE request, this article is placed under a 1RR/week restriction. All editors are restricted to one revert per rolling 168 hour period, excluding reverts of IP edits and clear vandalism. Violations of this restriction will be dealt with by escalating blocks, starting at 24 hours. T. Canens ( talk) 08:29, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
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AgadaUrbanit ( talk) 23:03, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
I have reverted edits by user:Rwityk. Those changes appear massive and substantial, so might require gaining a consensus on the article talk page first. AgadaUrbanit ( talk) 10:32, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
I made some recent edits that involved matters of judgement about the relative importance of matters of how Falun Gong is presented in an encyclopedic treatment. Such decisions are always fraught with caveats and second-thoughts. As far as I can tell I was cleaning up some of the mess from a recent POV-war about how Falun Gong's beliefs are represented. Some of the information was incomplete or oddly sourced, leading to a skewed presentation. At least, that is the impression it gave me, and going by my memory of reading everything on this subject some years ago. My memory is not extremely fresh. One could consult with Ownby on it, I suppose, but I tried to prune what I thought were gratuitous details that had been inserted as part of making a point. I could be wrong. If there's a problem we should discuss it (said to the invisible reader). Overall a very professional treatment synthesizing a vast number of sources. People I work with get paid a lot of money to do that--and here Wikipedians are, giving it away for free. The Sound and the Fury ( talk) 05:50, 28 November 2011 (UTC)
Hey everyone, I am a grad student doing a semester Wikipedia project on Chinese propaganda. I picked the FG controversy as a case study. My aim is to describe the CCP's propaganda campaign against FG, which is why I used official press releases and academic research as sources. I'm not here to make an anti-China or pro-FG point, nor am I interested in a Wiki war. I'm going to repost my changes because I'm doing a presentation tonight on my research, save a PDF of that version, and send it to my professor. So feel free to delete what I wrote after 9:30 pm EST 12-1-11. Until then, I will continue to reverse your edits. Discuss away, and Cheers! Rwityk ( talk) 01:10, 2 December 2011 (UTC)
My directions were to create a Wikipedia page or contribute to an existing page, on the topic of foreign propaganda. I believe I have satisfactorily completed the assignment. I'm getting the feeling that the biggest problem with my contribution is that I invaded some editors' "territory" and didn't consult with anyone before posting. So, I extend my condolences for anyone's pride that was bruised during the process, and wish the offended luck with their control complexes. Conversely, I also appreciate the sincere advice I've been given here, and if I ever get the urge to update a Wikipedia page again, I'll keep your comments in mind. 96.231.119.96 ( talk) 05:32, 6 December 2011 (UTC)Rwityk
In 1992, Li Hongzhi introduced Falun Gong and along with teachings that touched upon a wide range of topics, from detailed exposition on qigong related phenomenon and cultivation practice to science and morality. In the next few years, Falun Gong quickly grew in popularity across China to become the most popular qigong practice in Chinese History. [1] Falun Gong was welcomed into the state-controlled Scientific Qigong Research Association, which sponsored and helped to organize many of his activities between 1992 and 1994, including 54 large-scale lectures. In 1992 and 1993 he won government awards at the Beijing Oriental Health Expos, including the "Qigong Master most acclaimed by the Masses" and "The Award for Advancing Boundary Science." [2]
According to academics, Falun Gong originally surfaced in the institutional field of alternative Chinese science, not religion. The debate between what can be called " naturalist" and " supernaturalist" schools of qigong theory has produced a considerable amount of literature. Xu Jian stated in The Journal of Asian Studies 58 (4 November 1999): "Situated both in scientific researches on qigong and in the prevailing nationalistic revival of traditional beliefs and values, this discursive struggle has articulated itself as an intellectual debate and enlisted on both sides a host of well-known writers and scientists — so much so that a veritable corpus of literature on qigong resulted. In it, two conflicting discourses became identifiable. Taking “discourse” in its contemporary sense as referring to forms of representation that generate specific cultural and historical fields of meaning, we can describe one such discourse as rational and scientific and the other as psychosomatic and metaphysical. Each strives to establish its own order of power and knowledge, its own “truth” about the “reality” of qigong, although they differ drastically in their explanation of many of its phenomena. The controversy centers on the question of whether and how qigong can induce “supranormal abilities” (teyi gongneng). The psychosomatic discourse emphasizes the inexplicable power of qigong and relishes its super-normal mechanisms or which causative factors which go beyond wht canbe explained by presentday scietific models, whereas the rational discourse strives to demystify many of its phenomena and to situate it strictly in the knowledge present day modern science." The Chinese government has generally tried to encourage qigong as a science and discourage religious or supernatural elements. However, the category of science in China tends to include things that are generally not considered scientific in the West, including qigong and traditional Chinese medicine.
David Aikman has written in American Spectator (March 2000): "Americans may believe that qigong belongs in a general category of socially neutral, New Age-style concepts that are merely subjective, not necessarily harmful, and incapable of scientific proof. But China's scientific community doesn't share this view. Experiments under controlled conditions established by the Chinese Academy of Sciences in the late 1970s and early 1980s concluded that qi, when emitted by a qigong expert, actually constitutes measurable infrared electromagnetic waves and causes chemical changes in static water through mental concentration. Qi, according to much of China's scientific establishment, for all intents existed." [3]
Li Hongzhi states in Falun Buddha Fa Lectures in Europe:
"Since the time Dafa was made public, I have unveiled some inexplicable phenomena in qigong as well as things that hadn’t been explained in the qigong community. But this isn’t the reason why so many people are studying Dafa. It’s because our Fa can truly enable people to Consummate, truly save people, and allow you to truly ascend to high levels in the process of cultivation. Whether it’s your realm of mind or the physical quality of your body, the Fa truly enables you to reach the standards of different levels. It absolutely can assume this role."
Andrew P. Kipnis is quoted as stating: "...to the Western layperson, qigong of all sorts may seem to be religious because it deals with spiritual matters. Because Li Hongzhi makes use of many concepts from Buddhism and Taoism in his writings, this may make Falun Gong seem even more like a religion to the outsider; bur Falun Gong grew initially into a space termed scientific [in China], but was mostly insulated from the spaces formally acknowledged as institutionalized science in Western countries" [4]
The term 'qigong' was coined in the early 1950s as an alternative label to past spiritual disciplines rooted Buddhism or Taoism, that promoted the belief in the supernatural, immortality and pursuit of spiritual transcendence. The new term was constructed to avoid danger of association with ancient spiritual practices which were labeled "superstitious" and persecuted during the Maoist era. [1] In Communist China, where spirituality and religion are looked-down upon, the concept was "tolerated" because it carried with it no overt religious or spiritual elements; and millions flocked to it during China's spiritual vacuum of the 1980s and 1990s. Scholars argue that the immense popularity of qigong in China could, in part, lie in the fact that the public saw in it a way to improve and maintain health. According to Ownby, this rapidly became a social phenomenon of considerable importance. [1]
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Maunus ( talk • contribs) 18:29, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
Sociologist Susan Palmer writes that, "...Falun Gong does not behave like other new religions. For one thing, its organization - if one can even call it that - is quite nebulous. There are no church buildings, rented spaces, no priests or administrators. At first I assumed this was defensive [...] now, I'm beginning to think that what you see is exactly what you get - Master Li's teachings on the Net on the one hand and a global network of practitioners on the other. Traveling through North America, all I dug up was a handful of volunteer contact persons. The local membership (they vehemently reject that word) is whoever happens to show up at the park on a particular Saturday morning to do qigong."
In his thesis, Noah Porter takes up the issue of Falun Gong and finance in Mainland China. He quotes and responds to some of the allegations of the Chinese Communist Party that Li benefited financially from teaching the practice. Porter writes that when teaching seminars, there was an admission of 40 yuan per new practitioner and 20 yuan for repeat practitioners--with the repeat practitioners making up for 50-75% of the admissions. He goes on to say with respect to the CCP's claims: "...but the Chinese government figures for the profits of the seminars counted all attendees as paying the 40-yuan fee charged to newcomers. Also, the Chinese Qigong Research Society received 40% of admission receipts from July 1993 to September 1994. Falun Gong's first four training seminars took in a total of 20,000 yuan, which is only 10% of the 200,000 figure cited by the Chinese government. Finally, from that 20,000 yuan, they had several operating expenses..." [5]
Ian Johnson points out that during the greatest period of Falun Gong book sales in China, Li Hongzhi never received any royalties because all publications were bootleg. [6]
James Tong writes about the competing claims by Falun Gong and the Chinese government in 'The China Quarterly' journal, 2003. He writes that the government has attempted to portray Falun Gong as being financially savvy with a centralized administration system and a variety of mechanisms for deriving profit from the practice. He also looks over Falun Gong's claims of having no hierarchy, administration, membership or financial accounts, and that seminar admission was charged at a minimal rate. [7] Tong writes that it was in the government's interest, in the post-crackdown context, to portray Falun Gong as being highly organised: "The more organized the Falun Gong could be shown to be, then the more justified the regime's repression in the name of social order was." [8] He writes that the government's charges that Falun Gong made excessive profits, charged exorbitant fees, and that Li Hongzhi led a lavish lifestyle "...lack both internal and external substantiating evidence" and points out that that despite the arrests and scrutiny, the authorities "had disclosed no financial accounts that established the official charge and credibly countered Falun Gong rebuttals." [9]
Li Hongzhi stipulates in his books Falun Gong and Zhuan Falun that practitioners should only voluntarily help others learn the exercises and that this could never be done for fame and money, and also stipulates that practitioners must not accept any fee, donation or gift in return for their voluntarily teaching the practice. According to Falun Gong, Li's insistence that the practice be offered free of charge caused a rift with the China Qigong Research Society, the state administrative body under which Falun Dafa was initially introduced. Li subsequently withdrew from the organization.
Falun Gong website often state on their pages that "All Falun Gong Activities Are Free of Charge and Run by Volunteers" [10]
In an interview in Sydney on May 2, 1999, mentioning his financial status, Li said : "In mainland China I published so many books, but added together, they haven't exceeded twenty thousand Renminbi (equivalent to US $ 2,469). This is what the publishing company gave me. When publishing books in other countries of the world, you know there is a rule, which pays 5 or 6% royalties to the author, so each time I can only get a little bit, a few hundred, or a few thousand dollars." [11]
References
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Maunus ( talk • contribs) 18:29, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
I found a citation at Falun Gong#Death Toll, where an article "According to Ethan Gutmann of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies" suggests "a likely death toll based on refugee testimony is approximately 65,000"(The number in the original article is 70000). After checking this article, I was doubtful about the validity of its opinion on the death toll: firstly, the main focus of the article is not Falun Gong but the overall Chinese political situation; secondly, the article provides neither citation of the "refugee testimony" nor any possible sources of them. Though this article provide some useful opinion, I think this article is not enough credible for claim of such a great number.-- Inspector ( talk) 08:07, 1 January 2012 (UTC)
On second thought, we might want to consider depicting these estimates within a table, which would cite the numbers, source of the estimate, publishing date, and a brief account of the methodology employed (if available). Homunculus ( duihua) 03:30, 3 January 2012 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but the Weekly Standard, Jewish Policy Center, and National Review are not primary sources. They are solid, reliable sources, and Gutmann's articles within them would have needed to pass muster with some strict editorial boards. I included the blog because Wikipedia policy permits the use of self-published sources when the author is an established expert on the subject on which they are writing, and the blog provides a detailed explanation of Gutmann's methodology. If you want yet more sources that cite Gutmann's research, I suggest you check these: [18] [19]. I'm very curious how you are defining a primary source. Homunculus ( duihua) 21:12, 9 January 2012 (UTC) I'll elaborate: I assume you're defining Gutmann as a primary source because his conclusions were based, in part, on his own investigative research and interviews. He is a journalist. Conducting interviews and publishing the resulting findings is what journalists do. Gutmann's research has been reliably published on multiple occasions by reliable sources, cited in U.S. Congress, and lauded in the New York Times. Where his findings are provided on the page, they are given an inline citation. I'm really not clear on what you're objecting to. Homunculus ( duihua) 21:28, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
References