Talk:Free Republic

Note: Other relevent comments may exist at Talk:Jim_Robinson. Consider reading that page, too, before taking any brash action.

It's nice to see FR in the Wikipedia. I'll keep my eyes open for anything worth contributing. (by Paul Klenk, October 17, 2003)

It was interesting to see that someone really believed FR had a problem with racism. March 4, 2004

To anonymous deleter - if you think there is something wrong with what is written in the article, please explain here. DJ Clayworth 14:20, 7 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The organization has an official policy of not permitting any racism, however, racism is allowed. Examples are that Palestinian children can be called "bombs still growing", there is a SONG PARODY: Crying (frying Abu-Jamal), and the French are frequently referred to as weasels.

This is not just inaccurate, but a misuse of the word racism. Palestianian and French are nationalities, not races, and freeper objections refer to Palestinian and French political policies, not intrinsic racial characteristics.

That being said, Abu-Jamal refers to racial (Arab) characteristics, thus the argument for racism for that example stands. P.S., I am not the previous anonymous deleter, I always claim my work.Tom Merkle

If you have a subtler word for hatespeech against Palestinians and French please use it, but do not delete accurate information. Freepers' objections do not only refer to Palestinian and French political policies as the examples clearly show. Get-back-world-respect 00:16, 11 May 2004 (UTC)

The examples clearly show it not to be racism. The "bombs still growing" comment, while offensive, refers to the fact that many Palestinian children become suicide bombers relatively early. It is not a racial reference, as Palestinians are racially Semitic, and there is no implication that all Semites are suicide bombers (there isn't even an implication that all Arabs are). It's more of an example of a national stereotype—"Americans are fat and stupid"; "Palestinians are suicide bombers"; "Japanese are highly concerned with honor"; "Germans are beer-guzzling drunkards"; etc. That's not racism, although it may indeed be highly offensive (depending on the stereotype). --Delirium 22:11, May 24, 2004 (UTC)

Cf. racism: The United Nations uses a definition of racist discrimination, laid out in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and adopted in 1965:

"any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life."

So the excuse that Palestinians and French are not races does not make it less racist. Arians as defined by the Nazis are not a race either. Get-back-world-respect 07:19, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

The fact of the matter is that most English-speaking peoples recognize 'racism' as being rooted in ethnicity and the snubs being discussed in this entry are concerned with nation-based politics rather than any kind of imagined 'innate' racial characteristics. Since I don't see evidence of anyone trying to portray Palestinian children ubiquitously as 'future human explosives' or the like, I hesitate to adopt your term. The comments are certainly discriminatory and hastily generalized, perhaps, but don't stereotype or insinuate that one of people is clearly 'inferior' in some way or another because of its ethnicity (Palestininans are not all of one race, of course), so they don't qualify as 'racist' in general usage. Ditto for the comment about the French, which is more of a jab about France's recent political plays (especially regarding the Iraq war) than any physiological similarities between the French people and weasels.

The articles of the 1965 convention are also largely inapplicable to the members of a private online community. It is concerned with limiting unfair discrimination / disenfranchisement in the public sphere as a matter of policy (as it makes clear early on); therefore, it only makes sense to make the definition of race and racism as broad as possible -- in this case, broader than general usage -- in which I would include Freerepublic's forum -- allows. -- anonymous.

Some people seem to have problems with the article mentioning racism. Why do you not go to "free"republic.com and complain there? A simple google search will show you hundreds of examples. Get-back-world-respect 22:36, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

Summer Clean Up of the FR article

I took it that this article needed some help. I am on Free Republic as well, so an insider's viewpoint may help make this a decent NPoV article. Many details were missing and I supplied them. Some people on FR come from left but most are conservative. There are a few places where the language showed bias, and some places were not as relevant any more, like Poll FReeping. Lately, Moveon and other Democratic Party front organizations do it a lot more effectivly. I too don't understand the racism, but future edits and discussion can help fix things up. Dominick 23:51, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Hi Dominick, thanks for your changes. I changed some parts where you used FR-terminology not known to many others (ping...) Since racism is such a striking issue at FR I reincluded that "many" rather than "few" entries show it. You also wrote "it has been charged that moderators often ban". That is a frequent policy and moderators do not make a secret about it. About freeping polls I agree that it is not unique to the FR community but since this is an article about FR a short neutral note should be sufficient. Get-back-world-respect 00:32, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Hm, someone was quicker than I was. Cannot quite see why the whole edit should be reverted? Get-back-world-respect 00:34, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

reverting the whole edit is wrong, unless someone wanted to remove a NPoV article. Dominick 06:48, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Reverting changes, especially explained ones, without explanation is not helpful either. Why do you insist that the "electronic townhall" is not "self-described"? Was there anyone else who called it so? What makes you disagree about a short neutral note being sufficient for poll manipulation by others than freepers? Get-back-world-respect 11:35, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I put them in change comments. Going back and forth with me reverting edits I put in is absolutly wrong. It makes for bad feelings, and starts edit wars. Recall Wikipedia is collaberative I expect editing but not reverting for reasons I already gave in those comments. The term "Self-appointed" doesn't add any facts and only puts in PoV, all webpages are "self-appointed" wikipedia is the "self-appointed" encyclopedia. Claiming the DNC front orginizations do not manipulate pools isn't the point, I think claiming that ONLY FR does this or slanting the article this way is wrong, and PoV. This is a minor part of Free Republic. Wiki has one non-negiotable part, everything must be NPoV, not leftist PoV, I still think the specific examples of racism don't belong and the inordinate amount of time spent talking about FReeping a poll weaken the article. I can't fathom ANY reason why the main forum titles were delected, and some of the items are retained escape me. The main two parts I like about FR is getting links to interesting articles and having a way to discuss them, many are totally non-political. FR has gone from pure activism to a community. This article should reflect this bent. Dominick 12:40, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Do you think "self-appointed" is a derogatory term? Your analogy with wikipedia does not quite fit given that no one would question that wikipedia is an encyclopedia while few would come to the idea that FR is an "electronic townhall". No one claims "only" FR manipulated polls, it is already mentioned. But explicitly mentioning others here is not appropriate, this article is about FR. I deleted the list of sections because if people want to know about it they can check on their own. This is an encyclopedia article, so just the basics should be included. Articles about books do not include the titles of the chapters either. You exchanged "The group is funded through quarterly donations drives which mimic public television and PBS." by similar to. Obviously a donation drive is not similar to public television. "Unfortunatly, Wikipedia is one of those banned sources." is not encyclopedia style. It includes a judgment and names without any good reason a particular source. Please do not have bad feelings if your changes do not stay. It can be discussed here. Collaborative means people work together, that includes that the way to consensus is not always direct. Get-back-world-respect 13:18, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

NO I like being edited. I don't like seeing an injustice about FR dont from a self-appopinted activist. Activism isn't welcome here, and having information removed doesn't add to the article. Self appointed doesn't add any infomration, and the term town hall meets a meeting between people. I may edit out the term all together. The Basics isn't a good reason to remove data either, considering some of the minutae listed here. Lets let others look t the article before we continue back and forth edits. If this stews a bit we may both be satified. Dominick 13:25, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikiczar

Perhaps you may read the Talk Etiquette FAQ again. You have an activist's goal of exposing Free Republic, controling the article as a one-man show, and removing edits you don't like The one thing I do like about wiki is the collaberative effect, which you are stifling as a self-appointed Czar. You need to let this rest and have others pipe in. Dominick 13:32, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wiki policy is No personal attacks. "Wikiczar" is unacceptable. Unfortunately you did not respond to my argumentation - explicitly mentioning others manipulating polls inappropriate, donation drive not similar to public television, "unfortunatly" being a judgment. While "largely" measures quantity, "often" measures frequency. An online community is better described by the majority of its users, so it is better said that they are largely, but not exclusively, united on certain issues. Again, please do not have bad feelings if your changes do not stay. It can be discussed here. Collaborative means people work together, that includes that the way to consensus is not always direct. Get-back-world-respect 14:02, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Edits others have made have been reverted and changed by you, I am not the only one wronged. I am happy to have this moderated or have others come in and look. to that end I invuted a poll here, if you think this needs escalation fine. Get a third party in here. Dominick 14:49, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I do not see why you think there is anything like "escalation". This is just discussion, if you do not want to join it, fine. Get-back-world-respect 15:51, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I meant going up the dispute resolution path. Dominick 16:33, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

In cases of disagreements the first attempt should always be resolving it at the discussion site. Get-back-world-respect 18:47, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Poll

Start discussion here: Dominick 13:39, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Just for convenience, here's a comparison between the current revision and Domonick's last edit. [1]. If there's a more representative comparison, please list it, because this is pretty complicated. Mackerm 16:43, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Abstain

1. POV edit wars do not belong in Wikipedia:Current_polls. Yath 04:25, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Racism

There was a paragraph written about anti-black racism in the discussion. It was difficult to understand and not neutral. I agree that racism is a striking issue at the site, but please improve on the writing. Get-back-world-respect 23:29, 11 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I was pinging the Leader of the Black Conservative group at FR. Specifially, what racism? I have seen more than a few racists get booted. I don't consider the examples posted as racist, per se. A few others here have agreed.Dominick 01:31, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)

As the edits by anonymous 65.27.204.208, SimonP, Neutrality and Tom Merkle (Abu-Jamal refers to racial (Arab) characteristics, thus the argument for racism for that example stands) clearly showed, there are more people who agree about racism at FR. Racism against Arabs, Palestinians, Muslims and French is the most frequent I know about, so a Black Conservative is probably not the best person to ask. Also, if the person was not a racist but still at FR she or he is unlikely to perceive racism, a more objective statement would need a less biased sample of opinions. If you disagree about what racism is, please read the wiki article. Get-back-world-respect 01:35, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Description of typical posts

My edit has been labled as "POV" by a couple of users. As far as I can tell, the describing of most posts on Free Republic as "one or two sentence-long ad hominem insults about liberal political figures, institutions, ideology, and liberals in general, with some posts of longer length and substance." is not an NPOV violation. If you have a better way of phrasing it, please feel free, but before reverting my edits further, please post your objections here for discussion. --Holdek 04:50, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

There really isn't much to discuss. You removed a lot of pertinent information and replaced it with a broad generalization about the character of the discussion there. Rhobite 05:47, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)

No, look at the article, I've just restructured it and explained it. Your version duplicates entire sentances. --Holdek 06:33, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Oops, I didn't notice the duplicated information. Sorry about reverting. I have rephrased the sentence a little and moved it to the paragraph where it best fits. Rhobite 06:49, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)

I recieved this response when I posted a similarly worded insert into Democratic Underground:

Characterizing the posts as insults is POV and inaccurate. The comment that posts are short is vague -- we've said it's a message board so no one would be expecting lengthy essays. I don't see that we need to assure the reader that there are posts of varying length; that's what anyone would expect

The same principle should apply here.

I think Rhobite's version is a good compromise, and he's restructured so as to eliminate POV complications. Most of the posts on Free Republic are insults, and are of the length described. And I don't think most Freepers would object to this description; it's one of the primary purposes of Free Republic (to give conservatives a place to vent their frustrations.)

Your repost of the Democratic Underground material is not very usefull. It's a completely different article. --Holdek 19:29, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I also have to wonder whether anyone would object to this characterization. It's still a generalization, but it's based in truth. A semi-random sampling of tonight's comments confirms that yes, Freepers still post one-line comments expressing their disapproval of liberals, gays, environmentalists, and uh, Mexico. Rhobite 06:42, Feb 12, 2005 (UTC)

Judging by the frequency of the caricaturing, I have an overwhelming hunch that this entry (as of 2/15/05) was written by a NON-Freeper...

merged information

I merged the information contained in the Jim Robinson article, as I do not believe that it is common policy to have a seperate article about website authors who are notable only for thier website--see e.g. The Best Page in the Universe. However, User:Wakeforest immediately reverted the entry with the summary "don't agree leave page alone or you'll be blocked."

Any suggestions? I don't want to get involved in a revert war... --Jonathan Christensen 07:47, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

JC - the only person who seems to be acting unilaterally on this matter is you. You've unilaterally merged the page itself twice now with little to no discussion at all, though others have asked you to discuss that on Talk:Jim_Robinson. Showing up on the talk page and saying the equivalent of "yeah, but i'm gonna do it anyway" is not a discussion. As it stands right now there seem to be three people who favor leaving it as it was with only you proposing to merge it, yet you plow right ahead with the merge unilaterally. As for common wikipedia policy on people who are well known for their websites having separate articles, I direct you to a couple well known examples:

• The Daily Kos blog and owner Markos Moulitsas Zúniga
• The Drudge Report and owner Matt Drudge
• The Little Green Footballs blog and owner Charles Johnson
• Power Line (blog) and its owners John_H._Hinderaker and Scott_W._Johnson

Based upon these precedents, it seems that a separate article here would be both appropriate and in keeping with wikipedia formatting policy. I have restored the previous article and removed your redirect on this basis. I will also post a copy of this comment on the discussion forum there. If you still support a change in which the articles are merged, then YOU need to go over there and make your case for it on that discussion section rather than acting unilaterally and turning talking only after the change you desire is done. Thanks for understanding. Rangerdude 16:48, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I probably should have read this talk too before I reverted the page when I did. I’ll make some notes in both talk pages to prevent others from doing the same.-Casito 23:23, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Is there a site more evil than this?

Seriously I'd like to know.

yes those pedophilia related and that sort. the fact is that restricting their right to whine and/or discuss on forums about subjects they care about will only increase any hatred they already had, personally, I joined the free republic in an attend to redeem my kind on this guys eyes, after all isn't dialogue first always better? if I fail on this I'll let you know.

Closed deletion listing on Jim Robinson

The article Jim Robinson was listed for deletion on 16 April, 2005. The discussion was closed with the result of merge and redirect to Free Republic. The Jim Robinson article will not be deleted, but the information in it has been merged into the target article (this one) and Jim Robinson has been turned into a redirect here. You can view the discussion, which is no longer live: Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/Jim Robinson. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 19:51, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've done a bare-bones merge, basically just turning the Jim Robinson article into a section of this one--I have not taken account of duplicated information that may already exist in other sections, except to make an effort to merge the Jim Robinson external links into the external links section of this one, dropping a duplicated reference to the website and another to a 1999 article in Salon. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 19:53, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Why is a merger appropriate here while standing separate articles are deemed appropriate for similar authors of other political webpages, among them Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, Matt Drudge, Charles Johnson, John_H._Hinderaker, and Scott_W._Johnson? This inconsistency was pointed out previously on the talk and VfD pages with little substantive response and no attempt to reconcile the differences. Rangerdude 20:46, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The decision was taken as a result of a discussion which you can see in the link I provided. Three editors voted for keep: Rangerdude, Capitalistroadster, and Mcsweet. Nine other editors said that merge and redirect was more appropriate: Jonathan Christensen, Sean Curtin, bainer, Katefan0, Radiant!, Calton, G Rutter, Halidecyphon, Neutrality.

Thus there seems to be a fairly solid consensus for that latter. I would have recorded no consensus if one more person had voted to keep or three fewer to merge and redirect. Decisions on merging Matt Drudge, etc, would be taken on an article-by-article basis, as is the policy on Wikipedia. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 21:14, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Yes, but you also IGNORED the fact that other editors had already participated in the consensus in favor of keeping it on the page talk:Jim Robinson including user:ObsidianOrder and user:WakeForest well before user:jonathan christensen attempted to circumvent the existing consensus on the article itself after he didn't get his way and was criticized by several for a series of rash unilateral actions. Furthermore you seem to be violating wikipedia's own VfD principles, which explicitly note that VfD's are NOT to be decided on a democratic majority vote but rather on the weight of the various arguments put forth by either side. Seeing as the majority of persons who voted in favor of merging the two stated little or no reason whatsoever for their votes and very likely spent no more than a few minutes or seconds reviewing a dispute with a complex history tracing back to an inappropriate unilateral action by the same individual who initiated the VfD, giving those votes equal weight with those who took time to state and/or justify their positions on the argument is against the spirit if not the letter of the VfD process. As for decisions regarding Drudge et al, you are deflecting the issue, which is not whether those individual articles should also be merged but rather whether some semblance of consistency between them and the Jim Robinson article should be maintained. That is called a straw man argument as it purports to rebut the argument I offered about the other articles yet in reality completely ignores the point of that argument, which was not whether the others should be merged but rather about formulating a consistent article writing policy on similar cases. Rangerdude 02:35, 1 May 2005 (UTC)