Talk:2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany

Possible "censorship" by the media

This event was "censored" by the most German medias for almost four days! And there is unfortunately no indication in this article that there has been a rape in cologne. Please add this information. --88.77.216.57 (talk) 12:01, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

Looks not much like censorship, but some strange kind of failing primarily by police with a somewhat strange, new kind of criminal situation. --Itu (talk) 17:32, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

There hasn't been much word from RSes about censoring this, so I would hesitate adding it. But there is talk about reddit mods censoring this on r/worldnews and r/europe so I wouldn't be surprised if something came out of this. For now, though, it looks like there isn't much to add in terms of this getting censored. Sethyre (talk) 21:37, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

I did not follow the events and subsequent media coverage till yesterday, but the first article that I could find was from 2 January 2016. EXPRESS (german) I agree that this is still a quite local newspaper, but it wasn't completely ignored. Also I think that the delay in country wide media coverage resulted from the slow unraveling of the dimensions of this event. --Soulblydd (talk) 15:55, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

There is a discussion about this in Germany too. Former German interior secretary Hans-Peter Friedrich (CSU) accused the public media of forming a "cartel of silence" in this and other cases of criminal acts by migrants. [1] --Gerry1214 (talk) 17:14, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Yet reading more horrible witness-reports, its seems more impossible that police didnt realize what was going on that night. I see many questions rising about cologne police performance. --Itu (talk) 22:24, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Possible "censorship" by German-speaking Wikipedia: The German version of this article was deleted from the Main Page. According to some users (see talk page), the article is not relevant and badly written. This perfectly reflects the situation of the German media (some kind of voluntary Gleichschaltung). German Wikipedia has turned into a blog for the radical left, at least regarding political topics. JeremyThomasParker (talk) 18:58, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Saddly enough this also happened here now. From what I've read here on wiki, it has to do with a goal combined with some ruling as to why it is removed. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 08:05, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

This might have been the separate Friedlingen incident where boys allegedly locked up two girls and then raped them. They boys were held in Weil am Rhein. Some articles connect these two events with the Cologne attacks, see here [2] while some others state that they are unrelated [3] "German privacy laws prevent the police from naming the suspects but it has confirmed they are not asylum-seekers." UltimateLiberty (talk) 17:18, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Now, some days later, many mediareports seems to proof that there was pro-immigrant (self-)censorship by newsmedia to an unbelievable extent all across europe. --Itu (talk) 05:40, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Article contents problems

• The introduction talks about 5 cities, except Cologne the article does not describe what happened (e.g. how many victims) and what the reactions were on a per-city basis.
• The article is contradicting itself and incorrect even on basic facts.

• 8 asylum seekers detained and five men from ages 18 to 24 were arrested are not exactly matching.
• Police confirmed that eight arrested suspects were all asylum seekers, who were known to authorities because of a history of pickpocketing. is pretty much the opposite of what the police is saying - latest information is that there were no arrests so far, and the police has not made any statements on whether suspects are asylum seekers.

• Media reactions and how they are discussed are an important part of the whole topic. This section is short and focuses on a fringe theory regarding the influence TV tax on public media - voiced by a private media opinion column (not an RS). The role of private media is not even mentioned.
• The article also fails to explain why this happened. According to the police the sexual assaults were largely to distract people and use the resulting confusion for thievery.

LoveToLondon (talk) 01:37, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

@LoveToLondon: and you're doing all this research and not directly helping out the article because...? ~ Cyclonebiskit (chat) 02:17, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

• No research (just a brain) is required for seeing that the article contradicts itself.
• No research (just following the media) is required for seeing that the article contradicts the latest information.
• It would be incredibly hard to fix and continuously update an article where many things that were reported in so-called "reliable sources" turn out to be incorrect 2 days later, where other editors make many claims based on misreading sources (Wikipedia is the only place I've seen so far that claims that there were more than one thousand perpretratores), and where basic facts like the number of perpetrators are completely unclear (based on the police and mayor statements, up to 1000 perpetrators in Cologne might as well turn out to be 20 - they say they don't know, and everyone else only repeats their numbers).
• Part of the problem are editors doing things like using a British newspaper quoting a Cologne tabloid as local news site - this is clearly very questionable contents and not an RS that should be presented unquestioned in the article.
• There is a lot of ongoing discussions regarding topics like media reporting. A NPOV overview (instead of just picking some random biased opinions) would be a lot of work.

The current article is a complete mess, and the subject is a moving target. Bringing it at this point in time anywhere near to correct and NPOV is a huge task, and nothing I would do voluntarily. LoveToLondon (talk) 03:56, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

@LoveToLondon: Merits of editing the article or not aside, lets revisit the actual issues you've brought forth. Given recent edits to the article, what has been solved so far and what still needs to be fixed? Concerns about the constant need for updating are irrelevant as that's the case for any current event. ~ Cyclonebiskit (chat) 04:33, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Problems that currently exist:

• What should be of this article and what should be excluded? There is a normal level of crimes of all kind when millions of people drink and party. Some amount of rapes is normal, some amount of robberies is normal - neither is newsworthy. The large-scale "sexual assault for robbery" is the novel thing here.

• It would really help to have an overview of the different cities the article claims were part. What happened where, how many victims. And is it actually part of the story.
• Like someone recently added the completely unrelated Weil am Rhein story (to double the number of rapes?).
• Some source from Poland for claiming Similar attacks on NYE have been reported outside of Germany by 7th January in Austria, Finland and Switzerland. is also pretty bad. As an example, more reliable sources say Police received three reports of assualts, two of which led to criminal complaints for Finland. It doesn't even say whether these are sexual assaults, and in any case that's not a noteworthy number and no connection to Cologne has been proven so far.

• A proper discussion of the role of the media is still missing, which is hard to do. A very difficult part is that you can spin the whole article in very different directions depending on which media you cite. Like anonymous police officers as basis for the newspaper sources for Primarily the most Arab perpetrators seeked to commit sexual offenses or in their words "sexual amusement". Whether a newspaper is for or against refugees has resulted in a quite different reporting (or non-reporting) here, and noone can verify the statements of an anonymous police officer. At the core is a highly political thing, the most controversial topic in German politics in recent months: Angela Merkel allowed more than 1 million refugees into Germany in 2015 (imagine an US President allowing 5 million refugees into the US in one year - that's the same by population), and the friction this causes inside her government coalition is the only thing that could potentially endanger her chancellorship this year.

LoveToLondon (talk) 23:43, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I think a lot of English coverage has come from "Chinese Whispers" of inaccurate original reports (have to start somewhere). I believe that we need German speakers on this article, in order to have the finger on the pulse of the mainstream and first-hand reports, as Love To London is suggesting. '''tAD''' (talk) 09:46, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I am from Germany and agree with The Almightey Drill regarding the number of detainees. There were conflicting reports. Latest numbers are to my knowledge 2 in custody which were detained on Sunday, but it is checked, if they were even involved in the events. So this can and should be left open right now. I disagree that the article is a complete mess. It reflects the partly contradictory information that is given by the authorities up to now. I don't see why a neutrality warning is needed. If there are other views and political positions, just put them in the article with a good source. Last I read is, that the number of complaints in Cologne raised to 121 today.--Gerry1214 (talk) 12:10, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

One important addition from my side: I heavily doubt that the large number of severe sexual assaults happened just to rob the victims. Who rapes someone just to get a cell phone? This is nonsense and I just need my brain to get that.--Gerry1214 (talk) 12:17, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Just added a new striking source for this last point.--Gerry1214 (talk) 15:03, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

@ ~ Cyclonebiskit (chat) 04:33, 7 January 2016 (UTC), you wrote: What should be of this article and what should be excluded? There is a normal level of crimes of all kind when millions of people drink and party. Some amount of rapes is normal, some amount of robberies is normal - neither is newsworthy. The large-scale "sexual assault for robbery" is the novel thing here. (among others).

If you seriously believe this is the core-point of these events and this article than I believe you are insane. please combine these few small-word pieces. "large groups of predominatntly foreign men" , "Large amount of sexual assaults and even cases of rape across 6 states" , "fireworks being tossed in the crowd by said large groups" and "large amount of theft". Also outlets state that such large scale event has NEVER taken place on new years eve prior. And you seriously almost want to dismiss this as 'REGULAR and NOT NEWSWORTHY' 195.109.63.17 (talk) 13:58, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

The two "rapes" might have been the separate Friedlingen incident where boys allegedly locked up two girls and then raped them. They boys were held in Weil am Rhein. Some articles connect these two events with the Cologne attacks, see here [4] while some others state that they are unrelated [5] "German privacy laws prevent the police from naming the suspects but it has confirmed they are not asylum-seekers." UltimateLiberty (talk) 17:32, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

In addition to containing contradictory information, the article - particularly the "Incidents" section - suffers from badly written prose so that it's even hard to tell if the article is self-contradictory or not because some of the sentences are simply impossible to understand. I'd help to fix it but 1) I'm having trouble understanding what the text is trying to say and 2) my German's not good enough to figure out exactly how the text matches up with the sources.Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:48, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Neutrality tag

Why specifically is this tag on the page? Are there neutrality issues outstanding? I'm just concerned that this tag may give the impression that there is debate over whether these events took place. --Boreas74 ^{You'll catch more flies with honey} 16:27, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Some figures and specifics were taken from early reports, and latter ones contradicted them '''tAD''' (talk) 18:53, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Is that really a neutrality question though? Faceless Enemy (talk) 19:13, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I think I solved the issue now by making the conflicting reports explicit. So this is no contradiction of the article anymore, but of the figures given by the authorities or other sources. As far as I can see, it is specified by whom and when figures were given. The template should be removed.--Gerry1214 (talk) 19:54, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Gerry1214 --Boreas74 ^{You'll catch more flies with honey} 20:10, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

This Wikipedia article reads like a Donald Trump ad. Someone please add more neutral sources and quotes.

I know for sure the sources I added (BBC News) is considered reliable. I think it's too early to add a neutrality tag given the fact the article is constantly being edited. Jonas Vinther • (Click here to collect your price!) 11:20, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I've removed again. Can we please discuss and give specific reasons and examples of issues before re-adding? --Boreas74 ^{You'll catch more flies with honey} 11:46, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I agree. Jonas Vinther • (Click here to collect your price!) 13:08, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Article not showing up on Google?

I'm just curious, but is anyone else having the problem of not being able to find this article through Google? No matter how specific I make my search this article refuses to show up, even when I limit my search to within the Wikipedia domain. Even the French Wikipedia version of this article shows up, but not this one. I have to locate this page by searching within Wikipedia anytime I try to access it. Curious. --Philpill691 (talk) 20:30, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I have the same problem. I sent a message to Google using the "feedback" link. Suggest every other with this problem should also do so.--Gerry1214 (talk) 20:49, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I have no idea. I was thinking is it because it is a new article, but if the French one works, why not here? '''tAD''' (talk) 21:35, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

I just tried to find the article through Google using the title "New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany" in quotation marks, but there was no result, that leads to this article here. Is this some kind of censorship? -Metron (talk) 08:09, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Why is it that I wouldn't be surprised? ;) Maybe this should be broached by the Wikipedia/Wikimedia officials?--Gerry1214 (talk) 10:36, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

This is strange, it's the first result for Bing and DuckDuckGo but not for Google. --Boreas74 ^{You'll catch more flies with honey} 13:23, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I can imagine there might be some kind of filter for rather new Wikipedia articles containing the word "sex", aiming to keep the porn business from exploiting Wikipedia as a link farm. Raising the article's QA assessment may help (or not). In any case, we should cooperate more closely with Google on these issues, helping them to better assess an article's quality. --PanchoS (talk) 17:13, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

"Don't shout too loud when being raped by a refugee for the good of the European Union." Censorship, simply as that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ernio48 (talk • contribs) 8. Jan. 2016, 18:21:55‎

Sorry for the rude word, but this is bullshit. Much more resentful commentary on this topic is freely available on Google. Just do a simple Google search to see the supposed cover-up conspiracy simply doesn't exist. --PanchoS (talk) 17:27, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

First 8 results for me (in Australia) are all related to this page. All, except the first result(!), are from WP. 220 of ^Borg 17:53, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

According to Slate from August 2015, there has been a dramatic decrease in traffic from Google to Wikipedia, apparently because Google changed their search/display coding to emphasize commercial sites over Wikipedia, for business reasons. See [6]. Google has censored this article from their search results, but they did link to a "scraper" site which used this article's title to lure the unwary to a spam site without providing the text of the article. But maybe it is the "sexual" which degrades its prominence in Google, since the random new article, already nominated for speedy deletion Cora braitberg shows up in Google search results at the top. Edison (talk) 18:59, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Funnily I agree with some of the previous statements. I'm not realy surprised that you're fed commercial crap. How we must love internet sometimes (sigh) 195.109.63.17 (talk) 06:33, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

It does not show for me either, on 11 JAN, see the saved results here. Zezen (talk) 08:01, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Update: it starts to show up as of 12 JAN 2016, see here. Zezen (talk) 15:24, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Notice it shows up under the redirect name "Rape of Cologne"... seriously, Google, WTF?Crumpled Fire (talk) 00:26, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Update: Attacks now reported from Finland, Sweden, Switzerland and Austria

According to Austrian police several attacks are now being reported against women in Austria during NYE committed by immigrants from Syria and Afghanistan. In Finland a group of 1000 immigrants mostly from Iraq reportedly gathered around main railway station and sexually harassed women. [7] --MyMoloboaccount (talk) 20:47, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

English links [8] Finnish police reported Thursday an unusually high level of sexual harassment in Helsinki on New Year's Eve and said they had been tipped off about plans by groups of asylum seekers to sexually harass women...Three sexual assaults allegedly took place at Helsinki's central railway station on New Year's Eve, where around 1,000 mostly Iraqi asylum seekers had converged.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 20:49, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

This is getting very hypothetical. Firstly, a police reporting a few harassment cases for large cities on the New Year's Eve isn't exactly news-breaking. We're easily within the daily averages for such reports - there are anywhere from 200 to 300 such reports a year in Helsinki, so 3 happening on one of the largest holidays shouldn't be a statistical anomaly. Secondly, for Finland, the latest information does not support a connection between the few harassment cases in Helsinki and the many cases in Cologne. I apologize for not having been able to find readily translated links, but in this one from Finland's national broadcasting company, http://yle.fi/uutiset/helsingin_poliisi_kolnin_hairinta_uhkasi_tapahtua_myos_helsingissa__1_000_turvapaikanhakijaa_asematunnelissa/8576615 , the same police who AFP refers to, says that "At this time, we don't have a clear picture of how organized this has been."

In another bit, http://yle.fi/uutiset/krpn_tutkinnanjohtaja_suomessa_ei_suunniteltu_vastaavaa_kuin_kolnissa/8576981 , the chief investigator of Finland's National Bureau of Investigation says that "In investigation, nothing has turned up that would give a reason to believe in retrospect that anything similar to Cologne (Köln) was being planned"

Seriously, this is a rumor mill, nothing more. Wikipedia's not a tabloid - but this is starting to seem like it was. Tzaeru (talk) 11:04, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Furthermore, the reported assaults didn't even take place at the Central Railway Station (in Finnish). Finland at least should be removed from the ingress but this whole issue makes the original news source (Australian) seem unreliable. 2001:14BA:21E6:4000:95A5:724D:1825:BFB8 (talk) 18:13, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Similar attack reported in Zurich, Switzerland [9]--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 20:26, 7 January 2016 (UTC

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3390168/Migrant-rape-fears-spread-Europe-Women-told-not-night-assaults-carried-Sweden-Finland-Germany-Austria-Switzerland-amid-warnings-gangs-ordinating-attacks.html

http://nyheteridag.se/exposing-major-pc-cover-up-in-sweden-leading-daily-dagens-nyheter-refused-to-write-about-cologne-like-sex-crimes-in-central-stockholm/

Weil am Rhein

[10]

I'm not denying at all that every act of violence against women is an act of violence against women, but I don't think this is in the same sphere of what this article is about, apart from the place of family origin of the accused.

The "new dimension" of crime which gave the other events so much attention was that they were in public, in groups, and by strangers. This (a rape is still a rape, full stop) has a different criminal Modus Operandi '''tAD''' (talk) 21:45, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Agreed; note the last sentence: "There is no apparent connection to the mass sexual assaults committed in Cologne on New Year's Eve." See WP:COATRACK. Faceless Enemy (talk) 21:49, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 January 2016

Source 6 should be http://www.zeit.de/gesellschaft/2016-01/koeln-verdaechtige-asylbewerber-bundespolizei-silvester 73.187.81.35 (talk) 15:09, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Hi. The original source "Welt Newsticker" won't work. It will redirect to the newest ticker news. So that is probably not a good source. (The first 'Information' in the Box cited by that source is not in the Zeit article). --Det&cor (talk) 15:27, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Question: What exactly is wrong with the current Welt.de source? I can't read German very well, but I put it through Google Translate and it appears to verify the information it stands next to. We can add the new source in, but why does source 6 need to be replaced entirely? Mz7 (talk) 21:02, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Partly done: I have added another instance of the Zeit source you mentioned, but I haven't replaced the Welt.de source. Let me know if I have missed anything. Regards, Mz7 (talk) 05:20, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Footnote [6] is unresolved

hey,

the Footnote [6] used so far 4 times in the article is has this message (Cite error: The named reference welt.de was invoked but never defined (see the help page)).

Thanks

--Amanouz (talk) 15:54, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Hi. The original source "Welt Newsticker" won't work. It will redirect to the newest ticker news. So that is probably not a good source. (The first 'Information' in the Box cited by that source is not in the Zeit article). --Det&cor (talk) 16:02, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

up to now

The Zeit article states that no asylum seekers (at all) were accused of sexual assault "up to now". About the 18: (= the 2/3 of the 31, the 'majority', the asylum seekers). "No sexual offences has been linked to them". The 'up to now' is kinda wrong.

That article works very good with google translate:

http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/silvester-uebergriffe-in-koeln-innenministerium-gibt-details-zu-koelner-verdaechtigen-bekannt-1.2809907

https://translate.google.de/translate?hl=de&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sueddeutsche.de%2Fpolitik%2Fsilvester-uebergriffe-in-koeln-innenministerium-gibt-details-zu-koelner-verdaechtigen-bekannt-1.2809907

--Det&cor (talk) 15:57, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

The "up to now" is necessary. The persons were mostly suspected because of robbery - this was what the police officers could see and persecute more easily than the sexual assaults in the crowd. Several eye witness reports say so. Which does not mean, that the perpetrators who were checked have not committed such assaults. The article in Die Zeit seems to clarify this better than the one in the Süddeutsche Zeitung. It says: "Sexualdelikte seien bisher nicht mit den Asylbewerbern in Verbindung gebracht worden." ("Sexual offenses were so far not linked to the asylum seekers.") [11] That does not exclude that this will possibly follow during the future investigations.--Gerry1214 (talk) 17:27, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Based on this important information, I removed the claim "Perpretrators: Majority Asylum Seekers" from the infobox as it is clearly misrepresenting the sources. Major topic of this article are the sexual assaults, and if not even a single asylum seeker has been linked to any sexual offenses, then this is massively misleading. Please help taking care that this misrepresentation isn't reintroduced again. Even if contradicting information should appear somewhere, perpetrators cannot be only be specified in the infobox if supported by unambiguous, reliable and verifiable information, if possible by official sources. --PanchoS (talk) 18:30, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

You misunderstand the whole issue. There are enough victim, eye witness, police reports that clearly link the assaults with the asylum seekers as made clear in the rest of this wiki article. The article in "Die Zeit" only says, that the 31 checked by the Federal Police (and there were many more checked and suspected by the local Cologne police) are so far not accused of sexual offences, which as I said may change during the further investigations. I strongly recommend to read eye witness, victim or police reports or other well founded sources about the issue before editing this article. This is not meant with disrespect, just as an necessary condition.--Gerry1214 (talk) 18:41, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I introduced a new source, which should bring more clarity: "Bei den Straftaten handele es sich vorwiegend um Körperverletzungen, auch schwere Körperverletzungen sowie um Eigentumsdelikte wie Diebstahl oder Raub. Sexualdelikte seien als "Beleidigung auf sexueller Basis" eingestuft worden. Es seien Ermittlungsverfahren eingeleitet worden. Die Bundespolizei ist ihrem Auftrag gemäß nur innerhalb des Kölner Hauptbahnhofs sowie in dessen unmittelbarem Vorfeld eingesetzt." ("The crimes were primarily personal injury, even fatal injuries as well as property crimes such as theft or robbery. Sexual offenses were classified as "insulting on a sexual base". Investigations were initiated. The Federal Police is in service in accordance with its assignment in the Cologne main train station and within the direct vicinity.")--Gerry1214 (talk) 19:02, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I add the source also here: [12] --Gerry1214 (talk) 19:08, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

By January 7 the number of complaints to the police in Hamburg increased to 70 -> see http://www.deutschlandfunk.de/uebergriffe-an-silvester-108-anzeigen-in-hamburg-41.447.de.html?drn:news_id=567265 108 complaints in Hamburg, 41 in Düsseldorf (...) According to police, most of the perpetrator were foreigners. -> http://www.welt.de/newsticker/news2/article150768600/Zahl-der-Anzeigen-in-Koeln-laut-Spiegel-auf-rund-200-gestiegen.html According to Spiegel, number of complaints in Köln rose to about 200. JeremyThomasParker (talk) 19:13, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Your new source doesn't bring any more clarity on this aspect. I've not yet seen any reliable source stating that the majority of perpetrators of the sexual assaults were asylum seekers. I'm not saying this is unconceivable, but as long as it hasn't been clearly and unambiguously established, we can't pretend it to be a fact. So while we can refer to these allegations in the main article text (where we can use reported speech to clarify it's not yet confirmed), we can't include it in the infobox which covers unambiguous and confirmed facts only. --PanchoS (talk) 19:46, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm sorry, your edit is not right. The Welt says clearly "robbery", it says "schwere Körperverletzung" which translates to "mayhem" or "grievous bodily harm", and it says at least "insulting on a sexual base". I will correct that. And it is clear from other sources in the article, that asylum seekers were involved. Der Spiegel says that, Arnold Plickert the chief of the Police Union says that, several policemen from Cologne say that. What you try to do here seems to be kind of nitpicking to deny the facts given by the sources.--Gerry1214 (talk) 21:11, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

@Gerry1214: What you call "nitpicking" actually means taking care the sources are correctly represented. The ZEIT article clearly states that asylum seekers were suspected to be involved in injury and theft, but not linked to sexual offenses.
Secondly, the WELT article does specify "injuries, including grievous bodily harm, as well as offences against property like theft or robbery," but it doesn't specify who was suspected of these offenses, nor does it say who was charged with "sexualized insults". Your repeatedly introduced allegation of asylum seekers being charged with sexual offenses clearly isn't backed by either of the two sources, but is a clear case of WP:SYNTHESIS.
I'm therefore removing your unsourced statement again, reminding you that another reintroduction of your WP:OR would constitute WP:DISRUPTive editing. Bring a single reliable source that unambiguously links asylum seekers with sexual offenses, and we can talk about it to see if it is sufficiently reliable. --PanchoS (talk) 23:18, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Disagree. There is no consensus for your aggressive editing denying reliable sources as Die Welt. The facts are clearly shown here word by word. Die Welt backs everything I written. Die Zeit doesn't contradict that. Die Welt clearly says "32 Straftaten, zu denen 31 Tatverdächtige namentlich bekannt sind." ("32 offenses relating to 31 namely known suspects"), then talking about "the offenses" and "the suspects" as I cited above. So it specifies very clearly who is suspected. Also you are removing another well sourced sentence which comes close to vandalism. Just read the Welt-article sufficiently and understand it.--Gerry1214 (talk) 23:32, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

OK. As I'm not interested in an edit war with you, we need a WP:Third opinion on this issue, unless anyone steps in here. I'm filing a request there. --PanchoS (talk) 23:40, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Sounds good. Let's further discuss it. Beyond that I'm sure the following days will bring more detailed information so that we indeed don't need to start a war on words.--Gerry1214 (talk) 23:45, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

For the record, I agree with Gerry1214's version and I'm at a loss to understand PanchoS's removal of it. It's sourced, and the source is eminently WP:RS. Jeppiz (talk) 23:47, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

The sources being "eminently WP:RS" is just a red herring. Of course the sources are reliable. Nobody disagrees with that. Point is that the claims, as repeatedly introduced by you and Gerry1214, are not given in any of the two sources or any other reliable source. I filed a WP:Third opinion request to help us settle this content dispute. --PanchoS (talk) 23:59, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

But it does say that. Perhaps you want to interpret the police saying that most of the involved they checked were Syrians as unsure as there has not been a trial, but that is to add your own POV interpretation. The source is RS and the source says most of the involved were recent Syrian immigrants. It may be right or wrong, but that's what the source says. Jeppiz (talk) 00:06, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

It does say that a majority of suspects are asylum seekers. But it does not connect sexual delicts with the asylum seekers amongst all suspects, let alone the subgroup of Syrians. Only the ZEIT article specifies what is being held against asylum seekers, naming it as "injury and theft", and explicitly ruling out any sexual delicts. --PanchoS (talk) 06:44, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

It clearly connects "insulting on a sexual base" with the suspects and it clearly links the suspects to these and all of the other offenses as I have shown above. So there is no reason for the tag "not in the citation given".--Gerry1214 (talk) 14:11, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

The WELT article doesn't connect "insulting on a sexual base" with asylum seekers, so it doesn't contradict the ZEIT article which explicitly states no sexual delicts were connected with asylum seekers. So your claim is not covered by any o the two sources, and at least the tag has to stay there until new sources give more insight. --PanchoS (talk) 14:37, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

"but offenses classified as "insulting on a sexual base"." not given in an any source. All sources say unambiguous "no sexual offense". (It is so apparent that I can only hope the reason is the language barrier. But I can't see that either. It is just not there. I don't understand it at all. There is an information given without a source (and there are thousand of sources in German and in English) and it seems to be common understanding that there is no source -the tag is there for I don't know 10 hours-, but the unproven information is persistent. Furthermore I hardly doubt there is a source according to the tone of the statement by the federal police (the statement would even be wrong, legally. Because an insult is -at least- a misdemeanor ("Vergehen", 185 stgb i think). The police states no sexual delicts "Sexualdelikte"(Zeit) (not the civil wrongs, obviously. In English maybe criminal wrongs?). And evan a parking ticket is a delict (a "criminal" wrong in english I guess. But a parking ticket is not "criminal" it's an Ordnungswidrigkeit (don't know the English term). But it's still a delict. It's just wrong. It's my first wikipedia-article edit. So I back up for now (This is way to time consuming) --Det&cor (talk) 17:06, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

I don't know if you can read German, but please do me a favor and translate the following from the WELT article: "Bei den Straftaten handele es sich vorwiegend um Körperverletzungen, auch schwere Körperverletzungen sowie um Eigentumsdelikte wie Diebstahl oder Raub. Sexualdelikte seien als "Beleidigung auf sexueller Basis" eingestuft worden. Es seien Ermittlungsverfahren eingeleitet worden." [13] And for Pancho: I explained in detail here how it is connected, but it seems to me, that you don't want to understand the source. This is the last time I will repeat this, because it is ridiculous to explain simple clear sentences from a newspaper article.--Gerry1214 (talk) 19:05, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

That's not new. The article is about the 31 (minus the two German). It doesn't say that the sexual attackers were asylum seekers. It does only accuse any of those 29. The other articles clarifies that information: there was no sexual attack done by the 18 asylum seekers. --Det&cor (talk) 19:28, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

I repeat it especially for you as you seem to read articles and discussions selectively. Cited from the Welt article: "32 Straftaten, zu denen 31 Tatverdächtige namentlich bekannt sind." ("32 offenses relating to 31 namely known suspects"), then talking about "the offenses" and "the suspects", while it gives in detail with nationalities the suspects for these offenses: the 31 persons which by majority are asylum seekers. So the 31 are suspected of the crimes named in the article. If you continue nitpicking by saying: we have an American sexual offender here and asylum seekers who only picked flowers in the flower shop, then I have to cite Lemmy: "Come on. P*** off." ;) And read the rest of the sources. Please.--Gerry1214 (talk) 19:40, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Following a quick idea, I replaced in the article "them" with "the suspects". I hope this satisfies your search for the odds and ends. ;)--Gerry1214 (talk) 19:50, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

@Gerry1214: Please return to civil behaviour. Four-letter words will only bring you in trouble, they won't intimidate the contributors you're swearing at.
Again, exactly this is my argumentation:
(1)The WELT article doesn't say a word who exactly was charged with the sexual delicts.
(2) The ZEIT article explicitly says asylum seekers were not charged with any sexual delicts.
→ It is not covered by any source that sexualized insults nor any other sexual delicts were linked to asylum seekers. Quite the contrary. Your wording however still suggests exactly that.
I'm not so sure anymore if I'm too blue-eyed, but for now I continue assuming you're acting in good faith. Therefore I want to assure you that I'm not trying to whitewash what happened on New Year's Eve. What happened there is scandalous on several levels. At the same time I can't and won't accept POV-pushing by misrepesenting sources – deliberate or not. --PanchoS (talk) 11:09, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

I put forth a proposal to settle our dispute. It's a real compromise as I still think the last half-sentence should be removed, but I could live with it and move on. It's my last word though. Within reason, the source can't be bent further towards your POV. --PanchoS (talk) 11:24, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Everybody, please see the new section I recently added below. With the recent coverage in the Independent this issue can finally be put to rest! -109.40.141.1 (talk) 11:32, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Indeed, this Independent article is a game-changer, turning our dispute moot. Though it remains to be seen whether one or the other source misinterpreted something or whether this just reflects recent developments in investigation, I will readily replace the contentious sources by your new source. If all sides can accept this, we can consider the dispute ettled at this point. --PanchoS (talk) 11:53, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Incorporated the new Independent source in this update, so if @Gerry1214, Jeppiz, and Det&cor can all live with my wording, I'm ready to withdraw the dispute resolution request I filed. --PanchoS (talk) 12:10, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Absolutely, thanks for your edit! Jeppiz (talk) 12:15, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Lack of focus, news story

This article has some problems. With its present title, it should exclude sexual assaults other than on New Years Eve and other than in Germany. But it presently says in the lede "In addition, similar assaults in Austria, Finland, Sweden and Switzerland were reported." It also has the subtext "Asylum seekers are evil sexual predators who conspire to defile and rob German women." Very few things are referenced to reliable sources to satisfy verifiability, and it seems to be based on rumors. It smacks of a Conspiracy Theory. Ideally it would go to AFD as a news story per WP:NOTNEWS and WP:CRIME, but past experience is lots of neophyte editors would chime in and note that it was covered by lots of news sources and that they LIKE it. Edison (talk) 17:19, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

You may create articles for the other countries, but for the moment I think it is enough that it is clarified that similar events in lower numbers happened also in other European countries nearby. You may interpret the article as you like - but it is based on dozens of reliable and verifiable sources. And if you would name the "rumors" or "conspiracy theories" it would be very helpful. This would put more substance to your arguments.--Gerry1214 (talk) 17:35, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I quote the talk page of the corresponding article in the German Wikipedia: "Wir haben bisher keine validen Zahlen über Opfer, Taten, Täter oder Festnahmen." which says , via machine translation "We have no valid figures on casualties, acts, perpetrators or arrests." by German editor Logo at 14:44, 6. Jan. 2016 (CET). Instead we have constantly changing and inconsistent information which lacks validation from reliable sources. We do not have " dozens of reliable and verifiable sources." We need to get this right, since it has major geopolitical implications, and feeds into narrative of fear-mongering demagogues in more than one country. Edison (talk) 18:41, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

So are you arguing that we delete the article? It was on the front page of the Wall Street Journal the other day. The challenges we face here are the same as the challenges Wikipedia faces when dealing with any other evolving story. Faceless Enemy (talk) 18:57, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Many news stories are on the front pages of newspapers for a short while, until the next sensation comes along. See WP:NOTNEWS. But I noted that too many people are fascinated by shiny things, so I would not nominate it at this time. Too many new editors would chime in , not understanding that we are not "News Of The Week." If groups of men had groped/robbed women in Times Square on New Year's Eve in 1932, would we have an article about it? Notability does not consider timeliness. Maybe in a couple of years if coverage peters out. The thing that might give it notability is the political consequences such as forced retirement of a police chief, new laws, new policies toward deporting asylum seekers who commit crimes (at present they must commit a crime which results in a 3 year prison sentence to get deported, per a German source), or right wing Europeans or Americans seizing on the reports to get votes. So far there are lots of conflicting and hazy reports which seem to contradict each other. Often, with a sensational story, 90% of what the media reports early on turns out to be wrong. Edison (talk) 19:08, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Cologne police chief resigned. Faceless Enemy (talk) 19:17, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

That's what I was alluding to. So far we have no secondary sources, just initial news reports, which are primary sources. A good secondary source might look at what happened in prior years at mass events (not just New Years, but sports events with drunken yobs) and might analyze whether it was actually a planned attack. The adequacy of security cameras, the adequacy of the numbers of police, compared to other large cities when there is a mass gathering, and their response is still hazy. Can German media use something like the US Freedom of Information Act to get official police documents as to who was detained or arrested, and on what charges? Edison (talk) 19:47, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

still serious problems with prose

Particularly in the "Incidents" section.

Just take the first two sentences. First one talks about "the men". What "men"? This noun is just dropped right at the beginning as if the reader already knew everything about the topic. Then the second sentence talks about "the perpetrators". Perpetrators of what? Remember, the lede is NOT the introduction to the article but a summary of it. So first thing, right off the bat, the body text is missing an introduction or background or even a single paragraph which would explain the scope of the topic.

Then the same paragraph talks about groups of "30-40" and then repeats itself but this time talks of groups "2 and 20 people". The wording also leaves it unclear if these are groups of "perpetrators" or victims.

First sentence next paragraphs - similar problem. It talks about police denying that they did not know something. Shouldn't that something that they were accused of not knowing be explained first? Shouldn't the initial police statements come first? This is just a mess. The paragraph clumsily also lumps a bunch of sentences together without any structure. In the middle, between the "sexual amusement" and the "On January 8", it changes topic - in the middle of a paragraph. And then it jumps right back to discussing the ethnicity of the perpetrators. Then you have another sentence with effectively redundant information.

And thennnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn we finally get to a freakin' paragraph which finally describes what they hey this article is about. At the end of the section. Remember your basics of journalism some of which apply to any kind of writing: Who? What? When? Where? How? We don't get any of that until this very last paragraph in the section.

Oh yeah, this one's funny too. The paragraph begins with "By January 8...". And it ends with "By January 7...". Last I checked, both numerically and temporally 8 comes after 7, unless we're all currently travelling backward in time.

I'm sorry, this whole section is an an ugly mess, I'm putting the copy-edit tag back on and please don't remove it until the problems have been fixed.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:22, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Welcome to FOXpedia

It was later revealed by police that 18 of the 31 suspects checked by the Federal Police on New Year's Eve were asylum seekers.[6] None of them had been accused of sexual offenses before then.[13]

Correct: None of them had been accused of sexual offenses.[13]

This is just plain wrong! Non of the 18 asylum seeker were accused of sexual offenses, that evening (or ever as far as we know). They were accused of robbery e.g.. (The sexual crimes are done by some of the other 13 of the 31, allegedly). All Sources (including the cited).

--Det&cor (talk) 18:24, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

See above under "up to now".--Gerry1214 (talk) 18:44, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

The article does not claim the injustices were committed exclusively by refugees. It does, however, note credible eyewitness accounts of victims as reported by reliable sources including The Guardian, The New York Times, BBC and Deutsche Welle. Hardly "FOXpedia" as you call it. Whamper (talk) 19:09, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

It was later revealed by police that 18 of the 31 suspects checked by the Federal Police on New Year's Eve were asylum seekers.[6] They were suspected of mayhem, robbery and "insult on a sexual base", as sexual assaults could not been linked to them so far.

Wrong again. If 'they' are the 31 it would be correct. If 'they' are the asylum seekers it is just wrong. The Federal Police said clearly: no sexual insults linked to any of the 18 asylum seekers. Suspects: nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, four Syrians, five Iranians, an Iraqi, a Serb, an American and two German. All of them might be asylum seekers, except the two Germans and unlikely the American _{(the other way around there is a low single digit number of Germans who successfully request asylum in the US in some years, probably because home schooling is illegal in Germany)} . Just because the second source talks about foreigners it doesn't contradicts the clear statement of the federal police. Nowhere anyone says it is just not yet to be done to link any sexual insult what so ever to these 18 asylum seekers (Except of you, sir). They may be robbers, but there is just no single singe they could be sexual "insultans". If anyone would suspect them, the federal police hadn't made the statement.

The eyewitness are not linked to these 18 assylum seekers. --Det&cor (talk) 19:34, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

The article is about 'New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany' not exclusively '31 persons accused of non-sexual crimes 18 of whom are asylum seekers'. The article does not take a position on whether or not the sexual assaults were perpetrated exclusively by asylum seekers. As already stated above, the article notes of credible eyewitness accounts of sexual assault as reported by reliable sources including The Guardian, The New York Times, BBC and Deutsche Welle. The reported incidence of widespread mass sexual assault remains regardless of what these 31 persons have been accused of (or in this case, not accused of).

Please also note that the article documents a current event. We do not know all of the facts yet and the case has yet to be definitely resolved. You state Nowhere anyone says it is just not yet to be done to link any sexual insult what so ever to these 18 asylum seekers (Except of you, sir). - Your English here makes no sense, but from what I can decipher, you appear to be accusing me of making a definite assumption as to who the perpetrators of the sexual assaults are. Your accusation is incorrect. Please do not assume others you address are a 'sir'. Whamper (talk) 20:27, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

It was later revealed by police that 18 of the 31 suspects checked by the Federal Police on New Year's Eve were asylum seekers,[6] which were suspected of grievous bodily harm, robbery and theft, while sexual assaults have not been linked to them, but offenses classified as "insulting on a sexual base".[10][14]. Source[14]: (Headline, google translate, thus you don't like my english) "31 suspects, the federal police investigation for the assaults on New Years Eve, 18 of them are asylum seekers. Sexual offenses are the latter but not charged". PS Other source won't say any diffrent. --Det&cor (talk) 22:04, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Okay i c the problem: correct translation: but the latter [the asylum seekers] are not accused of sexual offenses. (no source at all for insultina on a sexual base for that particular incident by those) --Det&cor (talk) 22:11, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

"The 31 suspects are not believed to have carried out assaults that were sexual in nature, according to AP." [14]. It was later revealed by police that 18 of the 31 suspects checked by the Federal Police on New Year's Eve were asylum seekers,[6] which were suspected of grievous bodily harm, robbery and theft, while sexual assaults have not been linked to them, but offenses classified as "insulting on a sexual base" . There's just no source for the struck out part. (And yes that is all I am talking about and it comes back again and again in the article without a source.) --Det&cor (talk) 23:14, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I agree with what you say about parts of that sentence not being covered by the sources, Det&cor, but would you mind raising this issue above in the #up to now section, where we've been discussing exactly this in a content dispute that now undergoes dispute resolution because nobody stepped in? Thanks. --PanchoS (talk) 06:34, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Title

Shouldn't it have the year in it?

Probably. I mean hopefully this will never happen again, but that's probably overly optimistic. The current title also seems to imply that this is some sort of routine annual event, which it isn't. And given that there were similar events elsewhere in Europe, the focus on Germany in the title may need to change. Faceless Enemy (talk) 21:19, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

It should say 2015/2016 like the German Wikipedia article, "Sexuelle Übergriffe in der Silvesternacht 2015/16," since the events started before midnight and continued well past midnight. By the way, "Sylvester Night??") Edison (talk) 22:13, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

The title should probably also reflect the fact that, according to the latest information, these seem to be mostly robberies where sexual harassment has been mainly used to confuse and intimidate the victims. 2001:14BA:21E6:4000:95A5:724D:1825:BFB8 (talk) 11:30, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

I haven't followed up on the news since january 8th, so I'm nt sure about what is linked where and what is true and false precisely, but there were also accounts of rape, and these I think are hardly "to cover up theft". Also, what I find strange about the entire incident, why is it believed the sexual harrassment was to cover it up? it makes no sence. why would they cover it up? its not like anyone could stop them otherwise. And also, where is the source that would confirm this claim? its just a bold statement and interpretation or even speculation, unless an offender has actually confessed it. Fact remains though: large scale sexual intimidation was claimed that day all acros the country(ies).

The "rapes" might have been the separate Friedlingen incident where boys allegedly locked up two girls and then raped them. They boys were held in Weil am Rhein. Some articles connect these two events with the Cologne attacks, see here [15] while some others state that they are unrelated [16] "German privacy laws prevent the police from naming the suspects but it has confirmed they are not asylum-seekers." UltimateLiberty (talk) 17:26, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

@ Edison: Sylvester nacht, as its called in German, its named after a serving pope called Silvester, who coincidentally died on dec 31. Sylvesternacht is directly translated to: New years eve. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 08:05, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

New Der Spiegel article

Good article in the English online version of Der Spiegel about this: [17]. It says that Cologne has for years had gangs of North Africans (not part of last years's wave of migrants) , and "The perpetrators dance up to their victims in a pretend celebratory mood, rub up against them and rob them. Those who try to defend themselves are insulted, threatened or even hurt." It says that 11,000 robberies of this sort have taken place over the last 3 years in Cologne. It did not say it was ever on the scale of 200 to 1000 attackers in one place at one time. The article has much more info than the little set of factoids which all the other articles are repeating, including accounts from local and federal police.. Edison (talk) 22:15, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

So either Edison did not bother to read through the article or is citing it very selectively indeed to cherrypick just the parts supporting his version. It's ironic that after a scandal involving extensive whitewashing, we see the very same whitewashing attempts here at Wikipedia. Jeppiz (talk) 22:59, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I agree Edison that the Spiegel article brings some background aspects into the discussion, that are missing. But there are also aspects that I doubt. There were no 11.000 robberies "of the sort" of New Year's Eve in the years before. "Der Antanztrick" (the "dance up trick") is used to rob someone, not to sexually exploit him. In Cologne on New Year's Eve it was, as the police officers cited in the WP article said, "exactly the opposite": the "sexual amusement" was the priority. The robbery was the nice addition for the perpetrators. So Cologne here indeed has a "completly new quality". But it can be compared to incidents in the Tahrir Square in Egypt some time ago. The German WP already has that in the article. This is indeed missing here and should be added.--Gerry1214 (talk) 23:06, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Jeppiz should refrain from personal attacks, per WP:NPA: "Comment on content, not on the contributor. Personal attacks harm the Wikipedia community, and the collegial atmosphere needed to create a good encyclopedia. Derogatory comments about other editors may be removed by any editor. Repeated or egregious personal attacks may lead to sanctions including blocks." I reject his claim that I did not read the article and that,somehow, without reading it, I selectively cherrypicked, and whitewashed. I provide a link for all to access the article. Edison (talk) 23:16, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I think we have brought enough WP:RS to the table confirming that several of the people arrested were either asylum seekers or recent immigrants. As the number of suspects is estimated to be around a thousand, it's highly possible other non-refugees/immigrants who were simply of Arabian or African ancestry participated, but that doesn't mean the European migrant crisis had nothing to do with the incident. Best, Jonas Vinther • (Click here to collect your price!) 23:18, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I am not making any personal attacks Edison, I'm merely pointing out that your selected quotes from the article are not representative and, if you did read it, you also know it. The article makes it very clear that recent asylum seekers were involved in the incidents, such as he report mentions deliberate attempts to provoke the police. One example is of someone who "tore up a residency permit with a smile on his face, saying: 'You can't touch me. I'll just go back tomorrow and get a new one.'" Another example mentioned in the report was an unidentified man saying: "I'm a Syrian! You have to treat me kindly! Ms. Merkel invited me." As Jonas Vinther points out, both this article and several others explicitly state recent asylum seekers were involved, so the efforts to deny that is not based in any WP policy. Jeppiz (talk) 23:25, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm not planning on making lots of further edits to this article, but as this documents a recent event, I'd suggest waiting a few more days or weeks before establishing consensuses on heated topics such as this. Peace! Jonas Vinther • (Click here to collect your prize!) 23:29, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

Jeppiz, see if anything in the post I complained about was at all "collegial." If you see no attack in your post, then you have a different standard from mine. If I seemed to be denying that asylum seekers were present. I did not do so. I noted that persons of the same ethnicity had frequently done group assaults surrounding, rubbing up against and physically attacking victims, in the same city, thousands of times over three years. Asylum seekers may have joined the ranks of local gang members in doing a similar trick with a higher element of sexual assault. When they say there were two rapes, could that be groping extended to digital penetration as opposed to copulation, in the terms used by German law enforcement? Several victims said they were grabbed between the legs. So far we have a couple of anecdotes about things said..BTW, When the two made the statements quoted, were they speaking English? That question came up on he German talk page.Edison (talk) 23:54, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

The two "rapes" might have been the separate Friedlingen incident where boys allegedly locked up two girls and then raped them. They boys were held in Weil am Rhein. Some articles connect these two events with the Cologne attacks, see here [18] while some others state that they are unrelated [19] "German privacy laws prevent the police from naming the suspects but it has confirmed they are not asylum-seekers." UltimateLiberty (talk) 17:27, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Orange maintenance tags

We've seen several rounds of disruptive maintenance tagging, and it has to stop. This article is currently listed on WP:ITN. That's why I'm here. I'm one of the admins who watches over that page. The article was placed on the home page once it was determined that it met the criteria. If there's a problem with the article serious enough to require an orange maintenance tag, we will pull it from the home page. This cannot be done by mere fiat of one or two editors. Please explain here what's wrong and if there's a consensus, I will allow the article to be tagged, and pull it from the home page. This has to be a thoughtful, deliberate action, not a reaction driven by one or two persistent editors. Please discuss. Jehochman ^Talk 01:38, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

As has already been pointed out to you, "listed on WP:ITN" is no reason to remove legitimate tags. What is disruptive is you edit warring over the tag, when as an administrator you should know better and lead by example. If there are problems with the article then they need to be fixed. Adding a tag alerts both readers and editors and invites them to help fix these problems.

If you had actually been paying attention rather than engaging in drive-by blind reverting, you'd notice there are TWO sections where these problems are ALREADY discussed. There's in fact a dedicated section right above which I started. It is extremely disingenuous for you to ask people to "Please discuss" when this is actually the first time you've bothered to ... you know, discuss. It's even more disingenuous since previous requests directed at YOU to engage in discussion were met with derision, condescension, assertions of faux-authority which you do not have, and personal attacks [20] - in short a refusal to actually participate in discussion. So take your own advice first, then give it to others please.

I don't care if you pull it from main page, other editors can make that decision.Volunteer Marek (talk) 02:00, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

And frankly, it's dishonest to write "I will allow the article to be tagged" on the article talk page right after you've removed it for the third time. Also, consider this your 3RR warning. I'll do the formalities and leave on your talk page as well.Volunteer Marek (talk) 02:05, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

I've pulled the article from the home page because of your tagging. If another ITN admin comes along and reviews the situation, I am pretty sure you will be warned, but I will leave it to them. Please do not post to my talk page again under any circumstances. This is not VolunteerMarekOpedia where you get to exercise unilateral control of the home page by tagging articles you don't like. Jehochman ^Talk 16:10, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

If you are edit warring and tip toeing up to the 3RR line then policy requires that I leave a warning on your talk page before reporting you. If you do break 3RR and I do report you then I will also post the required notification to your talk page. Otherwise, don't worry, your talk page is not a place I enjoy visiting anyway.

And I'm sorry but tagging a single article that has obvious problems does not constitute "exercise(ing) unilateral control of the home page". You are being ridiculously hyperbolic. It's merely just that - tagging a single article which has obvious problems. Which still haven't been fixed. If you are so concerned about the, uh, "home page", then fix the danged problem.

And let me repeat it one more time because you are completely ignoring the main issue: there is no policy what. so. ever. which says that an article which is linked to from the main page cannot be tagged for problems. That would be a really stupid policy, which is probably why it doesn't exist.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:17, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

I've also voiced my opinion regarding this article. I can see the reason why Jehochman pulled it from the main page, but I also see VolunteerMareks point of view. I think the main problem with this article in particular is that coverage of the incident and the confirmation about what realy happened (as opposed to the contradicting statements) is met with slow progress directly affecting the "Quality" of the article. But at the same time, its coverage in media is globe-wide, making it definately news-worthy material. And as VolunteerMarek explained, although the "Goal" of the ITN page is to adress quality unambiguous news events, it does not rule out the fact that newsworthy events can be covered with insufficient of the desired quality. Which leaves the question: "Is removing an article which suffers from this, not newsworthy anymore?" I think not. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 08:05, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Bielefeld ?

I (native German) have intensely read almost all articles at FAZ.net, spiegel.de, zeit.de and sueddeutsche.de , also some at regional newspaper sites like ksta.de, kr.de, rp-online.de, and have also watched the main news TV (tagesschau.de, heute.de) . Bielefeld wasn't mentioned.

this detailed article (regional newspaper) writes Auch drei Raubdelikte verzeichnete die Polizei, unter anderem wurden zwei Frauen in der Innenstadt die Handtaschen entrissen. (three robberies; two of them: the handbags of two women were snatched) - it does n o t write that they suffered Sexual harassment . The combination of Sexual harassment and Robbery is (here in Germany) seen as one characteristic that makes the events in Germany so special.

=> I propose to remove Bielefeld from the article (including the mark on the map). --Neun-x (talk) 04:44, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

I added more on Bielefeld as of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. In this source sexual offense ("kissing") is clearly mentioned.--Gerry1214 (talk) 15:10, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. this article (phrased cautiously) contributes to the thesis that Bielefeld is 'worth mentioning' in the wp article. It quotes a police report saying that policemen in der Silvesternacht mehrfach Hilfestellung bei der Durchsetzung des Hausrechtes durch die Diskotheken geleistet hätten. Die für alle Beteiligten nicht vorhersehbare Aggressivität der beteiligten Männer gegenüber den Sicherheitsdiensten war erheblich . --Neun-x (talk) 11:54, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Bias of title

This title focuses entirely on the sensational element of this event (SEX). The main crime reported seems to robbery and the sexual assaults, which are described appear to be acts of groping being used as a tactic to distract woman from acts of robbery. There were two allegations of rape made. I don't know about crime rates in other cities but I image that on New Years Eve there were many acts of robbery, perhaps also accompanied by groping designed to distract victims from the act of theft.

The use of "sexual assault" is also quite difficult since it's directly translated from the German legal code which states that in German "sexual assault" is "Whosoever coerces another person to suffer sexual acts by the offender." That is a unique definition which may not agree with sexual assault definitions from English speaking countries.

I suggest a title such as New Years Eve robberies and alleged sexual assaults in Cologne.Monopoly31121993 (talk) 10:37, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

An allegation of a crime named as a crime is not biased if the suspects are not named and pointed out as being found guilty before trial. See Category:Unsolved murders '''tAD''' (talk) 22:01, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Number of victims?...

I noticed that in the info-box it gave the number of victims as approximately 200, but I don't know that this is accurate. The latest information that I've seen is that 121 have been reported so far just in Cologne.

I know that with sexual assaults in general, typically only about one in three are reported to the authorities. And it would seem that in this sort of context, where the same crime and perpetrators have already been reported by others, and where the sheer number of simultaneous perpetrators makes identification of individual assailants much more difficult, that, if anything, additional victims would be *less likely* to want to come forward and go through the ordeal of being questioned about what happened to them and filing a report. So then, IMO, it would be reasonable to extrapolate that the real number of victims is probably at least 600, and likely quite a bit more.

But of course this sort of estimation and extrapolation can't be included in the article unless/until it's been published in a reliable source. In the mean time though, can we edit to make it clear that there's a high degree of uncertainty regarding the actual number of victims, or at least make it clear that the number given is the approximate number of victims who have gone through the process of filing a report, and that the number who have not filed a report is unknown?... -109.40.19.34 (talk) 12:29, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Au contraire, spurred by media reports, victims have come forward, that normally wouldn't have come forward. --Distelfinck (talk) 12:33, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

@Distelfinck - Of course it's speculatory either way, and I'm not sure exactly what sort of process a woman has to go through to make a report and be counted among the official victims. I think that your argument might make sense in certain other circumstances - for example if there is a single person (or perhaps a small group of people) who has been identified and charged as a serial rapist. Under such circumstances, this would provide a good reason for other women to come forward. But if a woman is one of many who was simultaneously attacked by say a dozen men in a large crowd and doesn't feel that she can readily identify any of them (this is what a number of the women quoted by media have said), then what would be the motivation for her to come forward? To spend hours talking with the police and reliving the horror of the attack, but not to do anything which would actually give the police any more information than they already have that would help apprehend the perpetrators?...So that the official tally will simply be 122 instead of 121?.

In any event though, this is largely beyond the point, since like I said, it's speculatory either way, which can't be included unless it's been published in a reliable source. In the mean time though, unless there is a good objection, I will go ahead and edit the article/info box to make more clear that there is uncertainty, and that the numbers given are based on those victims which have come forward.

Finally, another thought on the uncertainty: it would seem that the definitions and self-reporting is also likely to be less than ideal under such circumstances. For every woman who was more seriously assaulted, there was probably at least one other who managed to escape with only being subjected to more minor groping. So then how many of the women in that latter group would count themselves as victims and file a police report? Also, the media has reported that, though they weren't the primary target, a number of were also physically assaulted in order to separate them from their girlfriends or other female friends they were with. How many of these men filed police reports and were then counted among the victims? In any event, it's clear that there's still a lot of ambiguity and uncertainty regarding the number of victims. -109.40.19.34 (talk) 13:50, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

lack of neutrality, possibly biased news article

I don't see any reference to statistics on rapes in the various cities, comparing the number of rapes on this new year's eve and previous new year's eves. It simply states that there were rapes in several cities. Knowing that rapes occur frequently every new years eve, this news article is not informative and instead seems very much based on emotion rather than rationality. I know a lot of people are afraid, but don't use wikipedia as an outlet of your emotions.

You're not the first person who finds this article biased or non-neutral. Please, see the many sections above and learn from the discussions. Best, Jonas Vinther • (Click here to collect your prize!) 15:10, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Was there international coverage and political debate on the previous years' events? We can't write articles on stuff we don't know about. '''tAD''' (talk) 21:57, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

I searched Google News Archive and found no reporting of sexual assaults by mobs in previous New Years. There were just cases of one or more persons raping one female. Not like this public mob assault on a hundred females. Edison (talk) 04:32, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

^Exactly. I've seen over social networks a concerted effort to paint this as something run-of-the-mill, quotidian and what Germans would sit back and watch with popcorn apart from when darker-skinned people do it '''tAD''' (talk) 20:58, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

I know now after reading the detailed description that grouped rapes occurred. This is far from obvious when reading the heading and should be made more obvious. Kai robert (talk) 15:53, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Changed title

I notice the title of the article was changed to 'New Year's Eve sexual assaults and robbery in Germany' is there a consensus that this is the correct title, sources I've read indicate that the sexual assaults were the main focus of the attacks with the robberies being secondary. If robbery should be in the title then shouldn't it be plural too, just from a grammatical point of view?

I also note that the thefts are listed as thefts but other crimes have allegedly or alleged as qualifiers. Is there a reason they are treated differently? -- Boreas74 ^{You'll catch more flies with honey} 21:30, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

Yes, there is a consensus about the title above. Jonas Vinther • (Click here to collect your prize!) 22:48, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

The events in Cologne are covered worldwide and should be a subarticle. German States of America (talk) 04:17, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

@Jonas Vinther - With all due respect, I would question the basis of your assertion that "there is a consensus about the title above." I don't see a requested move having been done here, or any of the other sort of processes to ascertain whether there is consensus for the new title. This should usually be done *before* the article is moved. I would ask that the article be reverted to the previous title until/unless a consensus for the new title can be established. -109.40.141.1 (talk) 11:28, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

A few thoughts on why the recent title change is not a good one:

1. The sexual assaults have received the lion's share of the coverage and analysis on the events thus far. Were it not for the sexual assault aspect, it's unlikely that the story would have received such widespread international coverage and the public outcry which led to the firing of the police chief and Merkel discussing changes to Germany's immigration policies.

2. Following WP:COMMONNAME, our titling should reflect the fact that most headlines on the event to date have focused exclusively on the sexual assault aspect of the event, not on the robberies. The press coverage has indeed *mentioned* the robberies as well, and our article certainly should, but it was almost never part of the *primary focus* or *headline*, so it shouldn't be in the title of our article either.

3. This is more a grammatical nitpick, but even if we were to include the robberies in the title, we should at least have some grammatical consistency. I don't see any reason for "assaults" to be in the plural and "robbery" to be in the singular. Had this proposed title been subjected to a discussion process then surely someone else would have noticed this. So I would cite this as further evidence that the recent title-change DOES NOT reflect consensus at all, and was instead simply a hasty and unilateral action on the part of one user (or perhaps a small group) without getting input from the rest of the interested community. -109.40.141.1 (talk) 11:28, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

For the reasons I and 109.40.141.1 have given above can we move back to the earlier title or discuss and reach an agreement on the correct title? Apart from anything else the plural/singular mismatch will need to be fixed, but my preference is 'New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany'. --Boreas74 ^{You'll catch more flies with honey} 16:49, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Asylum seekers now explicitly suspected of sexual assault...

I know that in a couple of the sections above, PanchoS and others had raised the question of whether or not we had a reliable source explicitly reporting that refugees/asylum-seekers were official suspects not just of robbery, but also of sexual assaults. So I just wanted to let everyone know that we do have that now:

"The German federal police said that out of 32 people identified as sexual abuse suspects so far, 22 were in the process of seeking asylum in Germany." http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/cologne-attacks-police-use-water-cannon-and-pepper-spray-on-anti-immigration-pegida-protesters-a6803996.html

I hope this is helpful and can at least put to rest this one area of disagreement :-) -109.40.141.1 (talk) 11:09, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Note that gives the impression that 32 people were identified as sexual abuse suspects (and as a result that apparent fact has now been added to the lead of this Wikipedia article), but Reuters [21] reporting of the exact same figures from the same federal police paints a quite different story. Reuters say the 32 people were suspected "of playing a role in the violence", which sounds different to being sexual abuse suspects. They then break down the figures in the investigation: "of 76 criminal acts, most them involving some form of theft, and seven linked to sexual molestation". So we have gone from 32 sexual abuse suspects to 7 acts of sexual molestation. That is their reporting of what the federal police said, which is what the Independent source you quoted from is also reporting from. At the same time ITV [22] and others report German interior ministry spokesman Tobias Plate saying the "vast majority" of the criminal acts were linked to theft and bodily injury, but only some sexual assaults also reported. Reuters [23] then reports him as only saying 3 were related to sexual assaults. What that means is open to interpretation: out of the 32 suspects mentioned, either all of them are suspects of sexual abuse, or 7 of them are or 3 of them are, or some combination therein. As with a lot of reporting of this incident, different reliable news outlets reporting from the same sources report different things. Year Zero is a concept (talk) 13:59, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

@Year Zero - There are a couple issues with your citations above:

1. The sources you cite are older, and therefore less likely to contain the most up to date information.

2. Your interpretation of many of the quotes strike me as rather misleading. For example, in your first Reuters link, the actual quote was: "The federal police documented 76 criminal acts, most them involving some form of theft, and seven linked to sexual molestation." But you cut it in such a way as to leave out the word "documented." There were certainly many more acts, with many more women already having come forward, but those are just the ones which they consider to be more thoroughly "documented" (though the standard of "documentation" is not clear. It's also worth noting that with at least most of the sexual assaults, there were multiple men who simultaneously perpetrated them. So even if there were only seven (which there wasn't - that's off by a couple orders of magnitude! - but even if there were...) there could certainly be 32 men suspected of those seven.

Similarly, with your second Reuters citation, you cut the quote in such a way that it left out important information. Here's the full quote, in context, with the relevant info included: "Plate said the vast majority of the 32 criminal acts documented by federal police *on the night* were tied to theft and bodily injury. Three were related to sexual assaults, although police had no names tied to these acts."

So those were just what the police documented the night of the attacks themselves - at a time when almost everyone agrees that the police response was woefully inadequate, and still a few days before the coverup of these attacks was broken and the police leadership began to take the investigation seriously! -2.200.38.88 (talk) 15:05, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

1. The Independent source and the first Reuters source are talking about the same thing: German federal police saying they identified 32 people, 22 of whom are assylum seekers. The Independent is just reporting it slightly later (22 hours ago) as a background point at the bottom of their more recent story about the anti-immigration Pegida protest. Here is CNBC [24] 7 hrs ago explicitly stating that the German federal police saying they identified 32 people, 22 of whom are assylum seekers, is from earlier in the week. And RT [25] stating that it's from Friday.

2. You're adopting a bad faith approach, looking for some kind of nefarious subterfuge that you can imply I'm trying to employ in order to mislead. Don't bother, I don't have an axe to grind, or a side to be on, and I don't really care about the politics and sensibilities of the incident. My interest is in how accurately Wikipedia can report the wide variety of reliable sources and also how contradictory and unclear all the various reliable sources are, especially when it comes to numbers and specifically what those numbers are actually referring to. Your point that I was replying to was entirely about having a reliable source explicitly reporting that refugees/asylum-seekers were official police suspects and made no mention of the numerous eye witness and victim reports. Because my point was in direct response to your point it addressed your point about official police suspects rather than some other point you didn't make about the numerous eye witness and victim reports. In other words, the reason I didn't mention the eye witness and victim reports is because you didn't mention them; you were talking about a reliable source that addresses official police suspects, not other sources that report numerous eye witness and victim reports. Similarly with whatever it is you're trying to imply about the lack of the word "documenting"; because you're talking about official police suspects and I'm responding to your point about official police suspects it's an obvious given that official police suspects are documented, officially, in documents, by the police, as officially documented suspects. They can't be official police suspects without documentation having been done, so there's no need to include the word - especially seeing as you're going to read the word in the links I provided anyway, along with lots of other words I didn't include because they're already in the links and are obvious.

You need to focus on considering the point being made and whether it can benefit the quality of the article, not on trying to find ways to imply misdirection and omission by the other person. Year Zero is a concept (talk) 17:13, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

To further illustrate the point about how the numbers are confusing; contradictory; potentially referring to slightly different entities, types of things and reports; and are reported differently depending on which publication you read, The Guardian [26] reports on Sunday 10th at approx 6pm GMT that "So far, of 31 suspects detained by police for questioning, 18 were asylum seekers [...] and none of them were accused specifically of committing sexual assaults". So on the one hand we have the Independent with 32 sexual abuse suspects (22 asylum seekers) that Reuters refers to as playing a role in the violence rather than sexual abuse suspects, and on the other hand the Guardian stating that the current state of play right now is 31 detained suspects (18 asylum seekers), none of whom were accused specifically of committing sexual assaults! They have to be referring to different things (32/22 and 31/18 are different figures for a start, but are consistently reported. Also one publication is talking of people suspected of something whereas the other is talking of people detained and accused of something). It doesn't end there either: if you read all the available mainstream sources there were an initial large group of either 1500, 1000 or several hundred people (which number is it though?). It is clear that smaller groups broke off from them and perpetrated acts including theft and sexual crimes but it's not absolutely clear that the initial large group were all perpetrators (and of what?). Different sources say different things about the numbers. Year Zero is a concept (talk) 02:36, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Whats funny to me is how we fight a war of numbers here on wikipedia which quite frankly is pointless. The accuracy and precision of this article is bad only because the sources we depend on is heavily inaccurate and unprecise. One thing I do know, there's no almost 2 weeks passed. and progress on the story to be brought out in public isn't really fast. But we can all safely say: 31 (or 32) detainees, is not the same as 31 (or 32) official suspects. also there's 18 asylum seekers, or 22. Police did state that out of the 31 (or 32) the names and nationality of these people was known. And I believe they also reported that all were suspected of theft and infliction of bodily harm paired with threats. german news outlets report "Körperverletzung" which stands for victims receiving damage from physical violence. The statement about how 'körperverletzung' is treated by german law rules sexual assault outside of this specific act of crime. Meaning that the crime of sexual harassment is already the 4th committed crime during that night (theft, treatening and physical voilence being 1, 2 and 3 mentioned in my post). And there's been mentions of varying numbers of people who were reported to have fallen victim to this crime, not how many were accused of it. And thats where we stand now I think. Or should I say, that's where we know we stand, because investigation is still ongoing and news isn'r updated as readily. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 07:19, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 10 January 2016

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Status quo title restored by EdJohnston. Will be simpler to just close this and anyone advocating for a new title can start a new RM. Jenks24 (talk) 02:03, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

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New Year's Eve sexual assaults and robbery in Germany → New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany – This is a move back to original title. The move was done without consensus and the current title has grammatical and other issues, see Changed title above. I did try to change myself but the original page was edited after the redirect so I can't for technical reasons. Boreas74 ^{You'll catch more flies with honey} 17:11, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Tough question, I think the best approach is not to determine which usage is predominant among ALL rs's, but rather look to the best. Newspapers like The New York Times, Wall Stree Journal, The Times, Financial Times, TV networks like BBC, and NBC/ABC/CBS. Offhand it looks like all of them mentioning robberies, with UK newspapers using a clearer sex-assault frame than US. NYT headline mentions "attacks on women" and first para says "groped and robbed"; WSJ headline and first para only refer to "assaults", though third para describes the complaints as being "largely for sexual assault"; The Times headline refers to "scores of sex assaults" and first para says victims complained they were "robbed, sexually assaulted or raped"; Financial Times headline declares "Cologne sex assaults" and first para describes it as a "shocking mass sex attack". Without looking at TV, I think on balance it is being framed as a mass sex assault more than a mass mugging. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 17:47, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

• Point of process - I've gone ahead and moved the page back to the previous title. The move had been done without consensus, so it should not be the starting point for a move discussion. Consensus should be required to move the page away from the previously established title, *not* to move it back there after it had been moved without consensus. If some people aren't happy with the previous title then they should start another RM, and it can be moved again if/when there is consensus for this. -Helvetica (talk) 20:32, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

• Update - I had tried to moved the page back to the old title, but apparently the move didn't go through because the old title still existed, as a redirect page. An admin probably needs to do the physical move. Nonetheless, my larger point above stands. The article should be immediately moved back to the old title, as soon as technically possible, and the previous title and *not* the current one should be then be the starting point for any move discussion. Consensus should not be required for *anything other than* the previous title. -Helvetica (talk) 20:46, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

I restored the article to the shorter title per a request at WP:RMTR. The voters here will decide what the ultimate title will be. EdJohnston (talk) 01:48, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Clash of cultures vs. Racism debate

@Monopoly31121993 and Dontmakemetypepasswordagain: Would you guys please both stop "discussing" controversial issues via edit summaries of reverts, and instead discuss it with us here on the talk page? Feel reminded of the WP:3RR rule.
Monopoly, it's been a good idea to include more material on the public debates unfolding, including the issue of racism, but it is a very bad idea to build your argument on spurious blogs that got everything wrong – that's why I reverted you once, and might also be the reason why others reverted you several times. Please stick to reliable sources, don't add WP:OR, and resolve disputes here on the Talk page. Thanks, PanchoS (talk) 19:01, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

I agree with removing that information (most recently removed here [27]) and keeping the victorygirlsblog.com blog source [28] it's based off out of the article for the following reasons 1. It's a blog. 2. Although it's a blog it could potentially still be a reliable source if it meets further strong criteria but its not a blog of a news outlet and its editor doesn't claim to have any professional journalistic qualifications in its "about" section [29] 3. Only 2 of its 14 writers claim to have journalistic qualifications. 4. The qualifications of the writer of the article are simply that she is a grown up army brat, travelled in Europe and Asia, is a wine enthusiast, a Betty Page fan and likes soft animals. 6. The requirements for being a writer of the blog are that you are conservative and send them a story that that they like. 7. The original way the Wikipedia editor tried to get the information into the article was to mimic the claim the blog title is saying: "German Feminists Claim “Muslim Rape Gang Story” Just A Cover For Racism" but just by reading the source that's obviously not true. It quotes 1 tweet of 1 feminist of note but she is English not German, so she can't be an example of German feminists doing anything. It then quotes another random tweeter that is of no note, leaving me the reader thinking, "so what, I can find 1 single random tweeter of no notability that says any random thing I want to write a blog article about?". 8. The claim in the blog is wrong, gives no evidence that it is of particular weight or representation in the German feminist community or representative of a particular media view and doesn't really give a firm indication of why it deserves to be in this article. 9. The inserting editor initially included it as an anchor point to include further information into this Wikipedia article on a theme of about how rape claims are being used to justify racism and that was his reasoning in the edit summaries when reverting it back and including the other information with it [30][31][32][33], but that's not even what the blog source is saying, it's actually mocking that view. So the only way to keep it in the article without getting immediately reverted was to switch to mimicking what the source content rather than title actually says, so now we're left with this weird, surreal paragraph in the media reaction section that essentially says a couple of people tweeted something and this blog thinks what they tweeted is rubbish - which will leave anyone reading it thinking "OK, so why on earth is this in the article then"? Year Zero is a concept (talk) 23:27, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Nice read… so yeah, that's the long version of "spurious blog that got everything wrong." Guess we'll find better sources to cover the ongoing debates… --PanchoS (talk) 08:52, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Swedish scandal coming out

Financial Times

It's not made clear in this link whether the Cologne issue led to this issue coming out of the woodwork, or if it is a mere coincidence. Does anyone from Sweden know if there's a connection? '''tAD''' (talk) 09:23, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

More coverage here from a non-paywall site: [34] -Helvetica (talk) 14:30, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

I didn't have paywall, maybe because I'm in the UK. Some people oppose Sputnik because they believe it to to have too much influence from government in Russia, here are other sources NYT Guardian '''tAD''' (talk) 00:49, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

I've made a new article on the We Are Sthlm scandal. If anyone has some sources in Swedish to expand the article (or wants to move the title 300 times), please help '''tAD''' (talk) 01:56, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Gender imbalance as a possible contributing factor...

ABC News (Australia) published a story discussing gender imbalance as a possible contributing factor to the attacks. [35] From what I understand, among the migrants who have arrived over the last year or so, there are *a lot more* single men (and male teenagers) than there are single women (and female teenagers). So it would be logical to think that this may have been part of what caused the sexual assaults. I'm not sure where to include it in the article, but posting a couple excerpts below:

"Professor Valerie Hudson, a Texas A&M University professor, said gender imbalances could cause serious problems in the community.

She said societies where men outnumbered women were more susceptible to higher levels of violence, insurgence and mistreatment of women."

""Nevertheless, from the reports that we have it does look like the overwhelmingly male nature of the migration wave, coupled with marginalisation among those migrants, may have been a contributing factor."

Professor Hudson said it was staggering that European nations were so caught up in debating the impact of refugees' religion, but did not seem to consider maintaining a balanced gender ratio in the community." -Helvetica (talk) 15:57, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Call me crazy, but even if you were one out of a million men all trying to get with the last woman on earth, in NO POSSIBLE WAY WHATSOEVER is that an excuse to go a sexually assault the woman. And I'm very sorry if that is the state of condition humankind is in that results in such acts. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 07:30, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

@195.109.63.17 - I think you misunderstood what I wrote above, and also what Ms. Hudson said in the article. She and I are in no way trying to say that what happened was excusable, or by any means justified, rather we're trying to come to a better understanding of the factors which *caused* this to happen. To make an analogy, understanding the *motive* (and other factors) that caused someone to commit a murder does not mean that we're saying the murder was in any way justified.

A large population came to Europe where the men and male teenagers outnumbered their female counterparts by a very large margin. And most of these male migrants came from much more conservative cultures and were now seeing large numbers of attractive young women in plain view for the first time, but, due to the demographic imbalances (among other factors), most of them had little chance of actually having a sexual relationship any time soon. Therefore we have a probable source of the pent up sexual frustration and anger which ultimately caused some of these young men to behave the way they did.

Finally, I hope that your use of the word "you" in the first sentence of your comment above was meant in the more general sense of "one" or "a person," and not referring to me in particular. -Helvetica (talk) 11:30, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Read victim blaming. This rationalization has no place in the article. It is just pure speculation by some non experts. Jehochman ^Talk 13:00, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• @Jehochman - You're of course entitled to your opinion but, as I outlined above, seeking to understand the motives and factors which led to these sorts of crimes is no more "victim blaming" than it would be in a murder case. As to your contention that this was "pure speculation by some non experts," professor Valerie Hudson is an expert in public policy, and her commentary was cited by a major reputable news source in that expert capacity. Like I said, you're welcome to disagree with her view, but that does not mean that it isn't noteworthy or deserving of inclusion. A major debate surrounding the New Year's Eve sexual assaults relates to public policy, so certainly relevant. When I have the time I may start a new section of the article discussion the background and possible causes in more depth...That is if someone doesn't beat me to it. -Helvetica (talk) 13:42, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Professor Valerie Hudson is not an expert on criminology, is she? Once her opinion is used to explain something outside her area of expertise, it should not carry weight. I think this article could be used as a source about the immigration crisis as an expert opinion that governments should be careful to maintain natural gender balance because failing to do so can lead to more crime. The logical fallacy is to jump from that general advice to implying that the gender imbalance contributed to this particular set of crimes. Maybe it did, or maybe it didn't. There might be other factors at work that haven't been fully investigated and explained. Jehochman ^Talk 14:46, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

@Jehochman: As I understand it, Wikipedia policy is to give talking heads as much weight/credibility as reliable sources give them (though I agree that "reliable sources" often get it wrong). As long as this is presented as a possible/partial explanation (not an excuse), then it seems reasonable to add it in, along with other causes (as hypothesised in reliable sources). Is there precedent in other articles on crimes/atrocities about the "causes"? We could use those as a starting point. Faceless Enemy (talk) 15:28, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

@ Helvetica: First, I didn't mean you or any person with the word "you" in the first sentence. I meant, if 1 man, from a set of multiple men.... etcetcetc. Making the word used in hypothetical, non-personal way. :)

Secondly, I understood your point perfectly and I tried to counter it by saying that regardless of what factor is supposed to 'cause' it. it plain simply shouldn't as per human rights and personal safety. That was exactly why I did say, even if men would GREATLY outnumber women (like a million to one) it shouldn't be a cause for sexual assault. Yes, I realize that's naieve, but that's besides the point. For the article however, I think the main point of why this is so heavily covered by media is exactly because of that. Its basic infringement of personal safety and in particular: women rights. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 15:11, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

I am unsure how the point about "one out of a million men all trying to get with the last woman on earth" can be used to improve the article. Regardless of that I will point out that, if we accept Darwinism as driving the evolution of the species, then it is entirely possible that the existence of a gene that gives a male a tendency to commit rape would have enough advantage over other genes to prevail - also in situations with a significant gender imbalance. This _may_ explain (but not excuse) certain behavior among humans (and other species). This is not actually a comment on the actual assaults, just a reaction to the quoted point. Lklundin (talk) 15:54, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

All this hypotheticizing belongs in other articles, not this one. If somebody wants to learn about sociological, biological, and genetic theories of rape, they can go to the article and read. We don't need to repeat all this theorizing here. If a world leader or somebody more notable than a professor steps forward with a reaction, "We think this is why it happened", we can report that. For now, a non-notable expert opining on a TV show isn't enough significance to be mentioned. Jehochman ^Talk 17:14, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

I will stop the hypotesizing after this one statement....@ LKlundin: "I am unsure how the point about "one out of a million men all trying to get with the last woman on earth" can be used to improve the article." It wasn't, I was just saying that regardless of tendencies, there's also the 10 first commandments which provide a solid foundation of how people also supposed to treat eachother. So ideally, one should be capable to refrain such tendencies and keep themselves in check. and now I finish this theoretic debate. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 06:25, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Let play with facts. Men were suspected, and maybe already acused of crimes on women, out of them there is evidence that asylum seekers were present and actively commiting these crimes. We're as of yet unsure who did what. And let us wait until the german police have finished their investigations. Because I quite frankly find it despicable that other countries' officials are making statements out name of germany..... I think germany can do so quite fine themselves. And now I end it. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 06:25, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

I respectfully disagree with Jehochman about the notability and validity of the article. Not only are we not beholden to wait until "world leaders" weigh in on why this could have happened, world leaders are actually much less qualified to comment on things like this than is a Professor of Political Science whose main work has been on the effects of disproportionately high numbers of males on society. The fact that her opinion is reported by reliable sources grants it further notability. Editor's personal opinions about whether or not she is correct should be set aside, because all that matters is if it is notable and reliable, and in this case it is absolutely both. UnequivocalAmbivalence (talk) 01:25, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Copyediting template

Whoever left the copyediting template, please list the specific issues as you see them. Looking over the article, it does not seem to require this template. Jehochman ^Talk 16:27, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Please 1) actually read the talk page and 2) when you instruct others to "discuss on talk" 2a) check whether they already have discussed it on talk and 2b) actually deign to discuss the issue yourself. Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:39, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

[36].Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:40, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Also, I see that some improvements have been made. However, there is still a good bit of stuff in the "Cologne" section that properly belongs in the "Police response" section and vice versa. And that's just after a quick look.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:44, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

From what I can see, the specific copyedit problems you highlighted 3 days ago above in the still serious problems with prose section seem to have disappeared by themselves because the article has changed so much and those areas have been rewritten and changed by quite a few people. Also, I don't understand what you mean, and therefore what we can do to fix it, when you say a good bit of stuff in the Cologne section belongs in Police Response section - basically because your description of the problem is too vague or broad and not specific enough for me to know what needs doing to fix it. Also, hinting that there must be other copyedit problems because you've only had a quick look so far doesn't really help anyone to know what you think those problems might be, so it leaves us in the tricky situation of trying to fix a problem that you haven't really defined. Other editors have tried to remove the copyediting template, for example above in Orange maintenance tags, and you are continually insisting that it be put back whilst berating them for trying to remove it, which is leading to a problem whereby there is a largish volume of berating but not much of a volume of specifics on what you think needs fixing, copyedit-wise. I think it would be really helpful if you could produce a bullet point list of current specific things you think are wrong with the article, in terms of copyediting. From what I've seen it's quite normal for people to periodically request a listing of what the current specific issues are from the people that think there are problems and are refusing to allow a tag to be removed as a result. Year Zero is a concept (talk) 00:32, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Please provide specifics or remove the tag. Jehochman ^Talk 07:37, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

How many times do I have to repeat that the specifics have actually already been provided (above)? Look, if you can't be bothered to actually read the talk page, it's not my problem

Having said that, I do agree with User:Year Zero is a concept that most of the problems have been fixed.Volunteer Marek (talk) 08:51, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

I think part of the issue is that we have native German speakers, in part, working on the article and that when writing in English, a bit of German grammar shows. This article will need ongoing prose polishing. But I'm watching, as are others. Jehochman ^Talk 13:04, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 12 January 2016

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: not moved. WP:SNOW close with unanimous consensus against the proposed move. Disclaimer that I'm an involved party in this discussion, but it's beyond clear to anyone at this point that this is not going to fly so I feel comfortable closing the discussion. Proposed title violates WP:NPOV and does not meet the criteria for WP:COMMONNAME (and by extension WP:CONCISE). If my closing is contested due to my involvement, feel free to re-open the discussion and ping me accordingly. ~ Cyclonebiskit (chat) 18:27, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

---

New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany → Rape of Cologne – WP:CONCISE. – Article editor (talk) 01:04, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

This has recently been subjected to a series of moves, so I don't think any move could be considered uncontroversial, especially one to "Rape of Cologne". Pinging Article editor. Jenks24 (talk) 02:06, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

This is a contested technical request (permalink). Jenks24 (talk) 02:06, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Oppose. This is not the common name of the event, which would be the only reason to have it at such a title. I have no objection to moving the article to any title which can be established as the common name in English, regardless of "neutrality" concerns - but there's no evidence here for any such title. 64.105.98.115 (talk) 05:12, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
• Strong oppose – Definitely not a common name, only appears to be used in forums and select right-wing media rather than the public at large. WP:CONCISE doesn't necessarily apply either due to significantly differing connotations of what the rape of a city means (see Rape of Nanking, though this is not the article's title). ~ Cyclonebiskit (chat) 06:03, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
• Comment can you provide reliable sources to establish your proposed name as concise? Tiggerjay (talk) 07:02, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Strong oppose – First and foremost, Cologne is one of several cities where these crimes have been committed so excluding those would be a grave mistake. Secondly: out of the alleged crimes, rape was only a small part of the events (from what I know from sources). Note here that rape and sexual assault are not the same thing. Rape is always a sexual assault, but sexual assault is not always rape. Thirdly: If the name was supposed to come from women being raped during new yaers eve, then the title should at the very, very, very least have been RapeS of Cologne (to stress the multitude.) 195.109.63.17 (talk) 07:44, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Comment: Shouldn't this invalid request (and just to be clear, I don't mean trying to change the name is invalid, or trying to change it to Rape of Cologne is invalid, I mean deliberately trying to get it quickly changed without discussion via the use of a specific Wikipedia technical process designed for uncontroversial name changes is, especially when you're using it for every single one of close to 100 name change requests you ever do) have just been rejected and the editor asked to submit it themselves by the correct process instead? They have a history of trying to unilaterally create controversial article namespaces without discussion (their first block) and abusing this particular process they've tried to use here (quick article name change without discussion via "Requested moves - Uncontroversial technical requests") [37], so it's inconceivable that they don't know the difference between a normal name change request (and all the ensuing discussion that requires) and this attempt to get a name quickly changed without discussion through "Requested moves - Uncontroversial technical requests" [38], which specifically tells you not to use it if here has been any past debate about the best title for the page or if someone could reasonably disagree with the move. In the past when they have tried this they have often just been rejected and asked to submit it via the proper process (see their talk page), which they then don't do, for obvious reasons. I don't even know why they have tried this when it couldn't possibly have worked, except that perhaps experience has shown them that it actually has worked in the past so there's a very slight chance it could again. Oppose of course, because the editor's context shows it's not a serious request and that it's an obvious attempt at abuse of process. Year Zero is a concept (talk) 09:44, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Oppose for now, but without prejudice. In spite of what some of the commenters above wrote, there is some historical precedent for using the wording "rape of..." to describe events which involved multiple rapes, other sexual assaults, and other crimes, for example the Rape of Nanking. The word "rape" can be used more broadly to express a sense of gross abuse and violation of a city and its citizens. That said, there are still a couple issues here. One - the article as it's written now includes not just Cologne, but incidents in Hamburg and other cities in Germany and other countries. So the Cologne portion would have to first be split into a separate article of its own, which might happen at some point, but not yet. Also, there would have to be some indication that this phrase, or similar phases, or a German equivalent of this phrase, had become more widely established. So again, maybe in the future, but not yet. At this point it's probably best to wait on any page moves. -Helvetica (talk) 11:14, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Oppose. This is neither WP:COMMONNAME nor WP:NPOV nor particularly descriptive of what happened in a number of German cities. Propose speedy closing this as an obviously non-serious request and per WP:SNOWBALL --PanchoS (talk) 12:57, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. If, however, the event later becomes known or remember as the "Mass rape of Cologne" or "New Year's Eve rape of Cologne" or something similar, I would support a title change, but this is impossible at the moment. Helvetica makes a very good point. Jonas Vinther • (Click here to collect your prize!) 14:59, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:NPOV. It is not remotely comparable to Rape of Nanking (yet). OTOH, I would name it 2015 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in GermanyZezen (talk) 15:22, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose while I simply commented above, based on additional research and the discussion above, I also formally oppose this move based on current evidence or lack thereof. Tiggerjay (talk) 17:35, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose The nominator should refrain from such disruptive actions as requesting a move to a title which only appears in a Google News search at 4 sites, two of which are Breitbart News, one is The Libertarian Times, and one opinion piece at an Israeli news service allied with the settler movement. This is unacceptable POV pushing. Edison (talk) 19:33, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
• Wow. Oppose In 100 years time, if this name becomes as universal as the "Rape of Nanking", maybe. I'm surprised a debate this unipolar hasn't been snow closed yet '''tAD''' (talk) 22:14, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose What happened, according to reliable sources, was mostly sexual assaults. The rape of cologne would make it sound like there has been a mass raping. --Remote Helper (talk) 17:07, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

• Comment There are no articles detailing the two alleged "rapes". The two "rapes" might have instead been the separate Friedlingen incident where boys allegedly locked up two girls and then raped them. They boys were held in Weil am Rhein. Some articles connect these two events with the Cologne attacks, see here [39] while some others state that they are unrelated [40] "German privacy laws prevent the police from naming the suspects but it has confirmed they are not asylum-seekers." UltimateLiberty (talk) 17:30, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

• Comment it seems like WP:SNOW applies here. Although as an involved editor, I'm no inclined to close it myself. Tiggerjay (talk) 19:28, 15 January 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - Rape in the context of a city or region or country usually refers to atrocities that result from a military assault (which itself may include sexual violence as weapon) such as Rape of Nanking or Rape of Ethiopia or Rape of Malaya. Alexander's Hood (talk) 18:14, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Number of victims: Update 2016-01-13

total number of victims : 901 in only a few hours

Cologne : 650 victims, number still rising daily

http://www.spiegel.de/panorama/justiz/koeln-mehr-als-650-anzeigen-wegen-uebergriffen-zu-silvester-a-1071692.html

Hamburg: 153 criminal complaints

http://www.shz.de/hamburg/silvester-in-hamburg-zahl-der-anzeigen-steigt-auf-153-id12421366.html

Stuttgart: 31

http://www.swr.de/landesschau-aktuell/bw/uebergriffe-an-silvester-stuttgarter-polizei-bestaetigt-31-anzeigen/-/id=1622/did=16774720/nid=1622/bb4oax/

Frankfurt: 22

http://www.fr-online.de/frankfurt/uebegriffe-an-silvester-weitere-anzeigen-nach-silvesternacht,1472798,33498886.html

Düsseldorf: 41

http://www.wz.de/lokales/duesseldorf/silvester-41-anzeigen-wegen-noetigung-1.2095301

Dortmund: 2 (no actual data available)

http://www.ruhrnachrichten.de/staedte/dortmund/44137-Dortmund~/Polizei-sucht-weitere-Opfer-Silvester-Sexuelle-Belaestigungen-auch-in-Dortmund;art930,2914251

Bielefeld: 500 offender (official numer of victims unknown)

http://www.nw.de/lokal/bielefeld/mitte/mitte/20674877_Boulevard-Erschreckender-Bericht-eines-Tuerstehers-zu-den-Silvestervorgaengen.html

Freiburg: 2 (no actual data available)

--87.156.119.18 (talk) 08:56, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

AfD Template?

Should the article have a AfD template if it's on a specific section in the article? --Captain Sweden 10:48, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I've removed the template and closed the discussion. The AfD was likely put together at the same time someone else merged and redirected the page in question (Rapefugees not welcome). Any discussion on the content itself can be had on this talk page rather if need be. ~ Cyclonebiskit (chat) 10:53, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Biased, selective and sensational title

The most common crime here was theft not sexual assault but this article is titled sexual assault. This was changed from a title which included robbery. This selective depiction and categorization of the events is sensational and promotes a certain POV of the events. It should be reverted.Monopoly31121993 (talk) 12:18, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

That's actually very true, but what do you do when an news story elicits a flood of sensationalist coverage? Our "reliable sources" are unanimous in portraying the event as " a mass rape of white women by Arabs" (and drawing appropriate conclusions about how Europe is under assault and so on). Xenophobic blogs are also feeding the narrative, using old and very incomplete data from Sweden to show that rape in Europe is an "Arab problem". This is then recycled back into the established news outlets via citogenesis. In this way racism becomes THE "neutral" view, and any attempt to counter it becomes "fringe". So what the hell do you do? Original research? Curious to hear how you'd tackle this nasty and dangerous narrative. 81.88.116.27 (talk) 12:51, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

This was as you said, a mixed crime wave, but how do we sum that up as one title without a very vague "events" or "incidents"? I am open to a change as long as there is a better alternative '''tAD''' (talk) 13:51, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

My experience with Wikipedia is that some editors prefer and push for sensationalism in titles of articles. They may prefer to refer to a protest as a "riot" for example if one or two right-wing news outlets have done so already. This is especially troubling when it is done in connection to articles that have major discussions of minority communities/groups and in this case Muslims, Arabs, North Africans, refugees and immigrants. I don't have a solution to this problem other than to follow Wikipedia's rules which state that article's title must follow Wikipedia's 3 core policies of "Verifiability, No original research, and Neutral point of view.." In this case the title is not verifiable and contains original research because it makes a judgement as to whether the alleged attacks legally met the German legal code's definition of sexual assaults (which is significantly different from the definition in much of the English speaking world, and remember this is the English article version so direct translation is not always appropriate), and is certainly not a Neutral POV because it emphasizes only the sensational "SEX" element and ignores the theft element. I suggest the title be changed to "2015 New Year's Eve German Crime Wave" (removing all sensationalism from the title).

Agree with Crime Wave proposal. It would also lead the article right direction: a discussion of crime in Germany on New Years Eve, of which rapes were a very notable and troubling part. 81.88.116.27 (talk) 14:30, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

It was a mass sex assault of white women by Arab/North African men. That's why it's being presented that way by RS's and this article. The fact that some majority of the perpetrating sleazebags also committed numerous muggings/robberies that were made convenient by the circumstances (i.e. women imprisoned by large groups of groping men; prostrate authorities unprepared for such shocking attacks) doesn't really change anything. Nor do I see any unfounded claims, bogus accusations, old data or other elements of "false narrative" in this article; but by all means if you can identify an actual problem, please do. Otherwise NOTFORUM applies to all bytes expende wishing aloud that the English-speaking world should view this incident differently (for some reason).

Also, unsigned user's argument about the title being "unverifiable" makes no sense at all. We call things what reliable sources call them, we don't put on our Wiki-legal-expert hats on and appoint ourselves to second-guess whether the reliable sources are getting the German criminal code right, or whether we think they are putting the correct emphasis on the correct aspects of the topic. Such a view can only be based on a fundamentally flawed understanding of WP content and sourcing policies. Sources are to be followed, not led. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 14:54, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

On the presence of Swedish statistics, I stand corrected. On the topic of the article - not so much. Was there no crime wave in Germany on New Years Eve? And what about the scoping of "sexual assaults"? You literally mean that all German women who were sexually attacked on that day were attacked by Arabs? That's ridiculous, yet that's precisely where the article leads: forget about the general problems of crime and rape, we are only interested in a certain (wink wink) type of crime, and we should also look outside of Germany for similar (wink wink) incidents to create the desired narrative If you want to be honest you might as well rename the article (which itself is pretty valuable) to "Mass sex attacks by Arab mobs in the case of Germany". That would at least make the scope of the article crystal clear. And sourcing will not be a problem, since that's a very popular narrative. In theory the title you defend may be ok - in practice it leads to editors going in a certain direction and picking up sources accordingly. In other words it sets the narrative. NOTFORUM does not apply because we are suggesting a concrete changes to the article. (BTW, my username is User:Guccisamsclub, i'm participating as ip, cause I've locked myself out with the javascript-blocker to spend less time on the wiki) (talk) 15:31, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Your response is a tad ridiculous. No, of course I don't mean that no sex assault could have been committed by a non-Arab or non-north-African that night. But there is no indication that any mass sex assault was perpetrated by some other demographic or group on the night in question, nor that "ordinary" sexual assaults that night were very substantial or numerous. Nor is there very much in the way of commentary saying that property crimes were the primary offense, or the primary reason for the attacks. You seem to be assuming—based on nothing at all—that the migrant sex assaults are somehow being blown out of proportion. If you don't have a basis for an argument, you shouldn't make it.

Also, I'm just gonna come out and say, it's pretty obnoxious to suggest that racism is the reason why Germans might take offense at this incident. If they gave asylum to a million Swedes and then 2000 swedes formed a sex assault gang in the public square, there'd be much focusing-on-the-Swede-rapists, and it would have little to do with race and everything to do with a shocking and unusual crime being perpetrated by outsiders who were allowed into the country as an act of goodwill. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 15:50, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Racism is indeed A reason for the publicity these attacks have received, well outside of Germany. Overnight everyone from German fascists to Breitbart, Trump et al have become defenders of German womanhood. To deny this is ridiculous. Germany has had 7,000 - 8,000 reported rapes annually, though the trend is one of secular decline. There are no figures on sexual assaults that that I could find, but they are certainly in the tens of thousands. Now you have the Cologne case, which accounts for an infinitesimally small fraction of the total, and all the sudden it's Armageddon. None of this is to dismiss genuine concern of women over their safety or the protests against these horrible attacks, many of which have featured the slogan "Against Sexism, Against Racism".81.88.116.27 (talk) 16:23, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

So you're basing your faux indignation on the fact that you don't actually know the relevant statistics? Right, I'm sure hundreds of sex assaults in a single square in a single city in the stretch of a few hours—with large gangs of men imprisoning women for subsequent abuse, right in front of the cops—is commonplace and only racists would take alarm. This thread is obnoxious and has no tendency to improve the article, it's just some NOTFORUM ranting about the West, my Muscovite brother. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 16:32, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

"ranting against the West, my Muscovite brother"... that's some nice stereotyping (and hilariously off-base, if you know anything about the political and racial climate in Russia).Ok, bye for now.81.88.116.27 (talk) 16:54, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I do know something about it. Anyway this discussion doesn't serve much if any valid purpose. To the extent there is any RS commentary connecting public concern with these incidents with racist views or tendencies that is fit for inclusion subject to weighting, but personal editor views and observations on a topic aren't a basis to adjust tone or other aspects of presentations given in RS's. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 17:01, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Dontmakemetypepasswordagain has been posted by me onto the NPOV/Noticeboard page for what appears to be POV pushing. I have also recommended that other editors more experienced with Sockpuppet investigations look into the actions of this account.Monopoly31121993 (talk) 17:22, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I would like to continue this discussion now. There seems to be consensus between 81.88.116.27, '''tAD''' and myself to change the name to "2015 New Year's Eve German Crime Wave" Monopoly31121993 (talk) 17:24, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I don't see any reasonable arguments for the template claiming the title was biased. Most of the sources focus on the combination of sexual assaults with other crimes. If there would have been only a "wave" of "pickpocketing" or just unspecified "crime" these events wouldn't have developed such a political impact. So this (esp. "Taharrush gamea") is the central element. Some may not like that or it wouldn't fit into certain forms of ideology. But this can not be a reason to deny it.--Gerry1214 (talk) 17:25, 17 January 2016 (UTC)--Gerry1214 (talk) 17:51, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Crime is crime. to focus only on the sensation aspect of sex crime (which was just part of it) is not appropriate given the actual event and what it says in the article. That title alone is not neutral.Monopoly31121993 (talk) 17:33, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Monopoly, if you look through the talk page history you'll see the question of how to characterize the crimes in the page title has already received much wider scrutiny, so at minimum you'd want to post an RFC/move request or whatever to get an appropriate volume of input, but anyways I don't think "crime wave" is going to get much support because it reflects a pretty substantial alteration of most of what we're hearing from the press. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 17:36, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I am a user who started editing in German Wikipedia in 2012/13 and switched to en: in December. I did a large number of my edits in music issues. But right now I'm interested in this issue and read much about in German. So these personal offenses are factually inaccurate. And certain crimes have political/cultural impact and reasons, others don't. There is an article for "crime in Germany" (which tells about several other nationalities/ethnic groups) for all crimes without certain impact. And this one for this special type of crimes.--Gerry1214 (talk) 17:51, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Monopoly31121993, as others have pointed out, the media focus has (rightly) been on the far more heinous sexual crimes, not on the robberies. Reliable sources are focusing on the sexual crimes, probably because they're (rightfully) considered to be far worse than robbery. Wikipedia must therefore do the same. If you would like to correct this, please feel free to lobby the sources that Wikipedia follows. Until then, the current title (or one to the same effect) is far more in line with Wikipedia policy and practice. Faceless Enemy (talk) 01:24, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

FWIW ( at this point probably little) I've come around the same perspective. Sexual assaults are clearly more notable that other crimes on NYE. Furthermore switching the focus to crime on NYE is unlikely to change any racial and national biases in in the article's narrative. So we'd be still dealing with Arab-on-white crime, since other crime (just as other rapes) were not perceived as notable by the media. So yeah there is no point in changing the title - it would simply downgrade the notability of sexual assault and accomplish little else. Gucci81.88.116.27 (talk) 08:59, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Can you identify any "racial or national biases"? No? Then there's nothing to discuss. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 15:36, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Your contribution above goes beyond NOTFORMUM - it's the equivalent of baiting/trolling someone on youtube. Even when someone recognizes the validity of your argument, you keep bickering. 81.88.116.27 (talk) 00:16, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

OK, since you won't stop questioning my motives, I'll say that you seem intent on constantly implying that there is rank racism or jingoism at work here, without any actual sourcing or article material. What you're essentially doing is repeatedly expressing your unsourced opinion, which apparently is not getting enough support from real people in the real world for your satisfaction, so you're spreading the message on WP talk pages. Soap, meet box. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 13:20, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Background Section repeatedly deleted

Why is it not okay to provide background to these events? Surely it is relevant. I had written about the rise of mass rape allegations by Neo-Nazi, far-right and Islamaphobic groups in the fall of 2015 and the EU's highest body stating that it was concerned about this. Everything was referenced and it was still deleted. This is not the way to create a Neutral article. Here was my original text:

Background − In 2015 the German government allowed hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers into the country as a response to the European migrant crisis. The government's decision was controversial and right-wing, Neo-Nazi, and Islamaphobic organizations began publishing reports of mass rapes carried out by Muslim refugees (e.g. Breitbart News Network, The Daily Stormer, Gates of Vienna, Asia Times). 2015 saw a rise in racism in Germany (as well as across Europe more generally) and the Council of Europe expressed its concerns about the issue to the German Government in early October, 2015.

User:Monopoly31121993, the problem is that none of those sources discuss their subjects in connection with the article topic. You're drawing connections that aren't in those sources; thus the prose attempting to incorporate those sources into the article is, itself, unsourced analysis. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 17:40, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

No Dontmakemetypepasswordagain, you are right. none of these blogs predicted the future. That's why they're in the section title "background"not predictions of the event. It is absolutley fine to have a background section in this article and it should be there so that readers understand that there was a rise in racism and "mass rape" allegation by neo-nazis and islamaphobic groups right before the alleged "mass sexual assault against white woman by Arabs" that you claim took place.Monopoly31121993 (talk) 18:01, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Those subjects are not background unless you have a source saying so. WP is not a source of original analysis. Find sources for the commentary you want to include, or don't include it. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 18:02, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Well, sources should be easy to find regarding the connection between racism and the publicity these attacks have received. For example a commentary from Laurie Penny. We can find others. But you seem very keen to ignore German female protesters who scream variations on "Gegen Sexismus, Gegen Rassismus" and other such voices, in favour of you own male Ammurican conservative spin (thickly coated in Wiki-verbiage, but clear nonetheless). Gucci81.88.116.27 (talk) 22:38, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

If there aren't any sources giving the spin you prefer, there's no need to make dumb or insulting comments. Just don't add the unsourced material and everything will be OK. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 15:32, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

What about other countries?

Sweden, Finland, Germany, Austria and Switzerland http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3390168/Migrant-rape-fears-spread-Europe-Women-told-not-night-assaults-carried-Sweden-Finland-Germany-Austria-Switzerland-amid-warnings-gangs-ordinating-attacks.html Xx236 (talk) 12:47, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

As this article is about Germany, I wouldn't focus too much on other countries. Jeppiz (talk) 15:56, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Where are the other articles? New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Sweden - red. Category:Crimes committed by asylum seekers - nothing. Xx236 (talk) 07:16, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

"Puerto Rican Day Parade attacks" and this article

One or more editors keep adding a SEE ALSO link to an article about some Puerto Rican Day Parade attacks. There is no sourced commentary in this article about any attacks at any parade, and there is no sourced material in the parade article about the incidents that are discussed in this article. Simply put, there does not appear to be any sourced connection whatever between the two topics. Thus we can't include the SEE ALSO link.

It's not enough to say that both articles are sourced; if there's no sourced link between them, we don't assert one on our own. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 15:40, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Wrong.

Per WP:SEEALSO: "The links in the "See also" section might be only indirectly related to the topic of the article because one purpose of "See also" links is to enable readers to explore tangentially related topics."

When I initially posted the link, I included an addendum, clarifying the relevance between the two—that the attacks in the US in 2000 were similar and, thus, the reader might be interested in reading the article to note the similarities. Both attacks involved a mass group of men, during a celebratory event, committing the same types of crimes: sex assaults and robberies on unknown strangers. That absolutely satisfies the requirements of WP:SEEALSO. -- Veggies (talk) 16:14, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

That does not mean you can include completely unsourced connections that are indirect or tangential. It just means that verifiable connections need not be direct or fundamental to the topic, in order to be included. But the baseline rule remains: No source, no link. WP is not a source of original analysis, and in this case your contentious unsourced claim happens to have a disparaging effect on Puerto Rican people in NYC. I request that you please self-revert. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 16:35, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

I requested feedback on this question at the "No original research" noticeboard. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 17:09, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

"That does not mean you can include completely unsourced connections that are indirect or tangential."

Define "completely unsourced". What am I supposed to find a source for? -- Veggies (talk) 17:52, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

"But the baseline rule remains: No source, no link."

Wrong again. See 1740 Batavia massacre#See also, Katyn massacre#See also for examples of "See also" sections with tangential and <gasp!> "unsourced" links. -- Veggies (talk) 17:52, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

"your contentious unsourced claim happens to have a disparaging effect on Puerto Rican people in NYC."

Grow up. -- Veggies (talk) 17:52, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Just because other articles engage in this practice, does not mean this one should. I frequently delete tangential seealso's myself. The connection to P-R is highly tangential (far more so than a link to Rape in Germany would be), and the only way to make the case that it's not is to provide at least (!) several sources. Also who really cares? Aren't there bigger fish to fry in terms of improving the article - like noting the well-documented exploitation of the event by the Right? -Guccisamsclub 81.88.116.27 (talk) 20:42, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

"Just because other articles engage in this practice, does not mean this one should."

That's not an argument, however. What the reasoning behind it? -- Veggies (talk) 23:41, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

"Also who really cares?"

Also not a valid argument. -- Veggies (talk) 23:41, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

There is no valid argument for inclusion of this claim, which remains unsourced. Please note that you don't have any support for this material and including unsourced claims in WP articles generally violates policy. I'm removing it again, please don't restore it again until and unless you can demonstrate a consensus for conclusion that is rooted in content policy. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 13:18, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

@Dontmakemetypepasswordagain:You have failed to answer any of my questions or address any of the points I made above. Failing to participate in a discussion is not grounds for determining "consensus". -- Veggies (talk) 13:37, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

You can't state a basis for inclusion and you don't have any support for inclusion. Find a source that connects these two topics, otherwise you are just edit-warring to force improper material into the article. Also, please note that there is no policy requiring us to include objectionable material so long as there is at least one user pushing bytes onto the talk page. Please, it should be plain as day that all you need to do is come up with a source; I've tried and I don't see any sources connecting these two topics. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 13:40, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

@Dontmakemetypepasswordagain:What source? A source for what? For who? You never answered that question above. I asked you days ago. -- Veggies (talk) 13:46, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Nonsense. From the very beginning, I demanded a source drawing a connection between this incident the the Puerto Rican Day Parade attacks. The statement you just replied to clearly states as much (as does THE VERY FIRST COMMENT IN THIS THREAD WHICH YOU ALSO REPLIED TO). If you are actually listening, there it is: no need to "discuss" anything further, just go find a source that does anything at all to justify this link. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 13:51, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

I don't know how to make this any clearer: you do NOT need a source for "See Also" links. There is nothing in WP:SEEALSO about that. Show me the guideline that says so. -- Veggies (talk) 14:00, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

I already told you that is plain BS as you can see by spending 5-10 seconds to read the policy on VERIFIABILITY: "All material in Wikipedia mainspace, including everything in articles, lists and captions, must be verifiable. All quotations, and any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citation that directly supports the material. Any material that needs a source but does not have one may be removed. Please remove contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced immediately." Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 14:04, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

So you can see that this material not only doesn't belong in the article, but it should actually be aggressively removed while this "discussion" is underway. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 14:06, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Wrong. Read the guideline more carefully. A link to an article is not "any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged". And even if you do challenge...something...about the Puerto Rican Day Parade attacks, the article itself has plenty of citations. What material are you trying to verify? -- Veggies (talk) 14:23, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

There is no verifiable link between the two topics or the two articles—which was stated repeatedly, and which can only be refuted by providing a source. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 14:27, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

We're not going to agree, here, then. There are pages and pages of featured articles with See Alsos without "sources" provided. We'll have to take this to WP:DR -- Veggies (talk) 16:17, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Obviously, nobody's going to object to a non-contentious SEE ALSO link that isn't sourced, so the existence of non-contentious unsourced links doesn't do anything to help you. This link, on the other hand, is extremely contentious and is unsourced. Extremely contentious unsourced claims don't belong on WP.

In any event, as the core policy clearly states Verifiability applies to all parts of an article. That's why policies dealing with individual parts of an article don't all contain reminders ("Remember, Verifiability applies here too!") -- because Verifiability applies everywhere. As has been shown to you. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 14:04, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

@Dontmakemetypepasswordagain:Since we're disagreeing, shouldn't we be discussing this on the forum you chose at WP:NORN? Funny that you decided to abandon the discussion and unilaterally act as you had been, regardless. Is that "consensus" in your mind? -- Veggies (talk) 15:59, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

To answer one question by quoting policy: "Whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense." I suggest that it is reasonable to include a See also link without an RS that specifically makes the link and we have FA that do so. This link is contentious because Dontmakemetypepasswordagain says it is. I will refrain for the moment from commenting further. I hope this helps. Richard Keatinge (talk) 15:05, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I have and idea for a broader approach to this at #Missing article: Mob sexual violence.--Pharos (talk) 17:00, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

You don't even have to write a new article here - though you might want to write such an article for other reasons. Just create a new category.81.88.116.27 (talk) 17:49, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I've started a new category here: Category:Sexual violence at riots and crowd disturbances.--Pharos (talk) 18:20, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

great work!81.88.116.27 (talk) 18:30, 22 January 2016

Christoph Ehrhardt (15 January 2016). "Gewalt gegen Frauen in Ägypten: Wo sexuelle Belästigung Alltag ist".Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. provides an explicite reference between the Puerto Rica assaults and the Taharrush in Cologne. Hope that helps. I would prefer to have it included in the main part. Its a sort of nuisance of Eurabia pundits (see Breitbart and others) to claim that Europe is under siege since new years eve. Cologne is neither Poitiers nor Vienna under siege. Erhardt provides a similar view. Polentarion Talk 18:55, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Agree with the objections to including this as a 'see also'. There is no connection discussed in a reliable source, and the vague similarities make it a matter for a category and not a see also link. Gamaliel (talk) 18:54, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

@Gamaliel:What do you see as being ambiguous?—Or to put it another way, what guidelines specifically address the required clarity/parity that must be in place for "See Also" links? -- Veggies (talk) 19:12, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

It's not about the ambiguity, it's about the fact that you are singling out one single incident based on those vague similarities, over and above all other similar incidents. The similarities are not significant enough to justify this. Gamaliel (talk) 19:30, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

What is a "vague similarity"? Is it similar or is it not? If not, why not? What would be a "definite similarity"? And where is the "vague similarity" exclusionary rule in WP:SEEALSO?-- Veggies (talk) 19:44, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

The fact that something is not specifically prohibited in the subclause of a policy does not mean that it must be included. Everything is determined by discussion and consensus. If you wish to convince others to include this link, this argument is not likely to be persuasive. Gamaliel (talk) 21:47, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I have already made my arguments above (as well my retorts to the given counter-arguments). I noticed, however, that you didn't answer my questions. -- Veggies (talk) 22:43, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Not to hijack Gamaliel's line of discussion, but I'll go ahead and explain some reasons why I agree the similarities are "vague". For one thing the incidents that are the subject of this article appear to have involved something on the order of 20-30 times more participants, victims, and reported crimes than the Puerto Rican parade attacks—and they were spread across multiple cities in multiple countries, instead of being confined to single area of a single city surrounding a parade in that city. Puerto Ricans are also thoroughly integrated natural-born citizens of the United States, whereas the alleged attackers here were economic migrants and refugees, taken in via extraordinary measures to avoid an impending humanitarian catastrophe, with many of them suspected of harboring terrorist ties, and many more suspected to have baseline views on women's rights (and appropriate treatment of women) that are fundamentally alien to the host countries that took the migrants in. Thus there are major political and cultural issues surrounding in the former but not the latter.

The above represents about 120 seconds of me picking out major differences between the two. The comparison is highly debatable and contentious; if it weren't, the lack of sourcing wouldn't matter.

Note also that I don't think anybody's objecting that a SEE ALSO link actually needs to be directly footnoted—but if there is no sourced material whatsoever that directly supports the comparison, it violates WP:V. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 15:01, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

The only "major differences" I see you've pointed out regard the scale of the assaults, and the sociopolitical make-up of the attackers. The former is a question of dimension, not a difference in characteristic. The latter objection is rather quizzical. Where did you hear that only Puerto Ricans were involved in the attacks in New York? Second, in looking at the few instances of mass, public sex assaults, I am quite unconvinced that the background of the rapists qua background is a "major difference" that creates a categorical and incomparable shift. Rape is rape—be it by a citizen, a resident, or a foreigner. What other categories of criminal acts should be cleft like this? -- Veggies (talk) 00:07, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

I just provided the sources that explicitely refer to the link, seems its being ignored for whatever reason. Even without them, the familiarity is evident, allowing for a "see also". Polentarion Talk 01:35, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Since this is something that clearly calls for scrutiny by multiple editors, would you mind providing a translation of that German source so we can see what it says? Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 15:01, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

The Article directly speaks about the developement of the deWP article. According Erhardts, its first version was based on mere recent press reports focusing on Marghrebian attackers and the BKA story. He describes how the extension used a larger base of studies and involved as well "similar events" as sometimes occuring mass rapes (and part of eve teasing) in India and the drunk and stoned Latino mob attack in New York Central Park in 2000. [41]Polentarion Talk 21:56, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

I think that if the analogy between Cologne and similar incidents (Oktoberfest, Puerto Rico etc.) can be sourced - it belong in the body of the article, in the same way that Taharrush gamea attacks in the Arab world belong in the body. If we leave them in SEEALSO, people will ask "are these incidents really comparable? How so? According to whom?". The problem with putting analogous incidents in SEEALSO is that there is no nuance and no sourcing. So by stuffing them in SEEALSO, we turn them into uncontestable and unverifiable facts. People won't be able to check the sources, or - potentially - insert new sources disputing the supposed analogies. The analogy will just fester in the SEEALSO section as a bald assertion, which is something that wikipedia should avoid like a plague. -Gucci-81.88.116.27 (talk) 22:29, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

So far as I can say, the See Also section can include material which on base of content is similar. If the Puerto Rican thing is indeed so similar in content than a See also could apply. regardless if its not directly connected (which I personally think would be really farfetched seeing there's 15 years in between. The See Also section doesn't exclude the use of similar "events" to have occurred elsewhere. If its desire to only have articles listed that have a confirmed connection, then WP rules should reflect this more clearly. 195.109.63.17 (talk) 09:57, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

Ramifications of the Incident (Media coverage,The Right, the Ultra-Right, Feminism, the Immigration Policy)

Some people appear allergic to mentions Far-Right politics and xenophobia. User Dontmakemetypepass scorns the addition of Laurie Penny as "not-notable". A more accurate description would be "idontlikeit". Still, since the section is controversial we should get make a head start here on the talk page, by establishing that the topic exists. To avoid pov-problems, we should include a range of opinions on the issue - including those of the Right. Laurie Penny's article is definitely a candidate for the proposed section. So are the manifestations by Neo-Nazis in Germany and racist attacks on migrants. We also have images to make it more palpable [here] and here. - to reiterate - we should also include and fairly represent arguments coming from the Center and the Right about the negative consequence of immigration and the problems of assimilation. Below is a box where people can stuff specific material to include in the proposed section. Use bullets. Guccisamsclub81.88.116.27 (talk) 21:21, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

-Should be noted that there is already a section about attacks on migrants, but it could be expanded (or a new section of the type I describe could be added, since the two do not strictly overlap) come on folks - anybody have anything or what? @Xx236, Veggies, Monopoly31121993, Gerry1214, The Almightey Drill, and Amanouz: 81.88.116.27 (talk) 14:02, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

• User:81.88.116.27 / User:Guccisamsclub: You're not supposed to dwell on the alleged personalities of other editors, and you don't even know what the hell you are talking about. I didn't "scorn" Laurie Penny, I didn't say anything about Laurie Penny being non-notable. But when you're talking about an obscure post, on an unknown blog, about somebody's 20-word tweet, that's well into the territory of non-notability—and even so, it was being given a shockingly biased presentation before I edited the material (in short, the blog authors thought her quote was idiotic, but whoever added this to the article simply included the quote without any of the criticism given). I also haven't removed any sourced material connecting this incident to far-right elements, but I do note that the only images you propose to include are images of cops fighting with right-wing protesters who were angry about this incident. Maybe you're the one suffering from "allergies" at the prospect of giving this topic a balanced presentation that is actually based on sources.

Yeah, I blindly took the material from the edit history - it was not what I intended it to be. Changed it to the the more appropriate source: Laurie Penny's article on the New Statesman's website. So yes - you were correct to remove the blog. (As for civility - go ahead and drop the issue. Your edit history shows enough such violations on your part, starting with accusing me of being a "Muscovite" polluting the talk page with "ranting against the West" - which is ludicrous misrepresentation of my views on just about everything and then some)81.88.116.27 (talk) 21:41, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, like I said, you had zero clue what you were talking about. P.S., I called you a "Muscovite" because your IP address geolocates to Moscow, and accused you of "ranting against the West" because you seemed intent on manufacturing an unsubstantiated and frankly fringe POV that the German reaction and focus of Western media were based on racism against the accused attackers, together with the equally ludicrous suggestion that this was somehow just a typical night of holiday sex assaults in Cologne. So, anyway, sorry if I was mistaken about you living in Moscow. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 14:00, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

"German reaction and focus of Western media were based on racism" - not entirely, but certainly in part. If you feel that everyday violence against women is trivial in comparison to Cologne etc - and that pointing to it is FRINGE - you can try to find an RS that backs your view - and put it into the box above. Ok let's stop this nonsense. 81.88.116.27 (talk) 14:40, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

If there is sourced commentary you wish to add, have at it. Dontmakemetypepasswordagain (talk) 02:35, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Missing article: Mob sexual violence

It strikes me that we are missing a major article, Mob sexual violence, to cover the general type, which would provide greater context on incidents of this kind documented in different parts of the world.--Pharos (talk) 22:50, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

That would be a huge article, spanning war rapes. If the scope is somehow set to group sexual violence in peacetime - then it could be doable.81.88.116.27 (talk) 23:40, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

War rapes would be covered under Wartime sexual violence; to make clearer that the scope is peacetime sexual violence in a mob situation, I think perhaps a general article could be titled Sexual violence in crowd disturbances and riots.--Pharos (talk) 08:58, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 22 January 2016

New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany → New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Europe – Attacks also took place in Austria, Switzerland, and Finland. – Article editor (talk) 13:15, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

This article has already been subject to several RMs and is on a controversial topic, clearly not renaming will be uncontroversial so please use the full RM process. Jenks24 (talk) 13:54, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

This is a contested technical request (permalink). Jenks24 ([[User

talk:Jenks24|talk]]) 13:54, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I would prefer to move it to New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Cologne. Thats the main site. Germany is way too generic. The events happened in dedicated urban places, Cologne the foremost, not in the countryside. All the others have been mentioned after Cologne got (in)famous. Polentarion Talk 16:39, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Agree with Polentarion. The evidence for links to other cities is Germany exists but is limited, a larger conspiracy in several European countries has afaik not been demonstrated at all.--Pharos (talk) 16:56, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

a bad idea. the topic of the article is notable on its own, and also more notable that the attacks elsewhere - the other attacks became notable after Cologne and were frequently covered through the prism of Cologne. Furthermore, it would mean losing focus and shifting from covering a specific event to covering a whole media narrative (i.e. the theory that its just not cologne, but the entire continent, that's under attack from migrant rapists). That's virtually a recipe for a pov-laden, sweepingly chauvinistic, coat-racking, tendentious and sensationalized article. I think even the move to from Cologne to Germany was slightly problematic - though not anywhere near as as bad as the proposed move from Germany to Europe.81.88.116.27 (talk) 17:47, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Three points: 1) a massive attack on fortress Europe is partially a sort of story telling, in the US, with the likes of Trump'n'Steyn going amok on the Eurabia narrative. I experienced that partially in the Taharrush gamea article, some pundits are trying to sell a circle of hell and hundreds of men chasing innocent women through Cairo and Cologne. I stopped working there. 2) There is a strong will to exclude the Puerto_Rican_Day_Parade_attacks of 2000 from this article, I fear for similar reasons. As shown, groups (of young men) groping women is not confined to the Muslim world (Eve teasing is another example), even if the current version has been invented in Egypt, where police forces started to use sexual harrassment as a political tool. Susanne Schröter has provided some insights and feasible solutions in a recent interview. 3) Germany has large differences in police tactics depnding of the specific policies of municipalities and Länders. Cologne (and the state of NRW) has had a lackluster approach on rioters and hools, the now retired head of police in Cologne was among the organizers of the peace movement protests in the 1980ies, and he never got a real touch with police work. This is changing now in Cologne and it has been different already in other parts of Germany. So its not about fortress Europe, but toytown Cologne, that is under pressure. All in all, lets move the article back to New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Cologne. Polentarion Talk 02:02, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

@Polentarion: I am not sure about moving the article to "Cologne" - but I'd encourage you to add any sourced critiques of the "fortress europe /rape of Germany" narratives to the box in the ramifications section here on the talkpage. Such critiques will help balance the existing article, I think. -gucci81.88.116.27 (talk) 13:18, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Lotta angloamerican tabloids are full with such gabberish, but the german side doesn't care much about it so far. But I will see what I can do. Polentarion Talk 17:33, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. Some important questions are: To what extent is rape - including collective sexual assault - in Germany an "immigrant problem"? Among the reported offenses in the other German cities (outside Cologne), what percentage of the crimes committed were sexual crimes? Were the incidents in Cologne part of a bigger, country-wide "wave of sexual assault by immigrants"? I am sure that we can find some balanced and sober discussion of these issues in German-language sources.-Gucci-81.88.116.27 (talk) 18:33, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Sorry, but the use of rape is quite different, Rape in Egypt translates in Sexual violence in Egypt in the deVersion, and thats appropriate. The scandal about Cologne is about the new treat of sexual harrassment by groups of strangers during festivals. The right of men and women to bear and wear beer in public festivals without being harrassed is our Second amendment, and we are going to defend that very German fortress;) Polentarion Talk 20:54, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Your point is well-taken. If you have sources to back up your view that the main problem is "harassment" by "foreigners" "during festivals" that would be great. (I see the tongue in cheek, BTW). However the larger narrative - outside of Germany and perhaps in Germany too - is that immigrants pose a major threat to German and European society. And that's no joke - as I am sure you'll agree. -Gucci81.88.116.27 (talk) 21:51, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Not really my point. Susanne Schröter was quite outspoken, that we have to train immigrants about gender relations here. And the municipalities have to get the funds for those trainings, and those which do not behave and integrate, will get in trouble. We have coped to integrate some millions of Silesians after WW II, in a country bombed back to stone age, we can do as well with motivated and ambitious refugees now. But the public expects the governent to act and regulate, not only to welcome. Merkel has not delivered on that. Another Berlin Wall is not in planning. Polentarion Talk 00:45, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

I do not agree that either Cologne or Europe should be in the focus of this article. Cologne in the lemma would exclude several hundred victims in Germany, Europe could lead to a chaos in the article/categories as it is right now mainly focused on Germany. I would support standalone articles for the other countries instead, if needed, or - just as it is right now - small paragraphs in this article with the facts, if they don't justify a standalone article. Most other WPs have the focus on Germany, and I think for good reasons. Just today a BKA report was cited in the German press, which states that incidents like Cologne happenend in 12 of the 16 German federal states. So I think more details from different parts of Germany will follow. E.g. the number of complaints from a city like Düsseldorf rose from 41 to 113 according to latest NRW police information. I will change that in the article asap.--Gerry1214 (talk) 18:49, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

It should be carefully investigated whether ALL documented assaults on NYE were perpetrated by immigrants - it may be broadly accurate, but it's dangerous to assume that. It's not as if such incidents are never perpetrated by the "native" population, as in the case of "Oktoberfest" a few years ago. It should be kept in mind Germany has 7-8 thousand reported rapes and about 45 thousand reported sexual assaults every year. Gucci81.88.116.27 (talk) 21:41, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Absolutely right, no one said that ALL documented assaults on NYE were perpetrated by immigrants, so doesn't the article. But what we know right now is, according to police reports and all others sources including policemen and eye-witness reports, that the overwhelming majority of the assaults were. But that's not even the question for the lemma. I only stated that this specific kind of assaults involving mostly groups of men targeting mostly women happened all over Germany and in some other countries on New Year's Eve. So Cologne as a focus would be definitely to small, Europe would be to wide for this article, as it is long enough right now and focused on Germany (e.g regarding political impact).--Gerry1214 (talk) 12:25, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

This seems like a bad idea. The article is already large enough as is, and broadening the scope would be problematic. On the other hand, restricting focus to Cologne would not be honest to the way the subject was reported in the media. It's better to leave this as-is. --Sammy1339 (talk) 20:09, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Cologne is the start of the scandal, and gained the media focus, that went to others. September 11 is about targeting symbolic U.S. landmarks, not about Shanksville, Pennsylvania, right? Polentarion Talk 21:18, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Not right, and I think that exactly illustrates the point. No one would want to move September 11 attacks to "WTC and Pentagon attacks". --Sammy1339 (talk) 01:00, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

So it was about Shanksville then? Sorry, but an article on September 11 attacks on America would not work at all, but thats being insinuated here, base is a 'Europe under attack' narrative in the American public. 03:46, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

The September 11 attacks were an actual conspiracy, organized by a few men, against the United States. For the recent sexual assaults, there is strong evidence of some kind of organization in Cologne, and weak evidence (which does not appear to be yet confirmed by police authorities or mainstream RS) of organization and coordination with other cities in Germany. There is no evidence at all for inter-European coordination; although the Cologne events clearly had organized criminal assaults, this isn't proven for other European cities on such a scale, or that a European-wide conspiracy led to increased violence over previous new years' in these other localities.--Pharos (talk) 22:11, 24 January 2016 (UTC)

It's not only not proven - it's preposterous. It's even more preposterous than the "protocols of the elders of zion". why is this even being discussed?81.88.116.27 (talk) 00:42, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

According to all German authorities I have read of - NRW police/Minister of Interior Ralf Jäger, Hamburg police, Bundeskriminalamt - there is no evidence of coordination either in Cologne nor Germany. What was reported is, that some of the perpetrators used social media to make appointments for New Year's Eve celebrations - not to commit crimes. German Minister of Justice claimed few days after the attacks that in his view the attacks appeared to be coordinated - but all police authorities contradicted him in the following days.--Gerry1214 (talk) 08:47, 25 January 2016 (UTC)