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Psychoanalysis and the pseudoscience category

We have an Arbcom decision that has already decided this matter, so this thread needs to be closed. If you question that, then discuss it in the appropriate section below. -- Brangifer (talk) 00:04, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

There is an issue as to whether putting psychoanalysis in the pseudoscience category would be an issue of NPOV. As far as I can tell, if reliable sources criticize an article for being pseudoscience it should be listed. CartoonDiablo (talk) 09:17, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

CartoonDiablo is currently refusing to respect WP:BRD on this and has not used the talk page to make a case. He has not listed reliable sources to support his view. In any disputed issue we have to look to the balance of what the sources say, and in any event editors should respect the use of the talk page. Not the first time we have seen this combative and game playing attitude from this editor ----Snowded 09:25, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

This discussion is not about user behavior (for which I did go to talk (diff) and did add another RS (diff)) and so far as I can tell BRD favors my position at this point. But the point is even if a single reliable source accuses it of pseudoscience it should go into the category. CartoonDiablo (talk) 09:36, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

I've never seen that "single reliable source" rule before and in many another discussion a balance is required. Your diff is just a statement that you are right, you are not engaging on talk and you are edit warring so it may become a behaviour issue. However lets see if other editors agree with the "single source" idea. If so there are going to be a lot of other articles to be changed :-) ----Snowded 09:40, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

There is obviously more than one RS saying that in the article but regardless I don't see it bringing about a large change. Very few science related topics have RSs accusing it of being a pseudoscience at all which is what makes it significant. CartoonDiablo (talk) 09:51, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Then show them on the talk page. We should note that the advocates of CBT (and you have been one) take this particular line about psychoanalysis and its not without controversy. ----Snowded 09:54, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

I took a stroll through Category:Pseudoscience, and what I notice is that literally every article I saw is on a subject that is widely recognized as pseudoscience. For the purpose of consistency with how the category is used, it seems that a small if significant accusation that psychoanalysis is pseudoscience should not necessarily place it in that category. To quote from the category itself, "This category comprises highly notable topics that are generally considered pseudoscientific by the scientific community (such as astrology) and topics that, while perhaps notable, have very few followers and are obviously pseudoscientific (such as the modern belief in a flat Earth). The pejorative term itself is contested by various groups for various reasons." Again, I don't think psychoanalysis fits the bill here. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:59, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

I'll list the overwhelming sources later but even a few seem to fit the bill. Compare the Evolution and intelligent design articles, in the former there are none while in ID there's only a few sources and it seems to be that way for all the articles. CartoonDiablo (talk) 10:05, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

It's not the number of sources that matters, but the prominence of that viewpoint in the scientific community. You only need a few for ID because literally zero mainstream publications think ID is actual science. For psychoanalysis, on the other hand, there is an entire body of mainstream science that treats it as something real. So it's not a matter of showing that you have any number of sources that psychoanalysis is pseudoscience. You need to show it's the major viewpoint. Someguy1221 (talk) 10:12, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

According to Science (the journal) it's on the fringes of modern psychology; according to the mainstream sources, it's not a part of mainstream science. In fact, Nature points out that all of "Clinical psychology ... is drifting away from science". IRWolfie- (talk) 11:12, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

My statement is here. I think this category is highly POV. Not only in this article. It displays a narrow unterstanding of philosophy of science. CartoonDiablo is a user I can't take seriously anymore. He fights the psychoanalysis by using dreadful arguments and reveals a minor understanding of scientiffic fields and the wikipedia. I think, he should banned for this an other POV-wars. --WSC 10:26, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Claiming psychoanalysis is science is rather dubious. The sources I've shown show how it is treated by the most reliable scientific journals; with apparent disdain, IRWolfie- (talk) 11:15, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Even if something is treated with disdain, that does not mean it is pseudoscience. Because this is a perjorative word, don't we need a clearly expressed scientific consensus that it is pseudoscience to describe it as such as per WP:LABEL? Otherwise, we use neutral, unloaded language. Also, whilst you mentioned a source, you didn't link to anything we could verify. WykiP (talk) 12:08, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

We have an Arbcom decision that has already decided this matter, so this thread needs to be closed. If you question that, then discuss it in the appropriate section below. -- Brangifer (talk) 00:04, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Scientific consensus on psychoanalysis as Pseudoscience

Scientific sources that considered the field pseudoscience:

• Karl Popper (based on secondary analysis of his views) (1990)
• Steven Pinker (1997) How The Mind Works
• Kevin B. MacDonald (1996) Psychoanalysis as religion, cult, and political movement
• Noam Chomsky (2003) Interview
• Stephen Jay Gould (1981) The Mismeasure of Man
• John F. Kihlstrom (1999) Is Freud Still Alive? No, Not Really
• Robert F. Bornstein (American Psychological Association) (2005) - "The Dependent Patient: Diagnosis, Assessment, and Treatment"
• Hans Eysenck (1985) Decline and Fall of the Freudian Empire

Scientific sources that considered Freudian theory pseudoscience but that it was useful in appropriating concepts for modern usage.

• Drew Western (1998) "The Scientific Legacy of Sigmund Freud: Toward a Psychodynamically Informed Psychological Science"
• Jason and Greenberg (1996) "Freud scientifically reappraised: Testing the theories and therapy"

CartoonDiablo (talk) 19:23, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

CartoonDiablo, I had a lot of patients with you but your distortion of facts is unbareble. I don't deny that psychoanalysis is called pseudoscience by considerable sources. I criticize the use of a catagory inside of wikipedia. Do you understand the difference? --WSC 19:36, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

That would be a question of the category, not the article. The category can be nominated for deletion but it should not be prevented from being used because you disagree with it especially when you agree that considerable sources call it as such. CartoonDiablo (talk) 19:40, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Even this point is unclear! Grünbaum deny the pseudoscientific status of psychoanalysis. He described also the falsifiability of it. Do you now want do deciede who's right? Popper or Grünbaum? But wait! You want! Right? --WSC 19:50, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

And several of those sources are polemical in nature - Pinker is subject to multiple attacks as is Chomsky from Cognitive Science and elsewhere. Its reviews of the field that would need, not protagonists. Academic anyway no editorial support for CD so we might as well close ----Snowded 20:14, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

They are reliable sources for science. The one essay was even reprinted in the The Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience, this is beyond clear. CartoonDiablo (talk) 20:21, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Sorry Snowded, he got us! Theres a "Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience" edited by Dr William F. Williams as article in Misplaced Pages. Let's pack up and go home. This argumentation is so cleare I can't find any arguments anymore. Thats it! He pulped us. --WSC 20:28, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Ah well, given normal cycles CBT will end up there soon enough and then we can see if there is a consistent position ----Snowded 20:44, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

First I'd like an apology for WSC's derisive comment, second it's even in the List of topics characterized as pseudoscience. CartoonDiablo (talk) 21:09, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Review of some of the authors/citations above:

• Popper: "based on secondary analysis of his views". Does that mean "an opinion" of what was in Popper's mind (view)?
• Chomsky does not use 'pseudoscience' in interview.
• Gould does not use the word pseudoscience or psychoanalysis in Mismeasure.
• Pinker uses "pseudoscience" only once in * reference to "orbs, luminous vapors, auras..." and never uses the word psychoanalysis in the text.
• Kihlstrom's does not use pseudoscience in article.
• Bornstein does not use the word.
• Western doesn't use the word.

Can we suggest then there is any "consensus"? This is an example where citations are not being scrutinized enough on Misplaced Pages leading to OR, POV, WP:DUE. Why would the list be offered when the word is not being used? Eturk001 (talk) 19:41, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

We have an Arbcom decision that has already decided this matter, so this thread needs to be closed. If you question that, then discuss it in the appropriate section below. -- Brangifer (talk) 00:04, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

No, we haven't a arbcom decision. What's your next argument? --WSC 12:47, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

What part of my instructions do you not understand? Discuss it in the appropriate section below. The Arbcom does NOT use psychoanalysis as an example of pseudoscience, but as "questionable science." Ergo, they state clearly that it must not be placed in Category:Pseudoscience, yet may contain content about the issue. Now go below and discuss it there. -- Brangifer(talk) 07:01, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Thusdays I don't follow any instrucitons. Thusdays I always think for myself. As you can read below, the Arbcom doesn't decide anything. And if they do, it has no consequence for our discussion here. Sorry, but you have to conceive new arguments. It would be nice and easy to use the Arbcom as excuse for having no arguments on this discussion. But it failed. Now it's on you to justify the catagory. Or try it again at the weekend. --WSC 07:12, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

I suspect you mean "Tuesday," but whatever the case may be, a collaborative approach would suit you well. I'm on your side on this one, and so is the Arbcom decision. That's my point: The category must not be applied to psychoanalysis. As far as whether an Arbcom decision still applies, yes, it trumps our opinions until a new Arbcom decision overrides it. Any attempt to override it would result in a new Arbcom proceeding, but the more likely outcome to avoid such a disruptive process would be to block or ban anyone so foolish as to think they are wiser than Arbcom. Even without the discretionary sanctions created for alternative medicine/fringe/pseudoscience issues, that could happen, but the discretionary sanctions give individual sysops/admins the right to do it on the spot, without (lengthy) due process (other than a warning), to anyone who appears to be disruptive, and your IDHT campaign places you near the top of the list for such action. You need to drop the stick and walk away. Find something more useful to do here, because you aren't getting anywhere. -- Brangifer (talk) 15:41, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

1. I ment tuesday! 2. Do you think, when a user gives another a instrution to discuss what he wants is some kind of collaborative approach? 3. The Arbcom ain't god! If some wikipedians belief such a institution are able to decide contentual questions, they shoud ask themself if they really understand what we are doing here. We had such a case in de.wikipedia. The german Arbcom (de:Misplaced Pages:Schiedsgericht) decides a name of a Lemma (morphology). It was de:Beschneidung weiblicher Genitalien. Last year the hell broke loos when some competent users (including me) gain attention. Now the Lemma is de:Weibliche Genitalverstümmelung. The Arbcom is a usefull instance to resolve conflicts betwenn users. But the Arbcom is overrated if they have to resolve contentual issues. 4. Is that a threat? Do you threaten me? Is this your understanding of collaborative work? I've made the experience, that some Admins are not only bloodthirsty zombies. Some of them are able to estimate such a case and notice whose arguments are based on scientific sources and whose are only a mishmash of misunderstood[REDACTED] policies and sophistry. I have faith in the admins of en.wikipedia... and a prayer on my lips. --WSC 17:46, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Detailed analysis

Just so you all know where I am coming from: My personal opinion on psychoanalysis is that it is clearly a pseudoscience, though for historical and sociological reasons it is not generally recognised as such. At this point it is not clear what will happen. There are some encouraging signs that it might mature into a proper science, but it is certainly possible that it will be generally seen as a pseudoscience before that happens.

But here is my analysis as to the pseudoscience category and the psychoanalysis article:

• Pseudoscience is relevant to psychoanalysis, as there is mainstream criticism of psychoanalysis making the connection, and even some of the criticism coming out of psychoanalsysis itself just stops short of using the word. (I am thinking of de:Martin Altmeyer.)
• Conversely, though not particularly important for the present question, psychoanalysis is relevant to pseudoscience as one of the original theories that Popper tried to distinguish from proper science when he coined the term, and one of the standard test cases for the various precise definitions of pseudoscience. (Each time someone comes up with a new definition, people immediately write about the question: Where does it put psychoanalysis?)
• Psychoanalysis is listed under List of topics characterized as pseudoscience, and ever since that article was renamed from its original title "List of pseudosciences", there has been little controversy about that.
• Psychoanalysis#Criticism cites Popper and Cioffi:

• "Karl Popper argued that psychoanalysis is a pseudoscience because its claims are not testable and cannot be refuted; that is, they are not falsifiable."
• "Frank Cioffi, author of Freud and the Question of Pseudoscience, cites false claims of a sound scientific verification of the theory and its elements as the strongest basis for classifying the work of Freud and his school as pseudoscience."

• Psychoanalysis is mentioned as an example of pseudoscience given by Popper, in Pseudoscience#Falsifiability.
• From WP:Categories#Articles: "Categorizations appear on article pages without annotations or referencing to justify or explain their addition; editors should be conscious of the need to maintain a neutral point of view when creating categories or adding them to articles. Categorizations should generally be uncontroversial; if the category's topic is likely to spark controversy, then a list article (which can be annotated and referenced) is probably more appropriate.
  A central concept used in categorising articles is that of the defining characteristics of a subject of the article. A defining characteristic is one that reliable sources commonly and consistently define the subject as having—such as nationality or notable profession "
• From WP:NPOV#Due and undue weight: "Misplaced Pages aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation in reliable sources on the subject. This applies not only to article text, but to categories as well."
• From WP:NPOV#Attributing and specifying biased statements: "Biased statements of opinion can be presented only with attribution. Another approach is to specify or substantiate the statement, by giving those details that actually are factual." I wouldn't call the statement that psychoanalysis is a pseudoscience biased, but the principle is generally applied to statements that are not uncontroversial in the most appropriate mainstream sources. That's clearly the case here. Attribution is essentially impossible with a categorisation. Specification or substantiation could theoretically be done via an appropriate subcategory such as "unfalsifiable theories". Neither seems to be a reasonable option here, so the categorisation is not possible. (This interpretation of WP:NPOV is in line with the quotation above from WP:Categories.)
• WP:NPOV#Fringe theories and pseudoscience refers to WP:FRINGE#Pseudoscience and other fringe theories for detailed guidance. It roughly classifies questionable theories as follows: 1. Obvious pseudoscience, 2. Generally considered pseudoscience, 3. Questionable science, 4. Alternative theoretical formulations.
  Topics of types 1 and 2 can be put into Category:Pseudoscience. ("1. may be so labeled and categorized as such without more justification." "2. may properly contain that information and may be categorized as pseudoscience.") Topics of types 3 and 4 can not be put into the category. ("3. should not be described as unambiguously pseudoscientific while a reasonable amount of academic debate still exists on this point.")
  This classification dates back to an old Arbcom decision (2006) which was also explicit that psychoanalysis falls under type 3 and was a bit more explicit than the present text that type 3 topics can't be put into the category: "Questionable science: Theories which have a substantial following, such as psychoanalysis, but which some critics allege to be pseudoscience, may contain information to that effect, but generally should not be so characterized." See WP:ARBPS#Questionable science. This case is dated but still highly relevant: What (not) to put into the pseudoscience category was one of the key questions.

Conclusion: Though the criticism of psychoanalysis as a pseudoscience is highly notable and relevant, according to long-standing principles which were developed with an eye to this special case, this is not sufficient to put its article into the pseudoscience category. Hans Adler 12:31, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Sorry I've read through List_of_topics_characterized_as_pseudoscience#Psychology this list. And I'm horrified. The Attachment Theory in Psychology is called pseudoscience (it's Attachement Therapy). The source are stage magician and other sources are websites as . This is pure POV and no serious basis for discussion. I put a POV-box in this naive "List" and hope, no one will read this nonsens ever.

Futher it's true that Popper called psychoanalysis a pseudoscience. It is one of his examples of pseudoscience and falsifiability. But Adolf Grünbaum, another main character of critical rationalism and the main critic of psychoanalysis, described, that psychoanalysis is very well falsifiable. But that is not the point. The point is, that these category is nonsense. Other philosophical schools, as positivism or analytical philosophy also use terms like pseudoscience with other requirements. So pseudoscience arn't well defined. Futher pseudoscience just testify that some schools of philosophy would call a discipline a pseudoscience. Not all of them. Other philosophers, like Theodor Adorno grouded there theories on psychoanalysis, for example. Futher you always need a well established source to call a discipline a pseudoscience. Let's have a look at the category:pseudoscience and pick a example. Theres Attachment Therapy in it and it is explict called pseudoscience in the article. I don't think, that Attachement Therapy is a good therapy, but to call it pseudosciens you need more than a textbook from other psychologist like the article does. They use the term pseudoscience very naive and don't go back to the philosophical roots of this theory. In other cases like E-rays no serious scientist or philosopher ever gives himself the trouble to estimate that theory. Maybe some sceptics? E-ray arn't pseudoscience e-rays are pure nonsense. Wikipedians estimated it as pseudoscience. Thats WP:OR. And the category is full of such OR. --WSC 15:54, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

The list certainly has problems. Not the least of them – and it has this in common with the pseudoscience category – is that its motivation and to some extent actual use (branding topics as pseudoscience) differs significantly from the justification for its existence (encyclopedic information about the pseudoscience debate, a legitimate philosophical topic). There is quite a bit of POV pushing going on there, both to include topics that don't really belong there or paint them more negatively than appropriate (currently this problem seems to exist with hypnosis and probably also hypnotherapy), and to exclude topics that clearly belong on the list.

I basically agree with your concerns about sourcing claims about relatively notable topics to non-scholarly anti-pseudoscience/anti-fringe activists. For little discussed topics this is sometimes unavoidable, and so it is general practice to use such activist sources when most editors basically agree that the activists are right. However, some editors take this as a licence to use such weak sources to criticise highly notable topics that are not so criticised by the scholarly mainstream, or if they have been, in preference to better sources. That's a problem.

Your example, attachment therapy: That field clearly has serious problems of an ethical nature. E.g., the interpretation of attachment therapy by a group of German therapists apparently amounted to serious physical abuse of autistic children. I don't know enough about the field to say that it's definitely not a pseudoscience, but (1) such ethical issues are orthogonal to a characterisation of the field as pseudoscience, yet professionaly anti-fringers tend to use pseudoscience as a generalised accusation against everything that is somehow questionable, and (2) it takes proper scholarship to determine whether the problems pertain to the field or only to some of its proponents/practicians. Therefore I agree that the sourcing for this entry is too weak.

Regarding psychoanalysis as a pseudoscience, and also your general comment that we should not have such a list because pseudoscience does not have a generally agreed, perfect, objectively verifiable definition: The last point is clearly an example of the continuum fallacy. And as to unfalsifiability of psychoanalysis, that's not something that we can consider objectively wrong and the accusation is highly notable. Therefore we can and should report the accusation, regardless of whether others contradicted this (which we could also report, though). And IMO psychoanalysis, in spite of some claims that are falsifiable in principle, has severe tendencies of improper immunisation against falsification. What is more, Grünbaum's book "Is Psychoanalysis a Pseudo-Science?" is part of a fruitful philosophical debate on whether psychoanalysis is to be characterised as a pseudoscience. That's more than enough to satisfy the inclusion standards of a list of topics that have been notably so characterised. And as a result of that debate, we now have more refined definitions of pseudoscience, some of which do cover psychoanalysis. Hans Adler 19:57, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

You said it! Pseudoscience is a combat term. And I don't want to defend Attachment Therapy as method. But that doesn't justify the catagory. As I try to describe CartoonDiablo above, the status of Psychoanalysis isn't cleare. Even in critical rationalism. Grünbaum is a important representative of it but also disagree with Popper (and nevertheless not gentle with psychoanalysis). Such issues arn't solvable by using categories. It's not a benifit to esthablish catagories which are not able to give an overview in a debate but distort a issue. Thats why the catagory isn't usefull. --WSC 20:15, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

The category makes sense for topics such as Time Cube or crystal healing. There is a well established demarcation line between what goes in and what doesn't: cold fusion clearly doesn't belong, homeopathy barely belongs, and psychoanalysis doesn't. Pseudoscience being a fighting word, the category is asking for trouble. But on Misplaced Pages that's rarely considered sufficient reason to suppress an article or category. Hans Adler 20:57, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

No it doesen't make sence anyway. Crystal healing for example, is an esoteric issue. Not a scientific. Futher theres still no clear definition of pseudoscience. Sociologist makes research about such esoteric teachings. Do they estimate esoteric as pseudoscience? Thats just superficial and a denial of reality. The term pseudoscience is unsuitable as catagory. --WSC 21:07, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree that crystal healing is more esoteric than pseudoscientific, but it is really both. A better example might have been bioresonance therapy, a prototypical pseudoscience. Hans Adler 21:41, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

When all is said and done -- nothing that is not "empirically provable" is "science." Religion is "not science". Numerology is "not science". Economics is "not science." Philosophy is "not science" and virtually anything to do with how or why people act as they do is "not science." Labelling any such as "pseudo-science" is, moreover, of no real value to anyone. Why not restrict the term and label to such things as someone might reasonably expect to be "hard science" which is empirically disproven as being of value? Thus stopping a huge amount of useless discussion and drama on Misplaced Pages. (BTW, since no one really claims Astrology to be "science" the label "pseudoscience" is pretty useless, folks.) Collect (talk) 21:24, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Pseudoscience means, roughly, activity which pretends to be science but isn't. When we categorise astrology as a pseudoscience, we are not thinking of newspaper horoscopes (they are just entertainment) but of what astrologists consider 'proper', 'scientific' horoscopes. Therefore astrology is. Excluding it on the grounds that nobody can reasonably expect it to be hard science would take us too far from mainstream definitions of pseudoscience. I would consider this original research. Hans Adler 21:41, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the extended commentary on the parenthetical remark - but you do not affect my position that we can reduce drama vastly by simply placing a rational limit on what we label or categorise as "pseudoscience" and that reducing drama on Misplaced Pages is a "good idea." Anythng regarding human thought or behaviour is pretty much guaranteed not to be empirical science. Cheers. Collect (talk) 22:05, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

• I started a list at User:John Carter/Pseudoscience articles of all the articles contained in an encyclopedia of Pseudoscience. Guess what, "psychoanalytic theory" appears as one of them. From what I remember, that article at least suggests that psychoanalytic theory is in part based on ideas of questionable scientific accuracy, and thus qualifies as a form of pseudoscience. I could check the source itself, or alternately others could, because I have noticed that some of these encyclopedias of various topics include topics which do not directly fall within their titular scope. Augustine of Hippo, for instance, is included in an encyclopedia of heresies because he spoke out against some "heresies", not because he himself argued anything "heretical". But, based on at least what I think I remember of the article there, I can't see any real objections to its inclusion in the category, based on what I remember of its being included in that source. John Carter (talk) 17:16, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

• On Quackwatch; Quackwatch is a very large organization with over 1000 scientific advisors. It is a highly acclaimed, and very reliable: Quackwatch#Influence. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:02, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Also: : "Anyone reading Sigmund Freud's original works might well be seduced by the beauty of his prose, the elegance of his arguments and the acuity of his intuition. But those with a grounding in science will also be shocked by the abandon with which he elaborated his theories on the basis of essentially no empirical evidence. This is one of the main reasons why Freudian-style psychoanalysis has long since fallen out of fashion: its huge expense — treatment can stretch over years — is not balanced by evidence of efficacy." : "Freudian psychoanalysis is far from the mainstream in modern mental health care." IRWolfie- (talk) 11:08, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

You have shown that it is not "mainstream hard science" - but that, it appears, is not the same as having Misplaced Pages specifically label and characterise it as "pseudoscience" which is a matter of judgement, not one of absolutes. In the case at hand, it appears yur arguments have not swayed a consensus of editors in this venue. Cheers. Collect (talk) 11:41, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

I'm actually fine with the category not being there because I doubt many people even look at the categories. I'm making points for the record, IRWolfie- (talk) 11:58, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

• Categories are a navigation device. Someone interested in pseudoscience will go to it to find articles about pseudosciences. They do not want it to be cluttered by every discipline that has been called pseudoscience, which probably would include all the social sciences. TFD (talk) 06:56, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Where to start? Maybe the removal of the category and list article, as suggested?

• When we look at Oxford, Websters, et al, we see that "pseudo-" means "false" or "to "deceive", i.e. pseudo-intellectual, which is clearly intended as an insult. Pseudoscience is a pejorative term and not scientific, if science is the aim. Is the term the desired voice of Misplaced Pages? Does a "list" really serve readers directly or a certain community? The caution of creating a separate "Criticism" section in an article is that it becomes a "troll magnet". What does creating a "list" of all things "not deemed by several authors to be science" serve? "Pseudoscience" might be considered language of editorializing or even a weasel word. Is psychoanalysis "false" or meant to "deceive"? Maybe we can agree that a dictionary can begin to be a first source on language usage. (Occam's razor?)
• It seems that the grammatical style being used when "pseudoscience" is the POV is quite unscientific. Absolutist declarations are made such as, "<topic> IS <accusation: pseudoscience>", as if it is an absolute truth, without question. True science is humble about truths. NIH is a great example, where continually they use cautious language and will say, "may", "suggests", or "more study is needed". This is a curious voice, the voice of science. When study does not show results, science realizes the studies may be flawed, insufficient, etc. Science is fallible. It realized it may not know how to test some things. This is scientific and style reflecting "scientific inquiry" and curiosity rather than declaration of truths. Declaring that something is pseudo- (false) because it has not been tested enough is not scientific, it's just pejorative, and again not a good voice for Misplaced Pages. If the aim is science, be scientific in language and suggestion. If science will categorize psychoanalysis, let it be scientific in language.
• Without finer discernment of levels, WP:ARBPS#Questionable science is being ignored, as noted. This seems a style issue of generalization, to the level of Logical Fallacy. The argument is that one person writes a paper that says "psychoanalysis didn't get results for depression in study" (maybe because of technique or understanding), for example. This is generalized to "it never works for depression", up to "it doesn't work in psychology", then to "it doesn't work anywhere and is not a science". Again, this is gravely UNscientific and declarative. There doesn't seem to be care for finer classifications: it's either science or false/deceitful. That's the black and white style of opinion journalism not scholarly encyclopedic description. Editors can take more time to craft precise articles reflecting subtle Aristotelian categorization. There's a large vocabulary between science, theory, esoteric, folk legend... to false and deceiving. Psychoanalysis may not be a reproducible, easily testable, or even a time efficient methodology. That hardly throws it immediately into a pseudoscience genus.
• All citations of pseudoscience need full text carefully read. The entire "list of pseudosciences" needs careful review. Another generalization or OR problem? Long lists of citations can be given to overwhelm the system. Full text may not be available. Just one example in this Talk: Noam Chomsky (2003) Interview. Read the full text. Chomsky says, "I do not think psychoanalysis has a scientific basis." The word "pseudoscience" is not in the full text. Also, the words "I think" are very important to the context, i.e. opinion. Why is it in the list above? It is a huge disservice to Misplaced Pages readers that so many claims of pseudoscience are supported with citations they won't be read. There seems to be a systemic bias that has an author's words morph into the word "pseudoscience".
• Lack of studies is not a proof: An implication can be suggested to readers that "it's not studied much so it's false", when the simple data may be the expense of a double-blind, MRI machine, etc. study is cost prohibitive. No conspiracy, just market reality. Does Misplaced Pages's voice want to declare: "if thou hast not funding thou are not science?" The reality may be that human creativity is outstripping research budgets. The defunded university system cannot test everything.
• Economics, social "sciences", all of psychology soon could be labeled "pseudoscience" without a clear set of criteria. There just needs to be one skeptic that publishes an article. Could anything that requires humanity (intuition, intentions, communication, etc.) be considered pseudoscience because testing methods are still too far behind? Are Maslow's Hierarchy theory and Jung's Synchronicity also to be labeled pseudoscience because they are difficult or expensive to test? MIT is beginning to do study on inference. It will be a large budget of time and money before simple ideas can be suggested to support decade’s old theory. Even then science won't declare a truth.
• Criticism is a human part of inquiry but not a proof of fault. Are the criticism citations science or opinion pieces? This also needs to be reviewed in each citation. To declare decisively that psychoanalysis "IS" pseudoscience is a logical fallacy leap from stating that several authors "said it in a paper" compared to the 99.9% of scientists that didn't need to say anything.
• Quackwatch is one person's web site: Stephen Barrett, M.D. The non-profit was dissolved in 2008. The funding page states clearly "I", indicating it is one person's POV earning income from those supportive of the POV. Citing this as a source is questionable. I realize it's getting difficult to decide on a "reliable source" these days now that it is so easy to print a magazine or book. Again, several citations don’t mean truth. That's not scientific.

"Pseudoscience" is a declaration and list-gathering editing style on a slippery slope that has slid too far without preserving Misplaced Pages's voice.Eturk001 (talk) 04:37, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Yes, we absolutely want to represent our best reliable sources and tell the reader that a not-very-scientific field of study, one that avoids the scientific method, is pseudoscience. Your detailed arguments above are interesting but not relevant; your target should be all the people who publish scholarly works naming and describing pseudoscience. Misplaced Pages uses WP:Reliable sources, not arguments from editors. Binksternet (talk) 05:13, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Ok, but there are relevant and reliable sources who suggest that psychoanalysis is a science. And of course there are eliable and relevant sources who don't even question the scientific state of psychoanalysis. Who's right? You? --WSC 07:29, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Let us rely on the English language as being a prime reliable source, even though authors take creative license to invent their own definitions. Oxford:"not genuine, sham, pretentious, insincere." from Greek pseudēs 'false'. WP:LABEL: "The prefix pseudo- indicates that something is false or spurious, which may be debatable." The usage of pseudo- in any article outside science in Misplaced Pages would be considered Words_that_may_introduce_bias. Labeling any person in an article as "pseudo-intellectual" would clearly be POV, opinion, and simply pejorative. Giving a quote using the word, with authors name and citation, may barely be acceptable, but then Undue weight would be given to that authors opinion. This lengthy debate is giving undue weight to the fringe terminology of pseudoscience.

On CartoonDiablo's above list of 10 authors who "considered the field 'pseudoscience'", how many used the specific word 'pseudoscience' specifically about psychoanalysis? Can the word be found? It was previously noted that Chomsky did not use the word in that article. Gould does not use the word pseudoscience or psychoanalysis in Mismeasure. Pinker uses "pseudoscience" only once in reference to "orbs, luminous vapors, auras..." and never uses the word psychoanalysis. That's just the first four citations I took the time to check. Is the entire list a pseudo-list? This is an example of many WP topics continually being labeled as pseudoscience where the citations do not reflect the POV bias. It's not just OR, it's mischaracterizing authors and their text to forward a POV. Eturk001 (talk) 01:55, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

It seems that the general case of whether or not there should be a category of pseudoscience makes the individual case moot.

• Describing something as pseudoscience when it is a minority viewpoint (as indicated by the reliable sources) is clearly against WP policy. WP:DUE says:

Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight means that articles should not give minority views as much of, or as detailed, a description as more widely held views. Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all, except perhaps in a "see also" to an article about those specific views.

• It seems some people are regarding the concept of "pseudoscience" as the opposite of scientific. The opposite of scientific is actually "unscientific".

Our own article on pseudoscience states that something can only be a pseudoscience when it is misleadingly presented as being science. If we are making pseudoscientific synonymous with unscientific, we should edit that article. However, it lists a number of ] that support the existing view.

• If we go by this existing definition, pseudoscientific refers to the presentation of some apparent phenomenon as science. Others might present that same phenomenon without any scientific connotations. For example, past life hypnosis might be presented as scientifically validated, or merely an interesting and fun 'trip'. The former is pseudoscientific, the latter is not. When, then would past life hypnosis become a pseudoscience? My own use of pseudoscience implies that the overwhelming majority of its presentation of is pseudoscientific, but I cannot assume that everyone has the same definition.

• Likewise, as "pseudoscience" has multiple definitions, it is highly confusing for Misplaced Pages to pick one and not explain to the casual reader which it is.

• This categorisation makes something into a black & white issue. We are forced to describe something as either a pseudoscience or not a pseudoscience.

No matter which definition we use, intelligent design is clearly much more pseudoscientific than psychoanalysis can be. Categorisation leaves no room for this nuanced point of view.

• As "pseudoscience" is perjorative as per WP:LABEL, this is an especially unfortunate categorisation.

So, because it's not clear to the causal Misplaced Pages reader what pseudoscience means and because we cannot include that definition on the same page as the article on the pseudoscience, it should be removed. The category being perjorative makes this very important. Can someone PM me when this is being considered please.

Secondly, from personal experience of hanging around skeptics (one being Derren Brown, to namedrop), criticising woo woo stuff can become a pastime, even a profitable one. I'd cite Dawkins as a well-known example (I prefer Randi who prefers to let science do the talking). Whether or not this attempt to classify psychoanalysis as a pseudoscience is motivated by an anti-psychoanalysis POV, I suspect there is a widespread vested interest in abusing this term. We all know that Misplaced Pages is subject to edit wars when there is any vested interest. To allow this categorisation to continue would be to waste thousands of hours of Wikipedians' time.

For some of the same reasons, I want to add that we need clear guidelines on relevant pages (perhaps WP:MEDRS?) on the use of perjorative terms like pseudoscience, as it is featured in the lead of Psychoanalysis and probably dozens of other articles. From WP:LABEL, they are "best avoided unless widely used by reliable sources to describe the subject, in which case use in-text attribution." WykiP (talk) 11:39, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

We have an Arbcom decision that has already decided this matter, so this thread needs to be closed. If you question that, then discuss it in the appropriate section below. -- Brangifer (talk) 00:04, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Arbcom decision decides this matter

I agree with the position to not use the PS category for psychoanalysis, but that decision is based on the PS Arbcom. Otherwise psychoanalysis is often described/labeled/characterized as pseudoscience, but that doesn't override the Arbcom decision for using the PS "category" on the article. The Arbcom decision still allows ("requires"... as always ) us to follow the sources, and thus psychoanalysis is listed at the List of topics characterized as pseudoscience. We do document that it is often characterized as pseudoscience, which is not the same as categorizing or classifying it as an absolute pseudoscience. We just document that RS have done so. That doesn't settle the issue at all. Whether it is or is not is another matter entirely. We just follow the sources.

Here is the box used to notify of the PS Arcom decision:

Note the first two of the four groupings allow for using the PS Category, but psychoanalysis falls in the third grouping ("questionable science") and we must not use the Category for it. It is even mentioned as an example! We can (and must) still document that some RS (of many types, including scientific skeptics) do call it a pseudoscience. Some of those RS are very notable and controversial, but we still use them, even if we don't like them. That's the Wikipedian way.

BTW, attempts to defend pseudoscientific subjects and fight against the use of the term pseudoscience have been such a problem that the Arbcom has special "discretionary sanctions" which can be applied to such editors:

In July 2008 the Arbitration committee issued a further ruling in the case reported above: Any uninvolved administrator may, on his or her own discretion, impose sanctions on any editor working in the area of conflict (defined as articles which relate to pseudoscience, broadly interpreted) if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Misplaced Pages, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics; restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project.

So....beware. Editors have been banned or blocked very quickly, and any admin can do it.

As far as pejorative terms, Misplaced Pages is uncensored and we don't care a flying hoot whether a term is pejorative or not, the only exception being in BLPs. There we are a bit more careful, but even then, if RS use a pejorative term, we use it too, but not in Misplaced Pages's voice. We use the source's voice, and when doing so we do not censor the source. Editorializing and editorial censorship are very unwikipedian. We must present things in the same manner and spirit as the sources. If a source presents a subject with a bite or punch to it, we try to preserve the source's tone and convey it the way the RS does. Doing otherwise violates proper use of the source and actually misrepresents it. Editors aren't allowed to do that. The same obviously applies if a source is favorable.

We are obviously not required to use pejorative terms when they are unnecessary, but we should not avoid them when they are the proper term to use. We don't exclude any words in the dictionary from coverage here, nor the concepts and controversies associated with them. The deciding factor is how RS use them. There is no question that the word "pseudoscience" is often used in a decidedly pejorative manner. That is something we should document and not shy away from.

This really freaks out believers in those ideas and practices to which the term is applied, and understandably so, but that is of no concern to us. Using the word in the lede at Homeopathy has probably been the biggest battle of this type. Every true believer and quack has tried to get it deleted, but because it is one of the most notable examples of grossly pseudoscientific piffle, and myriad RS describe it as pseudoscience, we document that fact and don't hide it. (It appears that the quacks have succeeded at getting it deleted from the lede at present, but the article is still in the category, which is proper.)

We cannot whitewash Misplaced Pages articles out of concern for the feelings of such people. We are not allowed to censor reality to appease the feelings of readers or believers in pseudoscience. We must objectively document "the sum total of human knowledge," which is the primary goal of Misplaced Pages. All existing encyclopedias have been censored, but this is a totally different encyclopedia. Everything notable gets covered here. -- Brangifer (talk) 02:54, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Based on this Arbcom, the word 'pseudoscience' should not be used: "Theories which have a substantial following, such as psychoanalysis, but which some critics allege to be pseudoscience, may contain information to that effect, but generally should not be so characterized." Thus, the term "pseudoscience" should not appear in the article. Note key word: allege. Psychoanalysis should not be "characterized" or generally listed in the pseudoscience category or any lists furthering that POV or 'characterization'. If the term is explicitly used in RS then it may be cited as direct usage, by that author, BUT following Misplaced Pages:DUE. To put psychoanalysis on List_of_topics_characterized_as_pseudoscience when one author, Karl Popper is cited, gives undue weight to Popper when balanced against thousands of authors who have not used the term. We will be hard-pressed to find authors investing resources to fight allegations and specifically state that psychoanalysis is "not a pseudoscience". Absence of literature against allegations does not prove allegations to be true. It just needs better categorization in science. Misplaced Pages drifts into the realm of political rhetoric when allegations by a few authors guides editor's attention to having to disprove the allegation. This is a 'hasty generalization' logical fallacy. The continued usage of listing numerous citations that do not use the term pseudoscience (see CartoonDiablo above) is POV, OR, and labeling. Arbcom says to not use the term. Eturk001 (talk) 19:12, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Not quite... the term "pseudoscience" may be used in the article... but only if directly attributed (saying "Dr. Ima Expert has called psychoanalysis pseudoscience <cite Dr. Expert>" is OK... saying "Psychoanalysis is pseudoscience <cite Dr. Expert>" is not). As for Categorizing (which is what this thread is about) I read the Arbcom decision as a clear indication that psychoanalysis should not be included in that category.Blueboar (talk) 19:29, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages and psychoanalysis have no feelings. It is not a question of feelings. However, "pejorative" means "expressing contempt or disapproval" and is not a correct voice for Misplaced Pages, though it may be cited as a quote by another author's voice. Calling things "false", "fake", is an opinion, POV, of an author not a fact. We want to "avoid stating opinions as facts" and "these opinions should not be stated in Misplaced Pages's voice." Eturk001 (talk) 20:37, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

We don't give a flying hoot about feelings IF a RS has used a pejorative word. We agree that such terms are always cited using a RS. No problem. If mainstream RS are in wide agreement that a subject is pseudoscience, and it qualifies as part of one of the first two groupings, we can even use Misplaced Pages's voice (without doubt for the first group), but still only because we have multiple RS that say so. The third grouping can use the term, but only in the context of quoting RS, and we can't use Category:Pseudoscience for articles in the third and fourth groupings.

Your logic happens to be flawed. We don't have to "prove a negative." Multiple authors in RS, besides Popper, have characterized psychoanalysis as pseudoscience. Maybe it is, or maybe it isn't. We don't care. Misplaced Pages has no opinion on the matter and we do not use Misplaced Pages's voice to state such things, but we do allow RS to state their opinions on the matter. We do not censor them.

So, what's your real objection? Me thinks thou doth protest too much. If it's because you don't like the word "pseudoscience," well, that's your opinion, and it has NO weight here. Otherwise, please explain. -- Brangifer (talk) 23:20, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

I don't see where you two disagree.

I have started a discussion on making guidelines for pejorative language. I hope this brief off-topic call for eyes is acceptable given the importance of this matter.

However, perhaps this Noticeboard would be a better place to discuss the ARBCOM position. Were they aware they were sanctioning pejorative language in at least one case? Abolishing the pseudoscience Category (as opposed to the ruling's 4 categories) might be consensus here. How would we reopen that case assuming it is at all possible? WykiP (talk) 02:31, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree. I don't see any real disagreement, and yet there are objections, but to what?! No concrete examples have been provided.

I think your approach here is the proper one for dealing with pejorative language.

As to the use of pejorative language on Misplaced Pages, the Arbcom doesn't usually get involved in content matters, but I wouldn't rule out some involvement in a matter like this. You could try to contact the Arbcom members and see if they are willing to take on the task, and what procedure to use. The problem would not be "sanctioning pejorative language", but to violate policy by censoring its use. Our de facto position is that we use what RS use. The one area where we are especially careful is with BLPs. We do take some consideration there, unless the individual starts violating policy in attempts to whitewash their article of any properly sourced negative information. In such cases I have seen the article quickly getting more such content that is even better sourced. That's an example of the Streisand effect, a sort of Pyrrhic victory, but without any victory, just a negative outcome caused by their attempts to censor Misplaced Pages. In the end, if RS use pejorative language, we will likely use it too.

Further discussion about pejorative language should happen here. -- Brangifer (talk) 03:19, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure what reference to Hamlet and "real" objection mean. Looks like we're in agreement that psychoanalysis is not to be "categorized" as pseudoscience. I like the word pseudoscience, it's in the dictionary. ;-) If an RS uses it, that's the word to use. It's just the reading of the arbcom, to me, says psychoanalysis should not be "characterized" as a pseudoscience. It was just the arbcom. Putting it on a list of topics "characterized as pseudoscience" seems to ignore that sentence. What do we say about that? My concern also was that citations actually be reviewed for content. It's a big job but important to avoid OR or worse. When 8/10 citations by CartoonDiablo above don't use either psychoanalysis or pseudoscience, is it correct Misplaced Pages style to interpret their words into new words? Chomsky, for example: "not based in science" only means that. Should we translate that into words he didn't use? It just respect for the RS. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Eturk001 (talk • contribs) 00:47, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

Well, the arbcom is a instance of[REDACTED] "to act as a final binding decision-maker primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve" The don't have the competence to resolve such contentual questions. Thats what they have done. They decided user banns. I've read the request for arabitration but I can find only sanctions of users. A large phrase is crossed out. I can't find any repercussions to ore discussion here. --WSC 09:35, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm learning the deeper areas of Misplaced Pages and appreciate the pointers I'm getting here. When I read Final Decision/Principals/#17 (20.1.17) of the PS Arbcom it notes the principal that psychoanalysis should not be "characterized" as pseudoscience and was "Passed 8-0 at 02:28, 3 December 2006 (UTC)". What does that mean? Eturk001 (talk) 03:43, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure. I think the arbcom votes for every statment. But the arbcom can't decide that psychoanalysis ain't a pseudoscience, also. Thats a decision of sientific sources not of the arbcom of en.wikipedia. Imagine, the arbcom decides that GB doesn't lacates in europe but in africa! What the arbcom decides ain't a dogma like a Encyclical. It's the jugement of some volunteers. They can't decide anything contentual. If they do, thats a overestimation of there own role. --WSC 07:10, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

I concur with Widescreen upon reading WP:ARBCOM. ARBCOM's ruling was binding at that time, but not binding forever. According to the page, they resolve disputes the community cannot. They do not set Misplaced Pages policy and guidelines. However, those rulings are extremely indicative as to how they would rule in the future and thus editors who wish to contradict them would need to have a very strong case.

This Village Pump discussion says much the same.

Also, see WP:What_Wikipedia_is_not#Wikipedia_is_not_a_bureaucracy WykiP (talk) 10:38, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

Eturk001, you wrote:

• "When I read Final Decision/Principals/#17 (20.1.17) of the PS Arbcom it notes the principal that psychoanalysis should not be "characterized" as pseudoscience and was "Passed 8-0 at 02:28, 3 December 2006 (UTC)". What does that mean?"

In the context of all that was discussed, written, and decided in that Arbcom, it means that Misplaced Pages editors must not use Misplaced Pages's voice to characterize psychoanalysis as pseudoscience, or to add it to Category:Pseudoscience. Otherwise, they expressly allow that articles "may contain information to that effect" (psychoanalysis as pseudoscience) if it is attributed to RS. Misplaced Pages takes no side in the matter, but does report that others have done so. Fair enough. -- Brangifer (talk) 07:54, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

Biased Editing of Kevyn Orr biography?

Kevyn Orr (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

I have called attention to this article but have not yet received a response. I inserted a quote from the World Socialist Web Site in which they referred to Mr. Orr as a "ruthless defender of corporate interest and a bitter enemy of working people." As there are many positive opinions quoted in reference to Mr. Orr I believe this quote helps balance the article. User Terrance7 has repeatedly edited out this content for different reasons each time. First it was "ranting language, unencyclopedic" the next time it was "libelous" and more recently "an unreliable source." I feel that his editing is biased. Your opinions? This article is getting a lot of hits due to the situation in Detroit being of international interest and I would like to see the dispute resolved quickly. http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Kevyn_Orr Truman Starr (talk) 17:39, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

It appears the quote and citation in question are as follows:

The World Socialist Web Site has called Orr a "ruthless defender of corporate interests and a bitter enemy of working people."

In my opinion, World Socialist Web Site is completely biased but is notable enough for a statement of opinion to be listed with in-text attribution as is noted above. Per WP:WEIGHT, this balances the opinion of Chambers and Partners that appears in the article and is derived from trivial mention in another source. Please note that WP:RSN may be helpful here. Location (talk) 17:54, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

I would first point out that the mere fact that there are "many positive opinions quoted in reference to Mr. Orr" does not mean that the article needs to be "balanced" by finding negative things to say about him. This should be clear but I can elaborate if you do not understand.

Also, Chambers and Partners is an authoritative, well-regarded, frequently-relied-upon, independent source for finding the best lawyers in particular specialties. To be listed in Chambers is a very big deal; it's not something that you can pay to be listed in. Thus, Chambers and Partners's statement that Orr is an outstanding lawyer is not remotely comparable to the World Socialist Web Site's unsubstantiated, ranting opinion that he is an "enemy of working people." What does that even mean? And why should anyone care what they think about Orr? As someone said in a previous discussion here about the appropriateness of citing WSWS, "If the opinions of the World Trostkyite movement are required for an article, we can quote the WSWS. Otherwise, best not." Terence7 (talk) 20:37, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

You seem to insinuate that I am merely looking to find negative opinion of Mr. Orr. This is not the case. A google search on Mr. Orr will quickly bring up the quoted article as the International Committee of the Fourth International is a well respected and internationally recognized organization. As Mr. Orr has become the Emergency Manager to one of the homes of industrialization in America, with deep roots in the labor movement, their opinion is pertinent to the article and the censorship of their opinion detracts from the weight of the article. Perhaps the labor movement does not appeal to you personally and you find the opinion of leftists to be inconsequential despite the fact that non-leftists have often quoted this website. I find your tone to be condescending. I certainly don't need you to explain why you think that any negative quotes are a detriment to this article. You have shown obvious bias in your editing of this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.14.26.255 (talk) 03:58, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

As I said on your talk page (maybe you haven't seen it since you're not logged in), I do not "think that any negative quotes are a detriment to this article." To the contrary, I left in much of the negative material that you added to the article, because it is factual and worthy of inclusion in an encyclopedia. My objection is specifically to the inclusion of this quotation from the World Socialist Web Site.

I would additionally point out that the quotation you are attempting to insert does not actually provide useful information; it is purely pejorative, ranting language, as I have been saying. Orr is a "ruthless defender of corporate interests"? Well, sure, he defends corporate interests — he was a corporate lawyer. What does it mean that he was "ruthless"? The author does not specify, so this is no more helpful to the reader than the information that was already in the article.

And he is a "bitter enemy of working people"? Again, what does this actually mean? Seriously. Does it mean that he personally harbors hatred in his heart for anyone paid an hourly wage? Does it mean that he has a track record of doing things that hurt working people (whoever exactly working people are)? Does it mean that he has never personally taken any action or voted for any candidates supporting working people?

This is such vague language that it can have no purpose except as a ranting attack on Orr. If you can find more coherent, thoughtful criticisms from reliable sources that would enhance the informative value of the article, go for it. I am all for that. But this isn't it. Terence7 (talk) 04:33, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

I understand you have an issue with the WSWS as a credible source. It is in Kevyn Orr's job description that one of the tools at his disposal is the ability to throw out union contracts without negotiation, sell public property, and displace the democratically elected officials of Detroit. This is why he is considered by some to be a "bitter enemy of working people." He has been appointed by a governor who has also been accused of being a "union buster" for making Michigan a Right To Work state despite strong union sentiment and large protests in the state of Michigan. Both the EM law and Right To Work laws were pushed into legislation in lame duck sessions. The opinion of a large international union-sympathetic voice is pertinent here. Truman Starr (talk) 22:36, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

People given extraordinary financial powers in such a case have a long list of what they can do - it is POV to single out particular ones and to make assertions thereon. We better serve readers with simple statements of fact, and not editorial commentary from the source ppromoted. Collect (talk) 22:59, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

• Oppose quote inclusion per WP:RS and WP:NPOV in relation to WP:BLP. User:The Gnome makes good arguments on these points, and these are well-exemplified by Truman Starr's parallel examples. However, I reject that there is overall consensus that The World Socialist Website is overall biased. I merely posit that a statement is not made true by the fact that you can reference it; it must still be factual for inclusion or otherwise significant (and specifically indicated as not a fact). I posted this comment on the article talk page, as well. --Jackson Peebles (talk) 19:50, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Carnival Cruise Line edits by SPA

Recent edits to Carnival Cruise Lines by Noremac617 (talk · contribs) have been removing or toning down well-sourced negative info about recent problems with Carnival ships. (Carnival has been having many serious problems lately, and there's substantial news coverage.) This looks like a WP:SPA situation - few edits on any other topic. No comments on Talk, edit summaries are all default values. Please take a look. Thanks. --John Nagle (talk) 06:43, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Watchlisted.--Auric talk 11:15, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

This is username Noremac617, regarding Carnival Cruise Lines I am fixing a series of inaccurate sections of information. It seems as if John Nagle wants to stop this very accurate information from being published.

Almost all edits by the above user have been deletions without edit comments. See , etc. There's been much bad news about Carnival lately, and I and others have been adding it to the article. --John Nagle (talk) 05:08, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the alert John. I've placed a note on Noremeac617's talk page asking them to discuss before making further deletions of sourced content and I've inserted myself into the talk page conversation. Let's see how it goes from here. Cheers! -- — Keithbob • Talk • 20:06, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Noremeac617's last edit was on 20 March 2013, but User:129.33.193.109 put back one of the edits on 25 March 2013, so please keep a close eye on IP edits. --Guy Macon (talk) 01:46, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

NPOV Issues with Historical Biography (SYNTH, Cherrypicking and COI)

I have added a neutrality tag to the opening section of the historical biography of Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, based on two examples:

1) The second line of the lead paragraph reads:

"Although he had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate, Oxford was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright"

I’ve never seen a historical biography start in such a backhanded way. A quick comparison to some notoriously treacherous nobleman such as Earl of Bothwell, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley or King John reinforces this observance. Even Atilla The Hun and Adolph Hitler Genghis Khan fare better in their opening paragraph, than this poor Eilizbethean earl. Aside from the backhanded nature of the phrase, it also appears to be a combination of WP:ORIGINALSYN AND WP:CHERRYPICKING, as the source actually says

"Much as Oxford's rash, unpredictable nature minimized his success in the world of practical affairs, he deserves recognition not only as a poet but as a nobleman with extraordinary intellectual interests and commitments."

When I read someone described as “violent” (the synth part) in the lead of a Misplaced Pages article, I expect the article to contain a certain amount of blood and gore. In this case, we have a nobleman that, in his youth, killed a single servant. Hardly notable as noblemen go, and certainly not worthy to be a primary character description in the lead of the article.

2) The deletion of material here: followed by the remnants of the section being moved to the very bottom of the article. This was a proper summary of its parent article. Now, I don't know what the section is, or why it's been tacked on to the article in such a poorly edited version.

I believe there is very little question that the most notable thing about this near-forgotten nobleman, is his ranking as the primary alternative authorship candidate for the works of Shakespeare. Whenever he has been mentioned by modern scholars, it is almost always due to this particular notability. Given this unquestionable notability, I am suggesting the authorship section be restored and returned to its prior location, as in this edit .

Regarding notability, during his day (Elizabethan England) he was publicly acknowledged as being an excellent courtier poet and playwright, Knights tournament champion (twice), and as a major literary and theatrical patron. Now, while there are many opinions about the man's nature, these are opinions and, I believe, should be noted as such. I am suggesting using this lead: , which is similar to the lead that was contained in this article up until a year or two ago, when the article started to fall apart:(references removed, but readily available)

I have tried to reason on the Talk page but have been told in no uncertain terms to come here. There, I am accused of wanting to delete negative material, and "skew" the article, neither of which are true, nor have they been shown by my actions. Some will try and make all of this about the authorship issue. It's not -it's strictly about notability, weight, and NPOV phrasing. Hopefully we can keep discussion about the edit suggestions, and not the editors. In interest of full disclosure, I received two topic bans for work on similar articles, and have recently returned to editing this artice. I am trying my best to follow the new ArbCom rules regarding dispute resolution for these articles. My opposing editor, User:Tom_Reedy, has a similar conflict of interest in that he has published on the subject and is a well known internet authorship personality. Thus the need for outside guidance. I look forward to your comments.Smatprt (talk) 23:41, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Adolf Hitler? "this poor Eilizbethean earl"? Please. Either you haven't read the introduction to the Hitler page or our values and opinions are so divergent as to render all discussion meaningless. To compare "Hitler was at the centre of Nazi Germany, World War II in Europe, and the Holocaust" to the relatively innocuous sentence you're disputing does not invite serious commentary.

I strongly urge others to read the talk page discussion. There it is explained that the sentence Smatprt objects to is taken from a reference written by an expert on Edward de Vere, Steven May.

It is also evident from that page and from what Smatprt writes above he thinks that since Oxford's main notability today is his candidacy for the True Author of Shakespeare's works, the bio page should be an adjunct to the Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship to provide mainstream support for a fringe theory. In fact, he has since made a couple of WP:POINT edits that make it very clear that is indeed his intention.

In truth, Oxford was a very minor poet, and a middling patron, although very generous to those he patronized, and the combined contemporary mentions of his "excellence" in poetry and play writing number a grand total of four, so he wasn't all that lauded by his contemporaries.

My idea of WP:WEIGHT is that a Misplaced Pages article should proportionately reflect biographies written by independent, reliable sources. Every treatment of Oxford I have seen except for the hagiography written by Oxfordian B. M. Ward mentions his character flaws early.

From the introduction to Alan Nelson's Monstrous Adversary (2003), the most complete and scholastic biography we have of Oxford to date:

As 17th Earl of Oxford he was among England's premier noblemen—very few approached being the seventeenth of anything. But he held no office of consequence, not performed a notable deed. He served, it is true, as Lord Great (or High) Chamberlain, but that office was purely ceremonial ….

Oxford neglected to serve others for the simple reason that his first aim in life was to serve himself. Of his estates he wrote to his father-in-law, the famous Lord Burghley:

I haue no help but of myne owne, and mine is made to serve me, and myself not mine.

That is to say: I have no resource but my own properties; they are meant to serve me, I am not meant to serve them.

Feudal rank was theoretically based on the very opposite principle: that noblemen held property first by royal grant and then by inheritance precisely in exchange for service.

Though lack of service would make Oxford virtually irrelevant to historians of the Elizabethan reign, he remains an object of curiosity for cultural and literary historians. He was a leader of fashion, a court poet of modest ability, and a patron of writers and performers. Additionally he lived a life so privately scandalous and so richly documented that his biography opens up a window of sorts onto secret passages of Elizabethan life and manners. Oxford has also been touted, for the past eighty years, as the author of the poems and plays of William Shakespeare. It has become a matter of urgency to measure the real Oxford against the myth created by partisan apologists … (1).

You can read more of the introduction beginning on page two here.

Additionally, the very first mention of Oxford in Laurence Stone's The Crisis of the Aristocracy (1965) is this on page 172: "The greatest wastrel of them all, the 17th Earl of Oxford, had already dissipated most of his inheritance before his hated first wife died and he could marry again and beget an heir male." On page 234, after a long description of a violent feud between Oxford and Sir Thomas Knyvett, the uncle of a woman who bore his out-of-wedlock child, Stone writes, "Both in the brutality of their tactics and in their immunity from the law, the nearest parallels to the Earl of Oxford and Sir Thomas Knyvett in the London of Queen Elizabeth are Al Capone and Dion O'Banion, Bugs Moran and Johnny Torrio in the Chicago of the 1920's."

In Daphne Pearson's Edward de Vere (1550-1604): The Crisis and Consequences of Wardship (2005), the first mention of Oxford in the introduction is this: "The twelve-year-old Edward de Vere, earl of Oxford since the death of his father exactly one month earlier, was riding to London at the head of 140 horses caparisoned in black and mounted by his entourage all dressed in Oxford livery, with the blue boar badge embroidered on each left shoulder. The future of the young earl, set to spend his wardship in the house of Sir William Cecil in the Strand, appeared assured, yet within thirty years this power had all but vanished, dissipated by the sale of his inherited estates" (1). Later in the introduction she reviews the various biographies of Oxford: "Although he ranked second in the hierarchy of earls, he receives little mention in academic work and, until 2003, there was no academic biography of him. Most references are limited to colourful events in his life and centre on the wasting of his patrimony, his confession of Catholicism, to which the famous tennis-court quarrel with Sir Phillip Sidney was an adjunct, and his feud with Sir Thomas Knyvett" (7).

His DNB entry (also by Nelson) contains this: "Oxford's eccentricities and irregularities of temper grew with his years. (examples given) On 23 March, however, the Yorkshire beauty and queen's maid of honour Anne Vavasour, who had been Oxford's mistress since 1579, gave birth to a son, whereupon he found himself back in the Tower. He recovered his freedom in June, and in December was reconciled with his wife. Domestic tranquillity was shattered again in March 1582, when Oxford fought a duel with Anne Vavasour's uncle Sir Thomas Knyvet. Both men were wounded, the earl more dangerously. Their quarrel continued on and off for a year, with deaths and injuries among retainers on both sides. Oxford was notorious in his own time for his effeminate dress, for his irregular life, and for squandering virtually his entire patrimony on personal extravagance."

And his earlier DNB entry written by Sidney Lee is even worse, with ""While manifesting a natural taste for music and literature, the youth developed a waywardness of temper which led him into every form of extravagance, and into violent quarrels with other members of his guardian's household" as the ultimate sentence in the opening paragraph.

Smatprt seems to think that negative coverage, even if true, equals POV treatment, and above he tries to pass off one sentence of the original source ("Much as Oxford's rash, unpredictable nature minimized his success in the world of practical affairs, he deserves recognition not only as a poet but as a nobleman with extraordinary intellectual interests and commitments") as the entire basis of the sentence he objects to in the lede.

But--as he has been told--the source is a range of pages, from page 5 to page 8 inclusive of May's "The Poems of Edward DeVere, Seventeenth Earl of Oxford and of Robert Devereux, Second Earl of Essex", Studies in Philology (University of North Carolina Press) 77 Winter 1980. I also provided the exact excerpts that the sentence summarizes:

Upon coming of age in 1571, Oxford was probably regarded with higher expectations that were held for any other young nobleman of the reign. … his future could hardly look more promising …. But waste the old earldom he did in a process that was well underway by January of 1575 when he set out upon an elegant continental tour; during his fifteen months abroad, Edward spent some 4,561 pounds, a sum derived largely from the estates which he insisted that his father-in-law sell for him. …De Vere had run up debts totaling thousands of pounds. Between 1575 and 1586, Oxford divested himself of most of his lands … (page 5)

De Vere's prodigality was but one aspect of a self-indulgent, erratic, often belligerent temperament which undermined his youthful prospects as well as his later ambitions. His tendency toward violence erupted at the age of seventeen when he killed one of his guardian's servants … Oxford so vehemently opposed the betrothal of his sister, Mary, to Peregrine Bertie … that Bertie feared for his life, and the Earl not only quarreled with Sidney … but may have planned his assassination as well. (page 6)

Oxford was noticeably disadvantaged by what Gilbert Talbot termed his 'fyckle hed' …. Oxford rejected his first wife, Anne Cecil, on trumped up charges …. In 1589 he betrayed the friends with whom he had joined in a secret profession of adherence to Catholicism, and when Anne Vavasour … gave birth at court to his illegitimate son he did not merely abandon her but insulted her publicly as well …. These reckless tendencies did not go unnoticed by the Queen …. It is noteworthy that she never appointed Oxford to a position of trust or sole responsibility. ....the Earl often requested military duty, but he never gained command of any sizeable body of troops ….(page 7) He was never entrusted with a diplomatic mission, entertainment of foreign dignitaries, nor office at court on in the government at large…. His pension was an act of charity … was designed to solve an unusual problem, the preservation of a necessary state figure whose irresponsibility precluded a grant which might be farmed out, commuted , or sold.(page 8)"

This is the material that is summed up with the phrase, "Although he had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate ...", which Smatprt believes qualifies as WP:SYNTH and should be deleted from the lede, yet Oxford "recorded by Stow as having introduced various Italian fashions to the English court" should be right up there.

I have elected not to bring in Smatprt's off-Wiki life to this discussion. Tom Reedy (talk) 02:53, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

First, we are talking about the opening lines of the article, not something mentioned two paragraphs down. However, I am not insisting that the Stow reference be included, and am not opposed to seeing it deleted from the 2nd paragraph. But that sentence is not why we are here.

And thank you for providing a list of opinions of the Earl's character, but they are just that - opinions, not facts. I could provide equally abundant opinions that characterize his life in completely different ways. It's called cherry picking and neither would be correct to use as a character summation in the opening sentences of a historical biography. And it would not be in the neutral tone required of the article, especially the lead. When such opinions are mentioned, they should be attributed, instead of characterizing their opinions as "scholarly consensus", which is quoted far too much in these articles. Please see Misplaced Pages:Identifying reliable sources#Academic consensus at WP:RS/AC, which "requires reliable sourcing that directly says that all or most scientists or scholars hold that view".

And given the context of the time, to characterize this Earl as notably "violent" - without anything more than a very short list of fairly typical Elizabethan entanglements - is simply not defendable. Where are the deaths? Where are the executions? The slaughters? Fact: When he was 17 he killed a drunken servant, and was found not guilty. He made some threats, and had the famous "tennis court" argument (of words). Sorry, but there's just nothing there to warrant such POV wording. Smatprt (talk) 16:45, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Are you going to shut up and let some outside editors comment on this or are you going to drone on ad nauseum as you usually do during these discussions? They have eyes and can do without your constant explanations to try to influence other editors. Tom Reedy (talk) 17:29, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Of it is the function of the lede to summarise the content of the article. Smatprt seems to want the lede to be entirely laudatory, or at least to contain no criticism. In fact, as has been pointed out before, this sentence is the only critical comment in all the paragraphs of the lede. It is supported by a quotation from a single source, for sure, but it is in essence a summary of the views of all reliable sources on this topic. The principal modern scholarly writers on Oxford are May (whose words are quoted), Alan Nelson his biographer and Daphne Pearson, who wrote Edward De Vere (1550-1604): The Crisis And Consequences Of Wardship. All these authors are agreed that the earl was prone to violence, spendthrift and volatile. Tom has alsready provided evidence from May and Nelson. Summarising the views of the most authorititive sources is absolutely not cherrypicking. It's what we are supposed to do. Of course negative and positive aspects of a person's life should be presented with proper balance, and that's what the intro does. It has one half sentence of criticism which Oxfordolators are persistently trying to delete.

Daphne Pearson: "It may be the he was not unique (though his profligacy surely was)." "his feeble attempts at power-broking with foriegn powers were destined to be ineffectual because his concerns were always for himself" (p.208) "His volatile personality was no asset. At court his most powerful friend was undoubtedly Lord Burghley, who continued to support the Earl for his daughter's sake, when a lesser man...would have abandoned him to his impecunious state" (p.213) "In the feud with Anne Vavasour's relations...Oxford can be seen as the Italianate courtier demonstrating a final violent fling in imitation of his feudal ancestors". (p.215)

Ironically, the Oxfordian movement started because its founder, Looney, looked up Oxford in the DNB and found a person who fitted his idea of the personality of "Shakespeare". As Oxfordian writer Richard F. Whalen sums up: "The Dictionary of National Biography's entry on Oxford describes him as an aristocrat with a violent and perverse temper, eccentric taste in dress, recklessness in his waste of substance, and genuine taste in music." This was already a familiar view, the National Review in 1858 describing Oxford as the "spendthrift earl" whose "reckless extravagance" led to the loss of his estates. In fact he was known as "the spendthrift" from the 18h century on. So it's somewhat ironic that Oxfordian editors persistently attempt to suppress evidence of the very traits that led to their fringe theory in the first place. Paul B (talk) 19:26, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Restating the request

Okay, we've heard from the two primary editors of the article in question, both of whom have conflicts of interest, and both of whom continue to be insulting and make personal attacks. You've heard my concerns, and I have acknowledged my own conflict, although I am not going to be baited in spite of recent attempts . We've plainly reached an impasse, as everyone can see. That's why we are here. To obtain the advice of independent editors who don't give a whiff about the authorship, but whose primary charge is solving NPOV disputes.

So to capsulize my request, which may have gotten lost in the above 16 paragraphs:

1) - Does the following wording live up to NPOV guidelines? Is it appropriate for the lead paragraph?

"Although he had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate, Oxford was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright, and since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works."

Or should this be reverted to the previous version :

Lauded in his own time as a playwright, lyric poet, sportsman, and patron of the arts, since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works. Oxford was an important courtier poet, praised as such and as a playwright by George Puttenham and Francis Meres, who included him in a list of the "best for comedy amongst us". Examples of his poetry have been documented, but none of his theatrical works survive.

2) - Should the following summary (now deleted) be eliminated , restored or something in between?

Note - These deletions have been going on for years, everything from quotes, to poems, to references, and lots of useful detail in between: , , , , , , Many thanks to anyone who can help us resolve this. Smatprt (talk) 21:47, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

I made nothing like a personal attack. Indeed your need to construe yourself as a victim who is constantly being harrassed does not create a good atmosphere for reasonable discussion. Your last sentence is bizarre. Of course deletions have been going on for years. Additions have been going on for years too. That's true of all articles. It is frankly impossible to have a rational discussion when arguments are presented in this way. I very much doubt that any independent editor will be found who will be able to usefully comment on this. All i can say, is that a single sentence cannot be not be identified as POV or vice versa except in the context of the lede over all, but it nevertheless seems clear to me that the first version - balancing positive and negative, is better than the second, which is just gush. Paul B (talk) 21:55, 21March 2013 (UTC)

The first version is opinion, the second is facts. Do you dispute that? You want to delete some of the facts, fine. Happy to discuss. But I fail to see why listing a sequence of mass deletions, made without discussion or consensus, strikes you as bizarre? And neither of you has yet to explain why introducing these opinions in the lead is valid for this article when none of the examples I provided (far more despicable characters) have anything even approaching such a lead-in to their articles. And just to clarify, you think it ok to tell another editor to "shut up"? Smatprt (talk) 22:14, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, but there is ample documentary evidence of Oxford's temperament from his own time; those judgements from his various biographers weren't made in a vacuum. His violence is well-documented, and as Nelson says, his prodigality was well-known and commented on in his time, and his reckless and erratic behavior was also commented on. He was the one who quit his post in a huff during the Armada when he thought his rank was not sufficient, which was commented on by his commander, and he was the one who quit the field without seeing action in the Anglo-Spanish War. These are all documented facts, not opinion. To describe them for what they are, as May, Pearson, and Nelson do, is not unsupported opinion, it is a description of Oxford made by experts after much research and study.

What is opinion is "he was lauded", unless by lauded you mean every other poet that Puttenham mentioned along with Oxford were "lauded" also. It would be closer to the truth to say "Oxford was among a group of courtier poets who were lauded by Puttenham and Meres". And nowhere that I know was he "lauded" as a sportsman. "He was an important courtier poet" is opinion, also, since neither Puttenham nor Meres used that word to describe him. Tom Reedy (talk) 03:28, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

P.S. Nobody told you to "shut up." You need to learn to read the actual words, not what you think is there. But you've been told that before, more than once. Tom Reedy (talk) 03:31, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Here is the link. Editors may judge for themselves if "Are you going to shut up...?" is ever suitable for a discussion page. Smatprt (talk) 17:28, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

In the short, 2 1/2-page biography of Oxford in the introduction to the Rollins edition of The Paradise of Dainty Devices(1927), Rollins says this about Oxford in the first paragraph of the bio (second paragraph of the section, the first lists the poems attributed to him in PDD):

"Oxford was an ill-tempered, violent man. He treated his wife with downright cruelty; he insulted Sir Philip Sidney, caused him to be banished from Court, and (at least according to popular rumor) planned to murder him. … Though he squandered his fortune and sold his ancestral estates, Oxford not infrequently extended his patronage to various men of letters, especially to those of the Bohemian type. Lyly dedicated to him Euphues and his England (1580); Spenser addressed a sonnet to him in the Faery Queen(1590); and many minor authors claimed him as their patron."

Compare his similar use of "Though he …" to the lede's sentence under question, "Although he …", both of which act as a balancer to lead into complimentary remarks about Oxford's patronage. Tom Reedy (talk) 23:07, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Comments from independent editors

• This sentence: Although he had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate appears to be editorial point of view, rather than a neutral summary of article content, and in my opinion, it should be completely removed from the lead. -- — Keithbob • Talk • 15:06, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Would you mind elaborating specifically how it violates WP:NPOV, given that the very first sentence in the policy states that, "Editing from a neutral point of view (NPOV) means representing fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources"? Tom Reedy (talk) 04:15, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

No, it appears to be an accurate reflection of the consensus view of professional historians (other than Shakespeare authorship conspiracist cranks). Guy (Help!) 22:35, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

• Why dont we just cite "reckless" "unpredictable" and "violent" nature that ruled him out of any responsible governmental or military post? The sources seem to be there in abundance. he appears to have been widely considered a difficult and irresponsible man by his contemporaries. Just heavily cite the para in question. Irondome (talk) 03:55, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Reply to Tom and Irondome: The answer to the two above questions, (and please User:keithbob correct me if I'm wrong), is twofold:

1) There is nothing in the source or the contemporary records that in any way connects the description of "violent", to his not receiving a government or military post. This would be WP:SYN (Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources... If a single source says "A" in one context, and "B" in another, without connecting them, and does not provide an argument of "therefore C", then "therefore C" cannot be used in any article.).

2) Starting off the article lead with a negative statement is not neutral, period. Even Misplaced Pages's FA articles on such notoriously violent and despicable individuals as Thomas Percy (Gunpowder Plot) (note his paragraph 4) and Elizabeth's master spymaster (& torturer) Francis Walsingham, two of Oxford's contemporaries, don't start off their leads discussing how the subject's supposed 'character flaws' led them to their ruin. That's why this sentence is "editorial point of view". User:Tom_Reedy is intent on beginning the article this way and is trying to write the lead to conform with his own POV,

as outlined here where Tom opines:

"Oxford was probably more noted in his own time for being a shit than for being a poet" and "Everyone of his biographers said he was a shit, and that despite being a shit and he was a generous patron of the arts and a minor court poet"

or here: where Tom's

"one definition of "shit" is "A mean or contemptible person," which is the sense I intended. Even most Oxfordians agree that he was such a person when it came to his personal relations"

which sums up Tom's own POV of Oxford's "personal relations", a POV that he has decided is so notable that it must be placed at the head of the article, without one single word allowed to be changed. This is editorial point of view. Also, WP:Weight explains why this kind of preferred placement is not allowed.

Note: I am not adversed to variations of this information being contained in the article. Accusations to anything otherwise are completely unfounded. Smatprt (talk) 19:07, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for putting words in another editor's (Keithbob) mouth. The entire purpose of coming to these boards is to solicit outside and neutral opinions, not to read and re-read and re-read your opinion, but any time another editor leans the least bit away from your POV you seem to be compelled to reiterate your complaints once more "just in case" they didn't get it right the first time. Oxford was a Grade-A shit, but he was at least interesting and didn't incessantly repeat himself ad nauseum.

The original source, some of whose relevant parts I quoted, are sufficient to rebut your accusation of synthesis. Here they are again (I'll just copy and paste from above):

But--as he has been told--the source is a range of pages, from page 5 to page 8 inclusive of May's "The Poems of Edward DeVere, Seventeenth Earl of Oxford and of Robert Devereux, Second Earl of Essex", Studies in Philology (University of North Carolina Press) 77 Winter 1980. I also provided the exact excerpts that the sentence summarizes:

Upon coming of age in 1571, Oxford was probably regarded with higher expectations that were held for any other young nobleman of the reign. … his future could hardly look more promising …. But waste the old earldom he did in a process that was well underway by January of 1575 when he set out upon an elegant continental tour; during his fifteen months abroad, Edward spent some 4,561 pounds, a sum derived largely from the estates which he insisted that his father-in-law sell for him. …De Vere had run up debts totaling thousands of pounds. Between 1575 and 1586, Oxford divested himself of most of his lands … (page 5)

De Vere's prodigality was but one aspect of a self-indulgent, erratic, often belligerent temperament which undermined his youthful prospects as well as his later ambitions. His tendency toward violence erupted at the age of seventeen when he killed one of his guardian's servants … Oxford so vehemently opposed the betrothal of his sister, Mary, to Peregrine Bertie … that Bertie feared for his life, and the Earl not only quarreled with Sidney … but may have planned his assassination as well. (page 6)

Oxford was noticeably disadvantaged by what Gilbert Talbot termed his 'fyckle hed' …. Oxford rejected his first wife, Anne Cecil, on trumped up charges …. In 1589 he betrayed the friends with whom he had joined in a secret profession of adherence to Catholicism, and when Anne Vavasour … gave birth at court to his illegitimate son he did not merely abandon her but insulted her publicly as well …. These reckless tendencies did not go unnoticed by the Queen …. It is noteworthy that she never appointed Oxford to a position of trust or sole responsibility. ....the Earl often requested military duty, but he never gained command of any sizeable body of troops ….(page 7) He was never entrusted with a diplomatic mission, entertainment of foreign dignitaries, nor office at court on in the government at large…. His pension was an act of charity … was designed to solve an unusual problem, the preservation of a necessary state figure whose irresponsibility precluded a grant which might be farmed out, commuted , or sold.(page 8)"

This is the material that is summed up with the phrase, "Although he had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate ...", which Smatprt believes qualifies as WP:SYNTH and should be deleted from the lede....

Now if you can be still long enough we might get some more opinions, but with you crapping up the boards with your hysterics I doubt it. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:22, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Tom, there is no need for that. I provided only new information, as you requested:

• showing the lack of causation between Oxford's supposed "violence", and any supposed repercussions.
• providing two FA historical biographies from Oxford's contemporaries, for comparison.
• providing examples of talk page statements that show a POV that is driving the article.
• regarding charge of speaking for another editor, I notified him of the comment and asked for any correction.Smatprt (talk) 20:01, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

You want new information? We don't need to figure out how the lead should read or how POV is handled by comparing other biographies; that's all been worked out. Try reading Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Lead section. Pay special attention to the second paragraph in the lead. Tom Reedy (talk) 20:12, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. And thank you for showing once again that none of your sources say that Oxford's "violence" was remotely connected with his lack of appointments, an item you believe is so notable it warrants the opening line of the article. Regarding writing styles, I prefer stay on topic, so please look in the 3rd paragraph of the manual - the part that requires a neutral tone, and once there, please pay particular attention to WP:IMPARTIAL - "A neutral characterization of disputes requires presenting viewpoints with a consistently impartial tone; otherwise articles end up as partisan commentaries even while presenting all relevant points of view. Even where a topic is presented in terms of facts rather than opinions, inappropriate tone can be introduced through the way in which facts are selected, presented, or organized." In many ways, the whole issue boils down to this, doesn't it, gentlemen? Smatprt (talk) 23:38, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

You must have skipped over this part from the original conversation on the Talk:Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford page:

What characteristics of Oxford does May say "undermined his youthful prospects as well as his later ambitions"?

Answer: his temperament, which consisted of

1. prodigality (which May says caused him to "waste the old earldom" by running up debts and selling his lands so that by 1583 he was described by Burghley as practically bankrupt)

2. self-indulgence

3. erratic (i.e. his "fyckle hed", fickle: Changing frequently, esp. as regards one's loyalties, interests, or affection, or, as May calls them, "reckless tendencies"

4. belligerency

5. tendency toward violence

6. his irresponsibility

His temperament seems to be important to the his biographers, since they nearly all mention it in the first few paragraphs or in the preface. And the tone is as neutral as can be written. Tom Reedy (talk) 01:26, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Reply to User: Irondome (from 16 paragraphs up), I believe leads are not supposed to require heavy sourcing, since they are required to reflect the major content points of the general article itself, which is where supporting details and reference cites are to be found. Smatprt (talk) 19:07, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Indeed so, and all thse points are eminently citable and should be fully cited - as long as you don't remove them. The evidence is absolutely overwheming that this is the consensus of historians from at least the 18th century on. IMO this discussion is utterly pointless. Smatprt's need to micromanage this thread has created a chilling effect which negates any interest in or useful commentary from other editors. I suggest that this should go to dispute resolution. Paul B (talk) 20:10, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Remove citable information? Do you mean this?]. I removed a personal attack, not a citable point of information.

Or did you mean these , , , , , , . Oh, that's right. Those aren't my deletions, those were all you guys.

A change of tact, I see. Now, you two claim it's my "chilling effect" and going on "ad nauseam" that has stifled the entire[REDACTED] community? Really? Don't you think it might have more to do with the walls of text you two have pasted here, even duplicating the same exact whole paragraphs, that might be turning outside editors off? And you won't even hat your duplicate remarks? You realize hatting isn't deleting, right? (There's a little button you push to read what's in the hat-bar.)

And IIRC, I haven't deleted any citable information. That is not my general habit at all. Check my history. Except clear vandalism by the high schoolers, or newbie-errors, I almost always add cite tags. It's what I do. Smatprt (talk) 23:38, 27 March 2013 (UTC) :-)

And seriously - you are actually saying that my chilling effect is so unearthly powerful that it "negates any useful commentary from other editors" of this noticeboard? Or that I can't respond to an editor, but you two can jump right at the very first independent editor here (who happened to disagree with you?)] The hypocrisy you two maintain is astounding. Smatprt (talk) 23:38, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

I think your "walls of text" crowding everybody else out might be one element that negates any useful commentary in that it is certainly not inviting to other neutral editors for any of their comments to be immediately buried beneath yet another "just in case" reiteration if their comments diverge from your viewpoint. These comments of yours directly above are a good example, and once again another call for outside opinions has devolved into a debate, which nearly always happens the three years or so I've interacted with you. Take it to dispute resolution. Tom Reedy (talk) 01:26, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Smatprt, this wildly emotional response is part of the problem. You point to diffs of editorial changes that have nothing whatever to do with the issue supposedly being discussed here. This is just blowing smoke, as the saying goes. And yes, this emotionalism does, in my experience, discourage other editors from commenting. This is why I think using the dispute resolution procedure would be more appropriate in this case. The editors there force the debate to remain on topic and about content. Paul B (talk) 16:24, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

"Wildly emotional"? Very amusing. I am not the ones making personal attacks, or repeatedly pasting in duplicate text from this same page. When you make an unfounded accusation, as you did above, I have the right to respond, as I did. And if I'm not mistaken, Tom, you are the majority contributor here, not me. And when taken as a team, you and Paul far outweigh me in edit count, word count and walls of text. Smatprt (talk) 18:45, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

I have repeatedly posted nothing whatever. But you certainly have repeated yourself over and over. I'll leave it to others to decide who is being emotional. I am concerned that your method of debate utterly negates the function of this board. And so now I will now repeat myself. Take this to dispute resolution. It's that way. Paul B (talk) 18:54, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Of course I've posted more than you have; it takes a lot more to defend than it does to accuse. Most of my verbiage here has been producing evidence from biographers who confirm Oxford's temperament and its consequences and the placement of that information. What I haven't done is harangue the independent editors who don't agree with me with a wall of text or try to draw a support voter back in the fray after other editors go the other way. Paul's given you the link to dispute resolution; use it. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:57, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

• Tom Reedy has a point in that the sources confirm Oxford was violent etc. The "synthesis" complaint is nothing but a summary of the sources. Our lead sections are supposed to be summaries, so I see nothing wrong. Binksternet (talk) 01:43, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Thank you Binksternet, for responding. Without intending to run you off, or stifle your input, I do have two questions: given WP:Weight, do you believe that these incidents of violence are so notable that they belong in the opening sentence of the lead paragraph, directly following the subject's name and title? Given WP:NPOV, is it proper to begin a sentence with a negative phrase (ie: Although he was horrible person, he did all these notable things...)? Thanks. Smatprt (talk) 18:45, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

I would be in favor of any lead section which included the idea that Oxford had a violent temper. I don't have a specific suggestion for the composition of that lead section. Binksternet (talk) 22:53, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

• I have not read through all the lengthy comments above, but looking at the main point here, I would say that the sentence in dispute belongs in the lead, but not the second sentence, or maybe just not in the first part of the second sentence. It does seem to me that right now the article says the most important thing about Oxford was that he was a horrible person and ruined himself financially. However there are who knows how many people in history who were not nice and spent money that they did not have. It is rather trivial to focus that much on personality. It would even be OK in my opinion to put that sentence the other way around, ie "Although he was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright, Oxford had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate. Since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works." I think that would follow the guidelines of WP:WEIGHT and WP:LEAD better.Smeat75 (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Also I think that lining three adjectives up like that is rather over-egging the pudding, more suitable for a personal essay or fiction than an encyclopaedia article, it gives the impression that whoever wrote that has very negative feelings about the subject. From a grammar handbook - ""In short, you cannot go wrong with two adjectives and using three is rare. (Lining up adjectives in a row is called 'enumeration of adjectives'.)""] I'd say choose two of them, reckless and violent or unpredictable and reckless, for example, but "reckless, unpredictable and violent" is one adjective too many. Smeat75 (talk) 21:16, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

I would support the above compromise. It seems sensible. I would suggest dropping "reckless". "Unpredictable" would serve in its place, and the sense of the statement is unaffected IMO. The question is whether to retain "violent". Was Oxford particularly "violent" within the context of the period? Ben Jonson killed a man by his own account in the Spanish Netherlands, and killed Gabriel Spenser in a duel, but I do not see the term "violent" in his lede. Irondome (talk) 21:23, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

That's because his violence didn't have all that much to do overall with his destiny. With Oxford, it was part of his temperament, which affected his life and career in major ways. As May (the source that is being cited to support the sentence, who is echoed by all of Oxford's biographers but one) wrote: "De Vere's prodigality was but one aspect of a self-indulgent, erratic, often belligerent temperament which undermined his youthful prospects as well as his later ambitions. His tendency toward violence ..." (I see May stacked three adjectives. He must not have read that textbook on writing.)Tom Reedy (talk) 00:56, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I disagree Tom. Elizabeth was surrounded by violent men, Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex even nearly drew his sword on her during the notorious cuffing incident. This didnt stop E continuing to place political trust and confidence in him. With Oxford it was more a combination of his irresponsibility and unpredictable nature, especially in potential political choices of political/court factions which was far more risky to a sovereign. She obviously percieved his unreliability in a general sense. Also May is beginning a new sentence there. May appears more preoccupied with Os self indulgence, belligerence (not necessary physical) and inconsistency. I dont think this violence thing flies really. Irondome (talk) 01:24, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

You do recall how Essex died, don't you? And he had talents Oxford clearly did not. In any case, all the biographers except one (B. M. Ward, an Oxfordian) mention his violent tendencies early (see my original post upstairs) and how they were part of his makeup that led to his downfall at court. And when one sentence begins with "X was but one aspect of Y that ...", the clear expectation is that what is named in the next sentence is yet another aspect of Y. Tom Reedy (talk) 01:55, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Look, I'm not wedded to its position in the sentence or even its place in the lead, but it was an important part of his personality that largely determined his fate, every biographer talks about it in the same context, and it should be in there. What should not be in the lead is a whitewash and a pack of lies about how celebrated he was for his poetry and playwrighting, because he wasn't. Tom Reedy (talk) 01:55, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Your points are well put and in a sober fashion Tom. Essex was in a different league. Which got him the chop finally. Elizabeth even put O onto an early form of disability pension when she recognised his inadequacies. Rather compassionate for the period. I would not go near a whitewash solution, but a fair synthesis of the two rival paragraphs in question. I do think this obviously very talented and artistic but dysfunctional young sod is rather being hung out to dry. Lets just show a little more balance. His violence is not backed up by facts, apart from the killing of a servant, and, as I have said, this action was unremarkable for the age and contemporary behaviour. I think the term "violence" is being overstated. Just my thoughts. Im uninvolved and love this subject, which I have gained some knowledge in, in recent years.Irondome (talk) 02:12, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I don't consider one half of one sentence of plain-spoken (cited) honesty "being hung out to dry." Have you read the rest of the lead? Here's what I wrote about him in another article, this one about his playing company (which is alas unfinished-hope to get to it this weekend). I've become quite fond of the old earl myself over the years as I've gotten to know the real person, not the tingod Oxfordian version of him. He's what I would call a remarkable second-rater, like the band Luna (band). Tom Reedy (talk) 02:50, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Its a sympathetic piece, no issues with your POV. Like the Luna ref. I just think we should substitute "volatile" for "violence". It seems to capture the sense more. He just doesnt seem particularly violent in biographic reality. We may be over-emphasising violence in a sense the sources are trying to clumsily capture, a general belligerance. Im fairly new to the whole debate and am working through the vast fascinating jungle of the Shakesperean authorship. "The reckoning" by C Nicholl and an old book, "The Shakespeare Claimants" by H.N Gibson origially excited me, so I have been increasingly drawn to the subject and more generally the period. Irondome (talk) 03:16, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Good question. And I, too, would support a compromise along those lines, assuming notability is established. I also note that the biographer being sourced here, Steven May spends far more time in his study discussing Oxford's patronage and learning. He sums it all up by describing Oxford as:

• "a nobleman with extraordinary intellectual interests and commitments', whose biography exhibits a 'lifelong devotion to learning."
• "Oxford's poems... comprise the earliest substantial alleviation of a dearth of courtier verse throughout the first decade of Elizabeth's rein. He is her first truly prestigious courtier poet"
• "Oxford's genuine commitment to learning throughout his career lends a necessary qualification to Stone's conclusion that De Vere simply squandered the more than 70,000 pounds he derived from selling off his patrimony...for which some part of this amount Oxford acquired a splendid reputation for nurture of the arts and sciences".

Are not these summaries more notable than his supposed "violence", especially given the context of the times? Smatprt (talk) 21:51, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

So May "sums it up" on pages 8, 9, and 14 of an article that begins on page 6 and ends on page 14? Tom Reedy (talk) 01:41, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I would suggest "unpredictable" and "volatile". They are hardly compliments after all. Irondome (talk) 21:58, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

I would agree to such a compromise. Somewhat along those lines, here was an earlier suggestion, where the actual quote (attributed and with a little context) was provided:

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Lauded in his own time as a lyric poet, playwright, sportsman, and patron of the arts, since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works. In the opinion of Stephen May, Oxford's modern editor, "Much as Oxford's rash, unpredictable nature minimized his success in the world of practical affairs, he deserves recognition not only as a poet but as a nobleman with extraordinary intellectual interests and commitments. Smatprt (talk) 22:16, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

You've been told already why that won't fly. Oxford was not "lauded" for anything, much less for poetry, playwrighting, and sports. He was praised excessively for his generosity by those he patronised. And the "opinion" of May (which indeed is a fact) happens to be shared by everyone of Oxford's biographers except B. M. Ward, who did in his book what you're trying to do here, and for the same reason. Tom Reedy (talk) 02:00, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

This will work for me:

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright, but he had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate. Since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.

One thing that needs to be taken into consideration is that this article will not be the same a year from now, so nothing is permanent. Tom Reedy (talk) 02:07, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree that the use of the three adjectives seems a bit much. "Unpredictable" sounds good, and I think if you're including "violent" you should reference it. And as someone who is totally unfamiliar with this subject, I would suggest that the bickering here is a bit off-putting. Ashleyleia (talk) 02:21, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Agreed. I think we should chill out on this a bit as an exchange of ideas. Remember you regulars of the entire question, some of us are new here to commenting on the subject :) Cheers.Irondome (talk) 02:32, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

The first version is too harsh, and the second is too oily. Thats the issue to an uninvolved editor. Its a question of getting the right feel in the lede, which doesnt prejudice or prejudge the new readers' attitude to the subject. He was a minor screw up and a court disaster waiting to happen. He also was aparrently genuinely talented. He didnt rapier servants on a daily basis. Emphasising violence in his lede skews it I feel.Irondome (talk) 02:43, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

We've spent enough time on this. If Paul agrees, I'll go with "reckless and volatile temperament", and in the second phrase of the sentence as I posted above. On reflection I think that it should have gone in the second phrase to begin with. Tom Reedy (talk) 03:59, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

SupportIrondome (talk) 04:03, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Question: If he was a courtier, is it that clear-cut that he never had any court responsibility (government responsibility I buy)? I´m very ignorant on how court worked in that time and place. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 06:54, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

He had a hereditary office, Lord Great Chamberlain, with ceremonial duties, which included ostensible jurisdiction over Westminster Hall during a coronation or a trial of his peers (such as the 1601 trials of Essex and Southampton), but as far as any position of responsibility, he was passed over in favor of more suitable members of the aristocracy. Every time he was offered a chance, he blew it. His self-absorption was complete, he had no empathetic ability nor did he ever learn to foresee the likely consequences of his behavior--very much an impetuous, live-in-the-moment person. Tom Reedy (talk) 12:59, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

But he is your little brother and you love him? ;-) Anyway, thanks for the answer. If his only court position was an inherited one, I´m satisfied. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:12, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

After wading through all of the above, how does this sound?

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was a patron of the arts, lyric poet and playwright, but he had a mutable disposition which led to the ruin of his estate. Since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.

Removing adjectives, removing arguments about him directly, removing stuff about not getting jobs, etc. The lede only needs to be a summary - the body of the article can get into how mean he was compared to his countrymen or not. Only one suggestion - no need to kill me as a humble servant <g>. Collect (talk) 13:37, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Er, "mutable"? I think that's taking euphemism too far. I'm happy with "reckless and volatile". Let's not forget that this is what made him "notable" in the eyes of his contemporaries and commenators over the ages (see A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature and ODNB for pre"Oxfordian" assessments). That's also the pretty-much undisputed view of non-fringe recent commentators. Oxford's wiki-bio is vastly longer and more detailed that that of, for example, the much more historically important Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex (who also wrote competent lyric verses, which are never mentioned in his bio, even though they are detailed in same source we use for Oxford's - Steven May). The only reason for this anomaly is the "Oxford/Shakespeare" partisans. We should be following what mainstream encyclopedias, biographers and historians have consistently stated is principally notable about him: his volatility, extravagance and his cultural interests. Paul B (talk) 16:54, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

User:Collect does cut out most of the editorializing, that's for sure. It's so clean and neutral, I could actually live with that. The last major argument going on here is: What precisely was the cause of the loss of his estates? To be sure he was greatly to blame, but how do we deal with these conflicting facts:

• The source (May) says "Oxford's genuine commitment to learning throughout his career lends a necessary qualification to Stone's conclusion that De Vere simply squandered the more than 70,000 pounds he derived from selling off his patrimony...for which some part of this amount Oxford acquired a splendid reputation for nurture of the arts and sciences".
• The article, 90% of which is sourced to Nelson, including "During his minority as her ward, one third of his estate had already reverted to the Crown, much of which Elizabeth had long since settled on Robert Dudley. Elizabeth demanded a further payment of £3,000 for overseeing the wardship and a further £4,000 for suing his livery.

When we have qualifying statements like this from the same sources, aren't we obliged to mention them. I'm not suggesting adding them into the lead. I'm suggesting that to say his temperament caused his ruin is not even accurate. It appears that of £70,000, 1/3rd was grabbed by the crown, then another £7,000. That's £33,000. Out of £70,000. No temperament to blame. Smatprt (talk) 17:00, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was a patron of the arts, lyric poet and playwright. Since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.

Just the facts. That's about as neutral as it gets. Smatprt (talk) 17:00, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

No, we don't just state the facts. We summarise the releavant content of the article as a whole - which includes the views of historians. And, yes, they all say that it was indeed his temperament that caused his ruin (the comparison with Essex, who had relatively little income, but great responsibilities, is pertinent). But really, we shouldn't be trying to argue against what mainstream writers have concluded. Nelson and Pearson detail his finances. We follow what they say in their overall conclusions. We don't start arguing the toss by totting up figures on this board. Clearly Pearson's analysis complicates the issue by pointing to complexities that need to be discussed and that should be properly included. In any case, who says that the "facts" you have listed are the most important ones? The ruination of his estate has been considered a hugely important feature of his generally not very important life by historians for centuries. It's as much of a fact as the rest. Paul B (talk) 17:06, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Regardless of whether he drank all his money up or gave it all away to missionary nuns in India, the fact is that his heriditary estates declined in good part because of his irresponsible prodigality. Give all your money to a charity instead of paying your mortgage and you're going to get kicked out of your house before long. Other, lesser nobles faced the same issues, because in truth they only held the lands in trust from the crown, yet they did not go under as quickly and as extravagantly as Oxford.

I'm on board, Irondome is on board, and Paul is on board. Let's quit wasting our time here. Tom Reedy (talk) 17:49, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

And no, Smatprt, this isn't the only issue that you brought up. Quoting from your original post above:

:2) The deletion of material here: followed by the remnants of the section being moved to the very bottom of the article. This was a proper summary of its parent article. Now, I don't know what the section is, or why it's been tacked on to the article in such a poorly edited version.

I suggest you take this to the WP:FRINGE noticeboard. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:27, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

The article isn't going anywhere, so let's just chill a bit, as Irondome said. There are lots of worthy suggestions to consider. Both users Comment and Keithbob, for example, think all the editorial stuff should go, and while I'm inclined to agree, I'm willing to continue working towards a compromise. Smatprt (talk) 18:36, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Suggested compromise versions

• 1 (current version - as amended by Tom) Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright, but his reckless and volatile temperament precluded him from attaining any courtly or governmental responsibility and led to the dissipation of his estate. Since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.

• 2 (suggested by Keithbob, with line removed) Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was a patron of the arts, lyric poet and playwright and since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.

• 3 (suggested by Collect) Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was a patron of the arts, lyric poet and playwright, but he had a mutable disposition which led to the ruin of his estate. Since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.

• 4 (suggested by smatprt) Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford (12 April 1550 – 24 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was a patron of the arts and sciences, lyric poet and playwright. Since the 1920s he has been the most popular alternative candidate proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.

The problem remains that there is a valid argument that if anything "led" to Oxford's ruin, it was the massive charges imposed by the crown when he became a ward, and again when he reached adulthood - a situation described by both Nelson and Pearson, as well as Ogburn and Anderson. So now matter how we slice it, trying to determine the true cause of his financial ruin, or assigning it all to his temperament, either approach remains problematic from an NPOV standpoint. Any suggestions from the independent editors? Smatprt (talk) 18:36, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

So IOW you're asking us to do original research and use non-RS sources, both of which are proscribed by WP policies. That's not what this noticeboard is about, and you're veering the conversation away from its purpose, which was to determine WP:POV and WP:WEIGHT. As a result the sentence has been modified and the POV and weight adjusted accordingly. You have been given several RS sources that state that Oxford's temperament led to his ruin. The sentence I suggested is backed by the sources--just go up a bit and re-read them. If you don't want to accept it, stop screwing around here and take it to dispute resolution.

Neither Ogburn nor Anderson can be used in a mainpage non-fringe article. They can be used in a fringe article in reporting what the fringe theory says. This is a historical biography, not Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship. Tom Reedy (talk) 18:21, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

As you know, Ogburn and Anderson are not acceptable sources, nor did they make any discoveries about his financial situation. Yes, Nelson and Pearson give due weight to the importance of wardship. This does not alter the fact that his extravagnace and volatility are given central importance by all non-paretisan writers, a fact that has been amply documented. Your version just oblioterates all mention of one of the historically most notable features of Oxford's life. It is quite properly descrinbed as a whitewash. Paul B (talk) 20:03, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I know know such thing. I've checked the RS Noticeboard archives and I find no disqualification of either Ogburn or Anderson. As far as I'm aware, we can include facts reported by Ogburn or Anderson, but not their opinions. Same with Nelson, who is extremely partisan in his writing. Their opinions have to be noted as such. But undisputed facts can come from numerous sources. Of course, if you have a link to a RS determination on this, I will stand corrected. Smatprt (talk) 20:38, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

For the uninitated, please can you provide a brief summary of the issues with Anderson and Ogburn Irondome (talk) 20:45, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Ogburn and Anderson are two Oxfordians who wrote incredibly lengthy books (as fringe theorists are wont to do) promoting Oxford as Shakespeare, based mainly on finding Oxford's putative biography in the Shakespeare works. WP:Fringe#Sourcing_and_attribution is applicable here, as well as the essay on identifying reliable sources, which states "Some people masquerading as scholars actually present fringe views outside of the accepted practice, and these should not be used." Smatprt has enough experience at the RS noticeboard ( ) to know that they are not acceptable references for this article; he is being disingenuous in using a technicality, i.e. since they haven't been specifically ruled on they are reliable on account of their publishing houses. Tom Reedy (talk) 20:11, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Probably immaterial to this particular issue, since all the sources mention the huge charges imposed by the crown on Oxford and other royal wards. FYI - Both Charlton Ogburn and Mark Anderson (writer) are published experts on Oxford (both wrote landmark works in the Authorship debate), but because they are authorship theorists, it has been argued that their entire literary output is therefore not reliable. I have never understood this argument. Smatprt (talk) 21:07, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

That was just a general req for clarification. I dont want to muddy the waters here. So there is agreement in the sources as to Es financial predations on O. From my own still relatively scant knowledge she seems financially ruthless in that respect, and she claimed several aristocratic scalps indirectly by hitting them in the purse. Irondome (talk) 21:21, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

How many of those whose financial scalp she took received a $1000 annual annuity after being so sheared? Oxford was not one of Elizabeth's enemies. Tom Reedy (talk) 20:14, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

I never thought or said she was. She was financially ruthless with the aristocracy as a whole. I have stated (somewhere) that her annuity was in effect an early form of disability benefit. She appeared to be wise to O's failings whatever their origin, and attempted to support him. Not the action of an enemy.Irondome (talk) 20:23, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Here is the link to the paragraph in the article that gives some detail, all referenced to Nelson., while Pearson devotes an entire book to it. Page 1 sums it up: . Smatprt (talk) 21:37, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Neither Anderson nor Ogburn are "published experts on Oxford". That's a pure untruth. Neither has any expertise whatever in Elizabthan history. In order to be descroibed as published experts they would have to have published in academic journals or with academic publishers. At minimum they should have had positive reviews from such journals. Anderson is a journalist and Ogburn was a miscellaneous writer (and various other things). Neither's books have been taken at all seriously by experts in Elizabethan history or literature. Nelson specifically says that Ogburn's book is completely useless (I don't think he commented on Anderson, who is not even considered worth mentioning by anyone I know of with an interest in the English Renaissance. The book is a complete joke). It's ridiculous that either of these authors are being presented as "experts". It's like describing Graham Hancock as an expert on ancient history. Of course if Smatprt wishes to revisit this issue he knows where the reliable sources board is. Paul B (talk) 22:11, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

Please, there is no need to accuse anyone of "pure untruth". And no need to revisit an issue that has never approached anything close to a consensus. Again, provide a link to the RS Noticeboard decision or just acknowledge that the issue has never been decided. In any case, one can be an expert without being published in academic journals. Both these researchers have been published by mainstream "independent third-party sources with a reputation for fact-checking", as the RS requirement goes. And both have been reviewed at length by "high-quality mainstream publications". This nonsense that only academics are considered RS here on Misplaced Pages is, well, just that - nonsense.Smatprt (talk) 23:16, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

When you say something you know to be untrue according to Misplaced Pages's rules, then "pure untruth" is polite. When you accuse an editor of COI because he is a genuine published expert you are are guilty of wikilawering of the worst kind. The general issue has of course been raised repeatedly at WP:RSN. However, you are free to raise the specific issues of Ogburn or Anderson's books at any time you want. You know perfectly well that they fail WP:RS by miles. To imply otherwise on this board is simply disingenuous. Paul B (talk) 11:39, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

To return to the point, however... Yes, User:Irondome, there is agreement in the sources as to Es financial predations on O. And I mean the uncontested sources. Cheers. Smatprt (talk) 23:18, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

@Irondome: Oxford eventually gained control of all of his lands, and Elizabeth did not "confiscate" a third of his estate. Read Nelson, pp. 191-4. He cuts to the chase on p. 193: "Given that fiscal restraint was a trait remote from Oxford's character, the story of his life becomes in large part the story of the loss of his lands....By about 1592 Oxford had alienated every landed estate inherited from his father, all the estates received at the hands of the Queen, and a London estate he would purchase in 1589, Fisher's Folly. The very roof over his deathbed was secure only because ownership was retained by his second wife's family." And from 194: "Not only would Oxford make no will at the time of his death in 1604, but his widow would refuse to take out the normal letters of administration--for who would bequeath non-existent property, or who would willingly accept an inheritance whose debts vastly outweighed its assets?" Tom Reedy (talk) 23:06, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Inching toward consensus, but not yet

We apparently have no consensus yet, and no compromise on this issue. The fact remains that the Ward system and QE1 played a part in Oxford's financial downfall. That is indisputable and sourced to Pearson (and has not been challenged by anyone here). We also have RS Stephen May's qualification (currently being ignored) that his "commitment to learning" and extensive patronage also played a part:

• "Oxford's genuine commitment to learning throughout his career lends a necessary qualification to Stone's conclusion that De Vere simply squandered the more than 70,000 pounds he derived from selling off his patrimony...for which some part of this amount Oxford acquired a splendid reputation for nurture of the arts and sciences".

Given this qualification, which is not being included, how can the bolded part of this sentence remain?:

• "Oxford was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright, but his reckless and volatile temperament precluded him from attaining any courtly or governmental responsibility and led to the dissipation of his estate

Also note this discussion ], where user:ErrantX, a respected editor and Administrator, noted:

• "The badly phrased damnation, along with the red flag of a reference in the lead, suggests a deliberate attempt to smear more than anything else."

Can anyone at this Noticeboard offer any input or put us on a path towards reolution? Smatprt (talk) 00:16, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

In all my above contributions I have certainly critically explored O's personality without any preconceptions, and have gained valuable knowledge from all editors, not least you Smatprt on this area. It would seem he was genuinely talented and artistic, who was recognised in his own time as having what would now be described as "personality disorders" through no fault of his own, and this was sufficiently recognised by E no less, who attempted to provide for him financially, in a modest sense throughout his life, as I understand.. This indicates a perceptive awareness of O's probably medical misfortune. She also, with major members of the court circle in fact arguably protected him from himself by not giving him responsibility. Often Responsibility in the late 16th C. led to the block, and O wouldnt have lasted five minutes in the jungle of contemporary court politics. Literally. There is evidence that he was regarded as being ill- judged in his maturity, especially with regard to positions of power, and there appears to be anecdotal evidence of a "volatile" or at least confrontational temperament. I strongly disagreed with the term "violent" being in the lede. None of this I believe constitutes a smear. He is an interesting and flawed personality, and I think its permissible for WP to cover that aspect of him. I am indeed personally increasingly sympathetic to O. But I dont believe the bolded proposed wording is unfair. I would suggest only "and led partly to the dissipation of his estate" Irondome (talk) 00:58, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

So now Smatprt is not only trying to reopen an almost-dead discussion, he's canvassing other editors who haven't participated in this discussion in a desperate attempt to change the outcome. The question is so important he has ignored it for almost two weeks, but he must keep the battle front open by dragging it out to keep it from being archived.

The sentence in question now reads, "Oxford was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright, but his reckless and volatile temperament precluded him from attaining any courtly or governmental responsibility and led to the dissipation of his estate." It is more than sufficiently referenced with citations from the top experts, but since Smatprt knows that Oxford wrote Shakespeare, their scholarly opinions aren't good enough, so here we are again on another marathon quest to right a great wrong in hopes that the regular editors will succumb to fatigue so that attrition will win what cannot be gained by discussion of policy and guideline. Not one thing has changed in his behavior, he's just moving slower to try to stay under the radar. Tom Reedy (talk) 03:05, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Since Smatprt is invoking ErrantX to argue against the sentence as it now stands, let's review the entire sentence.

"The badly phrased damnation, along with the red flag of a reference in the lead, suggests a deliberate attempt to smear more than anything else. If I recall this idiotic dispute, both "sides" are guilty of either hagiography or smear. Which just leaves us a shoddy article and endless arguments over a single sentence in the lead."

Smatprt is being deceptive here (no surprise; see #4 under Discussion), not only because he selectively quoted ErrantX; but also because the comment was made about the original sentence, "Although he had a reckless, unpredictable, and violent nature that precluded him from attaining any court or government responsibility and led to the ruination of his estate, Oxford was a patron of the arts and noted in his own time as a lyric poet and playwright".

ErrantX's comment was in reply to a comment from another editor, Guy: "The example in question is a historical figure, and the judgment of history is as the article says. He was a selfish, venal, decadent man. Misplaced Pages is not censored for the protection of those who wish their preferred Shakespeare authorship conspiracy theory candidate were more credible."

In addition, Smatprt is trying to canvass ErrantX under a false pretense]; he writes on ErrantX's talk page, "You were mentioned here (1). I have been accused in this discussion of putting words in peoples mouths, so I am requesting you look in and verify my quote of your statement. Thanks. Nobody has questioned ErrantX's statement or said that Smatprt is "putting words in his mouth". Smatprt is the editor who brought him up, but he is dishonestly trying to make it appear as if someone else is questioning ErrantX's statement. Why does he want ErrantX's input? Other editors at that discussion also commented, yet they weren't canvassed. Because he perceives him as sympathetic to his cause.

As I stated above, this is just more of the same time-wasting strategy that has been all too evident in dealing with Smatprt. Tom Reedy (talk) 03:56, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

ErrantX's comment suggests an off-the-cuff intuitive response without any specific knowledge of the topic. It makes generalisations that are, IMO, hard to sustain: "badly phrased damnation" (what is badly phrased about it?) "along with the red flag of a reference in the lead" (numerous articles have references in the lede. It's only a red flag to the extent that it indicates the statement might disputed by someone); "suggests a deliberate attempt to smear more than anything else" (there is absolutely no evidence of this at all). As we have shown repeatedly, this was the most notable feature of Oxford's life before he became a 'Shakespeare candidate'. He was known as the "spendthrift Earl". It is commented on by virtually every biography, short or long, ever written about him. It has even occasioned detailed studies, notably Pearson's, on the exact circumstances of the ruination. Paul B (talk) 21:13, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Sure guys, keep up your personal attacks and go ahead and smear other editors too. It's what you guys do. Canvassing? Hardly. ErrantX commented on this very subject on another page so his comments are relevant. but go ahead, Paul, attack him too. As you pointed out, Tom, no big change was made to the article, just your switching the order of a sentence. And for all your bullying, you can't even follow the simple policy of acknowledging the same "qualification" that exists in the source. While we are at it, another problem with this sentence is "precluded him from attaining any courtly or government responsibility". Any??? Really?According to the article (which your lead is supposed to reflect}:

• Oxford was "in March Oxford was to be sent to Scotland as one of the hostages for James's safety."
• Oxford "was 'the senior of the twenty-five noblemen' who rendered verdicts at the trials of Essex and Southampton for treason."
• "Cecil eventually obtained a position for him under the Earl of Sussex in a Scottish campaign the following spring".
• "In August, Oxford attended Paul de Foix, who had come to England to negotiate a marriage between Elizabeth and the Duke of Anjou, the future King Henry III of France."
• Oxford refers to "mine office" in a letter dated 1594, writing "My very good Lord. if it please you to remember, that about half a year or there about past, I was a suitor to your lordship, for your favor. that whereas I found sundry abuses, whereby both her majesty, & myself, were in mine office greatly hindered, that it would please your Lordship, that I might find such favor from you, that I might have the same redressed." Since as you keep pointing out, he had no real duties as Lord High Chamberlain other than ceremonial, what office was being hindered? Historians are not sure, but he refers to "his office" twice in this letter. Entire letter here: ]

Now I'm sure Tom and his little gang will say these all meant nothing, there was no office, no duties, rendering a verdict in a treason trial was not a responsibility, being sent to guarantee James' safety was not in important duty, etc. etc. But these duties are referenced in the article, and put the lie to another aspect of Tom's grand sweeping statement that he had no courtly responsibilities. Smatprt (talk) 15:45, 12 April 2013 (UTC) Tom - first - I've been a bit busy for the last few weeks. also -[REDACTED] is not nearly the big important thing in my life. I actually have a job and a family to take care of. How I manage my time is really none of your affair. I am a volunteer here. Please remember that. Tom - second - Regarding your misleading accusation above, what I actually said was: "I have been accused in this discussion of putting words in peoples mouths" I didn't say words in Errant's mouth as you mistakenly assert. Here is your earlier accusation that I was referring to:

• "Thanks for putting words in another editor's (Keithbob) mouth..." - Tom Reedy ] So please stop misleading Irondome and other editors here. are you ever going to respond to why you refuse to use May's qualification, as per policy? Are you ever going to acknowledge the duties and responsiblities that Oxford did have? Smatprt (talk) 15:45, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Irondome - Thanks for hanging in there and not being chased off by all the personal attacks. May I express my regrets and all the bs you have to sift thru. Smatprt (talk) 15:45, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

I admit that it very difficult not to make a "personal attack" against you for reasons I would be happy to discuss at length. Your continual self-presentation as a victim of abuse is particularly irksome. However, I've made no personal attack directed at ErrantX. Pursuing vendettas on this board will serve no purpose. It's about a "neutral point of view" regarding articles, not editors. Paul B (talk) 16:18, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Well, I'm sorry you find it difficult not to make personal attacks. How sad. Glad to hear you say "It's about a "neutral point of view" regarding articles, not editors." Too bad you three can't follow that sentiment. Smatprt (talk) 16:35, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

On the issue of substance: you list several events in Oxford's life that in your view constitute positions of "courtly or government reponsibility":

1. He was a hostage (how is that a position of reponsibility of any kind?).

2. He was on a jury in a trial the outcome of which was a foregone conclusion. I do not consider that to be a position of "courtly or government" respobnsibility.

3. He was in a military campaign. Again, being a soldier is not "courtly or government" responsibility.

4. He was an attendant to Paul de Foix, a foreign dignitary who was the one who actually had the responsibility and was doing the negotiating. Oxford's "job" was to be polite to him.

5. he uses the phrase "mine office" in a letter. Is this even an argument. It just means "my duties" in a generic sense.

As far as I am concerned these are no more positions of responsibility in a meaningful sense than being asked to hold the queen's fan while she changed her gloves is a position of "courtly" responsibility. This is a misuse of language to remove meaningful material which is factually accurate by a kind of pedantry and linguistic equivocation. It has nothing to do with NPOV as far as I can see. I think this board's time is being wasted. Paul B (talk) 17:01, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

In fact, the sources cited say exactly that: Oxford was never given a position of responsibility, and for good reason, no matter how much OR Smatprt comes up with.

If pointing out Smatprt's dishonest, tendentious and time-wasting editing strategies (of which this discussion is a good example) are personal attacks, then count me as guilty. His techniques shift according to the situation, and coming from two back-to-back year-long topic bans, the only thing that he has changed is his speed of execution. Tom Reedy (talk) 17:42, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

This discussion is now moot (explain that, atheists!) unless some other editor cares to pick up the torch. Tom Reedy (talk) 20:27, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Wow, I see my comment has caused quite a discussion! First, all I can say is that I am deeply disappointed in everyone here, you've behaved very poorly and should be ashamed. I've been watching this dispute from afar for some time; as a topic I have some knowledge of. It's disappointing because after pages and pages of dispute all we have to show is a not-very-good article.

The fact that you have endlessly debated the phrasing of a lead sentence is one of the biggest "red flags" on Misplaced Pages. Leads should naturally and clearly evolve out of the article prose, and content disputes should almost always focus on the latter. Arguing over lead sentences is the easy way out, because you can stuff in references and argue over individual words, without actually producing anything of substance.

Take an honest look at the article; do you think it is of good quality?

And this is the problem. Don't get me wrong; I consider smartpt's stance a fringe viewpoint. But I've watched that article flit backwards and forwards between praise and damnation - with little consideration for writing something informative. The talk page is full of endless discussion over editors interpretation, and this is where we end up.

Irondome's comment is encouraging; and I'd agree that his description of Oxford reflects scholarly coverage. Sadly, our article does not. I realise this is a strong comment, but I hope it wakes a few people up from being "in a dispute" to concentrate on why we are here: to write a good article. --Errant 00:27, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

I for one am not ashamed, sorry to disappoint, and you offer no other solution about how to deal with these types of problems--about as useful as telling a drug addict to "Just say no." Yeah, it's a shitty article, no doubt. The question is do you want a shitty article with accurate information or do you want a shitty article that reflects the wet dreams of those who fantasize about Oxford? For years anybody with any editorial skills whatsoever shied away from working on that and any related articles because they didn't have the stomach to put up with all the bullshit of dealing with a committed SPA POV editor. The article could be FA quality, and now that the distraction of having to deal with such an editor has been removed, it has a chance to become one. Am I ashamed of being part of whatever it took to clear the way for that possibility to happen? Not a chance. Would that we had more editors with the tenacity to stick it out to the end of the indeterminable Misplaced Pages processes with tendentious editors. Misplaced Pages would be better off with more such editors and with fewer finger-waggers ready to jump in after the tough work has been taken care of. Tom Reedy (talk) 04:02, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

This has been a fascinating engagement for me personally with the current thought on WP about the entire Shakespearean authorship debate, which I will stalk with interest. I must say that O's linkage with the authorship is rather weak to say the least. Give me a Christopher Marlowe spirited-away-and-he-never-really- paid The Reckoning a la Charles Nicholl (author). A masterpiece of popular history that really switched me on to the oddly contemporary nuances of the role of the state interacting with the lower orders, including Marlowe himself, despite his talent. In a sense this weakens the anti-Stratfordians whole case, for it demonstrates the role of the "ordinary man" at the highest levels of state activity and espionage at this period. Indeed early capitalism had arrived, with new money and London merchants financing the new colonies and feeling its political muscle as a class. Shakespeare was just such a man, albeit only in malt hoarding and money-lending at rip off interest rates. The period is almost proto-Thatcherite. Social mobility indeed. It gives great originally researched glimses of the sophistication of the late Tudor police - State fighting an ideological war on all fronts for its very survival against the Catholic Spanish world superpower, and even its communication with and payment of its agents. Give me Marlowe as a candidate anytime :)

I just think that this would be an interesting and useful article to WP users whether or not the candidacy issue is raised. I would argue he is sufficiently notable, and much work has been done on his various characteristics and personalities. I wonder if there is a medical study of his personality out there? It could be a great article, if we stopped fixating about the Shakespeare "thing". Cheers all. Irondome (talk) 02:41, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

I've refrained from joining the fray because I'm an interested party, and it might have seemed like ganging up. The problem in these articles is POV defensive nit-picking editing by hero-worshippers. The problem on the talk pages was that the plaintiff has a well-documented strategy of making an absurd article edit, then either on the talk-page or on various noticeboards, engaging in an extenuating war of attrition in order to get a "compromise". The technique is not scholarly but one characteristic of political in-fighting where two positions representing two 'democratically' formed constituencies, are required to thrash out an agreement that allows both parties some leverage and partial satisfaction. Scholarship doesn't however work the way filibustering in the US Congress or Senate does, or the Kabuki tactics of parties to the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, where stalemates lead to unhappy mediations and chronic mutual hostility. Observers asked to pitch in and provide neutral advice in such contentious areas step on a minefield if they think that 'mediation' between fringe-lunatic positions and standard secular scholarship requires a balanced weighing of the rights to representation in terms of egalitarian principles. In this case, the RS regard the fringe view as irremediably disturbed, conceptually, and endless negotiations over one word, then another, as we have had here, are pointless exercises in attrition and futility. That article, in any case, has been thoroughly worked over once by Nina Green, who overhauled it from top to bottom with the encouragement, or certainly no bickering bitching edit by edit as her work was in progress, from those of us who otherwise regard anti-Stratfordism as nonsense. What is requires now is a comprehensive reorganization on thematic, not chronological lines, unobstructed by our congenital nitpicker's disruptiveness. Tom and Paul and a few others managed to achieve FA status for the SAQ article, which suffered from the same disruptiveness until the disturbing presence was suspended, and if assisted by a few accomplished editors in a fresh editing environment, could probably achieve the same end with this de Vere article.Nishidani (talk) 09:16, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

Denying the obvious?

There is a dispute as to which line is better

—My proposal sounds (to me at least) a lot more neutral and objectively accurate than the current lead section.

I genuinely don't feel such a basic change merits an edit war .

Now, to omit the Indian POV altogether and to say that it's a ″territory of Pakistan″ when there is a long-standing international dispute over that very territory, is undue. That's all. Mr T 13:37, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

• For those reading this, please find more on the discussion at Talk:Gilgit–Baltistan#Recent edits. Mrt's arguments are inherently flawed. Mar4d (talk) 14:43, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
• Comment: Why does it have to be boiled down into one sentence? Why not follow the opening sentence with the last sentence of the first lead paragraph? Tom Reedy (talk) 15:12, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Tom, yes but in that case we would need to do something about the current wording. Because "territory of Pakistan" is implicitly invoking a sense of belonging i.e. as though GB inherently belongs to Pakistan no matter what. Mr T 17:20, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

It doesn't imply "always and forever" to me, but then again I have no skin in this particular game. I think you're reading too much in it, which is a common problem with editors who take sides on nationalist disputes and consider Misplaced Pages to be just another battle front. The rest of the article makes the situation clear. Either sentence would be fine if it were followed by or combined with the last sentence of the paragraph. Tom Reedy (talk) 19:26, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

I don't see why the article can't say something like: GB is a disputed territory that is presently controlled by Pakistan. -- — Keithbob • Talk • 20:11, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

I was thinking the same thing. Further, if it's a disputed territory (which it certainly appears to be), then it should say so in the lead paragraph, not in graphs 2 or 3. Otherwise the opening would not be NPOV. The same would apply to the article on Jammu and Kashmir (assuming references support it) that is mentioned in the edit summaries, otherwise a double standard would exist. Smatprt (talk) 00:15, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Mrt asked me to weigh in here. To me, the sentence supported by Mar4d and DS seems obviously correct. What is this place (Gilgit-Baltistan)? It's a territory, a region, an area, that makes up a singular entity as defined by those both inside and outside of it. Who administers it? Pakistan. Thus, it is correct to say that it is the northernmost administrative territory of Pakistan. Adding "under Pakistani control" is unnecessarily clunky that doesn't even imply the things that Mrt is trying to point out (that there's a dispute). Furthermore, the second sentence does imply anything permanent or intrinsic about the control. Thus, given the choice between two sentences that say basically the same thing, we should choose the more concise version. Qwyrxian (talk) 02:17, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Agree. After reviewing the issue the second sentence seems to be the correct form. A careful reading of the first passage. "Gilgit–Baltistan is the northernmost administrative territory under Pakistani control." asks the obvious question. "Gilgit–Baltistan is the northernmost administrative territory (of what?) under Pakistani control." In which case the answer is Kashmir. But all questions are quickly answered negating the need for a clunky first sentence. I really don't see the big issue here. Arzel (talk) 03:36, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Why not add "disputed territory" and be clear about things?  little green rosetta(talk)
central scrutinizer  03:46, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

@Keithbob: "I don't see why the... is presently controlled by Pakistan." ——I couldn't agree more. That would be the clearest version if it ever materializes.
@Qwyrxian:Thank you for responding. "we should choose the more concise version." - how is it a question of conciseness or clunkiness? :) All I am trying to put forward is that "region/territory/area under Pakistani control" is objectively more correct than "region/territory/area of Pakistan". Yes it's a small and subtle change, yet we are here and that should go to show the extent of ossification our contentious articles have attained.
@Arzel: "asks the obvious question" - I humbly disagree. The thing is it is only an "administrative territory of Pakistan" in Pakistan's POV, we're supposed to be neutral and balanced. I am not saying the claim of Mar4d is wrong per se but A. it doesn't take into account the dispute B. sends a specious message as it presents only Pakistani POV.
@Little green rosetta: I agree if that's a compromise we can reach.

P.S. I am open towards proposals for minor changes in the wording. Mr T 05:28, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

One other thing is if we say "GB is part of XYZ country" and then follow it up with "it is disputed" it might seem (not always but more often than not) that previously at some point of time XYZ country enjoyed the unfettered proprietary right over that chunk of land, and then later it became a subject of dispute. Which is exactly contrary to reality. Right since 1947 (independence of India and Pakistan) GB, along with Indian part of Kashmir, is the subject of serious dispute. In that sense dispute hasn't settled yet and these region's are only militarily controlled by XYZ country, they don't belong to any country until the dispute is formally concluded. I would like to refrain from commenting here from now on. Mr T 06:23, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

I don't see where it's a "Pakistani POV" at all. That's like saying "Tibet is in the People's Republic of China" is a Chinese POV. The reality of the situation is that one of Pakistan's administrative territories is Gilgit–Baltistan. Reality is not POV except to those who don't like it. Tom Reedy (talk) 06:26, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

"I don't see where it's a "Pakistani POV" at all" - you still don't see it as Pakistani POV? Besides, Tibet is not claimed by another country as its own. Maybe you don't want to see it as a Pakistani POV but some of the more neutral sources, the tertiary sources describe Gilgit-Baltistan not as a territory of Pakistan but as being under Pakistani control. Are they not reliable? That's the difference. Don't divert issue here. , , , etc. Britannica describes it as "Baltistan, geographic region of Gilgit-Baltistan, in the Pakistani-administered sector of the Kashmir region".
"The reality of the situation is that one of Pakistan's administrative territories is Gilgit–Baltistan." - That's only partial reality. There is more to it than that (which I have talked about already above). And not mentioning the other side of the dispute is censorship and not neutral. Kindly again read what I wrote. Mr T 11:05, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

• Along the lines of what editors Keithbob and little green rosetta have suggested, why not switch out the first two paragraphs with something along these lines:

Gilgit–Baltistan (Urdu: گلگت بلتستان‎, Balti: གིལྒིཏ་བལྟིསྟན, formerly known as the Northern Areas), is part of the disputed Kashmir region, an area of conflict between India and Pakistan since the two countries' independence and partition in 1947. Currently a territory administered by Pakistan, Gilgit–Baltistan borders the administrative territory of Azad Kashmir to the south, the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to the west, the Wakhan Corridor of Afghanistan to the north, the Xinjiang autonomous region of China to the east and northeast, and the Indian-administered state of Jammu and Kashmir to the southeast.

Just a suggestion as to how you all might compromise on this. Note the link to the Wiki article on the Kashmir conflict, for those wanting further info on this longstanding dispute. Regardless of the final wording, the fact that the region is disputed and claimed by both countries really needs to be mentioned right up front. Good luck, everyone :-) Smatprt (talk) 06:45, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

-I added the bracket —Mr T

I disagree, please see below. The fact that the territory is part of a disputed region is clearly explained in the paragraph that follows the lead. The opening sentence should start by explaining what the region is, and the fact is that it is an autonomous administrative territory that is a subdivision of Pakistan and under de facto jurisdiction of the government of Pakistan before anything else. The lead proposed by you is long and also does not meet WP:NPOV. For example, when you mention it as disputed right in the opening sentence, the question boils down to: disputed by whom? It is only disputed by India. The international community (United Nations) for instance is neutral on the matter; it recognises that there is a political/territorial dispute on Kashmir but does not comment on the legitimacy of Gilgit-Baltistan being a territory governed by Pakistan. Are you understanding my point? It's one thing to neutrally recognise that a territorial dispute exists over Kashmir and another thing to say that GB is illegally occupied. The international community is only concerned with the former, not the latter. Your usage of the word "controlled" is also unacceptable - that term is used in India. Even the United Nations does not use that wordage, preferring instead to call the region Pakistan-administed Kashmir and Indian-administered Kashmir respectively. Mar4d (talk) 07:17, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

• I like the proposed wording by Smatprt.

  "It is only disputed by India." - what does that supposed to mean? Of course it's India that disputes it. So? Does it not merit a mention? "(United Nations) for instance is neutral on the matter" - yes of course the UN is neutral and that is why even World Bank declined to provide loan for the construction of Diamir-Bhasha dam because of its disputed status. That is all the more reason to provide the reader with the information about the conflict. We ought to be neutral too. —Mr T 11:05, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

• Comment Please see my comment on this at Talk:Gilgit–Baltistan#Recent edits. The way that the lead currently is (Gilgit–Baltistan is the northernmost administrative territory of Pakistan) is neutral and perfectly makes sense. It explains that Gilgit-Baltistan is a subdivision of Pakistan while also differentiating it from the provinces by mentioning that it is a federally administered territory. And this fits the constitutional definition of Gilgit Baltistan too: GB is not meant to be a province, it's an autonomous administrative territory that is part of the Pakistani federation. There is no dispute over this fact. Many countries have territories that exist alongside states/provinces. So again, the opening sentence is an accurate description and I do not think the wording can be any more clearer, neutral, concise and more accurate. As far as the Kashmir dispute is concerned, the paragraph right below mentions that the region is part of Kashmir which is disputed - what more do you need? Adding in the same into the article's opening sentence is not only redundant and trivial but also WP:POV by repetition. If I may add btw, Mrt3366 is setting a very POV-ish precedent on articles using his personal argument; see the mount K2 article for example, where he changed the lead to this extremely POV-version: K2 is the second-highest mountain on Earth, after Mount Everest. It is located on the border between Baltistan, in the Gilgit–Baltistan region a disputed area controlled by Pakistan, and the Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County of Xinjiang, China. ) and at Nanga Parbat also: Located in the Gilgit-Baltistan, a disputed region controlled by Pakistan, Nanga Parbat is... . Lastly, I will add that the article on Indian-administered Kashmir, an internationally disputed territory, currently starts of by mentioning the territory as the "northernmost state of India." I'm amazed that we're even discussing this for this article while the same approach has not been advocated for the latter article. This reeks of double standards. Mar4d (talk) 07:02, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Oh dear, I believe you failed to read my suggestion correctly. I suggested replacing the first two paragraphs. No repetition, no redundancy. My only point, and I believe the point made my several other uninvolved editors, is that the dispute should be mentioned up front. Regarding the other article you mention, simply start a section on it and I'm sure editors here will chime in, with similar advice for that article. But this section was started about the Gilgit–Baltistan article and only that article. (Personally, I would agree that the same approach should be taken at the Kashmir article, and would be happy to say so if you start a section on it.)

And note I changed controlled to administered in this edit. Smatprt (talk) 07:24, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

The dispute is already mentioned in the opening of the article so I do not understand what you mean by replacing the first two paragraphs. And again, the first sentence of the article does not need modification, it is accurate per the reasons stated above. Why do you believe the dispute needs to be mentioned "up front"? Also, I do not see any consensus building up at the moment to suggest that any part of the article needs replacement or modification. The discussion here is currently oriented towards whether the article lead even needs any modification, not proposals of what it should read like. Mar4d (talk) 08:12, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

• Mar4d, I understand you're predisposed to hate any proposal that wants to clarify the disputedness of the GB-sector of Kashmir but Smatprt's proposal is sensible one and to me an acceptable compromise for both of us. Guys please check out Talk:Gilgit–Baltistan#Neutrality, Talk:Gilgit-Baltistan/Dispute. Other sources that point to the disputed status of GB-sector: "Chitkara, M. G. (2003). Combating terrorism. New Delhi: APH Publ. Corp. p. 288. ISBN 8176484156.", , Google scholars, , there are numerous other sources. Mr T 11:08, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

You cannot claim what I'm predisposed to "hate". The only reason I am here is to maintain WP:NPOV. The opening sentence above is vague, redundant, clunkly, not to mention long and also a POV nightmare. Mentioning the Kashmir conflict with India before introducing the region is an administrative territory is also WP:UNDUE. Mar4d (talk) 11:55, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

• See the map from Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division, Washington, D.C. 20540-4650 USA. CIA describes Kashmir as "the site of the world's largest and most militarized territorial dispute with portions under the de facto administration of China (Aksai Chin), India (Jammu and Kashmir), and Pakistan (Azad Kashmir and Northern Areas)" CIA says here and here: "the Pakistani-administered portion of the disputed Jammu and Kashmir region consists of two administrative entities: Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan".
  Yet while talking of omitting this assertion you harangue me on maintaining neutrality? Mr T 05:40, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

• Question: For Mr. T (Mrt3366)- Hypothetically speaking, if the changes suggested above (or something similar) were enacted, would you support similar changes to the article on Indian-administered Kashmir? Mar4d has pointed out this area, which is also "an internationally disputed territory", "currently starts of by mentioning the territory as the "northernmost state of India." This would address any "double standards". Would you support near-identical wording and simultaneous changes being made?Smatprt (talk) 19:26, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

Sorry if I kept you waiting. But my answer is I would support any change that would raise the level of neutrality in articles related to India, Pakistan or anywhere else for that matter. Why do you ask, is it not obvious? Why is my neutrality being put to test? I don't support the phrase "northernmost state of India" either.
Nevertheless I fail to see how this questionnaire is relevant here. You know that "this section was started about the Gilgit–Baltistan article and only that article."

P.S. I would like to point to constitutional status of Jammu and Kashmir in India based on that we may also modify the language further. Again these are not exactly germane to our current topic. "Jammu and Kashmir" should be discussed elsewhere. Kindly don't digress from our current topic. Mr T 05:13, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

1) We're not changing anything, neither do I see any strong consensus here for that. 2) "You know that this section was started about the Gilgit–Baltistan article and only that article" - doesn't matter actually. In fact, I am going to change the title of the thread to include J&K as the latter is clearly relevant to the discussion here and it's scope. 3) "P.S. I would like to point to constitutional status of Jammu and Kashmir in India based on that we may also modify the language further" - doesn't matter, again. What status India gives to Jammu and Kashmir does not negate the international designation of the region. You're so ardent about bringing a change on the GB article and yet display leniency on J&K? Double standards!?? Mar4d (talk) 15:12, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

"In fact, I am going to change the title of the thread to include J&K as the latter is clearly relevant to the discussion here and it's scope." - I will not allow you to do that, you first start a discussion at J&K talk or better yet, just go ahead and put the changes you like to insert in J&K article. Stop badgering here.

"What status India gives to Jammu and Kashmir does not negate the international designation of the region" - it matters a lot as far as Indian POV is concerned, don't say it doesn't matter. But I never said I was opposed to J&K changes, did I? Why the heck do you want to create unnecessary fuss about that here? No body is opposed to it here. That's why I am wondering why not incorporate a similar and much relevant change in gilgit baltistan article? What is the matter with you? J&K is not directly relevant here. And we have reached some sort of consensus (which doesn't have to be unanimous). Mr T 16:24, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Wrong, strong consensus is formed through agreement between multiple editors and there is no such consensus here. "it matters a lot as far as Indian POV is concerned, don't say it doesn't matter." - so does Pakistani POV. That's why I'm saying all along, the article should start of with the fact that it is an administrative territory of Pakistan, which is a reality, and then merit a single sentence in follow-up about the Kashmir dispute. This is the only neutral option. The J&K issue is being used as an example because it is relevant to this discussion. I'm just merely pointing out that if any changes are proposed to GB, they will be applied in equal measure to the J&K article. But I do not believe any changes are needed in the first place in both articles; the leads are accurate. You're the one who's raised all the fuss here. Mar4d (talk) 17:05, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Keep attacking strawman. Mr T 05:25, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

• Question The BGN database does list it as part of Pakistan. Where is it with reference to the original border which was drawn? Where is it with reference to the de facto frontier between Pakistan and India in Kashmir? Who administers the territory? Is it completely self-administered? Has there been a plebiscite on state membership, autonomy, or other? These questions should be addressed in the lead. Are there any disputes with reference to the answers of any of these questions? VєсrumЬа ►TALK 01:52, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
• Answered Just my take on a start...
  "Gilgit–Baltistan is part of the disputed Kashmir region seized by Pakistan in late 1947 while the Kashmiris peoples of the region themselves had not yet decided whether to join Pakistan or India. The small principalities in the region, including Gilgit and Baltistan, remained semi-autonomous until 1974, when Pakistan dissolved them and integrated their territories. Complicating the situation further is a Shia–Sunni Muslim sectarian conflict ignited in the administrative center, the city of Gilgit, more than two decades ago."
  Your mileage may differ, of course. VєсrumЬа ►TALK 02:35, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Wow, hats off. I sceptical about whether pro-Pakistan editors will allow this much flow of truth upfront in the lead. They will probably just point to random policies and oppose it. Although I have been assailed personally by knee-jerk accusations like I am biased, nationalist, etc by my opponents, I would love to support these disclosures and their expositions (back them up with some reliable source if you can). Mr T 05:23, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

I sceptical about whether pro-Pakistan editors will allow this much flow of truth upfront in the lead. - Misplaced Pages isn't truth, it gives preference to NPOV. Besides, this is digressing off-topic and was never part of the discussion. We were here to discuss WP:NPOV, WP:DUE and WP:WEIGHT and per all these three policies, the territorial status of GB deserves ideally no more than one sentence in the lead and that too in the second or third paragraph. It's been clarified over and over again. It beats me that some are confusing this article with the Kashmir conflict article - perhaps that may be due to lack of know-how of the topic and perhaps also obliviousness to the fact that a comprehensive article already exists for the Kashmir conflict. The GB article is about Gilgit-Baltistan, not the Kashmir dispute. The proposals you are supporting are nothing but an attempt of heavily WP:COATRACKING the article. Mar4d (talk) 15:06, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Wrong again, that stuff is more germane here and more factually correct (with some minor changes in the language) than J&K is. You keep belaboring on J&K issue (which no one seems to oppose in the first place) and try to frame this proposal to change the language as "off-topic"? Man are you biased?!

"the territorial status of GB deserves ideally no more than one sentence in the lead and that too in the second or third paragraph." — do you really believe that the thing that makes GB-sector (of Kashmir) a matter of Global concern doesn't merit more than one line in the article?! Mr T 16:24, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Pakistan "seizing" territory certainly does not impart any rights. Every Kashmiri territory doesn't need to have a full recap of the original territorial division of Kashmir, but there should be some mention of conflict, whether between Pakistan-India (China in parts) or more parochial disputes--like over when to start observing Ramadan in Gilgit. Note that I indicated the lead needs additional essential content--GB is an amalgam of two separate principalities with different languages and cultures. As for "POV", quite frankly, accusations of pro-Pakistan and pro-India are themselves POV considering the multi-cultural assemblage of distinct principalities with their own customs and. in cases, languages, which we know as Kashmir and whose peoples would likely prefer that Pakistan, India, and China all stop stomping through their gardens planting their flags. VєсrumЬа ►TALK 18:11, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

I notice that your comments are mainly focused on the history of the territorial dispute. We already have a history section in the article (Gilgit-Baltistan#History) so most of this should go there. And at the moment, it's not like the lead does not mention Kashmir; look at the second paragraph! Over here, we are only discussing the opening sentence of the lead. A good lead is one that takes into consideration WP:NPOV and avoids WP:UNDUE WP:WEIGHT. Quite simply, the debate is whether the lead should say "administrative territory of Pakistan" (my argument) vs. "territory administered by Pakistan" (Mrt's argument). What's your contention, may I ask? Mar4d (talk) 18:34, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

As there is no sovereignty, neither. Territory controlled by Pakistan would be the most accurate. "Territory of" implies sovereignty and legitimacy according to international law. Administration also implies some measure of external legitimacy. As far as how Pakistan exercises its control, it can administer GB any way it likes, but that's immaterial with regard to territorial status according to international law. I don't see that there's a whole lot of wiggle room here. This has nothing to do with being pro-Pakistan or pro-India.VєсrumЬа ►TALK 19:24, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

"'Territory of' implies sovereignty and legitimacy according to international law." — Yes. Mr T 05:25, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

• I agree with Qwyrxian that the "territory of Pakistan" is the most concise and correct way of referring to Gilgit-Baltistan as a unit. If we're talking the Indian POV, then they don't recognize the legitimacy of that administrative division, and the dispute is about something broader.

  Mr. T's arguments are really strange, especially considering the apparent double standard of the lead of Jammu and Kashmir, which unproblematically refers to it as a "state of India". Also, he uses the term "military occupation" incorrectly, since there is an autonomous civilian administration in GB.

  Also, make no mistake, to tar GB with the "Kashmir" brush, whether in the lead or not, is to tacitly accept some Indian POV. Pakistan only designates part of the disputed territory, Azad Kashmir (to be reunited with "Jammu and Kashmir") as "Kashmir". The indigenous Shias and Baltis of GB don't like to be under Kashmiri control, and successfully fought for devolution.

  India also claims that certain territory of China is part of "Kashmir", although neither China or Pakistan accept this. The point is that while the world may recognize that there is a "Kashmir dispute", there is far less agreement on the scope of this dispute, and whether it applies to peripheral areas like GB, whose self-determination is denied by Indian claims. This controversy is why mention of GB's disputed status (as opposed to Azad Kashmir's status) should come second, not first. Shrigley (talk) 17:59, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

"Territory of" Pakistan implies sovereign authority. This is an encyclopedia, and we can't make such implications. Conciseness does not trump accuracy. Nor does "not Pakistan" mean "India" (or "China"). And @ Shrigley, what "tarring" brush are you talking about? We are talking Kashmir the region, not the distinct cultures, religious practices, etc. to be found in that region. I think the scope of the dispute is quite clear--that's everyone who lives there and what they want, versus which power wants to claim the land (IMHO...) and the people along with it, like some chattel.

Given the original intent, which was for (effectively) a plebiscite, until that plebiscite is held we can't talk about the legitimacy of claims on the part of any of Pakistan, India, or China. We can only represent the claims themselves. That a lot of time has passed is immaterial. It's well established in modern international law that time does not impart legitimacy. VєсrumЬа ►TALK 18:36, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

• I disagree with Shrigley on almost every count. I never ever tried to argue that Jammu & Kashmir lead is perfectly neutral, albeit it does mention "Indian-occupied Kashmir" & "Indian-held Kashmir". Should I create a fuss about that "double standard" here?? I even encouraged Mar4d to just insert the changes he wants. Hence I would appreciate if you guys didn't keep harping on J&K for the time being and let this issue about first line of GB settle first.
  Also, let's keep it focused on the content and not on editors for a change.
  The status of that territory is disputed right from the very beginning, that dispute is at least as enduring as Pakistan's right over that land. We are not here censor selected parts. Mr T 05:25, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

I also agree with Qwyrxian and Shrigley. Irrelevant to what India, the UN, or others think, the territory is fully controlled by Pakistan, who claim it, and has been for quite a while. The reality is that it is part of Pakistan, and the wording shouldn't be subject to whatever individual editors think about the implications of eternal legal right or truth or some such. There's more to this territory than just a dispute. CMD (talk) 13:48, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Proposed wording of lead sentence

"Gilgit Baltistan (formerly known as the Northern Areas) of Pakistan, is a self-governed region in the north of Pakistan. It is governed through a representative government and an independent judiciary." Tom Reedy (talk) 20:29, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

oppose - it is worse than the current line. This first line doesn't describe (to a nonspecialist reader) the graveness of the situation there at all. How about something like

″The region of Gilgit-Baltistan is the Pakistani-administered territory/sector of the Kashmir region that is subject to a long-standing dispute between India and Pakistan.″

This is to serve as the substitute for the first two paragraphs of current lede. Mr T 05:25, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

The purpose of the first few sentences of an article lead is not to give the entire history of the topic to alert the reader to "the graveness of the situation there". We're not here to right great wrongs or solicit supporters to the cause. See the article United States; it doesn't lead with all the Indian wars; it gives it further down the lead in the penultimate paragraph. Instead of fighting over the first few sentences of the lead you and the rest of the editors need to work on making the lead more comprehensive and ensuring that it covers all significant views in a neutral manner.

And BTW, here's where I got that sentence: http://www.gilgitbaltistan.gov.pk/. Tom Reedy (talk) 12:59, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

Look Tom, I don't know if that was your intention but http://www.gilgitbaltistan.gov.pk/ is a page from Pakistani government website thus Pakistan's POV. Putting that assertion as a statement of fact in Misplaced Pages's voice would be an extreme manifestation of bias. We need a neutral source preferably a reliable tertiary source like Britannica.
The neutrality of this article's introduction is very important and the first paragraph should adequately summarize key points of its contents: "the lead should be written in a clear, accessible style with a neutral point of view; it should ideally contain no more than four paragraphs and be carefully sourced as appropriate." - that is what the Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Lead section says. Mr T 14:43, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

For the record, I support the proposal by Tom as a neutral alternetive. @Mrt: The lead proposed by you is nonsense and not even in the equation. Since when did Kashmir dispute merit a mention in the first sentence, goddammit? Go back to the start of the thread, the debate is "administered by" vs. "territory of". Don't just go back on your words now. An article lead should be neutral and impartial and having a trivial start on a territorial dispute in the first sentence of an article about a region, not the Kashmir conflict, is wrong on all counts. What you are proposing is simply unattainable. And as a user above (Shrigley) very aptly pointed out, tarring the the lead with the Kashmir conflict is like tacitly accepting a bit of Indian POV upfront. Mar4d (talk) 16:52, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

The purpose of the first few sentences of an article lead is not to give the entire history of the topic to alert the reader to "the graveness of the situation there". We're not here to right great wrongs or solicit supporters to the cause - spot on, Tom. Lead paragraphs of articles on regions always begin with the region's official/de facto location. This is the convention for all region articles on Misplaced Pages. Everything else, including political disputes/claims, is of subordinate importance and follows much after (preferably in the article body in more detail). Fact is, GB is de facto territory of Pakistan and this is an established status quo. Status quo matters the most before anything. Mar4d (talk) 16:58, 27 March 2013 (UTC)

As mainly Pakistan and India both rushed in where the peoples of Kashmir had not yet weighed in on their preferences, the conflict is central; the de facto circumstances are the conflict and frontiers of control. I don't see that (to earlier section above) the status of any other piece of land within the Kashmir region is germane to the GB article. Lastly, @Mar4d, however you indicate de facto anything, it cannot be stated in a way which imparts more than exists in international law. What Pakistani or Indian laws or regulations state are artifacts of their chosen method of territorial control. VєсrumЬа ►TALK 00:54, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

• @Mar4d: You really think Tom's proposal here is neutral? "Neutral" would be mentioning both sides of the debate. The debate is between those who control the land (Pakistan) and those who claim the land (India). You have cleverly contended that you wouldn't mind omitting Indian claim altogether. You have resorted to all kinds of impertinent sophistry, chicanery but these aren't going to help your case. You're just proving your tendentiousness further.

  @Vecrumba: You're again right. "De facto" is an euphemism for "no indisputable evidence exists" or something like "not ordained by law". Hence we cannot use "de facto" anything to describe the official status of a place; either it's disputed or it's not. In this case the former is true. Mr T 05:28, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

"De facto" does not mean "no indisputable evidence exists", it means "as a matter of fact". It's a statement of reality. The status according to law varies depending on the POV in question, but the de facto position does not. That something is disputed doesn't mean it lacks official status, just that it has more than one. CMD (talk) 11:16, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I am behooved to tell you that Misplaced Pages is about verifiability not the subjective perception of "reality" as we see it.
I assume you do know what the meaning of word "euphemism" is?
Besides that de facto literally means "holding a specified position in fact but not necessarily by legal right", in this case because of the long-standing dispute that hasn't settled yet. International community is neutral on it, so should be Misplaced Pages. Any immanent or oblique indication of that nonexistent "right" would surely be misleading.
We don't engage in disputes but we are tasked with the job to neutrally describe it. Yes de facto it's controlled by Pakistan at this time. However that is only partial truth and there is another equally notable and relevant side to the story but you, Mar4d and Tom are talking of essentially censoring the fact about its disputed status altogether. I couldn't help wonder, why? Mr T 06:06, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Jesus I get tired of POV editors complaining about "censorship" on Misplaced Pages just because everything is not worded just exactly the way they want it to be. Nobody's censoring anything. As I have said before, the material can be covered later in the lead. Everything doesn't have to be jam-packed in the first graf. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tom Reedy (talk • contribs) 01:01, 1 April 2013

You may do well to avoid personal attacks. Mr T 08:46, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Please stick to the topic—there was no significant personal attack, and the implied criticism was on par with the suggestion that two named editors are censoring a fact with presumably sinister motives ("I couldn't help wonder, why?"). Reasoning along the lines "that editor is censoring a fact" is totally unhelpful—what counts are policy-based reasons to either include or exclude certain text. Johnuniq (talk) 10:04, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Question

Is it neutral to show the Portal:India on the see-also section of Gilgit-Baltistan (see the ugly edit war in that article recently)? GB is not administered by India neither does it belong to India per WP:NPOV, yet a bunch of nationalist Indians are eager and over-the-top zealous to add Indian POV. Even Mrt3366 has started dancing to the tune; it's amazing how he opposes GB being called a territory of Pakistan (when it is) because it's Pakistani POV according to him and yet he has no qualms about adding Indian POV to the article? Talk about double standards? There is no moral equivalence between Pakistani POV and Indian POV in the case of Gilgit-Baltistan, because it is administered by the former and not the latter - hence, it is the Pakistani POV that should prevail, whether anyone likes it or not.

One of the POV-warriors who's been part of that edit war (User:Zeeyanwiki) was enthusiastically opposing my removal of Portal:India from the article on the talk page, accusing me of "aggression" and treating Misplaced Pages as my "home property" and ironically was the first editor to remove Portal:Pakistan from the see-also section of Jammu and Kashmir which I added as counter-POV. What to say of this POV-pushing by nationalists? I am aware that there are sanctions imposed on the Afghanistan, Pakistan and India topic area. In my opinion, single-sided POV-pushing like this should be rewarded by instant blocks. Mar4d (talk) 05:34, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Also, given the recent removal of Portal:Pakistan from Jammu and Kashmir, I've removed Portal:India from Gilgit-Baltistan. Any one who jumps in to escalate the situation towards more ugliness is warned forthwith. Mar4d (talk) 05:36, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Cold fusion

The other editors persistently keep telling me I'm trying to push my POV into this article. My talk page proposals either get ignored or they are used to call me a pov pusher. To give an example:

There are hundreds of researchers involved. As of 2008 we have peer reviewed cold fusion complete with replications. Most of the article is sourced on Pons and Fleischmann, who are just 2 of them. You don't notice it at first sight but for example reference numbers: 19, 41, 44, 61, 68, 100, 130, 133, 141, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 156 and 157 all point at a single book published in 1991.

Because the elaborate Pons and Fleischmann coverage is basically good content, I propose to create a separate article about the initial P&F press release. With over 300 reliable sources there cant be any question about notability. When creating such article it should always reflect the same scientific consensus as the main article. I know this perfectly well, I'm an ip editor not allowed to edit the article and there is a huge cold fusion police force watching the article like a hawk.

This is not a question if the article should be split but if I have the right to propose it.

The responses:

• Disagree per WP:POVFORK

As the first response this is fair enough. Between these POV acusations I keep explaining Article spinouts:""Even if the subject of the new article is controversial, this does not automatically make the new article a POV fork."

• Disagree, this is another POV attempt to whitewash "LENR". It's the usual claim that "LENR" is not a continuation of F&P's experiments.

It is suggest I'm whitewashing something without edit privileges.

• WP:Recentism

1989 is not recent.

• "it has not been shown that Pons and Fleishmann have any notability other than their work with cold fusion."

I have no idea what this means.

• and "the article has many sections that have zero or almost zero mention of Pons and Fleishmann"

It may seem that way at first sight but the sources are used to describe things that happened 20 years after their publication without much attribution. It is great for P&F coverage but this is the main article about a science topic.

• "The first step in your whitewash is to remove mention of P&F (which is also the content with most WP:WEIGHT). Then comes the re-branding exercise."

Between the POV acusations I keep explaining the splitting guidelines.

• "Please don't bold again the first word in my comment. I purposefully left it unbolded because of Polling is not a substitute for discussion, article content is decided by strength of argument, not by counting votes in polls."

Fair enough, even said please. But I will get back to this one.

• continued "You are avoiding the most important argument: the reliable sources say that it's still the same field. And[REDACTED] is based on reliable sources. If you don't address that argument, then you are posting your own personal opinions (And here is my own personal opinion: sources say that CF, LENR and CNMS are the same because the last two haven't achieved their own breakthroughs. For example, a replicable experiment that requires a new theory. I think that sources will keep saying the same until this happens. But this is only my personal opinion)"

This doesn't seem an important argument for splitting off the excessive coverage. It doesn't even go there? Is it really true that I have to address this argument or else I'm pushing my pov?

This is the whole text in our article dedicated to peer reviewed cold fusion:

In May 2008 Japanese researcher Yoshiaki Arata (Osaka University) demonstrated an experiment that produced heat when deuterium gas was introduced into a cell containing a mixture of palladium and zirconium oxide. In an August 2009 peer-reviewed paper Akira Kitamura (Kobe University) et al. reported replication of this experiment. Replication of earlier work by Arata had been claimed by McKubre at SRI.

I think it is not enough. Am I entitled to such opinion? Am I allowed to propose such split? Because apparently I'm not, the proposal is shut down after 1 day.

I've tried asking 2 other editors for their opinion, neither showed up but I now stand accused of canvassing: and this is now a talk page topic?

This is just one example out of many. I've never managed to produce acceptable content for this article. I've suggested many very sensible improvements. Non of which have ever been accepted. I've seen many new and experienced editors get screamed down and/or banned by these editors.

I'm going to leave for a while now. I'm writing this in case there is anyone who still cares about content. This is the only reason.

bye

84.106.26.81 (talk) 06:59, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

And what was the question? ~ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 19:43, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

I can't say I've ever seen an editor screamed down at the cold fusion article. As has been stated elsewhere, P&F are where most of the weight lies (since it is where most of the coverage about cold fusion is). Attempts to split that coverage off will result in an article that is unbalanced towards recent attempts to create devices by a fairly small group of fringe proponents (just look at the peer-reviewed publication decline for example, and you see where the weight is, the graph is somewhere in the talk page archives). IRWolfie- (talk) 09:31, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Pizzicato (software)

Pizzicato_(software): I added templates for neutrality and primary sources and a user, whose username indicates association with the article, has repeatedly removed them. I attempted discussion on the talk page and have been ignored so far. I also warned the individual about edit wars and am now stepping back to allow WP moderators to deal with it. I'm pretty new myself, so I'm not sure if this is the correct forum for this notification. If not, please educate me! Plays88keys (talk) 20:19, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I've re-added the templates for notability and advert and have nominated the article for deletion. I just can't see how a piece of software like that is notable. I also have some WP:NOTHOWTO concerns which extend from the fact that those sources which do exist seem to be exactly that - how-to guides. Stalwart111 05:29, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Clean up for Sensitive articles

Several articles were created by an editor User:BengaliHindu where some articles like 2013 Canning riots didn't follow a neutral point of view. I tried to clean-up by citing from reliable sources but this was reverted by the user & some other ip. The difference is here. May be i'm wrong but it may also possible that such articles were created per Islamophobia. I believe Misplaced Pages should be free from personal feelings or views and articles on sensitive topics need extra care to maintain a NPOV. Best Regards,  Mrwikidor ←track 17:16, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Mrwikidor, thanks for reverting it back to your version; is far more NPOV than BengaliHindu's. Ashleyleia (talk) 03:55, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

Prison-industrial complex

Seems to have endemic POV issues - and an editor now has been trying to add specific corporations as being part of it, although the sources used make no claim about them being part of a "prison-industrial complex" and thier articles made no such claim until he added it to their articles. I suggested that he needed consensus to add such material per WP:BRD, but was rebuffed, alas. More eyes would be useful to assure adherence to policies and guidelines, and maybe even get the POV reduced a tad. Cheers. Collect (talk) 13:26, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

• I agree. that article has some serious POV issues. It looks like whole sections are each built from a single source being cited more than once, giving the illusion of multiple sources. Niteshift36 (talk) 13:32, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Indeed it appears to be a term used more in a polemic sense by a couple of books than as a "real term in wide usage" at all. The precise same logic could be used to make a Grocery-industrial complex and a Petroleum-industrial complex article. THough I kinda like a Lawyer-industrial complex. Collect (talk) 14:28, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes, the recent edits were very POV. Nothing I saw in the refs noted any connection to specific companies. Capitalismojo (talk) 15:48, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

"Lists of martyrs" articles that repeat fabrications and legends as historical facts

Does anyone have any ideas about what could or should be done about these articles List of Christian martyrs and List of Christians killed during the reign of Diocletian? The first one, List of Christian martyrs, tries to list notable Christian martyrs from all periods and is divided into sections. In the first section "Apostolic Age—1st century", 16 names are listed, of which the death of one, James the Just, is corroborated in a work of secular history, Josephus, and two, James the Great and Stephen, have their deaths described in the New Testament in the book of Acts (although whether they can really be called Christians is highly debatable, there was not a clearly defined Christian identity at that early time, they were a sort of sect of Jews.) The martyrdoms of Peter and Paul are early Christian traditions, though uncorroborated by any independent historical evidence. The rest are made up fabrications from hundreds of years later although this article just flatly states things like "Saint Matthias was stoned and beheaded" and "Saint Luke the Evangelist was hanged" even though if you click on the link "Saint Luke the Evangelist" it takes you to the WP article where it is stated that "Luke died at age 84 in Boeotia"! (when the truth is that no one has the faintest idea when or how he died). In the next section of that article "Age of Martyrdom—2nd to 4th centuries" 17 martyrs or groups of martyrs are listed, again saying things like "Saint Lucy/Lucia, martyred in Syracuse for refusing to marry a pagan suitor" with no indication that this is anything other than undisputed historical fact, when out of those seventeen entries there are seven that have some possible historical facts behind them, the rest,as Professor of Early Christianity Candida Moss has written in a recent book 'The Myth of Persecution were "fabricated out of thin air". The article goes on into more recent times and lists other figures who are undoubtedly historical. It is not right to mix fact and fiction in this way, I have left other remarks on the article talk page. The second article List of Christians killed during the reign of Diocletian is if anything a bit worse as it lists some seventy names and the WP article Diocletianic Persecution says from all the many stories of martyrs at that time "only those of Agnes, Sebastian, Felix and Adauctus, and Marcellinus and Peter are even remotely historical" so that's six out of some seventy or so that may have some truth to them, although even those are questionable and have been highly embellished, but the "list" article not only states flatly that all these saints were killed at that time but even gives exact dates and places for their supposed martyrdoms, for instance "Eulalia of Barcelona (February 12, 303, Barcelona)" - their saint's day being assumed as the day they were killed, the year I can only imagine that whoever created this article ( by a google search according to the talk page) just made it up. Really these articles are not just presenting fiction as fact, they are lies. I have tagged them both for accuracy and neutrality and left messages on the article talk pages, but I don't know what steps to take - try to move them to List of (legendary) Christian martyrs mixed in with real ones and List of Christians supposedly killed during the reign of Diocletian, according to ridiculous old made up stories, except for three or four that might have some truth to them, who knows? Nominate them for deletion? Go through and mark every one as invention except for the tiny handful that may have a kernel of truth? And then I suppose you would have to have a source for every one saying that there is not any truth to that story, and who knows how long that would take. But I do feel it is just intolerable for WP to be presenting these old fabrications as truth. Can anyone suggest anything?Smeat75 (talk) 04:26, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

Since martyrdom is a theological concept, rather than historical, it is fine to use information from theological sources, provided we are clear that the information may be uncorroborated or inconsistent with known history. We can have for example a list of Norse gods, even though there is no historical evidence that they existed. However the "List of Christian martyrs" is not neutral, it is just a list of what editors have added. Since different churches have different martyrs, there should be lists for each church. Thomas Cranmer for example who is on the list is in Fox's Book of Martyrs, which lists Protestants killed by Catholics for their religion. Obviously they do not appear on Catholic lists of martyrs. TFD (talk) 19:13, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

TFD's analysis seems insightful. The clarification that these are theological concepts rather than straight historical accounts would be the best improvement of the articles. Capitalismojo (talk) 20:18, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

That approach might work for List of Christian martyrs but List of Christians killed during the reign of Diocletian should be based on history not theology. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 20:24, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

That's a good point in principle, but in practice I think that sources for lists of martyrs will often be dominated by religious sources rather than secular historical ones; we have to acknowledge that limitation and work with it. bobrayner (talk) 20:59, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

I changed the wording to make it clear that the list is of reputed martyrs. Then of course we have to have WP:Reliable sources to show that they belong on the list. GeorgeLouis (talk) 04:05, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

Looking at the article, I support the change to "reputed". However, while martyrdom is indeed a theological concept, it doesn't mean it's unhistorical, and the comparison to Norse gods seems a bit bizarre. What we have here is a curious mix of history, church tradition, and outright legend. I guess I would feel most comfortable with the qualifier, "according to Church tradition", but I don't think it needs to be in the article name. StAnselm (talk) 05:34, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

Martyrs are, in general, a form of saints in Christianity, and I tend to think that the word is primarily used in a religious context, so at least personally I don't think that qualifiers like "reputed" are necessarily required. Most editors would realize up front that a religious perspective is more or less implicit here. Also, in the process of canonization, or inclusion in martyrologies, many if not most "martyrs" will be described as such there, and that in most cases martyrs are specifically recognized as a separate group from, for instance, confessors or clergy or whatever. Considering that those sources, which are basically the ones that "establish" whether someone is a martyr or not, call someone this, I think they can be relied upon. Having said that, there are a rather monstrous collection of reference books regarding saints, including martyrs. The most extensive I know of is the old Holweck biographical dictionary of the saints. I tend to think that if one or more of those reference books, which can include up to 10,000 or so names, describe someone as a Christian martyr or a Christian martyr of the Diocletian era, that would probably be sufficient for our purposes. John Carter (talk) 20:12, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

I have several problems with what John Carter has said. First, English[REDACTED] is read all over the world now and by people from many different cultures and backgrounds and I don't think we should make assumptions about shared cultural backgrounds such as knowing that a martyr is a theological concept. I think it is perfectly possible, for instance, that someone visiting an art gallery and seeing a painting of St Lucy holding her eyes on a platter or St Lawrence holding the gridiron he was supposedly roasted on, might wonder if that story is true or not and look it up on[REDACTED] to see and they deserve to find the best answer we can give. We need to make it clear, as it is a perfectly reasonable thing to wonder about, whether it is known, or not, if a particular story like that has any truth to it. If it is agreed that it is entirely "legendary" (ie fictional), or nobody knows for sure whether it is or not, the article should say that.Also one of the things that bother me about[REDACTED] is just how much it does rely on such sources as extremely old books, we should be giving the results of the latest research and scholarship and not just repeating Sunday school lessons from a hundred years ago. That's my opinion anyway and I am revising the opening sections of the article List of Christian martyrs at the moment, others are of course welcome to check what I am doing and agree or not or make their own contributions.Smeat75 (talk) 21:07, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

Since my views on this are represented on the talk page, here I'll just say that the article is misnamed: List of Christians killed during the reign of Diocletian could be any Christian "killed" (as distinguished from dying by natural causes) during the reign of Diocletian. If it's a martyrs list, it should be called that. As several editors have noted, such a list will include saints or martyrs as recognized by the religion that created them. The individual articles, as well as such venerable sources as the Catholic Encyclopedia, address issues of historicity. Without these nuances, the list becomes an implicit argument (that is, a synthesis that points toward a conclusion not present in the secondary sources themselves) if it treats every figure as of equal historicity or even religious validity (some figures seem to be part of the narrative tradition, but not even "certified" by the Church). The problems with this list article come from an initial lack of clarity about its scope and purpose. Cynwolfe (talk) 21:20, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

(e-c) I have no particular disagreement with some of what Smeat75 said, although I do have some rather clear reservations about what seems to me to be possibly jumping to conclusions which aren't particularly warranted, and which, in some cases, are actually counterindicated by facts. You will find, for instance, that the Catholic Church, who is the primary user of the term "martyr", has actually made a serious recent effort to review all the declariations of saints and label many of those stories which have little if any objective support as "legends," and, in some cases, like Clement of Alexandria, actually removed the name of the person from the martyrology. There is, and has been for about a hundred years now, an academic journal, Analecta Bollandiana, which basically has been among the leaders of this more intensive historical review. And many, if not most, of the more recent serious reference works relating to the topic of Christian hagiography have incorporated their findings, generally following the lead of the Catholic Church. Some other churches, like I think some of the Orthodox churches, will still, once in a while, canonize someone without much, if any, real historical evidence to support it, that's a different matter, but even they tend to describe such individuals in a way to indicate that there is no real historical evidence. And, actually, as per WP:TRUTH, we do not need to make it clear whether anything is known to be true or not. All we have to do is say what the most reliable independent sources say. And many, if not most, of the more recent ones, like I said, tend to themselves differentiate between the "legends" of a saint and their canonicity. For lists like these, I tend to think myself that if the Catholic, or Orthodox, or whatever, churches explicitly describe someone as a "martyr" in their current official documents, with in this case are generally their current liturgical calendars, that would probably be enough to establish their basis for inclusion. Even some of those are open to question, like the Anglican church describing Martin Luther King, Jr. as a martyr in their calendar, but I honetly don't know how many other examples of that type there are, and trust me, I've looked over a lot of reference books on this subject. John Carter (talk) 21:26, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

We could compare different church's lists, determine if there is evidence the subjects existed and whether their deaths were caused by their belief in the true religion, and prepare a list. But that would be synthesis. The Catholic church is the authority on who they consider to be martyrs, as are the Anglican and other churches. As for saints, they are people who performed three miracles after their deaths and now are perfect sinless creatures residing in heaven. There is no historical evidence that any saints existed. TFD (talk) 23:01, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree for the most part, although in recent years the number of miracles has been I think dropped to two for standard saints, and less for martyrs, and I guess I would think being more or less officially commemorated by any religious bodies, including several forms of Christianity, Sufism, some forms of Hinduism, Thelema, and other religions as a "saint" more or less for our purposes makes that person a "saint". John Carter (talk) 23:32, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

SLAPP

Seems an odd sort of article - it uses an acronym, and lists a slew of cases, but the sources do not use the acronym nor the term Strategic lawsuit against public participation. I wonder if this is a neologism-push where OR and SYNTH is used to connect disparate cases to promote a legal theory. The states described as having "anti-SLAPP legislation" appear to have laws not referring to this concept at all, but only to aspects which have always been problematic in law. The legal cases cited for other nations also appear not to involve use of this term or any similar term. Opinions thereon should surely be of value. Collect (talk) 00:26, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

I see what you are driving at, but this might be the wrong forum.

Before you post to this page, you should already have tried to resolve the dispute on the article's talk page. Include a link here to that discussion.

Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Law might also be interested. GeorgeLouis (talk) 03:47, 4 April 2013 (UTC)

Khalsa

The article Khalsa has this sentence in the intro:

The Khalsa is also the pinnacle of the Sikhism. Once an individual becomes a member of the Khalsa they overcome the inside-evils and the shred weakness of the body, mind, and heart, and become brave as lions.

1. Singh, Kartar (2008). Life of Guru Gobind Singh. Ludhiana, India: Lahore Bookshop. p. 126.

I had removed it earlier, but Vickle1777 (now blocked as a sockmaster) and Jujhar.pannu kept adding it back. I discussed this and several other problems at Talk:Khalsa. However, Jujhar.pannu insists that this statement should be allowed in the intro since it's supported by a reference. No luck at WP:THIRD, so dropping a note here. utcursch | talk 00:56, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

In regards to the context of the complete argument I would like to add what I originally wrote, "The first part is basically saying the Khalsa is the ultimate end point of devoted Sikhs which is imporant because people of little knowledge may not be familiar with the context, the next part is a quote and quotes can say whatever they want as long as they are referenced and relevent to the topic. Quotes may only be removed with benift if something better is used in its point. If the user feels the word pinnacle to be subjective I would be alright if the the first statement is changed to - Once a Sikh becomes baptized he is called a Khalsa." Jujhar.pannu (talk) 08:13, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

I suggest the statement be prefaced with "According to (whoever wrote it) ..." to attribute it instead of it being presented as objective fact. There's no end to these kinds of disputes in religious articles, and it's just gonna go back and forth ad infinitum. Tom Reedy (talk) 06:04, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

Listing languages of a country and NPOV: Algeria and the French language

In Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Algeria#Listing_French_name_in_lead_in_Algeria_article there is a debate over whether French names should be listed in articles about Algeria (for instance, "Algèrie" for Algeria and "Alger" for Algiers).

In Languages of Algeria I did extensive work on chronicling the language situation. On one hand Modern Standard Arabic (which is different from spoken Algerian Arabic) is official and French is not official, and in the past the Algerian government attempted to eradicate French from use in society by enacting government policies that would remove French. Unlike Tunisia and Morocco Algeria is not a part of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie.

On the other hand, as shown by the CIA World Factbook and other sources, French is the lingua franca of Algerian society and is still extensively used in the business and technology sectors in society. Senat.fr says that Algeria has the second largest French-speaking community in the world. Recently the Algerian government has reintroduced French into the education system. While some Algerian government agencies are Arabized (they only use MSA Arabic) others are not (the agencies make documents in French, and provide MSA Arabic translations). The documents submitted to United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names and the United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names from the Algerian government used French, and the government used French in almost all of its conferences.

There is an undercurrent of divisions in society. The sources I used say that bilingual Arabic-French is promoted by upper class and secular elements of Algerian society, while Arabic only was often promoted by Islamists. Also, the elites in Algeria at one time had their own kids learn French while others learned Arabic, making an "elite closure" that only gave the best jobs to those who spoke French.

Anyway, in terms of POV, knowing that there is a conflict over how important French should be in society, what is the NPOV solution? WhisperToMe (talk) 07:06, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

The NPOV solution is to completely forget about the question. We must move away from this odd but very wide-spread fixation on using the mentioning or non-mentioning of name variants as a symbolic sign of linguistic "territory-marking", i.e. as a symbolic recognition of the ideological "importance" of some language. We are not writing our articles for Algerians, neither French-speaking nor Arabic-speaking ones. We are writing them for English-speaking readers. The relevant criterion is not "how should we position ourselves to the ideological issue of how important French should be in Algeria?" The only criterion is: Are our English-speaking readers likely to come across the French name variants out in real life (in otherwise English-language contexts), and hence, will mentioning the French names help to clarify situations that might otherwise be confusing? Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:46, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

I think this approach might be a little over-complicated. In relation to articles on European countries, readers are quite likely to run into Latin and Greek names in otherwise English-language contexts (Britannia, Albion, Gaul etc). Does that mean those should be added? What about Cathay or Hindustan?

What you're getting at would probably be equally-served by: "Is the language widely-spoken in the place the article is about?". Formerip (talk) 13:50, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

"The only criterion is: Are our English-speaking readers likely to come across the French name variants out in real life (in otherwise English-language contexts), and hence, will mentioning the French names help to clarify situations that might otherwise be confusing?" - That is a large Yes, Yes, Yes (The primary webpage is French, not Arabic), Yes (the webpage for this ministry is only available in French) - One editor is in favor of not using French in situations other than "إقلي or إجلي or إكلي We can not identify the proper pronunciation only through the french writing (Igli)" but he also said "I think that in this case what applies to the arab language applies to English. for this, I propose the deletion except in cases similar to the previous example" WhisperToMe (talk) 14:33, 7 April 2013 (UTC)

UNMIK

Hi all,
There has been a slight disagreement over at United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo, concerning Kosovo's declaration of independence. Sources generally portray it in a straightforward fashion; the Kosovo assembly declared independence. For instance, &c. However, some editors are keen to phrase it differently; "At a meeting of the Assembly of Kosovo most of its members and other representatives of the people of Kosovo, acting outside the UNMIK's PISG framework (not representing the Assembly or any other of these institutions), ..." which to me looks like weasel wording and synthesis; individually, those words seem true if you make a very selective reading of section IV.B.2 (b) of a court document; the words just go out of their way to avoid saying what the bulk of secondary sources say. It looks like an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the declaration (needless to say, we already have plenty of (sometimes disputed) coverage of the legitimacy). Similar wording has sometimes been added to other articles. What does everyone else think? bobrayner (talk) 01:10, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Actually, an error appears in the opening line of the above statement. There is a major disagreement regarding the declaration:

• On 9 April 2012, information disagreeable to editors leaning a certain way materialised, and is sourced
• 13 days later, it is removed by Bobrayner on account of his own interpretation of the document
• Within hours, a second editor restores the sourced information but now produces an additional source
• 25 days later, the original objector takes issue again with the very same summary as when deleting the first
• Sourced information returns immediately followed by one more source
• FOUR MONTHS LATER, the page viewed several times and edited twice since the last revert and both times by administrators, the revision is wiped again. The author no longer claims that the points are not supported by the source, which has now seen two additions since its inception, so we see a claim of "neutrality" problem
• On 6 January 2013, the original editor restores the information citing discussion before restoring sources
• Lost again 20 January 2013 with a claim of synthesis...
• ...not accepted by original author in April, requesting objector to examine source.
• Removed again immediately without ackowledging source, simply claiming 'synthsis' once more
• I as third editor to approve sourced version restore the edit
• Down it goes again with the same summary

The sources presented by Rayner are minor reports that concentrate on the status of the declaration not violating international law, the opposite is not the aim of the text being restored, that is there to explain that - in short - representatives claiming to represent the people who did not represent the Assembly of Kosovo or other institutions made the proclamation. I don't see what the problem is with that, all the above examples prove is that there has the page has been disrupted by one single editor subsisting on false summaries. There's no POV issue there, certainly none that provokes a blanket revert. Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 08:00, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Narendra Modi

Narendra Modi is a controversial Indian politician running for the Hindu Nationalist BJP party -considered by some to be a likely candidate for the next Indian Primeminister. The lead of the article currently doesn't mention the political stances of either MOdi or the party he is a leader of, and it only gives the Hindi names of the parties - without supplying even the English translation nor the political platform. When I tried to insert mention of his politics, as neutrally worded as I could, it was removed without explanation. And the article now again does not mention anything about his politics. I think it might be worth it to keep some eyes on the article as it seems it may become a likely problem area with the upcoming Indian elections. It is nwt claimed on the talk page that it is undue weight to mention his political stance or to describe the political platform of his party in the lead.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:37, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Clear ownership issues as well. I am butting out, but someone should add this article to their watchlists.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 17:18, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Margaret Thatcher

This article has had a low-level POV problem for years, with negative views on her minimised. However, after an 800-strong party in Glasgow in celebration of her death], and another in Brixton, amongst others, and even some MPs speaking out in celebration of her death. (). This is is not normal, but all criticism of her is being systematically removed. The miners hated her, and still hate her. , .

At the moment, the artocle contains meaningless platitudes by Cameron and Milliband, and doesn't mention the controversy.

The simple fact is, Thatcher is widely hated. Not by everyone, of course. But by presenting positive views and censoring the negative, we hide the controversy of one of the most divisive and controversial PMs of British history.Adam Cuerden 22:05, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Agree, its a problem. Two Danish right wing foreign ministers who worked with her in the 80s today remembered her as "terrible" and "rude".·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 23:00, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

This is an encyclopedia and not a Danish tabloid. Articles are written to be of long-term interest. Let some serious journals and newsmagazines provide hqrses. Kiefer.Wolfowitz 23:13, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Who said it was tabloids? Your comment is disrespectful and almost made me call you something ugly. These are serious Danish newspapers. There is no shortage of serious peer reviewed sources describing how hated she is in a large part of the world - the article doesnt reflect that.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 23:16, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

The links I give include the BBC, Reuters, the Herald Scotland, Sky News, and the Belfast Telegraph. Have you actually checked the links? Adam Cuerden 23:18, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Although my Northern bias may be showing, I do think that we need to be wary of hagiography. As much as she was loved by the right-wing, she was also absolutely despised by most people north of the Watford Gap. Sceptre 01:13, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Don't forget Facebook, Adam. Some people have said things about her on Facebook and I know you think this should be in the article. Needless to say, I disagree. Neither the bland nor the rabid reactions should be reported verbatim in the parent article; this is recentism and we have a daughter article for that. --John (talk) 09:05, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Seriously, you don't think that this is notable? Do you have any idea how unusual this sort of behaviour is in Britain? Apparently, the last person whose death was marked with widespread street parties in Britain was the death that marked the end of the European front of WWII, which I'll phrase like that because I don't by any means think that she's comparable to him, and it'd just be a distraction. This is arguably the most notable fact about her death, and today's coverage has only expanded the scale. I can only imagine what things are going to look like on the day of her funeral, when people actually have time to plan. Adam Cuerden 13:25, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages is an encyclopedia, and as such, all that belong there are facts. There should be no "opinions" either positive or negative in an encyclopedic article. It sounds to me as if you're asking for people to "put more negative stuff in there to make it fair." That's clearly contrary to the purpose of an encyclopedia. Perhaps you should read WP:Introduction. Cheisu7 (talk) 09:16, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree with Cheisu7. "Just the facts, ma'am" should be the guiding principle. Especially with politicians, one can find many people ready to offer negative quotes. It should be addressed purely in an encyclopedic, biographical way. Also a bit of "assumption of good faith" and having a bit of respect for those even with whom you disagree wouldn't hurt. Whether "pro" or "con", it cannot be denied that she was a very important person in world events, and those events can be described with NPOV. Individual's reactions really aren't relevant. That's what blogs are for.JohnKAndersen (talk) 11:02, 10 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

You can cover an opinion as a fact, as in WXY group had a favorable opinion and ABC had a not so favorable opinion WhisperToMe (talk) 17:14, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Agree with JohnKAnderson. "That's what blogs are for" should sum up my opinion on this. Too many people try to use Misplaced Pages to further their personal agenda rather than having anything substantial and encyclopedic to contribute. No offense to the folks above but this has been my general observation on this project. — Nearly Headless Nick {c} 04:01, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

• Too true that Maggie was a polarising figure. I've already complained about the meaningless rhetoric in that article (which was a major part of it when I last looked) that I'd like to see removed. But I would add that if the positive stuff stays, then so should a non-undue part of the negative comments. The reporting on the street parties definitely merits staying, as this is incontrovertible fact, but we just need reliable commentary as to how sizeable and widespread these parties were. -- Ohconfucius  04:25, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

I do not agree that what you are calling "eulogising" information is equal to peoples' individual and personal dislikes. As with most famous people, their page is usually reserved for their accomplishments, with perhaps a "she did not have unanimous support" or "some considered her a polorising figure due to her positions", without getting in the dirt might be acceptable. Most American politicians' pages are locked, and controversial issues kept to a minimum, or given their own pages. If, say, your beef is with the Miner union deal, then write an article about that controversy (if there already isn't one). On her Wikipage, which sadly will have no more additions and hopefully soon locked, should reflect more of a biographical tone, not a pro/con ripping apart of her polices. Time to exercise that British propriety that is so widely admired, allow her to have this "story of her life" wiki, but absolutely add to related pages that had merited entries, and have some empathy and respect for this leader, regardless of your political predilections. "Golden Rule"...her page should focus on her and her achievements primarily, everything else should go to the specific "scandal" pages.JohnKAndersen (talk) 09:24, 11 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

Steinberger guitar discussion is an extended rant.

Sorry, I don't have the content background to start a meaningful discussion on the talk page, but as a passer-by looking for information hoo boy is Steinberger (regarding the instrument manufacturer of the same name) far off NPOV once it gets to "history and production". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.114.105.44 (talk) 02:39, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

I have reverted the POV edits made by IP:32.134.161.26. If you find any unsourced controversial edits, revert them and leave a message on the talkpage. Thanks --Neelkamala (talk) 10:53, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Including union affiliations of prosecutor who refused to charge union members with assault/Steven Crowder

Steven Crowder (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

In Steven Crowder's article, the alleged assault against him was included, and he attempted to press charges against the other party.

Despite video of the incident, and the Union Spokesman himself condemning the violence and the acknowledged trampling of a tent by union protestors that belonged to a group Steven Crowder is affiliated with, the Prosecutor dropped all charges against union members, and refused to charge the ones involved in this alleged assault.

• The prosecutor that refused to bring any charges against the union is endorsed by the very same union (according to his own site, on the opening page). This seems like relevant information.

• Group affiliations for everyone else involved were included; Crowder,the alleged assailant, as well as the spokesmen. Why omit it in this very influencial person's case?

The dispute is that some think it is sufficient to say only that the charges were dropped, which leaves the impression they charges were completely without merit (that's usually the reason charges are dropped against the will of the complainant). Others believe that mentioning that the prosecutor was endorsed by the unions provides critical context, as well as treating him with the same standards as all the other players by being transparent with his affiliations.

• No suggestion is made that he refused to prosecute BECAUSE he is endorsed and gets campaign money from those unions. That would be a clear cause/effect, and obviously not neutral.

However, it is misleading to omit the information that he is endorsed by them, which he displays prominently in his campaign material. Including it lets the reader decide, with complete, relevant information and full context on both parties' affiliations.

There have been multiple attempts to resolve this on the "talk" page by rewording, deleting the actual name of the union and using the generic noun, rearranging words within the sentence, separating the sentences completely to further any possibility of a suggestion of cause and effect, with no counter-compromises being offered nor any discussions of the compromises proposed as is suggested in the guidelines for resolution.

• So, being totally objective, do you think that a Prosecutor that refuses to charge any member of an organization should have it noted that he is endorsed by and/or takes contributions from that very same organization; and that this one simple fact provides important context to the broader discussion? These are provable encyclopedic verifiable truths which assist the readers in making their own determinations.

Thank you, JohnKAndersen (talk) 05:57, 10 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

You say, "No suggestion is made that he refused to prosecute BECAUSE he is endorsed and gets campaign money from those unions." In that case the the information is irrelevant. On the other hand, mentioning it implies a cause/effect relationship. Why else would it be "misleading to omit the information." TFD (talk) 06:12, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Because, omission of relevant information steers the reader to one conclusion, "the charges must have been without merit". Offering both sides, WITHOUT making the conclusion either way, allows the reader to decide with more complete context. In case I wasn't clear, I do not want to say the affiliation WAS or was NOT the reason for his actions. Just want to include provable facts and let readers make their own determination. Omitting the affiliation leaves out a pertinent fact that along with everyone else's affiliations, can lead the reader to EITHER conclusion, or a completely different one altogether, IF they are presented with all the facts. If you take out everyone's affiliations, the section would essentially read "two guys got in a fight in a park". Since this was a very political event, affiliations become critical context.JohnKAndersen (talk) 07:11, 10 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

Except that you are not "offering both sides". You are inventing a new side in contravention of the neutral point of view. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:50, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Both sides are offered in that including the affiliation balances the statement that leaves the impression the charges were frivolous. Evidence for both sides should be presented to be NPOV and to provide the full context, and let readers decide if it played a part or not. That's the fairest compromise. As it sits now, only evidence for the later is included.JohnKAndersen (talk) 10:37, 10 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAnderson

TFK, I believe it should be up to the reader to decide their opinion on the matter of what the prosecutor's reasons were for dropping the charges. Whether one believes it or not, the fact is that the connections are indeed relevant. Merely including the information implies nothing. Are you also against the idea of presenting the information beginning with, "some point out that..."? The information would be relevant no matter who the article is about, yet its exclusion seems purely political here. Cheisu7 (talk) 07:34, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Inclusion is absolutely implication. A serious encyclopedia is not in the business of including irrelevant information, or turning an article on one subject into a coatrack on another. If reliable sources have mentioned the prosecutor's union affiliations in connection to this case, then and only then are they relevant outside his own article. Someguy1221 (talk) 07:48, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

What is exclusion, then? Cheisu7 (talk) 07:58, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

If readers can reach into the author's mind and figure out what he deliberately excluded, they probably don't need to be reading Misplaced Pages anyway. But it's very simple: Sources, sources, sources. If you want to add a bit of content to an article, produce a source that mentions that content, in the context of the article's subject. You don't go digging up tangentially related facts to make some point no source ever did. You add to an article, "Prosecutor X, who received campaign funding from unions, refused to press charges against a union", and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what you're implying. So show that a source implies the same thing, and we can talk. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:15, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

No one has ever suggested including campaign funding. There are many articles that do link this prosecutor to union "issues", but in this case the edit (which was improperly deleted before consensus/no consensus could happen by the way) just mentioned that he was endorsed by those unions. It also ties Crowder to AFP, the Spokesman to the AFL-CIO, etc. Why should this one person who has made such an important decision in this story be immune?

It's done more in the interest of full disclosure and transparency. Many would find nothing wrong with his endorsements. Fine. They can draw their own conclusions, I do not want to make them for them. But leaving as it is implies the charges were frivolous (there were documented physical injuries). Additionally, I don't think the Prosecutor's home page where he lists his endorsements, and the union page that proudly endorses him, is "digging up tangentially related facts". And it certainly can't be considered irrelevant. Selective omission to steer the reader to a particular conclusion is not NPOV, providing a readily (actually the primary biographical fact, often before his party affiliation) simple, provable fact from reliable sources is harmless, where selectively omitting a fact that is so clearly part of the story leaves a gaping hole in the article's integrity, not to mention POV issues.From the guidelines, "Misplaced Pages articles should be based on reliable, published sources, making sure that all majority AND significant minority views that have appeared in those sources are covered."JohnKAndersen (talk) 10:55, 10 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

If any of these arguments sound familiar, it's because the vast majority of editors at the page have told John the exact same thing he's being told here. I've explained that if there were verifiable sources (such as newspaper articles) where a direct link is shown between the prosecutor's union ties and his decision to not pursue the case, then that would be allowable under WP guidelines. However, the addition of the union tag in question without such sources ends up creating a guilt-by-association tone that is not encyclopedic. John, however, has continued his rants, varying them little, and ignoring the consensus of everyone else at the page (save for a single editor who joined WP and whose only 2 contributions to date to Misplaced Pages have been comments at this article). 5minutes (talk) 15:34, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

From the discussion here, I assume there is no Reliable Source that points out a link between the prosecutor and the unions? GeorgeLouis (talk) 16:40, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Actually, independent reliable sources state that the prosecutor declined to file charges because, after viewing unedited footage of the fight, he concluded: "It's pretty clear the person that they wanted to charge was acting in self-defense." ("Fox News footage flawed: No protest fight charges planned", Lansing State Journal). So not only is there a problem with original synthesis in our article, but we're also neglecting to convey the content of actual independent, reliable secondary sources on the subject. MastCell  18:02, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

GeorgeLouis: No, there is no RS that connects the two, and while I personally think that it's reasonable to hypothesize that a Democrat politician in a union-heavy state will likely have some union-based influence, it's my opinion and hypothesis, not a stated, reliable fact. And to answer MastCell's question: I don't think we're seeking a synthesis of positions as much as we're trying - with difficulty - to create a list of encyclopedic facts on a politically volatile article. 5minutes (talk) 18:36, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

I get it - that's never easy. I'll just reiterate my view that the more politically volatile the article, the more important it is to stick closely to reliable secondary sources and limit editorial syntheses. MastCell  18:54, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

GeorgeLouis, yes, there is a direct source and RS connecting the prosecutor to the unions. His own website, the unions' websites, and numerous newspaper and online articles about him and his past cooperation with the unions who contribute to his campaign and whom endorse him. (Again, not asking that the contribution issue be included, as part of a compromise to try to reach consensus.)JohnKAndersen (talk) 03:47, 11 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

5Minutes, your "vast majority" of 4 or 5 (depending on how often some changed their minds) against 2-3 is very misleading. Also, it's clearly stated in the process of consensus building that it is NOT ever arrived to by a vote, and there is no "seniority". Even if it were 20 to 2, guidelines indicate that majority input should never bulldoze minority input, and a compromise should be reached. No one who disagreed responded to compromise, nor offered compromise themselves (another requirement of building a consensus). Just a "gang" style bullying, refusing to engage in meaningful compromise, despite my repeated attempt at dropping content, re-wording the language to try to please everyone, per the guidelines. So that's why it may sound familiar...I was never engaged with someone willing to work towards an equitable consensus, just dictated to, "this is how it's going to be, even if it violate guidelines, time to give up". Whiffs of page-owning and simple interpersonal issues having obstructed consensus. You particularly could have found a way to word it where it is included in a way that all agree that it is just relevant facts that don't draw conclusions; as you agreed with me on the talk page, but refused to include on the article in a fair and NPOV way. But with no dialogue, there's no way you and I CAN come up with a compromise if all I'm told is "I've decided. Let it go." JohnKAndersen (talk) 03:47, 11 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

John, WP is not about looking for compromise. It's about publishing verifiable fact. The compromise that comes from that is a neutral POV article that explains events without extrapolating on them. Again - I DO believe that the prosecutor's union connections are involved in his decision, just as I'd believe that a Republican's NRA connections are part of why they vote for pro-gun legislation. It's the nature of politics. However, what I BELIEVE is not necessarily verifiable encyclopedic fact. You seem to have a great deal of trouble in understanding this concept, but it's a key concept in editing a fact-base resource. 5minutes (talk) 12:15, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

I have had to repeat myself because often my inputs were ignored with no compromise and often no response whatever, but plenty of personal attacks and profanity, and implications about editors that happen to agree with me. (There have been more than one; 5minutes agreed with me at one point, and Cheisu7 noted above, and others who WikiBold edited on the actual page.)

Meanwhile another editor has dropped in from time to time, made proclamations, edited arbitrarily while we were working on consensus, then announced they are done and leaving with no compromising. To make it perfectly clear, once again, I am NOT suggesting that there should be a link made between the Prosecutor and the unions charges being dropped and/or not brought. Simply as part of contextual info of a major public figure in this event, including that he is endorsed, since this entire article is ABOUT the union protests, just as the alleged assaulter had his union affiliation immediately pointed out, Crowder's conservative affiliations pointed out, I think it's worth merely mentioning the person's affiliations who at this point is attempting to end the issue. Additionally, his political affiliations, being an elected official, should never be hidden. At least in the normally used form of "(D)".

I do not understand a clear and concerted effort to to include every negative statement about Crowder, even if they are conjectural, but refusal to include relevant, provable, biographical facts about the person who refused to press charges and who conjectured about Croweder's intentions. It is NECK DEEP in POV; presenting only one side of the case rather than the balanced approach that is expected by an encylopedic source and the consensus procedure. The reliable sources issue is specious as it is on both the Prosecutor's website and the union's website, pointed on in numerous articles, etc. As far as what his opinion about the video (opinions I thought were to be excluded? We can't include the other side's opinions? Crowder's quotes about the union and why he is pressing charges and about the Prosecutor? To truly make it "facts only", saying "he refused to press charges" would keep it "facts only", since the rest of it is HIS interpretation, dripping with sarcasm, and his opinion alone. That carries absolute zero weight in court, just keeps it out of court for now; he would not be a witness to offer his subjective point of view.

So we're back to just facts. The problem on the talk page has been an extreme lack of compromise and assumption of good faith that is clearly spelled out in the guidelines about coming to consensus, for instance, offering different ideas that INCLUDE everyone's input and that everyone can agree with. As it is, it is worded to imply that the charges were without merit (in one man's totally objective opinion we are led to believe). THAT'S why including his affiliation, just like everyone else's in the article is noted, would balance and give sufficient information for a reader to decide on their own which scenario is more likely. Without it, misleading by omission results.

There were other details from reliable sources about people being injured in the tent collapse admittedly caused by the union protesters, among other details. One by one these were deleted to imply they caused no violence, even by their own admissions, which puts more weight to the Prosecutor's decision. "No one was hurt, not laws broken,right?" Wrong. They even pleaded guilty to FELONIES. There also were death threats, racial epithets, etc. All deleted to remove context of what led to the altercation (and the charges) that involved Crowder defending the tent that contained heating stoves, a food vendor with cooking appliances, women and elderly volunteers; all deleted to imply that the charges against the protesters had no merit. Going by the video alone and ignoring all the eye-witnesses, even from union members supporting Crowder's version of events not considered (or ignored). I think with the context of the protest in regard to Crowder. For anyone to make an informed opinion about this subject, I STRONGLY encourage you to watch the UNEDITED version on the article which supports the threats, intimidation, people crawling out from a collapsed tent, etc (sometimes from multiple angles). As always, I'm open for compromise to include everyone's input; the edits made now destroy the painstaking progress made over weeks and months (the polar opposite of consensus).JohnKAndersen (talk) 03:47, 11 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

Someone questioned reliable sources linking the Prosecutor's office with union issues in other situations. Even more relevant, here is just one RS demonstrating a relationship resulting from this very SAME protest; there are numerous others.

"On Dec. 6 — the first of the two days of major protests — eight people were arrested and charged with felonies in Ingham County’s 54A District Court, because they attempted to rush the Senate floor. All of them pleaded GUILTY in February to a misdemeanor charge and are scheduled to be sentenced in September."

"The three individuals arrested during the massive right-to-work protests at the Capitol on Dec. 11 won’t face criminal charges, Ingham County prosecutors have decided."

"After being made aware of the miscommunication and reviewing the criminal statute this past week, (Dunnings' Chief Asst DA) McCormick said prosecutors couldn’t find a crime that fit this particularly case...“We’re denying all the charges,” she said today."

"The determination means that ALL FORMAL CHARGES formal criminal charges stemming from (all of) the right-to-work demonstrations in December have been resolved." (Emphasis added)

That is just one reliable source of the Prosecutor's office dismissing ALL charges by ALL union members at this protest, even those that had been arrested and charged with felonies. This article includes about a dozen, even some who had pleaded guilty, but there are other RS articles with additional detail. (Btw, the legislators in the article ARE identified by party affiliation.) This should satisfy "second sources" of incidents and connections to the union from the Prosecutor.

And I'm not even suggesting including this information in the article...ONLY that he is simply endorsed by the local unions. So, does there need to be a whole new section included that shows this entire history in order to include that simple affiliation?

http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20130321/NEWS04/303210067/No-charges-against-3-arrested-right-work-protest-Dec-11

http://danaloeschradio.com/mi-prosecutor-lets-union-off-the-hook-in-crowder-case/ Cheisu7 (talk) 05:23, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but the two of you don't seem to be reading what is being written. If you want to mention that Dunning has been supported or endorsed by unions, in any article other than one about Dunning himself, you need to show a source that mentions Dunning's union connections in that context. We don't need sources about Dunning dismissing charges against union members, and we don't need sources about Dunning being supported by unions - rather, we need one single source that mentions the union association in connection with the dismissals. Anything else is original synthesis at worst, and utterly irrelevant at best. The neutral point of view is not about "presenting both sides", or coming to a compromise every time editors disagree with each other. The neutral point of view is entirely about sticking to what reliable sources have mentioned, in context. When you invent a new side to a story, you are violating the neutral point of view. The only "sides" we care about, the only points of view that make it into an article, are the ones discussed in reliable sources. Someguy1221 (talk) 06:04, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

• The post above was completely reworded, so the response below will seem not to make sense. It was a simple matter of someone who is not really familiar with the source material misstating the case. I also dismiss the new post out of hand as it ignores previous info; but at this point debating it is moot, as the article now satisfies the issues that were being debated; consensus. :)JohnKAndersen (talk) 03:58, 12 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

(See the post above). Somebuy1221, you are so far off base about this subject...those of us deeply involved in it understand the incident, where, when, why it happened, who was involved and their respective affiliations. NO ONE is trying to connect Crowder to the unions. That post was in response to someone saying that if there was evidence in OTHER cases that the Prosecutor had acted improperly in the past in his dealings with unions, that it would provide context in order to simply MENTION that he is endorsed (NOT INCLUDE THE PAST INFORMATION). I would say reversing charges of people who had already pleaded GUILTY, without any judicial review of any kind, and the other actions in the articles show this. I was just offering what was asked for; previous shady activities. Those three felons/non-felons were at the same protest, and the charges were dropped on all OTHER union members that had been arrested or charged with vandalism, assault, intimidation, etc. EVERY SINGLE ONE. That's the background context, BUT I DO NOT WANT TO PUT THAT ON CROWDER'S PAGE, only the simple fact that he is endorsed by the local unions. For the moment, the Prosecutor's conjecture about Crowder's intentions has been changed to include a NPOV quote, which diminished the necessity to balance it with Dunnings' union ties. His other quote was an opinion that essentially charged, tried and convicted Crowder as being at fault for the WHOLE mess. Dunnings' original quote is just factual without his conjecture.JohnKAndersen (talk) 08:27, 11 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersent

There's no reliable source that what happened in that case is in any way shady. Just your personal opinion, and the opinion of some blogger. You've made it very clear with this comment that you think you can read a source, draw conclusions, and add those conclusions to an article. And so we're back to the beginning: mentioning the union connections is at worst original synthesis, and at best utterly irrelevant. There is no more need to mention that the unions supported his campaign than there is to mention that Billy Bob's Craw stand supported his campaign. The only reason to add it in the article is to make a point, and there is no reliable source that makes that point. Someguy1221 (talk) 10:04, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Also, I just realized that some of this confusion was caused by my swapping Crowder and Dunning's names in my comment above. I have corrected that. My apologies. Someguy1221 (talk) 10:08, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Per WP:BLP, if we want to suggest, even with a nudge and a wink, that a public official has discharged their duties in any way that is less than proper, we need, as a bare minimum, strong and unambiguous sourcing that makes the same allegation. That would include a situation where a judge/proseuctor is alleged to have dealt with a case based on anything other than his understanding of the facts and the law. There's really no wriggle room on this one. Formerip (talk) 12:42, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

I've carefully avoided reading this article to see which union you are talking about, since my own affiliations are a matter of public record. The point is that your belief that the endorsement of this politician (which is not the same as an affiliation with that union) by a union is relevant to the article, is original research and synthesis, and has no place here, per WP:NOR (not to mention our constraints on BLPs). --Orange Mike | Talk 12:45, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the input, it seems as if we have come to an equitable compromise and the page is all the better, and more accurate, for it. The NAME of the union was never an intended addition. There were several "opinion", POV statements made about the main subject, Crowder, that made it seem like it was appropriate to include information that didn't leave the reader with a very slanted view. Now that those have been removed, and "just the facts" type statements made, alternate NPOV quotes replacing opinion-tainted ones, there is much less feeling to give "the other side" in order to balance. So even though the Prosecutor who has a log history of union "issues" as you see in the links above, affiliations to them are NOT included, but anyone going to his website or reading the he released even those who had pleaded guilty can draw their own conclusions which are quite clear. This idea that overpowering and incontrovertible evidence is irrelevant is naive. Just because he isn't video-taped taking a bag with a $ sign on it doesn't mean that certain repeated, targeted, specific actions are irrelevant. People have been convicted of murder with less evidence than some editors require when they are either A)Biased or B)Stubborn and refuse to admit they MIGHT be wrong purely out of spite or pride, even when they agree in "talk" sections. In any case, the page now is much approved, thank everyone very much that offered constructive input, and I feel the two most involved editors have reached consensus....hallelujah!JohnKAndersen (talk) 03:58, 12 April 2013 (UTC)JohnKAndersen

Your comments here, in which you repeatedly imply unethical or illegal activity by a living person with zero reliably-sourced supporting evidence, verge on violations of site policy. The goal here is not simply to develop an agreement between the two "most active" editors of the page, but rather to take on board feedback from outside editors. I'm not convinced you've made any effort to listen to or engage any of the feedback you've gotten here, except for that which reinforces your previously held viewpoint. MastCell  18:30, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

LAGbook - possible fraudulent articles

• LAGbook (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Chidi and Chika Nwaogu (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Socialnerd (talk · contribs)
• Shidan (talk · contribs) / 99.225.80.88 (talk · contribs)

Editor Shidan claims that much of the content of these articles is fraudulent, and that many of the sources are fraudulent press releases: Talk:LAGbook#Concerns_about_the_claims_and_sources_in_this_article.

Given the past problems we've had with the article, I think this is worth investigating. I'd expect that similar cases like this have occurred, but I can't recall any, so am looking for others' help and recommendations.

I've recommended that Shidan try to verify his claims and that editors examine all the references closely. --Ronz (talk) 17:37, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

War and oil

Please review these deletions. I do not believe they are neutral. Thank you. EllenCT (talk) 09:01, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

They appear neutral -- for gosh sake what do Palin's 2008 comments have to do with any of this? Or for that matter most of this "synth by collection of unrelated quotes" to the article which already includes the topic? And Cheney's words: . And that flow of resources, obviously, belongs to the Iraqi people, needs to be put to use by the Iraqi people for the Iraqi people and that will be one of our major objectives. seem to be on a "D'oh" level indeed -- for it by itself negates most of the attempted POV push that the US mainly sought to make money off of Iraq (which it appears in retrospect never occurred, nor did the US make any actual attempt to loot the oil). Sorry - the deletions appear quite proper from here. Collect (talk) 12:10, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Do you think it is unnoteworthy that there are sources in agreement from across the political spectrum? Palin need not be quoted, but summarized. Perhaps by someone who understands her nuance. Who has that kind of ability? In any case, here are additional sources:

• "Correction: In this article, The Daily inaccurately attributed a comment equating countries in the Arab world to gas stations to retired Army General John Abizaid. The comment was actually made by New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman."

• "The man once regarded as the world's most powerful banker has bluntly declared that the Iraq war was 'largely' about oil."

• "The U.S. and U.K. went to war against Iraq because of the Middle East country's oil reserves, an adviser to British Prime Minister Tony Blair said."

• "Tony Blair today derided as 'conspiracy theories' accusations that a war on Iraq would be in pursuit of oil"

Please let me know your thoughts. EllenCT (talk) 00:31, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

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