Wikipedia:Neutrality in Scientology

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Applicable policies and guidelines[edit]

Task: review all articles and trim, delete, or adjust as policy demands.

Participants[edit]

(for transparency, please declare previous involvement with Scientology or Scientology related articles)

  1. Scott Mac (no involvement with Scientology or its articles)
  2. The Resident Anthropologist (talk) (No, involvement with CoS. Previous involvement with Scientology articles but began editing wikipedia after WP:ARBSCI )
  3. Stanistani (no involvement with Scientology itself - have edited Scientology BLPs with the aim of upholding Wikipedia policy; !voted to delete List of Scientologists as BLP hazard)
  4. DGG ( talk ) (no involvement with Scientology, has !voted to keep most articles such as List of Scientologists: deleting BLP violation is good, deleting "BLP hazards" is not reasonable.)
  5. Cyclopiatalk 15:17, 26 December 2010 (UTC) (no involvement with Scientology, little involvement to none in Scientology articles; agree on deleting BLP violation; strongly disagree in deleting "BLP hazards" per DGG above).[reply]
  6. Collect (talk) 15:23, 26 December 2010 (UTC) total Scientology involvement is meeting J. W. Campbell at a WorldCon in NY in 1967 when the Scientologists were holding a meeting in the same hotel. Strong opinions on BLPs to be sure.[reply]
  7. FT2 (Talk | email) 19:42, 27 December 2010 (UTC) only WP involvement I can remember is Meade Emory‎ (AFD), probably a couple of others over the years, no CoS connection. Strong views on BLPs, but "Difficult to fix/maintain" or "Been a past problem" are poor deletion rationale.[reply]
  8. NestleNW911 ( talk ) I've been a Scientologist for a few years and I want to do my part to contribute to a NPOV on Scientology related pages. No involvement in Scientology related articles to date but plan to contribute to Discussion pages.
  9. I am an anti-Scientology activist. I am also not a wikipedian, just a reader who knows little about it. I made a few comments on the Jenny Miscavige deletion page and tried (and mostly failed) to improve on that article in order to prevent it from getting deleted. More importantly, I made a comment on the discussion page of User talk: Scott Mac. Scott deleted that comment, along with a discussion questioning his involvement and neutrality in this project, in particular him being a proxy for banned users. So what happens next? Will Scott delete this comment? Just so other participants know, these events are also documented on a thread on an outside forum: http://forums.whyweprotest.net/12-active-projects/wikipedia-editor-proxying-osa-deleting-jenny-miscavige-75541/#post1386803. For all clarity: I do not oppose this project. I am sure that independant reviewers fill find many Scientology BLP articles are biased. But at the same, I do question Mr Scott's neutrality in this matter.(unsigned comment was from User:85.147.221.167 - added by Off2riorob (talk) 20:13, 1 January 2011 (UTC))[reply]
  10. I am a former Church of Scientology member. I am not generally a Wikipedian, but I do feel that Scott Mac is acting as a proxy for banned users, either wittingly or unwittingly. Deirdresm (talk) 21:25, 1 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  11. I am a not-so-anonymous member of Anonymous, and a Wikipedia administrator, and am committed to maintaining NPOV in Scientology articles. SchuminWeb (Talk) 02:59, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  12. User:Griswaldo. (no involvement with anything related to Scientology on or off wiki) I can't promise much time or attention to this ... but since I just prodded an entry mentioned below I figured I'd add my name to the list.Griswaldo (talk) 20:06, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  13. I can help out, here or there. Off-wiki, I'm anti-Scientologist, on-wiki, I generally don't bring my personal feelings into the project, and I have no involvement in Scientology articles except for removing a few articles from the purview of the WikiProject for not really belonging there. Sceptre (talk) 05:26, 8 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  14. KWcrew1983 ( talk ) I've been a Wikipedia editor for a few months and have a great interest in religious/spirituality themed articles, religious tolerance and coexistence. I have never contributed to Scientology related articles, but have read a few. From my observations, I have decided that I desire to contribute to the cause of achieving a more balanced perspective in Scientology related articles. I will be contributing wherever appropriate.

Articles to be reviewed[edit]


Articles of concern[edit]

  • Please list any articles that give concern, with a brief summary of why. I suggest detailed discussion can best be done on the article's own talk page, or at any future deletion nomination.
For further discussion of the Philip Gale entry see Talk:Death of Philip Gale
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Everything in the article appears properly sourced, but I agree the article implies more of a Scientology connection than actually exists. I think the article should include the statement no link was found between the suicide and Scientology. 85.147.221.167 (talk) 20:20, 4 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I am having a hard time understanding why the article is focussed on Scientology at all. The connection appears to be completely original research. Yes he was raised a Scientology but what does that have to do with his death, for which he is notable? I'm assuming that whoever has been crafting this article has taken a guilt by association approach. He was raised a Scientologist --> he committed suicide --> see what Scientology does to kids?Griswaldo (talk) 20:48, 4 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't disagree, but the guilt by association is the Churches own doing by trying to prevent the publication of Ebner´s article on Philip´s death. And I do think that this fact is both substantiated and relevant to the article. I plan on reading through the article (it´s pretty tl;dr) to see to what degree a connection can be made. If there isn't any really, it may be appropriate to remove Scientology connections in the beginning of the article.85.147.221.167 (talk) 08:57, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The Boston Herald made the explicit connection in an RS article sufficient for what is in this WP article. The current article on Gale does not make any original research. Collect (talk) 11:18, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The Boston Herald speculated, without evidence, that he actively chose a date for his suicide had significance within Scientology and then reported that MIT students and Scientology newsgroup regulars also speculated about this. Hardly a convincing case for an encyclopedic connection Collect.Griswaldo (talk) 12:55, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • James Stacy Barbour - cleaned up a bit (removed Scientology references as lacking WP:RS) - sourcing still poor
  • Victor Győry -Dreadful sourcing for a negative BLP. Is this notable? If it is all it claims to be then there should be far more? Comments needed.
  • I just prodded this entry. After a news and books search the results did not warrant an entry even remotely.Griswaldo (talk) 20:07, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Seems to me that out of the three paragraphs mentioned in [1], the first is valid but the other two aren't. 85.147.221.167 (talk) 19:45, 4 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Are these notable?[edit]

Please review:

Gets mentioned in Guardian within Wikileaks cables - the Pirate Bay case appears sufficiently notable for her Collect (talk) 11:27, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Truncating discussion of Lockwood so that it doesn't clutter the page
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Notable enough - got in NYT via Lisa Marie Collect (talk) 20:01, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure that satisfies the criteria at Wikipedia:Notability (music). I've asked for some advice from regulars on that page [4].Griswaldo (talk) 20:47, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I am not sure his notability is as a musician as much as it is that he is a musician married to a specific notable person, which tends to augment notability outside of a narrow interpretation. Collect (talk) 21:35, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"Notability is not inherited" ... nor the product of matrimony. If the marriage made him notable then that notability is reflected in reliable sources per the provisions of the afore mentioned guideline.Griswaldo (talk) 21:40, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Notable enough for one person at the Music board to almost LOL at this. And I would submit the NYT's multiple mentions of him both for Lisa and for music are well sufficient. Collect (talk) 21:57, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Collect, instead of referring to references can you produce them so that I might have the ability to see for myself? Thanks.Griswaldo (talk) 22:08, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Guilt by association[edit]

Watch out for biased attempts to link Scientology with criminality when the link is trivial or irrelevant.

  • Mary Kay Letourneau convicted of Child-molestation. Her article included the irrelevant fact that her brother was a Scientologist. [5]
Likewise what is the relevance of the other brother and GWB? John lilburne (talk) 21:34, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Charles Manson was categorised as a "former Scientologist". He seems to have studied it in prison and once put Scientologist down on a form.

Use of self-published sources[edit]

Editors may want to review if the self-published YouTube videos listed here are in line with WP:BLPSPS policy; they are in mainspace at the time of writing. --JN466 03:27, 20 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Articles reviewed with no problems[edit]

See Wikipedia:Neutrality in Scientology/Reviewed

Discussions elsewhere[edit]

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