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Discussion

Several references have been deleted by one editor, it would be great if they could carefully consider what they've deleted and explain why they've done it. --Johnnyturk888 (talk) 10:19, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

For ease of discussion, I thought it might be useful if we can list concerns about the article under each heading and move on from there. --Johnnyturk888 (talk) 10:29, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Education

Liberal party involvement

Leaving the Liberal Party

Blogger and author

Question about SBS transcript

The Australian Parliament Library database has stored a transcript of an Insight programme, in which Irfan Yusuf was interviewed as part of a discussion about religion. It has some interesting stuff about his views on sharia etc. Its pretty well summarised in the article so am wondering whether it should be included, in whole or in part. --Johnnyturk888 (talk) 03:41, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

JENNY BROCKIE: Irfan, you're an Australian Muslim, you began your education in Australia and then you attended a madrassa in Pakistan. There were a lot of twists and turns in your education after that - tell us a little bit about those twists and turns.

IRFAN YUSUF: After being in a primary school in Pakistan during school hours and then madrassa before and after school, I ended up at Princeton (the town). And after spending time at a madrassa where I was surrounded by boys with skull caps it was natural when I got to Princeton that I would gravitate toward another set of boys who also had skull caps and who also didn't eat pork at home and what have you.

JENNY BROCKIE: So you liked the Jewish boys?

IRFAN YUSUF: Oh, absolutely, yeah, and then I got back to Australia and went to Ryde East Primary School in the heart of John Howard - of what used to be John Howard's electorate and ended up at St Andrew's, where in Year 10 I was - we were taught or we were actually shown videos of a chap named Frances Schaffer.

JENNY BROCKIE: Now this is an Anglican school?

IRFAN YUSUF: Now this is an Anglican mainstream established Anglican school where we were shown videos of Frances Schaffer as regarded as the ideological founder of the moral majority and the festival of light.

JENNY BROCKIE: What did that mean in terms of your views then in exploring theocratic Islam, where did you end up? What did you end up thinking and believing?

IRFAN YUSUF: I guess what I really believed in was that you know, you had to have God in government. I mean, Frances Schaffer was very strong about the idea that, you know, that the Enlightenment was, you know, wasn't really a good idea - the French revolution, you know, was basically all about chopping heads that...

JENNY BROCKIE: So you ended up believing in sharia law or believing in an Islamic State?

IRFAN YUSUF: Well, I guess what I believed in was that you had to have God had to be in government in some way.

JENNY BROCKIE: So you were believing in an Islamic state, though, in the idea of an Islamic state?

IRFAN YUSUF: I guess, yeah, that's - I explored - that was part of my exploration.

JENNY BROCKIE: I'm interested in talking about this, because, as you know, there's been fierce community opposition to the establishment of some Islamic schools here in Australia for fear of radicalisation. Can you understand that concern?

IRFAN YUSUF: Not really, because from what I've seen, I mean, I've acted for them, I've seen the way they manage their industrial relations issues and what have you, and from what I've seen is that they really go tend to go, I think, almost go overboard in separating religious studies from the rest of the curriculum.

Concerns over major revisions

Here is the diff that shows the two version I'm talking about .

1) The intro paragraph said he is a "solicitor , social commentator and author". The new intro gets very specific about what type of lawyer and says he "is the author of a memoir "Once Were Radicals - My years as a teenage Islamo-fascist". This seems to specific to me and leaves out his other writings. If it's appropriate to detail what type of law he practices I would prefer to do it in the body of the article.

: There was no other reference to his legal career in the rest of the article, so I thought it fit there best.

: His memoir is a published book, that will be quite notable. I know of no other significant works by him other than his blogs and a few opeds.

2)The education section got rid of "Irfan grew up in Sydney but spent periods in Karachi and Princeton, New Jersey, USA. He was educated St Andrew’s Cathedral School in Sydney,..." In favor of saying he was "raised by parents of Indian Muslim background". Didn't he grow up mostly in Australia with periods in these other places? Did he spend as much time in pakistan and the U.S. making it proper to give those locations equal weight? My understanding is that he grew up mostly in Australia, but spent some time in those places. Also, what is the significance of his parent's background? Are they Muslim? Didn't they move to Pakistan after living in India? It seems weird to select the Indian Muslim part and give that so much weight. Generally I prefer the old version.

: I think all those details of his background should be included as they currently are. I don't know what time he spent in each place, the sources don't shed light on that, that I'm aware. He is of Indian descent, even though born in Pakistan, I suspect it is something that would be normally explained in an encyclopedia article. I agree it doesn't need much weight, merely should be mentioned.

3) The details about his interest in Islamo-fascism need to be contexted. Again it's a weight and emphasis issue. My understanding is that he engaged with these ideas for a period (short?) in his life. But the wording doesn't seem to me to make this clear. How long was this period in his life? The quotes used add to the emphasis on the period of his radicalism. His rejection of those ideas or return to mainstream or AUstralian or whatever values isn't discussed at all in this section.

: It's relevant because it's his own description, including on his own memoir. I don't have sources on his rejection of those ideas but would be certainly open to include them. I can't put in there what I haven't found though.

: The article also states his views are more moderate than Sheik Hilaly, which is not really supported by anything. But I'm that's true. So I'm not sure what to do what that part.

4)Why is it better to say he was involved in Muslim Youth groups rather than to say what groups he was a part of? Again this seems like an effort to add weight to certain aspects of his life and doesn't seem appropriate to me. Why was "Yusuf served as President of the Bankstown Young Liberals and the Bankstown Liberal State Electorate Conference and was on the on NSW State Liberal Council from 1996-2000" taken out?

: They were taken out because I couldn't find a source for them. I thought that's what you'd requested in the first place.

4)As far as the rest of the article, I have the same issues. The quotations used seem to be very selective and unnecessarily (unencyclopedically) inflammatory.

: It would be better if you were more specific, I think the quotations shed light on an interesting phase in politics in the subject's life and on the controversies caused an oped he wrote, seemed perfectly relevant. Not sure in what respect they are inflammatory and all are sourced correctly. I agree it would be good to include other material to keep it appropriately weighted but I'd certainly oppose deleting useful material, I think it would be a terrible shame to junk all the work that's been done here.

5) Along those lines, why was: "Yusuf has written on various social and political issues for newspapers and websites Crikey!, New Matilda, Malaysiakini, AltMuslim, and ABC Unleashed. He has appeared on radio and TV programs in Australia, New Zealand and Indonesia. Yusuf has his own blogs where he has criticised some aspects of Australian and American foreign policy as well as local and international Muslim religious and political figures, including former Mufti of Australia, Sheik Elhilaly." and "He is the author of the memoir Once we Were Radicals and has spoken on his "search for balance within layers of identity" including growing up in Australia, interest in political Islam, Indian ancestry, Pakistani birth, Urdu language and culture and Muslim religion. Yusuf was awarded the Iremonger award by publishers Allen and Unwin for the book. He was awarded a Highly Commended for the Eureka Street/Human Rights Writing for an essay on combating violence against women in Muslim-majority states in 2008." taken out?

: They've been redrafted to included substantially the same material, the radio, TV references I think was removed, but not consciously, I suspect because far too many changes were reverted without consulting which I suppose is what we're trying to fix now. I don't really have any problem with including anything that is substantiated and relevant.

Those are my issues with the changes made. ChildofMidnight (talk) 16:49, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm in general agreement with ChildofMidnight. The article does seem to have become overly focused on certain aspects of his life and work. The result is an implication that he has a certain type of background that is relevant/influential to his work or gives him certain authority or relevance there, which is totally WP:SYN/WP:NPOV. If we're going to talk about his background and his work (which is completely appropriate for a bio page obviously), we absolutely can't cherry-pick or give undue weight if there is verifiable information available. DMacks (talk) 17:05, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

: I don't disagree, I think if there's more material to include, that would be good. His book is being released soon so I think there'll be some interest in all of this, perhaps meriting a longer article that might address the issue of proportion or not weighting material correctly.

Are there any particular areas you think we could work on in that respect. He has written a lot on his blogs about his views but I haven't got into that as I think it's possible to use his blog as a source? Certainly open to ideas and suggestions and I think it's been great to have the input in improving the article.

I'll also put the comments I made on Child's page about the article generally here for consideration as I think that deals with some of the concerns/issues too. Thanks for very much for taking the time to go through this as I'm sure it will lead to a much better article than the first version or this current one.. --Johnnyturk888 (talk) 05:15, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

After a few weeks of no response to my responses, a whole range of well-sourced material was deleted. I have reverted the changes which were made without any attempt to include the material, relating to the publication of his book and other matters. I'm not sure why this approach was taken but I think it's unfortunate. A more constructive approach might be to rewrite the article without deleting a great deal of well-sourced information. I've done my best and will be happy to contribute to a re-write if someone intitiates one. But deleting most of the article, reverting to a much older version (that is out of date and much less interesting and with less reliable sourcing) seems to be a backward move to me. --Johnnyturk888 (talk) 07:21, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Having reflected on the changes made, it seems even worse than a backward step to delete the picture his recent book cover and a substantial body of work on the subject of the article. Please do not revert without further discussion here, it isn't good practice. --Johnnyturk888 (talk) 07:33, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

You haven't addressed the concerns raised about your version of the article. You are welcome to seek a broader consensus if you're not happy with the outcome of this discussion. It's possible that other editors will determine your unencyclopedic version that gives undue weight a variety of provocative assertions is proper. I've discussed this with you here and on my talk page and I think on your talk page before that. I udnerstand you disagree with my conclusions, but there is no one so far who agrees with your arguments. ChildofMidnight (talk) 17:08, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

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