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Two editors have launched a massive POV re-write of Lyndon LaRouche, involving well over 100 edits between them over the past week. The effect of their editing has been to take a stable, neutral BLP well into attack-article territory. The main emphasis has been the deletion of press commentary favorable to LaRouche ( [1] [2]) while giving undue weight to obscure critics ( [3] [4] [5] [6].) The NPOV tag that I placed was also reverted [7]. I would appreciate some intervention from non-involved editors. -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:22, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
Here is a more complete set of diffs, specifically from User:SlimVirgin. Beginning on August 28, SlimVirgin began a series of controversial edits, 140 of them at last count, despite the "controversial" tag on the talk page which asks that controversial edits be discussed in advance. The edits are so numerous that it is difficult to unravel the overarching trend. However, the examples below are characteristic. SlimVirgin has a technique of mixing controversial with non-controversial edits and then assigning a vague or misleading edit summary, so that when she is deleting favorable or adding negative commentary, she will often use a summary like "tidying." -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:26, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
User:Dewen12 and I have a disagreement about whether or not a paragraph he wrote should be part of Van Jones. It is my opinion that the paragraph is negatively biased and sourced by non-reliable sources. It is his opinion that, since I am a Democrat, I am inherently inclined to remove unflattering information, and so his paragraph should remain, exactly as he wrote it. Rather than enter into a pointless edit-war, I'd appreciate some assistance in looking at Dewen12's desired contribution and helping decide what the most neutral version might be. - FisherQueen ( talk · contribs) 10:34, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
New User: I think that, if your friend can find valid sources to cite, the article should be allowed. Just because information is unflattering doesn't mean it shouldn't be posted. And to be clear, I'd say the same about Bush or any republican; I support people's rights to write an article about how Bush's war policy was viewed, as long as they have reliable sources as well. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
68.63.39.20 (
talk) 09:55, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
I'd like opinions on an ongoing dispute at Ahmed Deedat. Just as background, Ahmed Deedat was what might be called a Muslim missionary, or at least a Muslim missionary writer. He worked in the area which (depending on your POV) either attacked Christianity or defended Islam against Christian attacks. The problem with a Wikipedia article on someone like that is you tend to only get two types of editors: those Muslims who are admirers of his work, and those Christians who are very critical of his work. (I admit I am in the latter group). I have tried to insert a link to a page of writings critical of Deedat's work, by a Christian author named John Gilchrist, and a number of Muslim editors continually revert it. (Of course, from their POV, a Christian is trying to disrupt the article and only gets support from another Christian). Debate on the issue on the talk page ( Talk:Ahmed Deedat) almost invariably falls along Christian/Muslim lines. So I am looking for some new editors - preferably without strong opinions on Deedat - to take a look at the issue.
To me it's a pretty clear case. Deedat wrote against Christianity, so a Christian response is notable if it's by a notable enough writer. I detail my reasons that Gilchrist is notable at Talk:Ahmed Deedat#Should we link to the anti-Deedat material at Answering-Islam.org?; but briefly I offer 3 strong sources backing up Gilchrist's writings: (1) Christianity Today, probably the leading evangelical Christian magazine in the world (CT page here [22] references Gilchrist's "The Christian Witness to the Muslim", which is partly a response to Deedat's writings); (2) two of his books were endorsed by leading Christian writer Ravi Zacharias in 1995 [23]; and (3) Gilchrist co-authored a book with Josh McDowell (probably the leading Christian apologist, at least at the popular level in the 1970s/early 80s) in 1981 (book is here [24] an 8 MB downlaod; Amazon page is here [25]).
It has been objected that these are Christian sources and so are inherently biased, but that misses the point. In the field of Muslim-Christian debate, there are really only two sides - the Muslim side (which Christian consider flawed) and the Christian side (which Muslims consider flawed). Note WP:NPOV says: "where multiple or conflicting perspectives exist within a topic each should be presented fairly... Readers should be allowed to form their own opinions."
A second objection has been that it's POV to put a link to a Christian critique unless we first explain Deedat's arguments so the reader knows what Gilchrist is arguing about. To me that objection is nonsense - we link to Deedat's anti-Christian writings (about 12 times in the article) so there's plenty of context for a single link to a notable Christian response. After a back and forth with a single editor over this, with neither of us backing down, I've decided to call for other opinions. Our debate is in the last part of Talk:Ahmed Deedat#Should we link to the anti-Deedat material at Answering-Islam.org?, beginning at 16:41, 21 July 2009 (UTC).
Anyway, what do people think? I think it's a clear example of a notable critique of Deedat, which is on-topic, and not POV to insert, in view of the large number of pro-Deedat links the article already contains. But I'd like some more opinions... Peter Ballard ( talk) 11:40, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
Those are the only debates deemed notable to this particular third-party reviewer. Of course, there may be other sources out there. Newspaper articles, commentary from outsiders, etc. would all be really good to find to get better sourcing. I suggested starting here and working your way through the journal articles. If you cannot get access to them, go to your local university or college library, or you can message me and I can send you quotations. Alternatively, you can look for sources from news outlets like these which can also establish external notability. Unfortunately, looking for both John Gilchrist and Ahmed Deedat yielded almost nothing. If the book you mention is clearly notable, we're going to need to find some external third-party reviews of it, some indication of its popularity, or, even better, some criticism.In the 1980s and 1990s Deedat debated in several countries with religious opponents, who in most cases were representatives of evangelical or fundamentalist forms of Christianity. For example, he debated with the American TV evangelist Jimmy Swaggart, the Palestinian Christian Anis Shorrosh, and the Swedish Pentecostal Pastor Stanley Sjoberg.
which indicates that Deedat's most famout two works do not include the one you reference. Once you and the rest of the editors can agree on an objective standard for deciding which of Deedat's writings to have prose in our article, then if Deedat's book "The God that never was" makes the cut it clearly makes Gilchrist a notable character.Deedat’s key mode of argument, manifest in his most famous works, Is the Bible God’s Word? and Crucifixion or Crucifiction? is to critique Christianity through close biblical hermeneutics.
The author remarks that what distinguishes the form and content of both Gilchrist and Deedat's activities was their "exlusivist" outlook towards their religions informed by missionary or reactionary impulses in some cases mirrored in the activities of the Anglican and NGK churches. The author then lists Deedat, Vanker, and Laher as Muslim exclusivists with Pypers, Nehls, and Gilchrist as Christian exclusivists. However, apparently the popularity of exclusivist approaches waned through the 1980s and 1990s in favor of pluralism, thus casting both Deedat and Gilchrist as anachronisms. This is perhaps a way Gilchrist can be addressed in this article as it is a fairly good quality source. This isn't exactly an argument to include his website, but in the larger context of this discussion Gilchrist's reliance on web-based technologies is a unique identifying feature. I must warn you, the connection here is very tenuous and is shared amongst four other people as well, so we're looking at something that will not be weighted very highly. It may mean that Gilchrist's actual commentary gets excluded from the article simply by virtue of the fact that it seems to lack sufficient prominence, especially in comparison to other aspects of Deedat's life works.Naude and Greyling's academic and mission work was complemented by those of Gilchrist and Nehls; the latter worked in the Western Cape while the former worked in the Transvaal where he had established his "Jesus to the Muslims" organization. In 1977 Gilchrist, a lawyer, produced his work The Challenge of Islam in South Africa, in which he provided an overview of the position of Islam and Muslims with the aim of arming his "Jesus to Muslims" society and others regarding Muslim beliefs and practices.... Gilchrist saw the web as another avenue to make his ideas and writings known to a wider audience.... Gilchrist has since the 1970s spent a great deal of time studying sources of Islam and produced his extensive work Jam' al-Qur'ān — The Codification of the Qur'ān Text. This text's main objective was to undermine the Muslim interpretation and acceptance of the Qur'ān's authoritative and divine nature. In addition to these, he brought out "The Qur'ān and the Bible Series" and the "Christianity and Islam Series."
<- (outdent) I'd use it as a source for the Josh McDowell article, certainly. Not sure if it is the best for the Ahmed Deedat article for the reason you outline. ScienceApologist ( talk) 15:07, 1 September 2009 (UTC)
The article Prostitution has had several sections broken out of it and moved to larger article, often without any notice on Talk:Prostitution and without any linking or announcement to appropriate WikiProject. The articles in question are Feminist views on prostitution, Prostitution (criminology), and Legality of prostitution (specifically, the " Debate_over_legalization" section). These forks are quite blatantly one-sided, presenting an anti-prostitution/"prostitution abolitionist" position as basically the sole political and academic view on the subject. These articles are now severely unbalanced and in violation of WP:NPOV and represent POV forks.
The thing is, some of these subjects are large enough topics to break out into their own articles. However, it seems that in practice, the purpose of breaking these sections out into independent articles was to create editorializing articles away from watchful eyes in the original article.
I am requesting more eyes on these articles and suggestion on how to reintegrate the articles, clean up content forking, and turn these forks back into simple content breakouts.
Also, how does one deal with articles like the above where undue weight is a significant problem, that is, where editors have made extensive, referenced contributions, but are entirely one-sided? Bringing the article back to WP:NPOV seems to require either of two problematic alternatives: 1) add content until the article is balanced, which may take a long time in articles where previous editors have flooded the article with content from one perspective, or 2) delete excess content so that the article may be more easily balanced, but in the process take out referenced content and risk charges that content is being deleted for POV reasons. I'm really not sure how to deal with this dilemma. Iamcuriousblue ( talk) 19:58, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
I want to note that this seems to have blown up into a full-blown NPOV dispute. An editor who has edited several of the above-mentioned articles holds that there is an "academic consensus" against the idea of consensual prostitution and that views opposing this are of a "small minority". Naturally, I disagree with this and see editing prostitution-related articles toward this point of view as POV-pushing. I would like to get third-party opinions on this dispute and hopefully head off a full-scale edit war over several articles. Discussion is at Talk:Prostitution #POV_Forks. Iamcuriousblue ( talk) 22:41, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
Two editors have launched a massive POV re-write of Lyndon LaRouche, involving well over 100 edits between them over the past week. The effect of their editing has been to take a stable, neutral BLP well into attack-article territory. The main emphasis has been the deletion of press commentary favorable to LaRouche ( [40] [41]) while giving undue weight to obscure critics ( [42] [43] [44] [45].) The NPOV tag that I placed was also reverted [46]. I would appreciate some intervention from non-involved editors. -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:22, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
Here is a more complete set of diffs, specifically from User:SlimVirgin. Beginning on August 28, SlimVirgin began a series of controversial edits, 140 of them at last count, despite the "controversial" tag on the talk page which asks that controversial edits be discussed in advance. The edits are so numerous that it is difficult to unravel the overarching trend. However, the examples below are characteristic. SlimVirgin has a technique of mixing controversial with non-controversial edits and then assigning a vague or misleading edit summary, so that when she is deleting favorable or adding negative commentary, she will often use a summary like "tidying." -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:26, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
I refer to these recent edits of the article False prophet: [61] and [62]. In my opinion those edits violate neutrality of the article. They have been discussed in the talk page. No consensus has been reached. Uikku ( talk) 18:37, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
I changed the section title to be more informative to attract more editors. - 2/0 ( cont.) 20:10, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
user:Jack Upland is taking issue over the introductory paragraph of the Korean Air Lines Flight 007#Alternative theories section, which he says is POV because he believes it is exclusively critical of US government. Would appreciate a second pair of eyes on this wording as I can't see any NPOV issue (both the US and Soviets had conspiracy theories and propaganda campaigns). More details of the discussion are on the article's talk page. Thank you. Socrates2008 ( Talk) 12:37, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
I am engaged in a dispute with some users. I am trying to improve neutrality of the articles Mary (mother of Jesus) and Jesus, but they oppose it. I am sure every administrator is tired of problems such as this one, but your hep would really be appreciated. Thank you! Surtsicna ( talk) 22:45, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
Singularity, please don't distort my intentions. Grammatical edits always included punction marks as well; if other users weren't so passionate about reverting each of my edits, they would've kept the punctation marks. You can see that I have started a discussion at each talkpage; however, the POV-pushers revert edits much faster than they respond to arguments. Regarding Mary's sainthood, you should read my arguments on Talk:Mary (mother of Jesus). Infobox Saint should be presented in the article Blessed Virgin Mary, as all parameters of the infobox (veneration, shrine, feast, and patronage) are meant to describe Christian view of Mary. Similarly, disputing a person's death by saying one religion still believes he is alive in heaven is POV. That's true, but I have never replaced Christian POV with Islamic POV. I proposed having either none of them or both of them. The article currently claims he died on a cross just because one religion believes he did; isn't that also a POV? Shouldn't we try to achieve NPOV by presenting all points of view (like Wikipedia:Neutral point of view suggests)? Regarding Umm Isa, the fact that it was uncited was never brought as an issue by those removed it - it was removed on the basis of not being neutral (?!). BashBrannigan, trying to improve neutrality means presenting either all points of view or none. I have only tried to improve neutrality of the lead sections (the infoboxes, to be precise). For example, the lead section in the article Jesus says that Christians believe he was crucified and that Muslims believe he was not crucified, yet the infobox simply lists his cause of death as crucifixion. I would also like you to explain your last sentence; all my edits were explained and it's clear that their purpose was achieving NPOV. Surtsicna ( talk) 10:01, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
As a devout follower of Lactuosity, I am appalled as well. According to our faith, we believe that Jesus was wrapped into a big cheese-ball before being transported into the Universe to align a vast number of stars which have henceforth become known as the Milky Way. And I want that in the infobox. Seb az86556 ( talk) 12:45, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
Excuse me, I am not following. What is the point of your arguments, Seb and BaseballBugs? Can you get serious? Do you have to insult to prove that you're right? Even some forms of Christianity do not believe Jesus was crucified - Docetism for example. We have two religions: one usually teaches that Jesus was crucified (though some forms of it teach that he wasn't) and the other one always teaches that Jesus was not crucified. Wikipedia cannot decide which religion is right. Surtsicna ( talk) 13:44, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
|death_cause=
blank. There's nothing in that infobox that isn't in the intro or the first section of the article.
rʨanaɢ
talk/
contribs 14:54, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
|death_cause=
blank, but that was reverted and hence this discussion (+ some irrelevant comments by Seb and BaseballBugs). Your last sentence is also right; however, there are important points of view that are in the intro but not in the infobox. Besides, having the Infobox Person in the article about Jesus is also an Islamic POV, for Jesus is usually considered to be
more than a person in Christianity. Perhaps having no infobox is the best solution.
Surtsicna (
talk) 15:05, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
Albanian nationalism is an article full of highly biased claims like "These ideologies and Greater Albania have proponents that are not only nationalists but criminals[9] and terrorists[10] involved[11] in drug trafficking ,Human trafficking and other activities motivated by profit [12].". It is completely fallacious to identify an entire nation as criminals and terrorist. It is also misleading to cite Us Gov. listing KLA as a terrorist organisation. What their website actually says about KLA is this: "They established a parallel government funded mainly by the Albanian diaspora. When this movement failed to yield results, an armed resistance emerged in 1997 in the form of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). The KLA's main goal was to secure the independence of Kosovo." (state.gov). There is also a different, more neutral POV in Greek nationalism, Serbian nationalism and other Balkan states nationalisms that should be also present in Albanian nationalism. AnnaFabiano ( talk) 22:35, 6 September 2009 (UTC)
I did not write the original article for Bosphorus Cymbals, but have just rewritten much of it to remove the promotional language. What is the process for having the arning removed?
Experienced NPOV review is needed at this article, including (but not only) this edit.-- Arxiloxos ( talk) 20:57, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
Torchrunner ( talk · contribs) keeps running into WP:SOAP and WP:SYNTH issues with his edits with regard to 19th century northern European Christian Mystics. There have been repeated attempts to direct him to the appropriate topics but he seems not to be listening. I am on the verge of taking it to WP:ANI but before I did I thought I'd get an outside opinion as I am struggling to remain civil throughout this debate as-is. Simonm223 ( talk) 16:44, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
This page is still reading like an advert. Very little Encyclopedic information, all just comment and possibly original research. The primary source is their own webpage. Can someone with some authority have a look please. Noble demetia ( talk) 12:42, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
I did not want to do anything to this entyr, but it appears to be blatant self promotion. An seo compnay that prides itself on inbound links putting it's own links on Wikipedia - there is not benefit to this company being listed. Any company of a reasonable size could find a few flowery press articles. The whole entry is designed to game the search engines - not inform the user. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Insuranceuk2009 ( talk • contribs) 16:01, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
The article regarding
Steven Cohen (soccer) does not seem to be neutral particularly in the Controversy section. The reason why I believe this is because of the selective citing which paints a skewed picture towards an anti-Cohen belief. The page cites a number of anti-Cohen and boycotting websites that have valid points, but fails to use sources that are more neutral. Unfortunately the article is locked so I personally can't do anything. There are articles that are more neutral from the LA Daily News and the Examiner.
http://www.examiner.com/x-4128-Boston-Pro-Soccer-Examiner~y2009m8d27-Steven-Cohen-talks-about-threats-boycott-of-WSD-and-Fox-Football-FoneIn-sponsors-new-radio-show
http://www.dailynews.com/sports/ci_13204726
Thank you for any help fixing this. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
Oar39 (
talk •
contribs) 16:53, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
Amongst academics and practitioners, a large majority believe that conversion therapy (or reparative therapy) should be avoided, and that there is potential for harm. Because of the emphasis on self-control in many religions and particularly Christianity, elements exist who claim benefit for therapy aimed at changing sexual orientation. On the page given over to represent this debate, some are resisting the inclusion of material that represents the minority view, calling it fringe. Wikipedia policy seems to suggest that all views should be described, and that appropriate weight should be given to them based on their acceptance by their prominence. It also says "In articles specifically about a minority viewpoint, the views may receive more attention and space." How should the article reflect this? How can we break the deadlock? Hyper3 ( talk) 15:46, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
NPOV review is requested on this article; also have concerns about WP:UNDUE with the insertion of massive quotes like here. -- Nsaum75 ( talk) 08:32, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
This article does not seem to be particularly neutral, and in fact seems biased against the substane Laetrile as an anti-cancer treatment. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.26.219.98 ( talk) 12:58, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
The Palm oil entry is spun in such a way as to de-emphasise the negative aspects of palm oil, particularly health issues.
The page is already semi-protected, but should at least have a notice at the top about the unbalanced view it presents.
Yeago ( talk · contribs) is repeatedly removing [66] [67] [68] any analysis of health care and illegal immigration from Barack Obama speech to joint session of Congress, September 2009. In particular, Yeago is deleting analysis from Annenberg Public Policy Center's FactCheck [69] and PolitiFact.com, which is published by the St. Petersburg Times. [70] The findings of FactCheck and PolitiFact regarding Obama's speech and Joe Wilson's reaction have been covered by many reliable sources. For example, staff writer John Ward of The Washington Times covered the FactCheck report on Obama's speech [71] and staff writer Ben Szobody of The_Greenville_News discussed PolitiFact's analysis. Those are only two examples of secondary source coverage. Nevertheless, Yeago justifies deleting this material because "the content represents a non-neutral dissection and gives undue weight to the illegal immigrant aspect of the healthcare debate". [72] However, the topic of illegal immigration and health care was part of Obama's speech, and Google's news archive shows that it has been discussed in every major reliable source that reported on the speech. A general overview of the topic in relation to the speech can be found in The New York Times by David M. Herszenhorn. [73] According to Herszenhorn:
The question of how illegal immigrants would fare under a proposed overhaul of the health care system came into sharp focus on Wednesday during President Obama’s speech to Congress. Representative Joe Wilson, Republican of SouthCarolina, shouted “You lie!” when Mr. Obama insisted that his health care overhaul would not insure illegal immigrants.
Yeago maintains that it is NPOV violation to include any material on the subject, while my position is that it is a NPOV violation to exclude it. Viriditas ( talk) 01:29, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
This article is factually incorrect, defamatory, and libelous to the Marines of MarSOC-Fox company who were exonerated at a Court of Inquiry which found the Marines “acted appropriately and in accordance with the rules of engagement and tactics, techniques and procedures in place at the time in response to a complex attack.”
The Court of Inquiry concluded that there was no evidence to suggest the level of force was unjustified and recommended everyone in the March 4, 2007 convoy be awarded the Combat Action Ribbon and that a sergeant injured during the blast receive the Purple Heart. Following are references:
[1] “Marine Corps unit cleared in Afghan shootout” http://articles.latimes.com/2008/may/24/nation/na-convoy24 [2] “Marines who killed civilians were attacked” http://www.examiner.com/a-744305~Marines_who_killed_civilians_were_attacked.html [3] “Secret Report Criticized Army General” http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=28460 [4] “Lawmaker: Investigate general who booted MSOC” http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/10/marine_jones_msoc_071003/ [5] “Congressman tells Army: Stop MarSOC comments” http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2007/05/marine_marsoc_jones_070516/ [6] “Spec-ops Marines tell their side at inquiry” www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?t=127150 [7] “Marines were shot at, Army expert testifies” http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jan/26/nation/na-inquiry26 [8] “Witness: Casings Tossed in Afghan Deaths” http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2008Jan28/0,4670,AfghanMarineShooting,00.html [9] “Did Marines go wild, or simply follow the rules?” http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-warfog5feb05,0,2046631,print.story
I have tried twice to correct this, but it reverts back to the original libelous copy, which violates Wikipedia's neutral point of view.
I see in history several others have attempted to correct the article:
(cur) (prev) 18:22, 18 May 2009 Randy2063 (talk | contribs) m (9,032 bytes) (moved Shinwar Massacre to March 4, 2007 Shooting in Shinwar, Afghanistan: NPOV -- not ruled to be a massacre) (undo) cur) (prev) 02:56, 6 July 2008 Randy2063 (talk | contribs) (6,014 bytes) (rv -- I did read it -- a "war crime" has to be intentional; I don't see a prosecution under the War Crimes Act) (undo) (cur) (prev) 10:18, 12 May 2009 64.39.139.181 (talk) (9,043 bytes) (This so-called "massacre" was undisputably an accident. Does the author want to suggest that Marines are murderers? I changed the opening sentence; the entire article is hardly useful. Emckenny7 (talk) 15:26, 12 September 2009 (UTC)) (undo) (cur) (prev) 02:20, 9 November 2008 Randy2063 (talk | contribs) (6,101 bytes) (rv no legitimate legal body has yet ruled that this was either a deliberate killing of civilians or a technically war crime) (undo)
I ask that this article be deleted. (Emckenny7 (talk) 15:26, 12 September 2009 (UTC))
Note: The attack took place in Bati Kot, Nangahar, Afghanistan. Shinwar refers to a tribe and an area 20 miles from where this attack on the MarSOC Marines t took place. --Emckenny7 (talk) 15:26, 12 September 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Emckenny7 ( talk • contribs)
A few editors have been trying to insist that because they found a couple of sources that state Real Clear Poltics to be right-leaning that they can label the organization as such. I initially removed the section because there are far more sources that either make no distinction or make a statement of non-partisan or independent. I have discussed this at length in the talk page and most recently here with little success. In my most recent attempt I gave several specific examples pointing to reporting of them being independent or non-partisan to no avail. There seems to be a belief that if a majority of editors there think they are biased than that is what needs to be in the lead.
I have done numerous searches and have only been able to find a few instances of any mention of right-leaning or conservative in any MSM over the history of thier existance. To me this smacks of a fringe belief and original research as well as a netural point of view violation. We cannot simply go around and say a valid business is biased regardless of our personal belief. Arzel ( talk) 15:09, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Issues with WP:DUE given to primary source material espousing views of this fringe theorist in a way that causes the article to be a soap box for theorist's views. Experts in neutral phrasing needed to help preening out peacockery and generally correcing various neutrality problems. Simonm223 ( talk) 14:39, 15 September 2009 (UTC)
I was just reading the article about the Rashidun Caliphate. It seems to be written from a religious persective, and biased towards certain individuals and against others. I could not see verifiable sources to support the information in the introduction and in the section Early history: Succession of Abu Bakr, which features the particularly worrisome sentence: 'The chief cause of the apostasy was lack of true faith.' This does not sound like an encyclopedic article to me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Siriusregent ( talk • contribs) 09:09, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Would you please block User:Philbox17 account, he keeps deleting cited information from the article Réseau de Résistance du Québécois. This person is practicing article ownership, which can be confirmed by reading the editors user talk page User talk:Philbox17 and the lengthy problems this editor has had with this article. I believe this editor is a member of Réseau de Résistance du Québécois and lacks a NPOV. Thank you. 76.64.152.111 ( talk) 20:53, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
The article violates the rules of a neutral point of view, because the author is biased against the theory, states his own opinion and ignores recent archeological evidence in favour of the AAH.-- 87.188.197.220 ( talk) 22:00, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
The article had until recently been a redirect to America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009#Living wills because it referred to Sarah Palin's charaterization of this bill as requiring the Federal government to cut medical services by so requiring a "death panel" made up of bureaucrats to decide who should live and who should die. The article section discusses the issue in some detail.
Now some editors have re-written the Death Panel article treating the subject as something tangible and existant in many countries, including the U.S. The article wrongfully stretches the interpretation of the term "Death panel to NICE (which never hears indiviual cases when determining what expenses will be covered by government in the public health system), and even to death penalty appeals processes in criminal cases, and to bodies set up for the purposes of legal assisted suicide. None of these is what Palin what referring to!
To my mind, this article re-write is merely attempting to imply that Palin's death panels do exist and to segreggate the discussion of "Death Panels" from America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009#Living wills where the truth is actually detailed.
Clearly these panels do not exist in the way Palin use the term and it is wrong to imply that they do.
Opinions re POV please!-- Hauskalainen ( talk) 18:09, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
With respect the last two editors have been involved in an attempt to move the nonsense that was in the death panels article to a new article List of panels making life or death decisions where thy hope to pervert the purpose of Wikipedia. I am confused by the AfD process so if anyone knows how to get rid of the nonsense article List of panels making life or death decisions please do so. It is WP:POV and WP:OR and is being done to link spam. The redirect back to the Palin article is clearly intended by Evb-wiki and Cs32en to avoid linking the false allegation of a "Death Panel" to the article about the very bill that Palin alleges introduced the idea. The section where it was directed of course clearly debunks the idea. I will ensure the article reverts to the proper place!
(edit conflict) I'm confused why this content is being ridiculed as nonsense. I had 12 WP:RS's until User:Hauskalainen started blanking content, prior to submitting what he left behind for WP:Speedy deletion. -- 209.6.238.201 ( talk) 22:15, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
As the editor who created the article as a redirect, I obviously agree that the anon IP's content about capital punishment, etc. is inappropriate. The term should be a redirect. The issue of the target of the redirect would be better discussed at Talk:Death panel but has progressed here, so I'll chime in.
My original redirect was to America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009#Reimbursement for counseling about living wills. If a redirect to a "Living wills" section seems bizarre to Evb-wiki, let me explain that the section title (and hence the redirect) have since been restored to "Reimbursement for counseling about living wills". The reason to redirect to that section is that, when Palin was challenged about where these alleged "death panels" were to be found in the bill, her spokesperson responded by pointing to this provision. [74]
I don't think the redirect gives credence to Palin's ridiculous charge. It's somewhat better than a redirect to Political positions of Sarah Palin#Health care because a reader who types in "Death panel" is more likely to be looking for information about what's in the bill than for information about what Sarah Palin thinks. JamesMLane t c 02:15, 14 September 2009 (UTC)
I've been quietly WikiGnoming the mangled/incomplete/mis-linked citations at English Defence League. The content editors, in the meantime, have been swinging the content like a pendulum here. There are basically two forms of the article, depending from who edited it last. The first has no mention of "far right" against the subject, but calls all of its opponents (a government minister, a mainstream U.K. political party, and so forth) "far left" or "left wing" or "Trotskyite". The second has no mention of "far left" against the latter, and calls the EDL "far right". Editors with experience of applying the NPOV to stop an article swinging between such diametrically opposed extremes are invited to address the article and contribute to the talk page discussion.
And when you're done with that, there's another problem with "far right" labels at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#zombietime as well. ☺ Uncle G ( talk) 02:41, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
I think its important to note that Britain is currently under the regime of a party which openly describes itself on its website as a "democratic socialist party". I think its fair to mention that Denham by virtue of being a member of a self-proclaimed socialist party, is to the left of the spectrum and that is the point of view which his comment comes from. Currently certain people want to remove any mention of his political party from the article at all. - Yorkshirian ( talk) 14:25, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
Tiye#Monuments starts in with the uncorroborated claim that Tiye is not well-known because of her Nubian origin, stated as "her having been a black woman". While I cannot offer any contradictory evidence concerning the biases of Egyptology, I challenge this statement as 'fact not in evidence'. While I feel that the language itself is superfluously inflammatory and/or overgeneralizing and/or technically inaccurate, I reserve specific judgment in anticipation of needed citation and correction. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.196.231.133 ( talk • contribs) 17:14, September 17, 2009
Hi, members of the Réseau de Résistance du Québécois keep deleting information from the article about their organization. These RRQ members do not have a NPOV. One guy keeps creating sockpuppets and shows up a few times per day. Can you send some administrators over to monitor this article. A similar issue happened on the Scientology article a while back. Perhaps, you can just block all IP's that start with "70" that would probably stop the sockpuppet. Thank you. 76.64.152.111 ( talk) 20:58, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
Yesterday I came across Jews for Jesus and found it extremely biased. You don't have to take my word for it; take a look at the article as I found it. I think any reasonable person can see in a few minutes that it's a complete hit piece. The external links section is the official website followed by 12 anti-sites and negative articles. Jews for Jesus aims to combine belief in Jesus with being Jewish, but the article tells the reader over and over that this is not possible, which is an opinion. There is very little information about Jews for Jesus, but an extremely long criticism section. There is a promotional section about the unrelated Outreach Judaism. The references are cherry-picked quotes or from opposing organizations. I attempted to clean up and rewrite using independent reliable sources, but I was reverted with the edit summaries "nice try - now please just edit and not purge", "tweak" (for a mass revert) and "rv per WP:BRD; please discuss these changes before you edit-war" (I have reverted only once). I haven't been able to get much explanation on the talk page either. Some outside comments would be much appreciated. -- Apoc2400 ( talk) 22:04, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
The article was tagged with "{{Newsrelease|date=August 2009}}" which means that it reads like a news release or is written in an "OVERLY PROMOTIONAL TONE". I cannot see anything in it that sounds overly promotional, or reads like a news release. I've rewritten the article many times to make it as neutral as possible but the facts entered probably seem to make it sound otherwise. Please review the article, and maybe remove the inappropriate tag. WHY? Because the article, when viewed for the first time by someone interested in the subject, is more likely inclined to lose a considerable amount of interest because the tag that sits at the very top of everything else, appears to be telling him that HE'S ABOUT TO BE BORED. Any contribution to make it better would be very much appreciated. ≈ Commit charge 00:19, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
Over on Talk:Smiley face murder theory a couple of people are arguing repeatedly that the line in the WP:UNDUEWEIGHT section that says "In articles specifically about a minority viewpoint, the views may receive more attention and space" should be interpreted to mean that the views of the minority should get more space than the views of the majority because the title of the article is about the minority view. This, to me, is completely opposite of what that section is intended for. The same people are also arguing if the topic is really about a WP:FRINGE view that the article must be deleted completely. They seem strongly opposed to having the article adequately document the clear majority viewpoint of police investigators across several jurisdictions and the FBI. they instead favor the well-publicized but claims advanced by a few private consultants on talk shows and the like. We could use more input over there from people who deal with NPOV issues more regularly. DreamGuy ( talk) 21:19, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
The article for
Sungazing was edited 22 times by User:Skinwalker in a one hour period. During which he/she removed any explanation of the practise itself, ie. when to do the practise and any safety guidelines stated by known sungazers. With this done, the way has been paved for the article to take on his opinions of a practise that he seems to know little about (ie. safety guidelines, the actual process of what to do and when to sungaze etc...) As is seen with the statement "The practice of sungazing is dangerous". this is then followed by criticism of the practise with out any explanation of the process itself.
He/she has taken out entire sections of the process of how to sungaze saying 'wikipedia is not a how to section', yet on the page for
Driving, room is given on how to instruct somone to drive, optimising driving performance. The same is true with sungazing, the safety lies in the proper process, with that removed any opinionated view can be propogated. No one drives 90mph out of their drive way and the same goes with sungazing, there are safety guidelines and limits...
Another example of the opinionated editing, User:Skinwalker writes, "it has undergone analysis - staring at the sun is bad for you". i agree that staring at anything is bad for you, but if the practise entailed "staring at the sun" it would be called "sun staring".
It seems this editors opinion comes first and then the rest of the article is to follow.
i would like to note that the criticism section has went untouched.
There is almost nothing left of the original article, and its current state does not allow for any genuine and legitimate information on the process and practise of
Sungazing. i was wondering if someone could give any advice on how to stop these edits or how to procede.
Thanks.
J929 ( talk) 01:37, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
Sungazing is a practise, much like yoga Asanas.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asana
Wikipedia discusses some techniques on this page (Common Practices). What is the difference? If sungazing is practised within 'safe limits' as prescribe by knowledgable and established sungazers, it is a legitimate practise. The results are secondary. Skinwalker says its a fringe subject, yet there are plenty of people who sungaze and many who practise yogic asanas. if everyone who pulled a muscle or in someway made a postural mistake resulting in uncomfort doing asanas, the reports would be too much to publish, yet Skinwalker dwells on his results putting an umbrella like opinion on every aspect of the practise. Staring at the sun at noon and gazing at a setting sun (ie 5-10 minutes ) before it sets are two completely different actions, with different results/consequences.
J929 ( talk) 17:18, 21 September 2009 (UTC)
User User:Kusamanic first erased informations which reports that White people are a minority in Chile, and replaced them with other informations that Whites are majority [75] [76]. Then, I re-posted the information that Whites are minority, and I also posted a genetic resource that conclude that people from Chile are usually Mestizo (Amerindian and White mixture). The user is once again erasing these informations, and saying that I should use the talk page (I did use the talk page, but the user did not even answer me there) [77].
It seems they are racially biased edits from this user. Please, opinions about it. Opinoso ( talk) 21:02, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
Hi,
User:Opinoso doesn't act in good faith in each case. It imposes his personal opinion for on the mentioned sources and he has an appreciation preconceived on the population from Chile according to his point of view like we can observe here.
←Of course my personal opinion is not a source, but I have been to Chile myself and there's no way that 60% are Whites. Even in the areas of "German settlement" of Southern Chile, the local population looks more Amerindian than anything else→.This not only happens to the articles Chile it also has more than enough with other what has cost him multiple blockades for not respecting sources.
[78] it is necessary to remark that this multiple war of editions on the part of the
User:Opinoso began here. When I don't respect the mentioned sources and delete from of white population's category to Chile in the southern cone edition
[79]. I reverted him, as we can observe here:
[80], from today it began to follow my editions. This i denominate it sabotage by
User:Opinoso, when harassing me and to follow my editions
[81]
[82]
[83]
[84]
[85]. Without respecting the sources where they write of a white majority in Chile that varies from 52,7% and 90% to the population´s
[86]
[87]
[88] finally remarking that Chile is amerindian-mestizo like he writes here in one of its summaries of editions saying this without any source to back it up.
←Chile is mostly Amerindian-mestizo→.-
Kusamanic (
talk) 00:20, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
We need more opinions about this subject. Opinoso ( talk) 16:55, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
There's a clear conflict of sources out there: 90%, 64%, 50%, 30%? We cannot choose a few of them and post them and ignore the others. Given that Chile has no racial Census, all these sources may be based on nothing. All these different figures come from "scholars". But it is obvious that somebody is lying out there. To post in articles four different percentages for Whites in Chile is ridiculous. It makes no sense to say 30% is White, and then say 90% is White. I agree with the other users who says that Wikipedia should be silent. Opinoso ( talk) 04:40, 21 September 2009 (UTC)
First, I'm hoping I posted this in the correct place.
I came across an article,
Kongu Vellalar that has some atrocious aspects mostly POV. But I do not know about the topic and wouldn't want to make changes.
The article is: Kongu Vellalar
It appears to deal with an India sect. Even though I know nothing about this topic it, surely it should not contain sentences such as:
"The government of India census wants to keep its people ignorant on this aspect "
"which has aroused considerable jealousy and fear among the real holders of Power"
"which mostly go unresearched partly due to the heavy stench of ideological biases of contemperory Tamil historians"
The article also has NO references for anything.
There is a Neutrality warning at the top of the article, but is this sufficient? How can sentences like the above be left in?
These might be the worst, but the entire article is absolutely filled with unreferences and sometimes absurd statments like:
"Concerned scientists have warned the community to have at least two children per family to maintain steady trend"
I thought I'd mention this as I've honestly never seen anything quite like this on Wikipedia.
BashBrannigan (
talk) 05:34, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
There is a dispute as to whether categorizing the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society as "Category:Eco-terrorism" is in violation of WP:NPOV.
What the debate has boiled down to is that while some feel that categorizing an article is simply making use of an organizational tool, others feel that a categorization is a type of unqualified label, and thus goes against WP:Words to avoid/ WP:TERRORIST and is a WP:NPOV violation.
Please note that there are several governments and organizations, mainly those who support commercial whaling or the tradition of whaling, who have deemed some tactics of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society as acts of Terrorism. These statements are properly sourced. We also have a statement from the FBI that says they're "keeping an eye" on SSCS, but the article clearly goes out of its way to avoid declaring them "eco-terrorists" (while having no hesitation in doing so with organizations like the Animal Liberation Front. MichaelLNorth ( talk) 01:20, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
Relevant background regarding the application of disparaging categories to articles:
Note that "eco-terrorism" has much the same demarcation problem as "pseudoscience", "war criminal" and "terrorist", and according to the first two items and the way they are routinely applied the resulting NPOV problem can't be discussed away by claiming that categories are "only" a navigation tool. Hans Adler 08:47, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
On the talk page I highlighted that the category is a topical category on "eco terrorism", it is not a list of "eco terrorists". This is demonstrated both by its adherence to the naming convention for topical categories and its link to the "eco terrorism" page. Wikipedia:Categorization & Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(categories). Eco terrorism is not a very developed category and currently does not provide many subcategories such as eco terrorist, claimed eco terrorists, etc., but such subcategories likely should exist under the parent, topical category. Listing this group under "eco terrorism" will not and cannot mean they are "eco terrorists", only that its relevant to the the discussion of eco terrorism. In fact, select groups completely in opposition to SSCS can be listed under "eco terrorism" since those groups too may be relevant for someone researching the topic. Mdlawmba ( talk) 12:02, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
2 Questions:
68 - to answer your question, my position is the category should not be applied to anything, for the same reason that I believe it would be against wikipedia policy to create a "Stupid people" category and go around categorizing various articles with it. I believe that the name of the category its self brings with it a POV. — Mike : tlk 00:22, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
This is moving back to the argument of "surely the must be terrorists if they do XYZ". No matter how sure you are of the validity of this idea, it is still subjective, and thus still advocating the use of "Stupid People" instead of "People with IQ below 75" because you believe that having an IQ below 75 surely makes one "Stupid". You keep asking me "how many sources", and again, the number of sources is irrelevant. You should need no sources to justify applying a category to an article, which makes sense since there is no mechanism for attaching a reference to a category in Wikipedia."But there's only one commonly used term for people who affix "can opener" devices to thier hulls before ramming fueling ships in the name of whales."
It would take an objective and NPOV category label. This will result in little to no explanation or elaboration required for a full and accurate understanding of what the category is, and why it has been applied to the article.what would it take in your mind for a label to be appropriate and qualified.
I'm trying to figure out what sort of objective qualifiers you are applying to see if the word is appropriate and then apply those qualifiers to other categories in WIKI to see if a president has allready been set.
A militant is an individual or party engaged in aggressive physical or verbal combat.
Could you please rephrase. The current meaning sounds like you think I'm trying to alter the sources that the article uses as references. Somehow that doesn't sound right. 68 stated a list of characteristics, and I replied with an objective and NPOV term that encompasses them properly. I was reluctant to even play that game, since it is almost asking a rhetorical question since the criterion was so specific to Sea Shepherd. In the interest of reaching a consensus, I gave an answer, and it seems that you may not find it acceptable. Is this accurate? Could you elaborate? — Mike : tlk 07:50, 12 September 2009 (UTC)are you proposing that we use the new invented term in an attempt to make the notable sources more NPOV? That somehow doesn't sound right.. :)
_________________________________________
Republican Senator Scott McInnis is an ardent advocate of laws to control 'eco-terrorism' in the United States. In a recent interview he was asked by a journalist; Should these groups be lumped in the same category as what, you know, we have come to know after 9/11 as terrorists?
McInnis replied: Sure, absolutely, I mean they are the number one, the eco-terrorists, these types of organisations, you know, ELF some of these type of groups, absolutely, they are the number one domestic terror threat we have. Those people that flew that airplane in, they weren't in to die for money, they were in to send a message, disobedience, civil disobedience.
Note two things: people and groups accused of eco-terrorism are terrorists , the same as the 9/11 attack; and McInnis equates civil disobedience with terrorism of the 9/11 type. Ron Arnold, who created the word 'eco-terrorism' (not covered in the very bad Wikipedia eco-terrorism article), makes the same point. In a 1985 article he wrote: Ecoterror crimes range from misdemeanors—such as criminal trespass and obstruction—to felony equipment sabotage, bombings, and attempted murder. He reinforced that definition in testimony to the US Congress in 2000 when he said, ...ecoterrorism, that is, a crime committed to save nature. These crimes generally take the form of equipment vandalism but may include package bombs, blockades using physical force to obstruct workers from going where they have a right to go, and invasions of private or government offices to commit the crime of civil disobedience. So you can see, Mr. Chairman, the range of ecoterror crimes spans the most violent felonies of attempted murder to misdemeanor offenses, such as criminal trespass, but they are all crimes. In the conservative view, any act in opposition to business enterprises that involve the natural world is terrorism.
Categories label. The definition of 'category' is: a class or division of people or things having shared characteristics. — ORIGIN Greek kategoria “statement, accusation”. (Oxford English Dictionary). Categorising a group like Sea Shepherd is accusing them, labelling them and their members, as terrorists. The category is inherently not neutral, it labels groups and the people who are their members as terrorists in the same way that the category 'terrorist' did. The word 'eco-terrorism' is a portmanteau word that combines 'ecological' and 'terrorism'. It is a political word used to label environmental groups as terrorists.
In the UK, if Greenpeace (as they have) entered an agricultural plot and uprooted plants being used for research into genetically-modified organisms as a protest, they would be charged with trespass and, possibly, criminal damage. In the US they would be called 'eco-terrorists'. That is, as terrorists.
Labelling a group or an individual as a terrorist is a way of playing on people's fears. As Professor Sharon Beder notes: Propaganda aims to “persuade not through the give-and-take of argument or debate, but through the manipulation of symbols and of our most basic human emotions.” There are a number of basic techniques identified by the Institute of Propaganda Analysis, many of which are used in public relations. Two examples of these are “name-calling” and “glittering generalities”. “Name-calling” involves labelling an idea or a group of people so as to get others to reject them or treat them negatively without evidence being put forward to support such a label. ( Global Spin: The Corporate Assault on Environmentalism page 122). The word 'eco-terrorism' is a propaganda word that labels groups and people as terrorists.
This technique was used by the public relations firm Ketchum Communications when it advised the Chlorox Corporation when it faced protests from Greenpeace. The advice was to run a campaign labelling Greenpeace as terrorists by using the word 'eco-terrorist'. Labels such as “extremist” or “terrorist” are examples of the propaganda technique of name calling ... It is, according to Penny Cass, an attempt to activate preconceptions and stereotypes already held by the public. “Category-based expectancies define a group in such a way as to predict future behaviour and to interpret ambiguous information in the shadow of pre-existing stereotypes”'. ( Global Spin: The Corporate Assault on Environmentalism page 134). The list of sources that call Sea Shepherd 'eco-terrorists' is nothing more than name-calling and amounts to nothing more than an attempt to categorise the group as terrorists, which is what the category 'eco-terrorism' does.
For example, Japanese whaling interests first started out by calling Sea Shepherd 'vigilantes' then 'pirate-terrorists' then, after a Western public relations firm was hired, settled on the perjorative term 'eco-terrorists'. As Roescke points out, Today, Americans tend to have a heightened, almost Pavlovian, sensitivity to any use of the word “terrorist”.(Roeschke, J.E. (2009). Eco-terrorism and Piracy on the High-seas: Japanese whaling and the rights of private groups to enforce international conservation law in neutral waters. Villanova Law Review 20 pp. 99-136). He suggests that the Japanese whaling interests use this word to gain a negative image of Sea Shepherd in the US. He points out that laws concerning 'eco-terrorism' exist only in the US and, as such, there is no 'eco-terrorism' outside of the US. Outside of the US, the word only exists as a label used by vested interests and conservative (right-wing) anti-environmentalists to paint environmental protesters as terrorists to try and isolate them from public sympathy.
By using the category 'eco-terrorism' Wikipedia is labelling groups and the people who are members of these groups as terrorists, which goes against WP:TERRORIST and against the reasons for the decisions made in the cases of the former categories 'terrorist' (see: CfD Terrorists) and 'war criminals' (see: Cfd war criminals). By using this category Wikipedia is using a word invented as a propaganda tool to marginalise and isolate groups and individuals engaged in environmental protest. By using this word as a category Wikipedia is using a term invented in and isolated to the US in law; it is not a recognised word in law anywhere else in the world and is only used outside of the US by vested interests, and their supporters, as a derogatory propaganda term. This is a violation of WP:NPOV and the WP:Worldwide view position.
I would ask that a person with the authority to do so to please nominate the category 'eco-terrorism' for CfD. As well, the article eco-terrorism is a poor article, deficient in fact and showing a POV bias so if someone with the authority to do so, could you please put the NPOV and factual dispute flags at the top of the article; they would be doing Wikipedia readers a good service. TranquillityBase Message 06:39, 14 September 2009 (UTC)
It's been a few days since I posted in this topic (took a little break for perspective), so I'll mention that I'm replying to this comment from 68. I didn't intend to imply foul play, just that I was unclear as to what you meant.
This seems to be reverting into an argument about whether SSCS is in fact appropriately deemed an "eco-terrorist" organization, by various definitions, press releases, statements, etc... Perhaps it's a good time to go back to the "Stupid People" abstract example?— Mike : tlk 03:54, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Cpt-- It's obviously still not a clear cut issue, even after whatever category reworking you're referring to (please give me a hint as to where I might read about this, so I can be better informed). We should all re-focus here. This isn't about whether SSCS is an "eco-terrorist" organization, it's about whether an "unqualified label", like the "Category:Stupid People" example, should be subjective and carry a POV along with it. Also, we should decide the point at which we escalate this in the WP:DR process. It feels like we're in limbo here, and there's no point in continuing this discussion if it's clear there will be no consensus. I'm not saying we're at that point yet, but there's a good chance that we'll find ourselves there soon — Mike : tlk 14:46, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Here's another thing to think about. Labeling SSCS with "Category:Organizations comprised of stupid people" is, in essence, placing an unqualified (needing no elaboration or explanation) label, "Stupid people", on its members. Since WP:BLP applies to all content written about a person, throughout wikipedia, this guideline seems relevant:
From: Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons#Categories
"Caution should be used in adding categories that suggest the person has a poor reputation (see false light). For example, Category:Criminals (or its subcategories) should only be added for an incident that is relevant to the person's notability; the incident has been published by reliable third-party sources; the subject was convicted; and the conviction was not overturned on appeal."
Also, it seems that another guideline speaks to how we should should properly "label" organizations
FROM: Wikipedia:Words_to_Avoid#Words_that_label
"Some words may be used to label a group from an outside perspective, even though these words are used in accordance with a dictionary definition. For example, 'The Peoples Temple is a cult, which...', 'The Ku Klux Klan is a racist organization.', 'Pedophilia is a sexual perversion...'. Such terms, even when accurate, often convey to readers an implied viewpoint: that of an outsider looking in and labeling as they see it. The fact that a term is accepted "outside" but not "inside" is a good indicator that it may not be neutral."
The guideline then provides possible solutions to fixing these types of problems
"There are at least three ways to deal with this: attribute the term to reliable sources, replace the label with information, or use a more neutral term."
Attributing the term to reliable sources is not an option with a category, since there is no mechanism by which a reference can be added. The last two options are to replace with information (I'm not sure how this would work in the context of a category), or to use a more neutral term.
— Mike : tlk 15:38, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Mike, you wrote above what I think is the important part here:
From: Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons#Categories
"Caution should be used in adding categories that suggest the person has a poor reputation (see false light). For example, Category:Criminals (or its subcategories) should only be added for an incident that is relevant to the person's notability; the incident has been published by reliable third-party sources; the subject was convicted; and the conviction was not overturned on appeal."
Here is a quick recap for Terrillja
In the article History of Argentina the line "The dominant figure of this period was the federalist Juan Manuel de Rosas, who is considered by the traditional historiography a dictator. " (on the "Birth of Argentina" section) should be modified to something like "The dominant figure of this period was the federalist Juan Manuel de Rosas, who is portrayed under diferents angles by the diverse historiographic styles in Argentina: the canonic history usually considers him a dictator, while revisionism support him on the grounds of his defense of national soveregnity." to comply with the neutral point of view, as the consideration of Rosas as a dictator is not universal.
As it was long explained in the talk page, there was indeed a mainstream view of Rosas as a dictator in Argentina until the early XX century, mainly designed by Bartolomé Mitre and Domingo Faustino Sarmiento. Most of their views about history of Argentina, and specially the portrayal of Rosas, started to be hold in doubt by historians like Pepe Rosa or Scalabrini Ortiz during the 1940 decade, when Rosas was portrayed the opposite way. Modern historians like Felix Luna, Felipe Pigna or Pacho O'Donnell stay apart from both of styles, the once mainstream history and the revisionist interpretation of it, and refuse to make such categoric definitions.
User Justin A Kuntz rejects any mention to this, by pointing british authors. As it seems that the rejection of the original historiography hasn't arrived to England yet, he states that such is the "mainstream" view of the topic, and that the authors that reject it are just a minority viewpoint or a fringe or conspiracy theory. However, even if the viewpoint happens to be mainstream among the few english-speaking historians that worked with the history of Argentina, it wouldn't be a good idea to disregard sources that, even if written on another languaje, come from places where the topic at hand has been more deeply studied, checked and analyzed (wich in the case of history of Argentina means historians from Argentina). Wikipedia is written from an international point of view, and a local consensus on a subject shouldn't override a lack of it on a bigger scale.
Some books were Rosas is either portrayed as a heroe, or not portrayed as a dictator on an explicit manner (such as "he did wrong things but we won't call him a dictator", rather than simply a lack of the use of the word)
and so on.
The user is not willing to pay attention to the explanations given to him. He reverted my comments to him here and here. Afterwards, he added a template on his user talk page here, where he says "The more advanced at the game of righting great wrongs have enough grasp to read policy and decide that sourcing makes their edits bulletproof. Wrong again. Sources have to be reliable, so the conspiracy website or the book by a crank doesn't mean your edit is sacrosanct." Given the context, it seems clear that such mention was directed to me, and that the "conspiracy website" or "book by a crank" to the sources I had given to him. Here he declared his intentions to resist the proposed changes. here, after a long explanation by me, he did not reply to none of the points I made and instead try to refute the Clarin newspaper (wich was not provided as a source on the topic, but as a source that describes the debate itself as a legitimate scholar debate) as a reliable source by considering it a "tabloid", exploiting the confusion that may rise from the many meanings of the word (Clarin is indeed printed on a tabloid format, a size and shape of newspapers; but the negative implications of the word can't be applied to Clarin, and certainly not just with a google test). Here he does accept that he's working with english writers and acknowledge the existence of the dispute in Argentina, but cites NPOV as a reason not to mention it. Finally, here he takes the critic on relying solely on british authors as an acusing of bias and a personal attack (even when he didn't mind accusing me of editing with a personal agenda here), and refuses to go on with the talking.
As trying to solve this by explaining things to him has failed, I request external intervention. I am well aware on the policies of minority viewpoints and fringe theories, but I'm also well interested in history and historiography of Argentina. I know for sure that revisionism does not fall in such category of viewpoints, and I can provide any reference that helps to check such a thing that you may request me. MBelgrano ( talk) 15:35, 30 September 2009 (UTC)
There is an RfC about whether or not Pinochet should be listed under the fascism infobox. Plenty of sources link this dead dictator with fascist ideology but I suspect there has been some canvassing going on. Truly neutral opinions would be welcome. Simonm223 ( talk) 14:10, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
An RfC has been started at Talk:1421: The Year China Discovered the World#RfC: Article neutrality regarding the neutrality of this article. I feel the article is unbalanced and non-neutral, focusing purely on criticism and discrediting the author, with no inclusion (nor attempted inclusion) of positive reviews and contradicting opinions. Two other editors, who have stated they agree with the criticism, disagree. Views from those well versed in NPOV may prove useful.-- Collectonian ( talk · contribs) 17:13, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
Article background: This article is about a self-immolation incident in Beijing, which was used by the Chinese government to defame Falun Gong. The event itself is a blur because only the Chinese approved media could research and report on it inside China. So there are several opinions regarding what happened actually, this varies from the fact that the immolators were Falun Gong practitioners as the Chinese media stated, to the fact that this event was completely orchestrated by the communist government in order to justify its persecution (torture, labor camps, etc. etc..).
Situation: I think the article would fail NPOV, if the opinion of Karen Parker the chief delegate of an organization that is accredited with the United Nations, would not be included in the lead more exactly see here. This addition was resisted by some editors, and I did make some changes to it [94] [95] [96] [97] in order to comply, but whatever I did this information is not allowed to be added. See Talk:Tiananmen_Square_self-immolation_incident#This_event_was_staged_by_the_Chinese_government.
My perception: I think that without this addition a significant view will not be presented fairly.
Question: What do you think?
Thank you! -- HappyInGeneral ( talk) 16:36, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
I think that it would be wrong to have no reference to what Karen Parker says at all. It shouldn't be too long, but she spoke before a UN committee and offers an interesting view of what happened. Provided there isn't too much weight placed on it, what's wrong with it? John Smith's ( talk) 20:27, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
Looking at the article, it seems to be neutral enough. I understand the problem is regarding a human rights attorney's report on the matter? Well, I agree that she is a reliable enough source to merit possible inclusion in the article. But consider: too many viewpoints make an article seem like it's dissociative. In this case, I believe Parker, and just her, merits inclusion in the article. It would be too much, though, to include any more. Incidentally, the lead section needs a small rewording where it says "and some third-party commentators" to avoid WP:WEASEL. Sceptre ( talk) 22:18, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
The lede should not contain anything that is not elaborated in the body; it should be a fair summary of the article. Therefore, the question about whether it should go in the lede is a moot point; if the info on Parker was in the body, then of course it should be adequately summarized in the lede.
Now, as to how much should be said about Parker in the body, well, that depends on keeping a balanced view. I would imagine that Parkers statement may warrant a very brief mention in the article, but bear in mind that there are certainly lots of other prominent people who could also be quoted; without care, the article could descend into a 'quote-fest'. Per WP:TIGER, these arguments need careful presentation to maintain neutrality. Chzz ► 00:12, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
Per what the source stated:
KAREN PARKER, of International Educational Development, said State terrorism in the form of Government terror against its own people produced far more gross violations of human rights than any other form of terrorism; an example was China's treatment of the Falun Gong. The Government had sought to justify its terrorism against Falun Gong by calling it an evil cult that had caused deaths and the break-up of families, but the organization's investigation showed that the only deaths and resulting family breakups had been at the hands of Chinese authorities, who had resorted to extreme torture and unacceptable detention of thousands of people. International Educational Development had discovered that a self-immolation cited by the Chinese Government as proof that the Falun Gong was an evil cult in fact had been staged. The international community and the Subcommission should urgently address this situation..
What HappyInGeneral tries to add:
Karen Parker the chief delegate of an organization that is accredited with the United Nations [1] was quoted in a press release issued by the United Nations on 14 August 2001 saying that this was a clear expression of state terrorism, and that the event was staged to justify the extreme torture and the unacceptable detention of thousands of people. [2]
A simple rhetoric, claiming that they "discovered" that the incident was staged, with no references or evidence whatsoever. Furthermore the "state terrorism" claim was about China's treatment of FLG, not the Tiananman Square self immolation incident, which HappyInGeneral tried to synthesis. Parker is a lawyer, whose job is to take a client's POV and argue for them. There is little information on Parker's studies or academic credentials, and should not be placed an undue weight.
Furthermore, HappyInGeneral is a dedicated FLG activist, as his user page describes, and is the only one trying to add the material on the Tiananman Square self immolation, despite the fact that nearly every other user was against him. This source should not be used to push a pro-FLG POV and advocate the view that the self immolation incident was staged, as HappyInGeneral is trying to do.-- PCPP ( talk) 01:07, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
The lead doesn't accurately reflect the contents of the article. The article explores the incident and portrays the confusion and lack of evidence as to what really happened, and that there is a dispute between the Chinese government and Falun Gong as to the way the incident has been portrayed in the Chinese media. The lead should neutrally cover the confusion and lack of evidence, and that there is a dispute about the way the Chinese media has handled the incident. But it's inappropriate to target the Chinese government with the claims that have been made, as though these claims are fact, and to use the emotive language of the second paragraph - "Capitalizing on the incident" is not neutral, "created a plethora of printed materials" is not neutral "repeatedly broadcast" is not neutral, "vivid images" is POV and original research unless some reliable source can be found to support the word "vivid", and even then it's a very questionable use of language in this context in an encyclopedia, etc. I feel a little bombarded, and that I have to accept the version of events as presented to me, rather than allowing to me to make my own decision by presenting to me the facts. SilkTork * YES! 02:59, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
This is a very useful discussion to be having, as the article is currently being nominated for WP:FAC. I have been concerned about the article's neutrality for some time, it is a rather delicate balancing act here. I would thank VsevolodKrolikov and others' advice on how to neutralise the article, and I will edit the article accordingly. I agree that it is a very notable topic, and important historical marker in the battle of the Chinese state against a quasi-religious group. Vsevolod rightly mentions that the link between falun gong and the immolations is not presented very cleanly- this is certainly to a conscious effort on the part of Falun Gong editors and a subliminal effort on my part to capture the element of doubt about the true facts behind this event.
Happy and I have been disagreeing about the text to be inserted which I felt that it was done in complete violation of WP:LEAD, WP:SYN WP:NPOV and WP:RS. John Carter and PCPP have elaborated on these issues. Happy and I disagree over the cite in the lead, which was echoed by an editor reviewing for the FAC. What's more, I specifically disagree with the fashion how (pls refer to his four diffs above) Happy has attempted to insert the material. The text synthetised the assertion that Parker referred to the incident as "state terrorism". Note insertion two was blatant misattribution. The press release itself is a primary source which should not be used, particularly as it was not clear Parker was notable, or that hers was a "significant view" not already covered by others' - in fact, because of the perfunctory opinion [in the press statement], it is not detailed exactly what this view is. However, the summary position seems to mirror the Falun Gong view. Therefore, it could eventually be grouped together with FG if there is consensus that Parker's opinion warrants inclusion in some manner. Ohconfucius ( talk) 03:54, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
I much appreciate the constructive criticism received in connection with this article, and have now made a number of changes to the article which hopefully addresses the concerns expressed here. Please let me know if they are still not yet addressed. In the interests of keeping all FAC related discussions in one place, I would ask interested editors to kindly list in bullet point any remaining concerns about the article at the nominations page, so that they may be dealt with, and for the evaluation/nomination to proceed. Ohconfucius ( talk) 13:41, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
This article really cries out for some participation by utterly uninvolved (as in "I don't give a f---- about the Gaza war") editors who are interested only in applying Wiki policy and creating a neutral article. There's some excellent stuff in this article, and overall it is informative, but it's a powder keg and the talk page is like the Second Battle of the Marne. I realize most smart editors avoid articles like this, but I thought I'd give it a try just once. -- JohnnyB256 ( talk) 16:55, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
My edit is the paragraph at the top. The rest is the original article which ignores my relevant information of how the John Birch Society is and was percieved in popular culture. The position of a redical political group in society and how that group is percieved by the public is important and relevant. This group was known for intimidating people and stifeling voter participation. The original article ignores that and glosses over the very famous opposition to civil rights reform. The John Birch Society reached it's hight of notoriety during and soon after the civil rights struggle as a voice for segregation and against voting rights reform. Any unbiased article needs to ackowlage this history and the groups place in popular culture. The original article reads as promotional material for this extremist group.
Massive and completely unnecessary dump of what is obviously Waterunderground's preferred version of the article removed. If you want to see that version, use the article's edit history in the normal way. Uncle G ( talk) 21:31, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
—Preceding unsigned comment added by Waterunderground ( talk • contribs) 15:17, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
Contributors representing Foswiki, an article deleted through AFD several times, are consistently disrupting the discussion process on the TWiki article. The simplest explanation of the dispute is that proponents of an open source fork of TWiki have been aggressively promoting their product after a dispute over ownership with TWiki's founders. Myself and another editor were just reaching a working consensus when an IP jumped in again. I think what they're doing amounts to spam, but mediation from anyone not previously involved would be most welcome. Steven Walling 00:31, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
A question has been raised that the page is not neutral. As an example of this "Historically the BNP (including Nick Griffin)" why is Mr Griffin mentioned this page is not about him? that seems to me a bit biased. Do any other politcal party pages also note that the leader of the party supports its views? Slatersteven ( talk) 13:45, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
We now have this [ [98]]. Ther is no denile in the text as thye edit claims. Ans (as I poined out here [ [99]] the re-inserted link does not work. So editors are not even boptherting to check that a source is valid before reverting. Slatersteven ( talk) 14:24, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Of course it should be in the info box, and we have plenty of WP:RS for that. Verbal chat 16:41, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
There is a POV dispute in relation to the lede in this article and I therefore added the POV intro tag. One of the parties to the dispute, however, removed the tag with an edit summary saying "rv POV crap. This article is all referenced and sourced. The only POV is the warriors on the talk page". I don't want to start an edit war over the tag, but at the same time I don't think it is appropriate for it to have been removed before resolution. I was advised by an Admin to come here for advice. Mooretwin ( talk) 15:38, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
{undent} I rather think the problem lies in the inability of editors on either side of the conflict to compromise. The lede, as it stands, could be improved. It should be clarified that the assertion the victims were informers is an opinion of an historian and not an iron clad fact. Hart does not appear to meet the criteria for WP:RS considering his rather revisionist bent and errors in research method. Simonm223 ( talk) 22:02, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
The article on the film Super Size Me is not written from a neutral point of view. For example, here are the first couple of sentences from the article:
This film is one of the best documenteries i have ever watched! It gives you the full facts and details needed to know about the poisins and chemicals in the fast foods we eat...Super Size Me is a 2004 American documentary film directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, an American independent filmmaker.
I'm flagging the article for revision. I have not seen the film myself, so I cannot rewrite the entry, but someone should if at all possible. Thorswitch ( talk) 18:16, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
A header has been placed on the AC Propulsion eBox article, suggesting that it is written like an advertisement. While the article is not perfect, I do not think this header is justified. Since the tag was posted, I have added some references and fixed another. I have tried to clean up the article a bit. Please help me by weighing in as to whether you think the header is justified and, if you do, what changes you think could be made to eliminate the need for such a header. Of course, any edits to the article which would help would be enormously appreciated. I have no professional affiliation with this product or company. Thanks! Fbagatelleblack ( talk) 22:06, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
I am bringing this here because User:TheFix63 has made several edits that violate WP:NPOV. First, he kept adding the phrase "The Lakers are considered to be among the signature franchises of the NBA" to the lead even though I have told him that our policy prohibits the insertion of opinions. But he ignored, claiming that he is "confirming the existence of a major opinion." [100] Also, he removed a sourced statement on Larry Bird and replaced with an uncited statement contrary to the advice on WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV. [101] I asked him not to do that but he kept on making the same edit.— Chris! c/ t 02:02, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
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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. |
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Two editors have launched a massive POV re-write of Lyndon LaRouche, involving well over 100 edits between them over the past week. The effect of their editing has been to take a stable, neutral BLP well into attack-article territory. The main emphasis has been the deletion of press commentary favorable to LaRouche ( [1] [2]) while giving undue weight to obscure critics ( [3] [4] [5] [6].) The NPOV tag that I placed was also reverted [7]. I would appreciate some intervention from non-involved editors. -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:22, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
Here is a more complete set of diffs, specifically from User:SlimVirgin. Beginning on August 28, SlimVirgin began a series of controversial edits, 140 of them at last count, despite the "controversial" tag on the talk page which asks that controversial edits be discussed in advance. The edits are so numerous that it is difficult to unravel the overarching trend. However, the examples below are characteristic. SlimVirgin has a technique of mixing controversial with non-controversial edits and then assigning a vague or misleading edit summary, so that when she is deleting favorable or adding negative commentary, she will often use a summary like "tidying." -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:26, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
User:Dewen12 and I have a disagreement about whether or not a paragraph he wrote should be part of Van Jones. It is my opinion that the paragraph is negatively biased and sourced by non-reliable sources. It is his opinion that, since I am a Democrat, I am inherently inclined to remove unflattering information, and so his paragraph should remain, exactly as he wrote it. Rather than enter into a pointless edit-war, I'd appreciate some assistance in looking at Dewen12's desired contribution and helping decide what the most neutral version might be. - FisherQueen ( talk · contribs) 10:34, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
New User: I think that, if your friend can find valid sources to cite, the article should be allowed. Just because information is unflattering doesn't mean it shouldn't be posted. And to be clear, I'd say the same about Bush or any republican; I support people's rights to write an article about how Bush's war policy was viewed, as long as they have reliable sources as well. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
68.63.39.20 (
talk) 09:55, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
I'd like opinions on an ongoing dispute at Ahmed Deedat. Just as background, Ahmed Deedat was what might be called a Muslim missionary, or at least a Muslim missionary writer. He worked in the area which (depending on your POV) either attacked Christianity or defended Islam against Christian attacks. The problem with a Wikipedia article on someone like that is you tend to only get two types of editors: those Muslims who are admirers of his work, and those Christians who are very critical of his work. (I admit I am in the latter group). I have tried to insert a link to a page of writings critical of Deedat's work, by a Christian author named John Gilchrist, and a number of Muslim editors continually revert it. (Of course, from their POV, a Christian is trying to disrupt the article and only gets support from another Christian). Debate on the issue on the talk page ( Talk:Ahmed Deedat) almost invariably falls along Christian/Muslim lines. So I am looking for some new editors - preferably without strong opinions on Deedat - to take a look at the issue.
To me it's a pretty clear case. Deedat wrote against Christianity, so a Christian response is notable if it's by a notable enough writer. I detail my reasons that Gilchrist is notable at Talk:Ahmed Deedat#Should we link to the anti-Deedat material at Answering-Islam.org?; but briefly I offer 3 strong sources backing up Gilchrist's writings: (1) Christianity Today, probably the leading evangelical Christian magazine in the world (CT page here [22] references Gilchrist's "The Christian Witness to the Muslim", which is partly a response to Deedat's writings); (2) two of his books were endorsed by leading Christian writer Ravi Zacharias in 1995 [23]; and (3) Gilchrist co-authored a book with Josh McDowell (probably the leading Christian apologist, at least at the popular level in the 1970s/early 80s) in 1981 (book is here [24] an 8 MB downlaod; Amazon page is here [25]).
It has been objected that these are Christian sources and so are inherently biased, but that misses the point. In the field of Muslim-Christian debate, there are really only two sides - the Muslim side (which Christian consider flawed) and the Christian side (which Muslims consider flawed). Note WP:NPOV says: "where multiple or conflicting perspectives exist within a topic each should be presented fairly... Readers should be allowed to form their own opinions."
A second objection has been that it's POV to put a link to a Christian critique unless we first explain Deedat's arguments so the reader knows what Gilchrist is arguing about. To me that objection is nonsense - we link to Deedat's anti-Christian writings (about 12 times in the article) so there's plenty of context for a single link to a notable Christian response. After a back and forth with a single editor over this, with neither of us backing down, I've decided to call for other opinions. Our debate is in the last part of Talk:Ahmed Deedat#Should we link to the anti-Deedat material at Answering-Islam.org?, beginning at 16:41, 21 July 2009 (UTC).
Anyway, what do people think? I think it's a clear example of a notable critique of Deedat, which is on-topic, and not POV to insert, in view of the large number of pro-Deedat links the article already contains. But I'd like some more opinions... Peter Ballard ( talk) 11:40, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
Those are the only debates deemed notable to this particular third-party reviewer. Of course, there may be other sources out there. Newspaper articles, commentary from outsiders, etc. would all be really good to find to get better sourcing. I suggested starting here and working your way through the journal articles. If you cannot get access to them, go to your local university or college library, or you can message me and I can send you quotations. Alternatively, you can look for sources from news outlets like these which can also establish external notability. Unfortunately, looking for both John Gilchrist and Ahmed Deedat yielded almost nothing. If the book you mention is clearly notable, we're going to need to find some external third-party reviews of it, some indication of its popularity, or, even better, some criticism.In the 1980s and 1990s Deedat debated in several countries with religious opponents, who in most cases were representatives of evangelical or fundamentalist forms of Christianity. For example, he debated with the American TV evangelist Jimmy Swaggart, the Palestinian Christian Anis Shorrosh, and the Swedish Pentecostal Pastor Stanley Sjoberg.
which indicates that Deedat's most famout two works do not include the one you reference. Once you and the rest of the editors can agree on an objective standard for deciding which of Deedat's writings to have prose in our article, then if Deedat's book "The God that never was" makes the cut it clearly makes Gilchrist a notable character.Deedat’s key mode of argument, manifest in his most famous works, Is the Bible God’s Word? and Crucifixion or Crucifiction? is to critique Christianity through close biblical hermeneutics.
The author remarks that what distinguishes the form and content of both Gilchrist and Deedat's activities was their "exlusivist" outlook towards their religions informed by missionary or reactionary impulses in some cases mirrored in the activities of the Anglican and NGK churches. The author then lists Deedat, Vanker, and Laher as Muslim exclusivists with Pypers, Nehls, and Gilchrist as Christian exclusivists. However, apparently the popularity of exclusivist approaches waned through the 1980s and 1990s in favor of pluralism, thus casting both Deedat and Gilchrist as anachronisms. This is perhaps a way Gilchrist can be addressed in this article as it is a fairly good quality source. This isn't exactly an argument to include his website, but in the larger context of this discussion Gilchrist's reliance on web-based technologies is a unique identifying feature. I must warn you, the connection here is very tenuous and is shared amongst four other people as well, so we're looking at something that will not be weighted very highly. It may mean that Gilchrist's actual commentary gets excluded from the article simply by virtue of the fact that it seems to lack sufficient prominence, especially in comparison to other aspects of Deedat's life works.Naude and Greyling's academic and mission work was complemented by those of Gilchrist and Nehls; the latter worked in the Western Cape while the former worked in the Transvaal where he had established his "Jesus to the Muslims" organization. In 1977 Gilchrist, a lawyer, produced his work The Challenge of Islam in South Africa, in which he provided an overview of the position of Islam and Muslims with the aim of arming his "Jesus to Muslims" society and others regarding Muslim beliefs and practices.... Gilchrist saw the web as another avenue to make his ideas and writings known to a wider audience.... Gilchrist has since the 1970s spent a great deal of time studying sources of Islam and produced his extensive work Jam' al-Qur'ān — The Codification of the Qur'ān Text. This text's main objective was to undermine the Muslim interpretation and acceptance of the Qur'ān's authoritative and divine nature. In addition to these, he brought out "The Qur'ān and the Bible Series" and the "Christianity and Islam Series."
<- (outdent) I'd use it as a source for the Josh McDowell article, certainly. Not sure if it is the best for the Ahmed Deedat article for the reason you outline. ScienceApologist ( talk) 15:07, 1 September 2009 (UTC)
The article Prostitution has had several sections broken out of it and moved to larger article, often without any notice on Talk:Prostitution and without any linking or announcement to appropriate WikiProject. The articles in question are Feminist views on prostitution, Prostitution (criminology), and Legality of prostitution (specifically, the " Debate_over_legalization" section). These forks are quite blatantly one-sided, presenting an anti-prostitution/"prostitution abolitionist" position as basically the sole political and academic view on the subject. These articles are now severely unbalanced and in violation of WP:NPOV and represent POV forks.
The thing is, some of these subjects are large enough topics to break out into their own articles. However, it seems that in practice, the purpose of breaking these sections out into independent articles was to create editorializing articles away from watchful eyes in the original article.
I am requesting more eyes on these articles and suggestion on how to reintegrate the articles, clean up content forking, and turn these forks back into simple content breakouts.
Also, how does one deal with articles like the above where undue weight is a significant problem, that is, where editors have made extensive, referenced contributions, but are entirely one-sided? Bringing the article back to WP:NPOV seems to require either of two problematic alternatives: 1) add content until the article is balanced, which may take a long time in articles where previous editors have flooded the article with content from one perspective, or 2) delete excess content so that the article may be more easily balanced, but in the process take out referenced content and risk charges that content is being deleted for POV reasons. I'm really not sure how to deal with this dilemma. Iamcuriousblue ( talk) 19:58, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
I want to note that this seems to have blown up into a full-blown NPOV dispute. An editor who has edited several of the above-mentioned articles holds that there is an "academic consensus" against the idea of consensual prostitution and that views opposing this are of a "small minority". Naturally, I disagree with this and see editing prostitution-related articles toward this point of view as POV-pushing. I would like to get third-party opinions on this dispute and hopefully head off a full-scale edit war over several articles. Discussion is at Talk:Prostitution #POV_Forks. Iamcuriousblue ( talk) 22:41, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
Two editors have launched a massive POV re-write of Lyndon LaRouche, involving well over 100 edits between them over the past week. The effect of their editing has been to take a stable, neutral BLP well into attack-article territory. The main emphasis has been the deletion of press commentary favorable to LaRouche ( [40] [41]) while giving undue weight to obscure critics ( [42] [43] [44] [45].) The NPOV tag that I placed was also reverted [46]. I would appreciate some intervention from non-involved editors. -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:22, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
Here is a more complete set of diffs, specifically from User:SlimVirgin. Beginning on August 28, SlimVirgin began a series of controversial edits, 140 of them at last count, despite the "controversial" tag on the talk page which asks that controversial edits be discussed in advance. The edits are so numerous that it is difficult to unravel the overarching trend. However, the examples below are characteristic. SlimVirgin has a technique of mixing controversial with non-controversial edits and then assigning a vague or misleading edit summary, so that when she is deleting favorable or adding negative commentary, she will often use a summary like "tidying." -- Leatherstocking ( talk) 15:26, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
I refer to these recent edits of the article False prophet: [61] and [62]. In my opinion those edits violate neutrality of the article. They have been discussed in the talk page. No consensus has been reached. Uikku ( talk) 18:37, 2 September 2009 (UTC)
I changed the section title to be more informative to attract more editors. - 2/0 ( cont.) 20:10, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
user:Jack Upland is taking issue over the introductory paragraph of the Korean Air Lines Flight 007#Alternative theories section, which he says is POV because he believes it is exclusively critical of US government. Would appreciate a second pair of eyes on this wording as I can't see any NPOV issue (both the US and Soviets had conspiracy theories and propaganda campaigns). More details of the discussion are on the article's talk page. Thank you. Socrates2008 ( Talk) 12:37, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
I am engaged in a dispute with some users. I am trying to improve neutrality of the articles Mary (mother of Jesus) and Jesus, but they oppose it. I am sure every administrator is tired of problems such as this one, but your hep would really be appreciated. Thank you! Surtsicna ( talk) 22:45, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
Singularity, please don't distort my intentions. Grammatical edits always included punction marks as well; if other users weren't so passionate about reverting each of my edits, they would've kept the punctation marks. You can see that I have started a discussion at each talkpage; however, the POV-pushers revert edits much faster than they respond to arguments. Regarding Mary's sainthood, you should read my arguments on Talk:Mary (mother of Jesus). Infobox Saint should be presented in the article Blessed Virgin Mary, as all parameters of the infobox (veneration, shrine, feast, and patronage) are meant to describe Christian view of Mary. Similarly, disputing a person's death by saying one religion still believes he is alive in heaven is POV. That's true, but I have never replaced Christian POV with Islamic POV. I proposed having either none of them or both of them. The article currently claims he died on a cross just because one religion believes he did; isn't that also a POV? Shouldn't we try to achieve NPOV by presenting all points of view (like Wikipedia:Neutral point of view suggests)? Regarding Umm Isa, the fact that it was uncited was never brought as an issue by those removed it - it was removed on the basis of not being neutral (?!). BashBrannigan, trying to improve neutrality means presenting either all points of view or none. I have only tried to improve neutrality of the lead sections (the infoboxes, to be precise). For example, the lead section in the article Jesus says that Christians believe he was crucified and that Muslims believe he was not crucified, yet the infobox simply lists his cause of death as crucifixion. I would also like you to explain your last sentence; all my edits were explained and it's clear that their purpose was achieving NPOV. Surtsicna ( talk) 10:01, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
As a devout follower of Lactuosity, I am appalled as well. According to our faith, we believe that Jesus was wrapped into a big cheese-ball before being transported into the Universe to align a vast number of stars which have henceforth become known as the Milky Way. And I want that in the infobox. Seb az86556 ( talk) 12:45, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
Excuse me, I am not following. What is the point of your arguments, Seb and BaseballBugs? Can you get serious? Do you have to insult to prove that you're right? Even some forms of Christianity do not believe Jesus was crucified - Docetism for example. We have two religions: one usually teaches that Jesus was crucified (though some forms of it teach that he wasn't) and the other one always teaches that Jesus was not crucified. Wikipedia cannot decide which religion is right. Surtsicna ( talk) 13:44, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
|death_cause=
blank. There's nothing in that infobox that isn't in the intro or the first section of the article.
rʨanaɢ
talk/
contribs 14:54, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
|death_cause=
blank, but that was reverted and hence this discussion (+ some irrelevant comments by Seb and BaseballBugs). Your last sentence is also right; however, there are important points of view that are in the intro but not in the infobox. Besides, having the Infobox Person in the article about Jesus is also an Islamic POV, for Jesus is usually considered to be
more than a person in Christianity. Perhaps having no infobox is the best solution.
Surtsicna (
talk) 15:05, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
Albanian nationalism is an article full of highly biased claims like "These ideologies and Greater Albania have proponents that are not only nationalists but criminals[9] and terrorists[10] involved[11] in drug trafficking ,Human trafficking and other activities motivated by profit [12].". It is completely fallacious to identify an entire nation as criminals and terrorist. It is also misleading to cite Us Gov. listing KLA as a terrorist organisation. What their website actually says about KLA is this: "They established a parallel government funded mainly by the Albanian diaspora. When this movement failed to yield results, an armed resistance emerged in 1997 in the form of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). The KLA's main goal was to secure the independence of Kosovo." (state.gov). There is also a different, more neutral POV in Greek nationalism, Serbian nationalism and other Balkan states nationalisms that should be also present in Albanian nationalism. AnnaFabiano ( talk) 22:35, 6 September 2009 (UTC)
I did not write the original article for Bosphorus Cymbals, but have just rewritten much of it to remove the promotional language. What is the process for having the arning removed?
Experienced NPOV review is needed at this article, including (but not only) this edit.-- Arxiloxos ( talk) 20:57, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
Torchrunner ( talk · contribs) keeps running into WP:SOAP and WP:SYNTH issues with his edits with regard to 19th century northern European Christian Mystics. There have been repeated attempts to direct him to the appropriate topics but he seems not to be listening. I am on the verge of taking it to WP:ANI but before I did I thought I'd get an outside opinion as I am struggling to remain civil throughout this debate as-is. Simonm223 ( talk) 16:44, 4 September 2009 (UTC)
This page is still reading like an advert. Very little Encyclopedic information, all just comment and possibly original research. The primary source is their own webpage. Can someone with some authority have a look please. Noble demetia ( talk) 12:42, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
I did not want to do anything to this entyr, but it appears to be blatant self promotion. An seo compnay that prides itself on inbound links putting it's own links on Wikipedia - there is not benefit to this company being listed. Any company of a reasonable size could find a few flowery press articles. The whole entry is designed to game the search engines - not inform the user. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Insuranceuk2009 ( talk • contribs) 16:01, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
The article regarding
Steven Cohen (soccer) does not seem to be neutral particularly in the Controversy section. The reason why I believe this is because of the selective citing which paints a skewed picture towards an anti-Cohen belief. The page cites a number of anti-Cohen and boycotting websites that have valid points, but fails to use sources that are more neutral. Unfortunately the article is locked so I personally can't do anything. There are articles that are more neutral from the LA Daily News and the Examiner.
http://www.examiner.com/x-4128-Boston-Pro-Soccer-Examiner~y2009m8d27-Steven-Cohen-talks-about-threats-boycott-of-WSD-and-Fox-Football-FoneIn-sponsors-new-radio-show
http://www.dailynews.com/sports/ci_13204726
Thank you for any help fixing this. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
Oar39 (
talk •
contribs) 16:53, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
Amongst academics and practitioners, a large majority believe that conversion therapy (or reparative therapy) should be avoided, and that there is potential for harm. Because of the emphasis on self-control in many religions and particularly Christianity, elements exist who claim benefit for therapy aimed at changing sexual orientation. On the page given over to represent this debate, some are resisting the inclusion of material that represents the minority view, calling it fringe. Wikipedia policy seems to suggest that all views should be described, and that appropriate weight should be given to them based on their acceptance by their prominence. It also says "In articles specifically about a minority viewpoint, the views may receive more attention and space." How should the article reflect this? How can we break the deadlock? Hyper3 ( talk) 15:46, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
NPOV review is requested on this article; also have concerns about WP:UNDUE with the insertion of massive quotes like here. -- Nsaum75 ( talk) 08:32, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
This article does not seem to be particularly neutral, and in fact seems biased against the substane Laetrile as an anti-cancer treatment. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.26.219.98 ( talk) 12:58, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
The Palm oil entry is spun in such a way as to de-emphasise the negative aspects of palm oil, particularly health issues.
The page is already semi-protected, but should at least have a notice at the top about the unbalanced view it presents.
Yeago ( talk · contribs) is repeatedly removing [66] [67] [68] any analysis of health care and illegal immigration from Barack Obama speech to joint session of Congress, September 2009. In particular, Yeago is deleting analysis from Annenberg Public Policy Center's FactCheck [69] and PolitiFact.com, which is published by the St. Petersburg Times. [70] The findings of FactCheck and PolitiFact regarding Obama's speech and Joe Wilson's reaction have been covered by many reliable sources. For example, staff writer John Ward of The Washington Times covered the FactCheck report on Obama's speech [71] and staff writer Ben Szobody of The_Greenville_News discussed PolitiFact's analysis. Those are only two examples of secondary source coverage. Nevertheless, Yeago justifies deleting this material because "the content represents a non-neutral dissection and gives undue weight to the illegal immigrant aspect of the healthcare debate". [72] However, the topic of illegal immigration and health care was part of Obama's speech, and Google's news archive shows that it has been discussed in every major reliable source that reported on the speech. A general overview of the topic in relation to the speech can be found in The New York Times by David M. Herszenhorn. [73] According to Herszenhorn:
The question of how illegal immigrants would fare under a proposed overhaul of the health care system came into sharp focus on Wednesday during President Obama’s speech to Congress. Representative Joe Wilson, Republican of SouthCarolina, shouted “You lie!” when Mr. Obama insisted that his health care overhaul would not insure illegal immigrants.
Yeago maintains that it is NPOV violation to include any material on the subject, while my position is that it is a NPOV violation to exclude it. Viriditas ( talk) 01:29, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
This article is factually incorrect, defamatory, and libelous to the Marines of MarSOC-Fox company who were exonerated at a Court of Inquiry which found the Marines “acted appropriately and in accordance with the rules of engagement and tactics, techniques and procedures in place at the time in response to a complex attack.”
The Court of Inquiry concluded that there was no evidence to suggest the level of force was unjustified and recommended everyone in the March 4, 2007 convoy be awarded the Combat Action Ribbon and that a sergeant injured during the blast receive the Purple Heart. Following are references:
[1] “Marine Corps unit cleared in Afghan shootout” http://articles.latimes.com/2008/may/24/nation/na-convoy24 [2] “Marines who killed civilians were attacked” http://www.examiner.com/a-744305~Marines_who_killed_civilians_were_attacked.html [3] “Secret Report Criticized Army General” http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=28460 [4] “Lawmaker: Investigate general who booted MSOC” http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/10/marine_jones_msoc_071003/ [5] “Congressman tells Army: Stop MarSOC comments” http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2007/05/marine_marsoc_jones_070516/ [6] “Spec-ops Marines tell their side at inquiry” www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?t=127150 [7] “Marines were shot at, Army expert testifies” http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jan/26/nation/na-inquiry26 [8] “Witness: Casings Tossed in Afghan Deaths” http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2008Jan28/0,4670,AfghanMarineShooting,00.html [9] “Did Marines go wild, or simply follow the rules?” http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-warfog5feb05,0,2046631,print.story
I have tried twice to correct this, but it reverts back to the original libelous copy, which violates Wikipedia's neutral point of view.
I see in history several others have attempted to correct the article:
(cur) (prev) 18:22, 18 May 2009 Randy2063 (talk | contribs) m (9,032 bytes) (moved Shinwar Massacre to March 4, 2007 Shooting in Shinwar, Afghanistan: NPOV -- not ruled to be a massacre) (undo) cur) (prev) 02:56, 6 July 2008 Randy2063 (talk | contribs) (6,014 bytes) (rv -- I did read it -- a "war crime" has to be intentional; I don't see a prosecution under the War Crimes Act) (undo) (cur) (prev) 10:18, 12 May 2009 64.39.139.181 (talk) (9,043 bytes) (This so-called "massacre" was undisputably an accident. Does the author want to suggest that Marines are murderers? I changed the opening sentence; the entire article is hardly useful. Emckenny7 (talk) 15:26, 12 September 2009 (UTC)) (undo) (cur) (prev) 02:20, 9 November 2008 Randy2063 (talk | contribs) (6,101 bytes) (rv no legitimate legal body has yet ruled that this was either a deliberate killing of civilians or a technically war crime) (undo)
I ask that this article be deleted. (Emckenny7 (talk) 15:26, 12 September 2009 (UTC))
Note: The attack took place in Bati Kot, Nangahar, Afghanistan. Shinwar refers to a tribe and an area 20 miles from where this attack on the MarSOC Marines t took place. --Emckenny7 (talk) 15:26, 12 September 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Emckenny7 ( talk • contribs)
A few editors have been trying to insist that because they found a couple of sources that state Real Clear Poltics to be right-leaning that they can label the organization as such. I initially removed the section because there are far more sources that either make no distinction or make a statement of non-partisan or independent. I have discussed this at length in the talk page and most recently here with little success. In my most recent attempt I gave several specific examples pointing to reporting of them being independent or non-partisan to no avail. There seems to be a belief that if a majority of editors there think they are biased than that is what needs to be in the lead.
I have done numerous searches and have only been able to find a few instances of any mention of right-leaning or conservative in any MSM over the history of thier existance. To me this smacks of a fringe belief and original research as well as a netural point of view violation. We cannot simply go around and say a valid business is biased regardless of our personal belief. Arzel ( talk) 15:09, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
Issues with WP:DUE given to primary source material espousing views of this fringe theorist in a way that causes the article to be a soap box for theorist's views. Experts in neutral phrasing needed to help preening out peacockery and generally correcing various neutrality problems. Simonm223 ( talk) 14:39, 15 September 2009 (UTC)
I was just reading the article about the Rashidun Caliphate. It seems to be written from a religious persective, and biased towards certain individuals and against others. I could not see verifiable sources to support the information in the introduction and in the section Early history: Succession of Abu Bakr, which features the particularly worrisome sentence: 'The chief cause of the apostasy was lack of true faith.' This does not sound like an encyclopedic article to me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Siriusregent ( talk • contribs) 09:09, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Would you please block User:Philbox17 account, he keeps deleting cited information from the article Réseau de Résistance du Québécois. This person is practicing article ownership, which can be confirmed by reading the editors user talk page User talk:Philbox17 and the lengthy problems this editor has had with this article. I believe this editor is a member of Réseau de Résistance du Québécois and lacks a NPOV. Thank you. 76.64.152.111 ( talk) 20:53, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
The article violates the rules of a neutral point of view, because the author is biased against the theory, states his own opinion and ignores recent archeological evidence in favour of the AAH.-- 87.188.197.220 ( talk) 22:00, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
The article had until recently been a redirect to America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009#Living wills because it referred to Sarah Palin's charaterization of this bill as requiring the Federal government to cut medical services by so requiring a "death panel" made up of bureaucrats to decide who should live and who should die. The article section discusses the issue in some detail.
Now some editors have re-written the Death Panel article treating the subject as something tangible and existant in many countries, including the U.S. The article wrongfully stretches the interpretation of the term "Death panel to NICE (which never hears indiviual cases when determining what expenses will be covered by government in the public health system), and even to death penalty appeals processes in criminal cases, and to bodies set up for the purposes of legal assisted suicide. None of these is what Palin what referring to!
To my mind, this article re-write is merely attempting to imply that Palin's death panels do exist and to segreggate the discussion of "Death Panels" from America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009#Living wills where the truth is actually detailed.
Clearly these panels do not exist in the way Palin use the term and it is wrong to imply that they do.
Opinions re POV please!-- Hauskalainen ( talk) 18:09, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
With respect the last two editors have been involved in an attempt to move the nonsense that was in the death panels article to a new article List of panels making life or death decisions where thy hope to pervert the purpose of Wikipedia. I am confused by the AfD process so if anyone knows how to get rid of the nonsense article List of panels making life or death decisions please do so. It is WP:POV and WP:OR and is being done to link spam. The redirect back to the Palin article is clearly intended by Evb-wiki and Cs32en to avoid linking the false allegation of a "Death Panel" to the article about the very bill that Palin alleges introduced the idea. The section where it was directed of course clearly debunks the idea. I will ensure the article reverts to the proper place!
(edit conflict) I'm confused why this content is being ridiculed as nonsense. I had 12 WP:RS's until User:Hauskalainen started blanking content, prior to submitting what he left behind for WP:Speedy deletion. -- 209.6.238.201 ( talk) 22:15, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
As the editor who created the article as a redirect, I obviously agree that the anon IP's content about capital punishment, etc. is inappropriate. The term should be a redirect. The issue of the target of the redirect would be better discussed at Talk:Death panel but has progressed here, so I'll chime in.
My original redirect was to America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009#Reimbursement for counseling about living wills. If a redirect to a "Living wills" section seems bizarre to Evb-wiki, let me explain that the section title (and hence the redirect) have since been restored to "Reimbursement for counseling about living wills". The reason to redirect to that section is that, when Palin was challenged about where these alleged "death panels" were to be found in the bill, her spokesperson responded by pointing to this provision. [74]
I don't think the redirect gives credence to Palin's ridiculous charge. It's somewhat better than a redirect to Political positions of Sarah Palin#Health care because a reader who types in "Death panel" is more likely to be looking for information about what's in the bill than for information about what Sarah Palin thinks. JamesMLane t c 02:15, 14 September 2009 (UTC)
I've been quietly WikiGnoming the mangled/incomplete/mis-linked citations at English Defence League. The content editors, in the meantime, have been swinging the content like a pendulum here. There are basically two forms of the article, depending from who edited it last. The first has no mention of "far right" against the subject, but calls all of its opponents (a government minister, a mainstream U.K. political party, and so forth) "far left" or "left wing" or "Trotskyite". The second has no mention of "far left" against the latter, and calls the EDL "far right". Editors with experience of applying the NPOV to stop an article swinging between such diametrically opposed extremes are invited to address the article and contribute to the talk page discussion.
And when you're done with that, there's another problem with "far right" labels at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#zombietime as well. ☺ Uncle G ( talk) 02:41, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
I think its important to note that Britain is currently under the regime of a party which openly describes itself on its website as a "democratic socialist party". I think its fair to mention that Denham by virtue of being a member of a self-proclaimed socialist party, is to the left of the spectrum and that is the point of view which his comment comes from. Currently certain people want to remove any mention of his political party from the article at all. - Yorkshirian ( talk) 14:25, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
Tiye#Monuments starts in with the uncorroborated claim that Tiye is not well-known because of her Nubian origin, stated as "her having been a black woman". While I cannot offer any contradictory evidence concerning the biases of Egyptology, I challenge this statement as 'fact not in evidence'. While I feel that the language itself is superfluously inflammatory and/or overgeneralizing and/or technically inaccurate, I reserve specific judgment in anticipation of needed citation and correction. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.196.231.133 ( talk • contribs) 17:14, September 17, 2009
Hi, members of the Réseau de Résistance du Québécois keep deleting information from the article about their organization. These RRQ members do not have a NPOV. One guy keeps creating sockpuppets and shows up a few times per day. Can you send some administrators over to monitor this article. A similar issue happened on the Scientology article a while back. Perhaps, you can just block all IP's that start with "70" that would probably stop the sockpuppet. Thank you. 76.64.152.111 ( talk) 20:58, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
Yesterday I came across Jews for Jesus and found it extremely biased. You don't have to take my word for it; take a look at the article as I found it. I think any reasonable person can see in a few minutes that it's a complete hit piece. The external links section is the official website followed by 12 anti-sites and negative articles. Jews for Jesus aims to combine belief in Jesus with being Jewish, but the article tells the reader over and over that this is not possible, which is an opinion. There is very little information about Jews for Jesus, but an extremely long criticism section. There is a promotional section about the unrelated Outreach Judaism. The references are cherry-picked quotes or from opposing organizations. I attempted to clean up and rewrite using independent reliable sources, but I was reverted with the edit summaries "nice try - now please just edit and not purge", "tweak" (for a mass revert) and "rv per WP:BRD; please discuss these changes before you edit-war" (I have reverted only once). I haven't been able to get much explanation on the talk page either. Some outside comments would be much appreciated. -- Apoc2400 ( talk) 22:04, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
The article was tagged with "{{Newsrelease|date=August 2009}}" which means that it reads like a news release or is written in an "OVERLY PROMOTIONAL TONE". I cannot see anything in it that sounds overly promotional, or reads like a news release. I've rewritten the article many times to make it as neutral as possible but the facts entered probably seem to make it sound otherwise. Please review the article, and maybe remove the inappropriate tag. WHY? Because the article, when viewed for the first time by someone interested in the subject, is more likely inclined to lose a considerable amount of interest because the tag that sits at the very top of everything else, appears to be telling him that HE'S ABOUT TO BE BORED. Any contribution to make it better would be very much appreciated. ≈ Commit charge 00:19, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
Over on Talk:Smiley face murder theory a couple of people are arguing repeatedly that the line in the WP:UNDUEWEIGHT section that says "In articles specifically about a minority viewpoint, the views may receive more attention and space" should be interpreted to mean that the views of the minority should get more space than the views of the majority because the title of the article is about the minority view. This, to me, is completely opposite of what that section is intended for. The same people are also arguing if the topic is really about a WP:FRINGE view that the article must be deleted completely. They seem strongly opposed to having the article adequately document the clear majority viewpoint of police investigators across several jurisdictions and the FBI. they instead favor the well-publicized but claims advanced by a few private consultants on talk shows and the like. We could use more input over there from people who deal with NPOV issues more regularly. DreamGuy ( talk) 21:19, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
The article for
Sungazing was edited 22 times by User:Skinwalker in a one hour period. During which he/she removed any explanation of the practise itself, ie. when to do the practise and any safety guidelines stated by known sungazers. With this done, the way has been paved for the article to take on his opinions of a practise that he seems to know little about (ie. safety guidelines, the actual process of what to do and when to sungaze etc...) As is seen with the statement "The practice of sungazing is dangerous". this is then followed by criticism of the practise with out any explanation of the process itself.
He/she has taken out entire sections of the process of how to sungaze saying 'wikipedia is not a how to section', yet on the page for
Driving, room is given on how to instruct somone to drive, optimising driving performance. The same is true with sungazing, the safety lies in the proper process, with that removed any opinionated view can be propogated. No one drives 90mph out of their drive way and the same goes with sungazing, there are safety guidelines and limits...
Another example of the opinionated editing, User:Skinwalker writes, "it has undergone analysis - staring at the sun is bad for you". i agree that staring at anything is bad for you, but if the practise entailed "staring at the sun" it would be called "sun staring".
It seems this editors opinion comes first and then the rest of the article is to follow.
i would like to note that the criticism section has went untouched.
There is almost nothing left of the original article, and its current state does not allow for any genuine and legitimate information on the process and practise of
Sungazing. i was wondering if someone could give any advice on how to stop these edits or how to procede.
Thanks.
J929 ( talk) 01:37, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
Sungazing is a practise, much like yoga Asanas.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asana
Wikipedia discusses some techniques on this page (Common Practices). What is the difference? If sungazing is practised within 'safe limits' as prescribe by knowledgable and established sungazers, it is a legitimate practise. The results are secondary. Skinwalker says its a fringe subject, yet there are plenty of people who sungaze and many who practise yogic asanas. if everyone who pulled a muscle or in someway made a postural mistake resulting in uncomfort doing asanas, the reports would be too much to publish, yet Skinwalker dwells on his results putting an umbrella like opinion on every aspect of the practise. Staring at the sun at noon and gazing at a setting sun (ie 5-10 minutes ) before it sets are two completely different actions, with different results/consequences.
J929 ( talk) 17:18, 21 September 2009 (UTC)
User User:Kusamanic first erased informations which reports that White people are a minority in Chile, and replaced them with other informations that Whites are majority [75] [76]. Then, I re-posted the information that Whites are minority, and I also posted a genetic resource that conclude that people from Chile are usually Mestizo (Amerindian and White mixture). The user is once again erasing these informations, and saying that I should use the talk page (I did use the talk page, but the user did not even answer me there) [77].
It seems they are racially biased edits from this user. Please, opinions about it. Opinoso ( talk) 21:02, 19 September 2009 (UTC)
Hi,
User:Opinoso doesn't act in good faith in each case. It imposes his personal opinion for on the mentioned sources and he has an appreciation preconceived on the population from Chile according to his point of view like we can observe here.
←Of course my personal opinion is not a source, but I have been to Chile myself and there's no way that 60% are Whites. Even in the areas of "German settlement" of Southern Chile, the local population looks more Amerindian than anything else→.This not only happens to the articles Chile it also has more than enough with other what has cost him multiple blockades for not respecting sources.
[78] it is necessary to remark that this multiple war of editions on the part of the
User:Opinoso began here. When I don't respect the mentioned sources and delete from of white population's category to Chile in the southern cone edition
[79]. I reverted him, as we can observe here:
[80], from today it began to follow my editions. This i denominate it sabotage by
User:Opinoso, when harassing me and to follow my editions
[81]
[82]
[83]
[84]
[85]. Without respecting the sources where they write of a white majority in Chile that varies from 52,7% and 90% to the population´s
[86]
[87]
[88] finally remarking that Chile is amerindian-mestizo like he writes here in one of its summaries of editions saying this without any source to back it up.
←Chile is mostly Amerindian-mestizo→.-
Kusamanic (
talk) 00:20, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
We need more opinions about this subject. Opinoso ( talk) 16:55, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
There's a clear conflict of sources out there: 90%, 64%, 50%, 30%? We cannot choose a few of them and post them and ignore the others. Given that Chile has no racial Census, all these sources may be based on nothing. All these different figures come from "scholars". But it is obvious that somebody is lying out there. To post in articles four different percentages for Whites in Chile is ridiculous. It makes no sense to say 30% is White, and then say 90% is White. I agree with the other users who says that Wikipedia should be silent. Opinoso ( talk) 04:40, 21 September 2009 (UTC)
First, I'm hoping I posted this in the correct place.
I came across an article,
Kongu Vellalar that has some atrocious aspects mostly POV. But I do not know about the topic and wouldn't want to make changes.
The article is: Kongu Vellalar
It appears to deal with an India sect. Even though I know nothing about this topic it, surely it should not contain sentences such as:
"The government of India census wants to keep its people ignorant on this aspect "
"which has aroused considerable jealousy and fear among the real holders of Power"
"which mostly go unresearched partly due to the heavy stench of ideological biases of contemperory Tamil historians"
The article also has NO references for anything.
There is a Neutrality warning at the top of the article, but is this sufficient? How can sentences like the above be left in?
These might be the worst, but the entire article is absolutely filled with unreferences and sometimes absurd statments like:
"Concerned scientists have warned the community to have at least two children per family to maintain steady trend"
I thought I'd mention this as I've honestly never seen anything quite like this on Wikipedia.
BashBrannigan (
talk) 05:34, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
There is a dispute as to whether categorizing the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society as "Category:Eco-terrorism" is in violation of WP:NPOV.
What the debate has boiled down to is that while some feel that categorizing an article is simply making use of an organizational tool, others feel that a categorization is a type of unqualified label, and thus goes against WP:Words to avoid/ WP:TERRORIST and is a WP:NPOV violation.
Please note that there are several governments and organizations, mainly those who support commercial whaling or the tradition of whaling, who have deemed some tactics of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society as acts of Terrorism. These statements are properly sourced. We also have a statement from the FBI that says they're "keeping an eye" on SSCS, but the article clearly goes out of its way to avoid declaring them "eco-terrorists" (while having no hesitation in doing so with organizations like the Animal Liberation Front. MichaelLNorth ( talk) 01:20, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
Relevant background regarding the application of disparaging categories to articles:
Note that "eco-terrorism" has much the same demarcation problem as "pseudoscience", "war criminal" and "terrorist", and according to the first two items and the way they are routinely applied the resulting NPOV problem can't be discussed away by claiming that categories are "only" a navigation tool. Hans Adler 08:47, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
On the talk page I highlighted that the category is a topical category on "eco terrorism", it is not a list of "eco terrorists". This is demonstrated both by its adherence to the naming convention for topical categories and its link to the "eco terrorism" page. Wikipedia:Categorization & Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(categories). Eco terrorism is not a very developed category and currently does not provide many subcategories such as eco terrorist, claimed eco terrorists, etc., but such subcategories likely should exist under the parent, topical category. Listing this group under "eco terrorism" will not and cannot mean they are "eco terrorists", only that its relevant to the the discussion of eco terrorism. In fact, select groups completely in opposition to SSCS can be listed under "eco terrorism" since those groups too may be relevant for someone researching the topic. Mdlawmba ( talk) 12:02, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
2 Questions:
68 - to answer your question, my position is the category should not be applied to anything, for the same reason that I believe it would be against wikipedia policy to create a "Stupid people" category and go around categorizing various articles with it. I believe that the name of the category its self brings with it a POV. — Mike : tlk 00:22, 9 September 2009 (UTC)
This is moving back to the argument of "surely the must be terrorists if they do XYZ". No matter how sure you are of the validity of this idea, it is still subjective, and thus still advocating the use of "Stupid People" instead of "People with IQ below 75" because you believe that having an IQ below 75 surely makes one "Stupid". You keep asking me "how many sources", and again, the number of sources is irrelevant. You should need no sources to justify applying a category to an article, which makes sense since there is no mechanism for attaching a reference to a category in Wikipedia."But there's only one commonly used term for people who affix "can opener" devices to thier hulls before ramming fueling ships in the name of whales."
It would take an objective and NPOV category label. This will result in little to no explanation or elaboration required for a full and accurate understanding of what the category is, and why it has been applied to the article.what would it take in your mind for a label to be appropriate and qualified.
I'm trying to figure out what sort of objective qualifiers you are applying to see if the word is appropriate and then apply those qualifiers to other categories in WIKI to see if a president has allready been set.
A militant is an individual or party engaged in aggressive physical or verbal combat.
Could you please rephrase. The current meaning sounds like you think I'm trying to alter the sources that the article uses as references. Somehow that doesn't sound right. 68 stated a list of characteristics, and I replied with an objective and NPOV term that encompasses them properly. I was reluctant to even play that game, since it is almost asking a rhetorical question since the criterion was so specific to Sea Shepherd. In the interest of reaching a consensus, I gave an answer, and it seems that you may not find it acceptable. Is this accurate? Could you elaborate? — Mike : tlk 07:50, 12 September 2009 (UTC)are you proposing that we use the new invented term in an attempt to make the notable sources more NPOV? That somehow doesn't sound right.. :)
_________________________________________
Republican Senator Scott McInnis is an ardent advocate of laws to control 'eco-terrorism' in the United States. In a recent interview he was asked by a journalist; Should these groups be lumped in the same category as what, you know, we have come to know after 9/11 as terrorists?
McInnis replied: Sure, absolutely, I mean they are the number one, the eco-terrorists, these types of organisations, you know, ELF some of these type of groups, absolutely, they are the number one domestic terror threat we have. Those people that flew that airplane in, they weren't in to die for money, they were in to send a message, disobedience, civil disobedience.
Note two things: people and groups accused of eco-terrorism are terrorists , the same as the 9/11 attack; and McInnis equates civil disobedience with terrorism of the 9/11 type. Ron Arnold, who created the word 'eco-terrorism' (not covered in the very bad Wikipedia eco-terrorism article), makes the same point. In a 1985 article he wrote: Ecoterror crimes range from misdemeanors—such as criminal trespass and obstruction—to felony equipment sabotage, bombings, and attempted murder. He reinforced that definition in testimony to the US Congress in 2000 when he said, ...ecoterrorism, that is, a crime committed to save nature. These crimes generally take the form of equipment vandalism but may include package bombs, blockades using physical force to obstruct workers from going where they have a right to go, and invasions of private or government offices to commit the crime of civil disobedience. So you can see, Mr. Chairman, the range of ecoterror crimes spans the most violent felonies of attempted murder to misdemeanor offenses, such as criminal trespass, but they are all crimes. In the conservative view, any act in opposition to business enterprises that involve the natural world is terrorism.
Categories label. The definition of 'category' is: a class or division of people or things having shared characteristics. — ORIGIN Greek kategoria “statement, accusation”. (Oxford English Dictionary). Categorising a group like Sea Shepherd is accusing them, labelling them and their members, as terrorists. The category is inherently not neutral, it labels groups and the people who are their members as terrorists in the same way that the category 'terrorist' did. The word 'eco-terrorism' is a portmanteau word that combines 'ecological' and 'terrorism'. It is a political word used to label environmental groups as terrorists.
In the UK, if Greenpeace (as they have) entered an agricultural plot and uprooted plants being used for research into genetically-modified organisms as a protest, they would be charged with trespass and, possibly, criminal damage. In the US they would be called 'eco-terrorists'. That is, as terrorists.
Labelling a group or an individual as a terrorist is a way of playing on people's fears. As Professor Sharon Beder notes: Propaganda aims to “persuade not through the give-and-take of argument or debate, but through the manipulation of symbols and of our most basic human emotions.” There are a number of basic techniques identified by the Institute of Propaganda Analysis, many of which are used in public relations. Two examples of these are “name-calling” and “glittering generalities”. “Name-calling” involves labelling an idea or a group of people so as to get others to reject them or treat them negatively without evidence being put forward to support such a label. ( Global Spin: The Corporate Assault on Environmentalism page 122). The word 'eco-terrorism' is a propaganda word that labels groups and people as terrorists.
This technique was used by the public relations firm Ketchum Communications when it advised the Chlorox Corporation when it faced protests from Greenpeace. The advice was to run a campaign labelling Greenpeace as terrorists by using the word 'eco-terrorist'. Labels such as “extremist” or “terrorist” are examples of the propaganda technique of name calling ... It is, according to Penny Cass, an attempt to activate preconceptions and stereotypes already held by the public. “Category-based expectancies define a group in such a way as to predict future behaviour and to interpret ambiguous information in the shadow of pre-existing stereotypes”'. ( Global Spin: The Corporate Assault on Environmentalism page 134). The list of sources that call Sea Shepherd 'eco-terrorists' is nothing more than name-calling and amounts to nothing more than an attempt to categorise the group as terrorists, which is what the category 'eco-terrorism' does.
For example, Japanese whaling interests first started out by calling Sea Shepherd 'vigilantes' then 'pirate-terrorists' then, after a Western public relations firm was hired, settled on the perjorative term 'eco-terrorists'. As Roescke points out, Today, Americans tend to have a heightened, almost Pavlovian, sensitivity to any use of the word “terrorist”.(Roeschke, J.E. (2009). Eco-terrorism and Piracy on the High-seas: Japanese whaling and the rights of private groups to enforce international conservation law in neutral waters. Villanova Law Review 20 pp. 99-136). He suggests that the Japanese whaling interests use this word to gain a negative image of Sea Shepherd in the US. He points out that laws concerning 'eco-terrorism' exist only in the US and, as such, there is no 'eco-terrorism' outside of the US. Outside of the US, the word only exists as a label used by vested interests and conservative (right-wing) anti-environmentalists to paint environmental protesters as terrorists to try and isolate them from public sympathy.
By using the category 'eco-terrorism' Wikipedia is labelling groups and the people who are members of these groups as terrorists, which goes against WP:TERRORIST and against the reasons for the decisions made in the cases of the former categories 'terrorist' (see: CfD Terrorists) and 'war criminals' (see: Cfd war criminals). By using this category Wikipedia is using a word invented as a propaganda tool to marginalise and isolate groups and individuals engaged in environmental protest. By using this word as a category Wikipedia is using a term invented in and isolated to the US in law; it is not a recognised word in law anywhere else in the world and is only used outside of the US by vested interests, and their supporters, as a derogatory propaganda term. This is a violation of WP:NPOV and the WP:Worldwide view position.
I would ask that a person with the authority to do so to please nominate the category 'eco-terrorism' for CfD. As well, the article eco-terrorism is a poor article, deficient in fact and showing a POV bias so if someone with the authority to do so, could you please put the NPOV and factual dispute flags at the top of the article; they would be doing Wikipedia readers a good service. TranquillityBase Message 06:39, 14 September 2009 (UTC)
It's been a few days since I posted in this topic (took a little break for perspective), so I'll mention that I'm replying to this comment from 68. I didn't intend to imply foul play, just that I was unclear as to what you meant.
This seems to be reverting into an argument about whether SSCS is in fact appropriately deemed an "eco-terrorist" organization, by various definitions, press releases, statements, etc... Perhaps it's a good time to go back to the "Stupid People" abstract example?— Mike : tlk 03:54, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Cpt-- It's obviously still not a clear cut issue, even after whatever category reworking you're referring to (please give me a hint as to where I might read about this, so I can be better informed). We should all re-focus here. This isn't about whether SSCS is an "eco-terrorist" organization, it's about whether an "unqualified label", like the "Category:Stupid People" example, should be subjective and carry a POV along with it. Also, we should decide the point at which we escalate this in the WP:DR process. It feels like we're in limbo here, and there's no point in continuing this discussion if it's clear there will be no consensus. I'm not saying we're at that point yet, but there's a good chance that we'll find ourselves there soon — Mike : tlk 14:46, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Here's another thing to think about. Labeling SSCS with "Category:Organizations comprised of stupid people" is, in essence, placing an unqualified (needing no elaboration or explanation) label, "Stupid people", on its members. Since WP:BLP applies to all content written about a person, throughout wikipedia, this guideline seems relevant:
From: Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons#Categories
"Caution should be used in adding categories that suggest the person has a poor reputation (see false light). For example, Category:Criminals (or its subcategories) should only be added for an incident that is relevant to the person's notability; the incident has been published by reliable third-party sources; the subject was convicted; and the conviction was not overturned on appeal."
Also, it seems that another guideline speaks to how we should should properly "label" organizations
FROM: Wikipedia:Words_to_Avoid#Words_that_label
"Some words may be used to label a group from an outside perspective, even though these words are used in accordance with a dictionary definition. For example, 'The Peoples Temple is a cult, which...', 'The Ku Klux Klan is a racist organization.', 'Pedophilia is a sexual perversion...'. Such terms, even when accurate, often convey to readers an implied viewpoint: that of an outsider looking in and labeling as they see it. The fact that a term is accepted "outside" but not "inside" is a good indicator that it may not be neutral."
The guideline then provides possible solutions to fixing these types of problems
"There are at least three ways to deal with this: attribute the term to reliable sources, replace the label with information, or use a more neutral term."
Attributing the term to reliable sources is not an option with a category, since there is no mechanism by which a reference can be added. The last two options are to replace with information (I'm not sure how this would work in the context of a category), or to use a more neutral term.
— Mike : tlk 15:38, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
Mike, you wrote above what I think is the important part here:
From: Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons#Categories
"Caution should be used in adding categories that suggest the person has a poor reputation (see false light). For example, Category:Criminals (or its subcategories) should only be added for an incident that is relevant to the person's notability; the incident has been published by reliable third-party sources; the subject was convicted; and the conviction was not overturned on appeal."
Here is a quick recap for Terrillja
In the article History of Argentina the line "The dominant figure of this period was the federalist Juan Manuel de Rosas, who is considered by the traditional historiography a dictator. " (on the "Birth of Argentina" section) should be modified to something like "The dominant figure of this period was the federalist Juan Manuel de Rosas, who is portrayed under diferents angles by the diverse historiographic styles in Argentina: the canonic history usually considers him a dictator, while revisionism support him on the grounds of his defense of national soveregnity." to comply with the neutral point of view, as the consideration of Rosas as a dictator is not universal.
As it was long explained in the talk page, there was indeed a mainstream view of Rosas as a dictator in Argentina until the early XX century, mainly designed by Bartolomé Mitre and Domingo Faustino Sarmiento. Most of their views about history of Argentina, and specially the portrayal of Rosas, started to be hold in doubt by historians like Pepe Rosa or Scalabrini Ortiz during the 1940 decade, when Rosas was portrayed the opposite way. Modern historians like Felix Luna, Felipe Pigna or Pacho O'Donnell stay apart from both of styles, the once mainstream history and the revisionist interpretation of it, and refuse to make such categoric definitions.
User Justin A Kuntz rejects any mention to this, by pointing british authors. As it seems that the rejection of the original historiography hasn't arrived to England yet, he states that such is the "mainstream" view of the topic, and that the authors that reject it are just a minority viewpoint or a fringe or conspiracy theory. However, even if the viewpoint happens to be mainstream among the few english-speaking historians that worked with the history of Argentina, it wouldn't be a good idea to disregard sources that, even if written on another languaje, come from places where the topic at hand has been more deeply studied, checked and analyzed (wich in the case of history of Argentina means historians from Argentina). Wikipedia is written from an international point of view, and a local consensus on a subject shouldn't override a lack of it on a bigger scale.
Some books were Rosas is either portrayed as a heroe, or not portrayed as a dictator on an explicit manner (such as "he did wrong things but we won't call him a dictator", rather than simply a lack of the use of the word)
and so on.
The user is not willing to pay attention to the explanations given to him. He reverted my comments to him here and here. Afterwards, he added a template on his user talk page here, where he says "The more advanced at the game of righting great wrongs have enough grasp to read policy and decide that sourcing makes their edits bulletproof. Wrong again. Sources have to be reliable, so the conspiracy website or the book by a crank doesn't mean your edit is sacrosanct." Given the context, it seems clear that such mention was directed to me, and that the "conspiracy website" or "book by a crank" to the sources I had given to him. Here he declared his intentions to resist the proposed changes. here, after a long explanation by me, he did not reply to none of the points I made and instead try to refute the Clarin newspaper (wich was not provided as a source on the topic, but as a source that describes the debate itself as a legitimate scholar debate) as a reliable source by considering it a "tabloid", exploiting the confusion that may rise from the many meanings of the word (Clarin is indeed printed on a tabloid format, a size and shape of newspapers; but the negative implications of the word can't be applied to Clarin, and certainly not just with a google test). Here he does accept that he's working with english writers and acknowledge the existence of the dispute in Argentina, but cites NPOV as a reason not to mention it. Finally, here he takes the critic on relying solely on british authors as an acusing of bias and a personal attack (even when he didn't mind accusing me of editing with a personal agenda here), and refuses to go on with the talking.
As trying to solve this by explaining things to him has failed, I request external intervention. I am well aware on the policies of minority viewpoints and fringe theories, but I'm also well interested in history and historiography of Argentina. I know for sure that revisionism does not fall in such category of viewpoints, and I can provide any reference that helps to check such a thing that you may request me. MBelgrano ( talk) 15:35, 30 September 2009 (UTC)
There is an RfC about whether or not Pinochet should be listed under the fascism infobox. Plenty of sources link this dead dictator with fascist ideology but I suspect there has been some canvassing going on. Truly neutral opinions would be welcome. Simonm223 ( talk) 14:10, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
An RfC has been started at Talk:1421: The Year China Discovered the World#RfC: Article neutrality regarding the neutrality of this article. I feel the article is unbalanced and non-neutral, focusing purely on criticism and discrediting the author, with no inclusion (nor attempted inclusion) of positive reviews and contradicting opinions. Two other editors, who have stated they agree with the criticism, disagree. Views from those well versed in NPOV may prove useful.-- Collectonian ( talk · contribs) 17:13, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
Article background: This article is about a self-immolation incident in Beijing, which was used by the Chinese government to defame Falun Gong. The event itself is a blur because only the Chinese approved media could research and report on it inside China. So there are several opinions regarding what happened actually, this varies from the fact that the immolators were Falun Gong practitioners as the Chinese media stated, to the fact that this event was completely orchestrated by the communist government in order to justify its persecution (torture, labor camps, etc. etc..).
Situation: I think the article would fail NPOV, if the opinion of Karen Parker the chief delegate of an organization that is accredited with the United Nations, would not be included in the lead more exactly see here. This addition was resisted by some editors, and I did make some changes to it [94] [95] [96] [97] in order to comply, but whatever I did this information is not allowed to be added. See Talk:Tiananmen_Square_self-immolation_incident#This_event_was_staged_by_the_Chinese_government.
My perception: I think that without this addition a significant view will not be presented fairly.
Question: What do you think?
Thank you! -- HappyInGeneral ( talk) 16:36, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
I think that it would be wrong to have no reference to what Karen Parker says at all. It shouldn't be too long, but she spoke before a UN committee and offers an interesting view of what happened. Provided there isn't too much weight placed on it, what's wrong with it? John Smith's ( talk) 20:27, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
Looking at the article, it seems to be neutral enough. I understand the problem is regarding a human rights attorney's report on the matter? Well, I agree that she is a reliable enough source to merit possible inclusion in the article. But consider: too many viewpoints make an article seem like it's dissociative. In this case, I believe Parker, and just her, merits inclusion in the article. It would be too much, though, to include any more. Incidentally, the lead section needs a small rewording where it says "and some third-party commentators" to avoid WP:WEASEL. Sceptre ( talk) 22:18, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
The lede should not contain anything that is not elaborated in the body; it should be a fair summary of the article. Therefore, the question about whether it should go in the lede is a moot point; if the info on Parker was in the body, then of course it should be adequately summarized in the lede.
Now, as to how much should be said about Parker in the body, well, that depends on keeping a balanced view. I would imagine that Parkers statement may warrant a very brief mention in the article, but bear in mind that there are certainly lots of other prominent people who could also be quoted; without care, the article could descend into a 'quote-fest'. Per WP:TIGER, these arguments need careful presentation to maintain neutrality. Chzz ► 00:12, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
Per what the source stated:
KAREN PARKER, of International Educational Development, said State terrorism in the form of Government terror against its own people produced far more gross violations of human rights than any other form of terrorism; an example was China's treatment of the Falun Gong. The Government had sought to justify its terrorism against Falun Gong by calling it an evil cult that had caused deaths and the break-up of families, but the organization's investigation showed that the only deaths and resulting family breakups had been at the hands of Chinese authorities, who had resorted to extreme torture and unacceptable detention of thousands of people. International Educational Development had discovered that a self-immolation cited by the Chinese Government as proof that the Falun Gong was an evil cult in fact had been staged. The international community and the Subcommission should urgently address this situation..
What HappyInGeneral tries to add:
Karen Parker the chief delegate of an organization that is accredited with the United Nations [1] was quoted in a press release issued by the United Nations on 14 August 2001 saying that this was a clear expression of state terrorism, and that the event was staged to justify the extreme torture and the unacceptable detention of thousands of people. [2]
A simple rhetoric, claiming that they "discovered" that the incident was staged, with no references or evidence whatsoever. Furthermore the "state terrorism" claim was about China's treatment of FLG, not the Tiananman Square self immolation incident, which HappyInGeneral tried to synthesis. Parker is a lawyer, whose job is to take a client's POV and argue for them. There is little information on Parker's studies or academic credentials, and should not be placed an undue weight.
Furthermore, HappyInGeneral is a dedicated FLG activist, as his user page describes, and is the only one trying to add the material on the Tiananman Square self immolation, despite the fact that nearly every other user was against him. This source should not be used to push a pro-FLG POV and advocate the view that the self immolation incident was staged, as HappyInGeneral is trying to do.-- PCPP ( talk) 01:07, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
The lead doesn't accurately reflect the contents of the article. The article explores the incident and portrays the confusion and lack of evidence as to what really happened, and that there is a dispute between the Chinese government and Falun Gong as to the way the incident has been portrayed in the Chinese media. The lead should neutrally cover the confusion and lack of evidence, and that there is a dispute about the way the Chinese media has handled the incident. But it's inappropriate to target the Chinese government with the claims that have been made, as though these claims are fact, and to use the emotive language of the second paragraph - "Capitalizing on the incident" is not neutral, "created a plethora of printed materials" is not neutral "repeatedly broadcast" is not neutral, "vivid images" is POV and original research unless some reliable source can be found to support the word "vivid", and even then it's a very questionable use of language in this context in an encyclopedia, etc. I feel a little bombarded, and that I have to accept the version of events as presented to me, rather than allowing to me to make my own decision by presenting to me the facts. SilkTork * YES! 02:59, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
This is a very useful discussion to be having, as the article is currently being nominated for WP:FAC. I have been concerned about the article's neutrality for some time, it is a rather delicate balancing act here. I would thank VsevolodKrolikov and others' advice on how to neutralise the article, and I will edit the article accordingly. I agree that it is a very notable topic, and important historical marker in the battle of the Chinese state against a quasi-religious group. Vsevolod rightly mentions that the link between falun gong and the immolations is not presented very cleanly- this is certainly to a conscious effort on the part of Falun Gong editors and a subliminal effort on my part to capture the element of doubt about the true facts behind this event.
Happy and I have been disagreeing about the text to be inserted which I felt that it was done in complete violation of WP:LEAD, WP:SYN WP:NPOV and WP:RS. John Carter and PCPP have elaborated on these issues. Happy and I disagree over the cite in the lead, which was echoed by an editor reviewing for the FAC. What's more, I specifically disagree with the fashion how (pls refer to his four diffs above) Happy has attempted to insert the material. The text synthetised the assertion that Parker referred to the incident as "state terrorism". Note insertion two was blatant misattribution. The press release itself is a primary source which should not be used, particularly as it was not clear Parker was notable, or that hers was a "significant view" not already covered by others' - in fact, because of the perfunctory opinion [in the press statement], it is not detailed exactly what this view is. However, the summary position seems to mirror the Falun Gong view. Therefore, it could eventually be grouped together with FG if there is consensus that Parker's opinion warrants inclusion in some manner. Ohconfucius ( talk) 03:54, 29 September 2009 (UTC)
I much appreciate the constructive criticism received in connection with this article, and have now made a number of changes to the article which hopefully addresses the concerns expressed here. Please let me know if they are still not yet addressed. In the interests of keeping all FAC related discussions in one place, I would ask interested editors to kindly list in bullet point any remaining concerns about the article at the nominations page, so that they may be dealt with, and for the evaluation/nomination to proceed. Ohconfucius ( talk) 13:41, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
This article really cries out for some participation by utterly uninvolved (as in "I don't give a f---- about the Gaza war") editors who are interested only in applying Wiki policy and creating a neutral article. There's some excellent stuff in this article, and overall it is informative, but it's a powder keg and the talk page is like the Second Battle of the Marne. I realize most smart editors avoid articles like this, but I thought I'd give it a try just once. -- JohnnyB256 ( talk) 16:55, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
My edit is the paragraph at the top. The rest is the original article which ignores my relevant information of how the John Birch Society is and was percieved in popular culture. The position of a redical political group in society and how that group is percieved by the public is important and relevant. This group was known for intimidating people and stifeling voter participation. The original article ignores that and glosses over the very famous opposition to civil rights reform. The John Birch Society reached it's hight of notoriety during and soon after the civil rights struggle as a voice for segregation and against voting rights reform. Any unbiased article needs to ackowlage this history and the groups place in popular culture. The original article reads as promotional material for this extremist group.
Massive and completely unnecessary dump of what is obviously Waterunderground's preferred version of the article removed. If you want to see that version, use the article's edit history in the normal way. Uncle G ( talk) 21:31, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
—Preceding unsigned comment added by Waterunderground ( talk • contribs) 15:17, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
Contributors representing Foswiki, an article deleted through AFD several times, are consistently disrupting the discussion process on the TWiki article. The simplest explanation of the dispute is that proponents of an open source fork of TWiki have been aggressively promoting their product after a dispute over ownership with TWiki's founders. Myself and another editor were just reaching a working consensus when an IP jumped in again. I think what they're doing amounts to spam, but mediation from anyone not previously involved would be most welcome. Steven Walling 00:31, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
A question has been raised that the page is not neutral. As an example of this "Historically the BNP (including Nick Griffin)" why is Mr Griffin mentioned this page is not about him? that seems to me a bit biased. Do any other politcal party pages also note that the leader of the party supports its views? Slatersteven ( talk) 13:45, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
We now have this [ [98]]. Ther is no denile in the text as thye edit claims. Ans (as I poined out here [ [99]] the re-inserted link does not work. So editors are not even boptherting to check that a source is valid before reverting. Slatersteven ( talk) 14:24, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Of course it should be in the info box, and we have plenty of WP:RS for that. Verbal chat 16:41, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
There is a POV dispute in relation to the lede in this article and I therefore added the POV intro tag. One of the parties to the dispute, however, removed the tag with an edit summary saying "rv POV crap. This article is all referenced and sourced. The only POV is the warriors on the talk page". I don't want to start an edit war over the tag, but at the same time I don't think it is appropriate for it to have been removed before resolution. I was advised by an Admin to come here for advice. Mooretwin ( talk) 15:38, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
{undent} I rather think the problem lies in the inability of editors on either side of the conflict to compromise. The lede, as it stands, could be improved. It should be clarified that the assertion the victims were informers is an opinion of an historian and not an iron clad fact. Hart does not appear to meet the criteria for WP:RS considering his rather revisionist bent and errors in research method. Simonm223 ( talk) 22:02, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
The article on the film Super Size Me is not written from a neutral point of view. For example, here are the first couple of sentences from the article:
This film is one of the best documenteries i have ever watched! It gives you the full facts and details needed to know about the poisins and chemicals in the fast foods we eat...Super Size Me is a 2004 American documentary film directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, an American independent filmmaker.
I'm flagging the article for revision. I have not seen the film myself, so I cannot rewrite the entry, but someone should if at all possible. Thorswitch ( talk) 18:16, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
A header has been placed on the AC Propulsion eBox article, suggesting that it is written like an advertisement. While the article is not perfect, I do not think this header is justified. Since the tag was posted, I have added some references and fixed another. I have tried to clean up the article a bit. Please help me by weighing in as to whether you think the header is justified and, if you do, what changes you think could be made to eliminate the need for such a header. Of course, any edits to the article which would help would be enormously appreciated. I have no professional affiliation with this product or company. Thanks! Fbagatelleblack ( talk) 22:06, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
I am bringing this here because User:TheFix63 has made several edits that violate WP:NPOV. First, he kept adding the phrase "The Lakers are considered to be among the signature franchises of the NBA" to the lead even though I have told him that our policy prohibits the insertion of opinions. But he ignored, claiming that he is "confirming the existence of a major opinion." [100] Also, he removed a sourced statement on Larry Bird and replaced with an uncited statement contrary to the advice on WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV. [101] I asked him not to do that but he kept on making the same edit.— Chris! c/ t 02:02, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
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