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Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory

Just a friendly reminder of WP:NOTFORUM... —PaleoNeonate – 22:50, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

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Qwerfjkltalk

Greenwald

I wouldn't bother with a RfC. I disagree that people are likely to call Greenwald an unreliable source and personally would refute such a characterization or conclusion. However, as a self published source I can't see any way to use Greenwald's self published work as if it were a typical RS. I simply can't see how one gets around WP:SPS in this context. I understand your concerns but this is not a winning plan. If Greenwald is correct in the end I think others will eventually see the same thing even if they don't credit Greenwald for seeing it. Springee (talk) 18:36, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

Springee - Thanks for your concern. Really, I am not trying to achieve anything else than making the existing de facto ban official. He is practically banned at this moment and the way the ban was done leaves room for interpretations, ambiguity and misunderstandings. NYP is considered to be an unreliable source. Ok, but that was decided using the right procedure - using a RfC. And so deserves Greenwald too. I am not delusional so I'm not trying to change his status. Also I am not trying to raise his status above the status of other SPS, and to try to use his work as RS. There is something else. Wikipedia considers Greenwald to be dishonest, having no credibility etc. And that's something totally different than being unreliable because he is a SPS. At this moment, the conclusion is that Greenwald is essentially a bad journalist. That's the issue that I want to debate. I know what the result will be and I have no hope to change it. I just want to make it official, that's all. I hope I made myself understood.

By the way, I never started any RfC, maybe you can help? :D - I tried Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#RfC_on_Glenn_Greenwald and failed already. -- Barecode (talk) 18:57, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

The problem is based on the way Wikipedia works he shouldn't be a usable source in most cases. Yes, it's crappy that a lot of good journalist have decided to go self published and thus Wikipedia can't cite their work. But if that door were to be opened then a lot of really crappy reporters would also be allowed in. This isn't a case of "Wikipedia thinks". Wikipedia the encycolpedia makes not statement one way or another. Some Wikipedia editors think X. When I first started editing I was involved in an article about automobile suspension. This is a subject that I understand and where I happen to know some real experts on the subject. A big issue I ran into was editors citing car magazine where the writers were clearly out of their depth[1]. They were wrong and I could explain why but at the time I didn't understand that, for better and worse, Wikipedia is going to stick to "reliable" sources. I found that really frustrating because my personal knowledge and understanding and ability to explain why the sources were wrong, meant very little since I didn't have sources on my side. That is where you are with the material you want to source to Greenwald.

You mentioned the NYT as a reliable source. That is true but it didn't come about because of a RfC. The NYT has all the elements that people want to see in a good media source. Thus the NYT is presumed good until shown otherwise. I do agree it seems odd that we would be OK with Greenwald's reports when they were published by the Intercept where he had an editorial freedom agreement [2]. But in the end Wikipedia has it's own rules and that means we are stuck needed sources that check certain boxes if we are to use them to make certain claims. Greenwald as a self published source doesn't check those boxes. I mean if I were to start such a RfC I would vote "not reliable" even though I personally think his work is still good if more on the analysis vs factual reporting side of things. Springee (talk) 19:38, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

Springee - Thanks again, you are very kind. I think Wikipedia was generous with Greenwald and closed it's eyes while he published at The Intercept. Also he was too big to ignore him. If there is no RFC for NYT then there is one for New York Post. IMO this Greenwald issue is part of the larger thing - the liberal bias of Wikipedia. Honestly I think it's delusional to pretend that liberal media has no bias. When even Le Monde diplomatique talks about liberal hysteria and the media war against Trump. Even Bill Maher (liberal) says the Dem is the party of no common sense. If 99% of the Wikipedia editors believe there is no liberal bias, the number doesn't convince, it is still delusional. Their denial reinforces the very point that Wikipedia itself has a liberal bias. I am not trying to win anything. I just want to avoid interpretations, misunderstandings and ambiguity. If there is no liberal bias in the media and in the Wikipedia then Wikipedia has nothing to lose by "officially" declaring (in a RFC) there is no such bias. If there is liberal bias and Wikipedia declares there isn't such bias, then well.. it is quite uncool but it is still a big win for everyone to remove ambiguity. In that case, Wikipedia wins by having the opportunity to learn from the errors made in the past. I think we can both agree that Wikipedia is not error-free, that Wikipedia can make errors, that Wikipedia can deny its own errors, that Wikipedia should not be afraid of having a clear position about it's own possible errors, and that Wikipedia can better learn from the errors of the past if those errors are more evident. If the errors are not clear, that is very bad because Wikipedia will be encouraged to keep making errors.

I am only afraid that I won't be allowed to ask for that "official" view - by invoking technicalities - or even worse, by shutting me down before I can ask that - for "talking too much nonsense". Therefore I make my case here, preventive, just in case that might happen:

Other than editing once in a while, my main focus is to have the "official" view of Wikipedia about the bias of the liberal media and the liberal bias of Wikipedia. By "official" view I mean RfCs where the community consensus decides if there is a liberal bias. I hope I will not prevented from asking the official view by invoking technicalities or by using the errors that I will make or by claiming that I am trolling and such. --- Barecode (talk) 07:23, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

I previously mentioned that you are fighting against straw men of your own creation, and this false accusation/assumption shows you're still doing it:

"If 99% of the Wikipedia editors believe there is no liberal bias"

One of the most common complaints brought here by people who are clueless about Wikipedia's excellent policies and guidelines is that Wikipedia is influenced by "liberal bias", so you're not in good company when you push that accusation. Editors have discussed this subject endlessly for years. We even have a whole article about the Ideological bias on Wikipedia. See also Wikipedia:Replies to common objections#Systemic bias and Criticism of Wikipedia#Partisanship. Of course Conservapedia and Larry Sanger level this charge all the time.

So why is your accusation a straw man? Because your statement is not true. There is indeed "liberal bias in the media and in the Wikipedia", and only a fool completely denies it. Rather, what you see as denial is just their objection to the accusation on other grounds. We just understand why and how the liberal bias in U.S. media does and does not affect Wikipedia, and to what degree that influence is and isn't legitimate and good or bad. I suspect you think there is no legitimate explanation for the situation, and I doubt that anyone here will ever be able to convince you otherwise.

You, Conservapedia, and Sanger are being very hypocritical with your accusations. What would y'all do if there were a "conservative bias in the media and in the Wikipedia"? I doubt we'd hear you complaining. You'd absolutely love Wikipedia. It is simply the nature of the beast, IOW literally impossible for it to be otherwise, that at different times in history, one ideology will be more dominant, often for very short periods of time, and that varies a whole lot between different cultures and nations at the same time. Right now there is a serious/deadly struggle between conservative and liberal ideologies on a different and more dangerous scale than we've ever seen. Now it's a struggle between conservative authoritarianism and liberal democracy, and the United States is in very real danger of becoming a conservative, single party, authoritarian, religious dictatorship, and that would violate many key features of the Constitution. The planned violent insurrection at the Capitol on January 6 wasn't some innocent blunder by extremists. There are serious plans to violently take over the government, warp the electoral system so voting makes no difference, and create a conservative, Christian right, religious state, akin to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan or Iran. Because of their support for the Constitution and their interpretation of certain biblical ideas, some religious groups have warned of this danger for the last 120 or so years. (See Separation of church and state#United States and Separation of church and state in the United States.) They see this move as the last step in acceptance of the Antichrist before the end of the Earth, with persecution and killing of all dissenters who will not bow to this religio-conservative ideology that doesn't respect religious freedom or human rights because it is a regressive philosophy that works to undo all progressive changes away from barbarism, intolerance, racism, homophobia, xenophobia, misogyny etc. A United States ruled by those old rejected ideas is the wet dream of many, but not all, modern American conservatives.

Our RS and NPOV policies are very clear that bias alone does not determine whether a source can be used. It is their reliability, and both left- and right-wing biased sources can be used if they are reliable. Look at this as a linear political spectrum (read Historical origin of the terms right and left. Little has changed since then.) with sources scattered all along that line. It is the nature of humanity and extremism that people and sources tend to swing, and the more sensible ones tend to stay fairly near the center. Those on the left and right that are near the center share the same facts, but interpret them differently. Such opinions can be reliable because they are still factual. Such sources can still be used for factual and opinion reporting. As one gets further from the center on either side, bias gets stronger and the sources are usually only useful for opinions. When one gets even further out on the fringes, bias is so strong that it affects their view of facts (IOW they twist, deny, or omit uncomfortable facts). Such sources are fringe and unreliable for use here. Per WP:ABOUTSELF, they can only be used in an article about themselves, and then in a manner that is not unduly self-serving. They have no due weight here.

So what should you do about it? What's a better way to use your time? Try to understand it. Until you do that, you'll just keep tilting at windmills, and we know that Don Quixote looked pretty foolish when he did that. Start asking instead of accusing, and do your own homework before wasting others' time. Stop attacking it. Stop starting long discussions in the wrong venues. Listen to the criticism or you'll just get blocked for your enormous violations of NOTFORUM. We've been extremely patient with you and given you far too much rope, but you're hanging yourself with it. -- Valjean (talk) 18:16, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Valjean - Thanks for your message, really. It's obvious that you assume I belong to a certain group (Conservapedia, Sanger etc). Speaking of tribalism. With all due respect for your life and Wikipedia experience, today even Noam Chomsky seems to be in the anti-Trump, pro-BLM, pro-AOC etc. camp (that's a gigantic disappointment for me by the way). I do not expect anyone to be outside of this political clash. Please take a moment to consider that maybe I do not belong in any camp of the struggle you presented. If Wikipedia would be conservative, the editors would be very angry about me. Since you commented politics I assume I can do the same: Anyone who genuinely tries to disconnect from this clash can see the things more clear: Both US political parties have the same agenda. They both demonize socialism (each one in a different way) and they promote crony capitalism (while officially pretending they promote capitalism). Their goal is and always was (at least since 1900 or so) to increase poverty and chaos everywhere. When they go to Guatemala - that country becomes a banana republic. They pulverize Iraq. They helped others or at least supported them to massacre large numbers of people in Indonesia and Guatemala. Interfered in other Latin American countries. They want the world to look like Haiti, Africa, Mexico (which looks far worse than the worst case scenario you presented) - and all in the name of freedom, democracy and human rights - and they are very successful in their "terra-formation" efforts. They both want conflicts with Russia and China, and the list of their common agenda can go on. Trump 2016 is just the result of the fact that the people became tired with the entire political class and voted an outsider. He is a clown and incompetent and incapable to make a difference and he knows that. He can only slow down the process for a little bit. This process of increasing poverty and chaos will inevitably lead do some convulsions but there is no chance whatsoever for an authoritarian, religious dictatorship and so on. It is very scary to contemplate the reality that while the evil is advancing, they make both camps to hate and to blame each others more and more. Both parties have the same agenda but the left is 10 times more efficient. Anyone can see how the left alienate the entire Eastern Europe calling it authoritarian, dangerous, anti-democratic, fascist and so on. You are anti-democratic and racist and dangerous if you dare to disagree with the left - everywhere in the West and in the Western's sphere of influence. And when you scare decent people using such aggressive tactics, you actually push them in to the right-wing camp, they become more racists. The same happens in the USA. Not every mom who votes Republican is a white supremacist. They are simply tired about leftist insanity and they switch sides.

To be honest and with all due respect, I think it is more likely that it's you tilting at windmills, and simply because your political view is misguided. You and the rest of the US society are captured, absorbed and immersed in this artificial conflict, you are wasting your energy in something absolutely useless and irrelevant, and that helps the real evil to keep doing undisturbed what they want. There is no doubt in my mind that Noam Chomsky and you are way more intelligent than me. But in the same time, I am completely sure that you are both misguided. It's paradoxical but it seems that's how life works.

Therefore I think it's foolish to assume that editors do not have a political agenda. I have my own agenda too. It is absolutely normal to expect editors to believe they struggle for a greater cause than even Wikipedia, and to be ready to even sacrifice Wikipedia "a little" bit in order to win political points. Wouldn't you be ready to compromise Wikipedia's neutrality a little bit, if that helps you to save your country? In my case, my contributions can't harm because my political views are not misguided. There is plenty of evidence in plain sight that both parties have the same agenda (for example Noam Chomsky presented a lot of stuff), I don't have to believe in Alex Jones or in QAnon or in any fringe conspiracy theory. I never believed in the crap that most people believe: "Capitalism is better than Communism!" or "Communism is better than Capitalism!" because I could see this is a false, artificial conflict that distracts people's attention from the real problem: corruption. As a general rule, it is probably good that, whenever you see a conflict, to think very well about the fact that it might be an artificial conflict and both sides might be misguided. IMO that can help a lot.

As long as Wikipedia will have any kind of bias, people like me will produce some irritation simply because they notice the bias. IMO that's absolutely expected. If I'll be allowed, I will start a RfC about Glenn Greenwald, and about the bias of the liberal media and about the bias of the liberal bias of Wikipedia. I am not trying to change anything, I am only interested in the bottom lines of those three RfC's. Those conclusions can serve in the future for error-correction. If you or other editors feel like my actions can help the catastrophic event of authoritarian, religious dictatorship to become a reality then what can I say? It's not my fault if you believe that, you are wrong but.. well.. do what you think it's best.

You said this: Start asking instead of accusing - and that's exactly what I did. All I did at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#RfC on Glenn Greenwald was to try to close that conversation (that followed the closing of the RfC attempt), asking everyone to help me to make a RfC and to make the debate inside the RfC, instead of continuing the debate there. I kept asking editors "please help me to start this RfC", because I want to do it in a way that it won't be quickly closed. Instead, nobody bothered to help me, but everyone tried to prove that my views about Glenn Greenwald are wrong. Therefore it is completely untrue that I am creating a time sink, abusing other editor's patience and using Wikipedia as a forum. It is me that tried to bring to close that debate and to just start a RfC but everyone else turned a blind eye to my request and kept trying to prove that I'm wrong. I also asked at Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources#Reliability and Credibility because I want to open a RfC in a way that Wikipedia can accept it. You already closed it although I was only honestly asking for help.

You said this: We've been extremely patient with you - yet nobody bothered to show me how to properly open the RfC. Interesting patience. You said Stop starting long discussions in the wrong venues. - That's exactly what I did. I kept asking editors to stop talking there and to start a RfC. You said: and given you far too much rope, but you're hanging yourself with it - The editors ignored my call for stopping the conversation there and for starting a RfC and they kept pouring messages there. It looks like a filibuster. And now you are using their own refusal to stop in order to accuse me of using Wikipedia as a forum and for not stopping. I am sorry but it looks completely absurd.

I said above, it's not unexpected for me to see that I am silenced - before I can even make my case.

As for the forum shopping accusation: on Wikipedia talk:Reliable sources/Perennial sources#The bias of the liberal media - it's already stopped. On Wikipedia_talk:Reliable_sources#Independent_journalists - this is where I started then I moved to WP:RSN. The people kept pinging me there and I assumed I can answer them. At Wikipedia_talk:Reliable_sources#Reliability_and_Credibility I asked for help. And at WP:RSN#RfC on Glenn Greenwald I was struggling to close that conversation and to start a RfC. I'm sorry to disagree but I wasn't forum shopping. -- Barecode (talk) 20:57, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

I think we can agree on something, and that is how power and corruption create more poverty. Do we agree on that much? Much poverty is created by the abuse of workers and the unequal division of profits. This injustice creates fuel for class warfare. (Read what Buffett says about this.) [ Jack London wrote an interesting book about some of these issues: War of the Classes (1905). I'm basically a Scandinavian Social Democrat now, so I believe in voting rights, democracy, social justice, collective bargaining, and am willing to pay higher taxes for important common social needs like education and health care, etc. It's cheaper that way. I have paid taxes as high as 67% and felt I got what I paid for because the government was far less corrupt and more democratic than in the U.S.A. I despise vulture capitalism, socialism, and communism. They don't work (for the vast majority), and both vulture capitalism and communism are inhumane. It's best to stay away from the extreme ends of the political spectrum. -- Valjean (talk) 22:40, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Its quite clear that @Valjean: sees this whole discussion on Wikipedia embedded in some sort of political struggle within the US and not a thing for itself. I dont and for the intentional purpose of this discussion dont' care where the US stucture of gvt will end up in. And i also believe, which is the most important thing when u are in business of writing an encyclopedia, that u can objectively write about topics by transcending your own political preferences and sticking to the truth, which is given to u by social scienece. So, if u are personally democrat for example, u can write objectively about the transition of your country into authoritarianism, as a wiki editor, without putting into it your own political preferences. The business of science is not proscribing reality but describing it. An overtly passive thing. Now lets not get off topic. The editorialship here decided to, by their own political preference that a reputable source is not reputable by their liking. And now they try to bully everyone else into submission who thinks the opposite. And that won't stand. I'm willing to fight a crusade for that. And if i fail, there needs to be a battle on the record the way en.wiki seized to be an encyclopedia. This tiny thing about Greenwald is crucial. --Ivan VA (talk) 22:32, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

I disagree with this: "The editorialship here decided to, by their own political preference that a reputable source is not reputable by their liking." Politics are irrelevant to the question. As a progressive liberal, I used to be a big fan of his. As far as Wikipedia is concerned, his reliability is not related to his politics, but to the sources that cite him. When left- or right-wing RS cite him, we can cite them. As for him, he is a self-published source. That policy limits how he and other SPS can be used, their politics be damned. It's that simple. -- Valjean (talk) 22:48, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Ivan VA - I agree that this tiny thing about Greenwald is crucial. Because zooming out one step reveals the real problem: the liberal bias. I agree there is bullying. That's how things work in any biased system. Speaking about the crusade: if you want to stand up to it then you have to be extremely careful to not make mistakes. If you take it too personally and become too angry or you talk insulting or talk from above, or make fun of your opponents (in the most tense moments do not make jokes, no matter how tempting it is, because it can spoil everything) or you become incoherent or you bring some widely-disproved arguments or if you make illogic statements or even if you are simply not capable to point the finger at the real issue and become confused, then the opponents will silence you. Also if you are not aware of the traps. In my case it looks like, willingly or not, the community set me a trap, but luckily I was careful to avoid it. I was not giving rope and me hanging with it. In reality the rope was shoved down my throat in order to be later used to "hang" me. It was looking dishonest - but not unexpected. And it doesn't necessarily reveal intrinsic bad faith, it can be the result of fear and the desire to struggle for a greater cause. I think we can't require anyone to be completely neutral and to completely forget their political views because it simply doesn't work. In a hypothetical situation, if you can make some changes and wreck Wikipedia in order to save the world (say from a comet), would you do it? I certainly hope you will. I think it's unrealistic to expect people to have no agenda. When you have a misguided agenda you will make errors, in time the errors will become more and more visible and one day the bubble will burst. My job is to do my best in order highlight those errors. If you do that right, the system has better chances to correct those errors. Anyways I can agree that politics is mostly rubbish and simply having a political view is plain wrong. The best way you can transcend your own political preference is to have no such political preference whatsoever. Then your preference becomes having to chose between making propaganda (which is disingenuous by itself) or making no propaganda at all. Coming back to Glenn Greenwald: The problem is not that he is an unreliable source. The problem is that Wikipedia "silenced" all the news outlets that are interested in quoting Greenwald.

Valjean - Since you made assumptions about my position towards Wikipedia (which might indicate your views), please allow me to make an assumption too. It's not an assumption about you but about Wikipedia editors. If I would try to bring back at Wikipedia this statement which reveals how deeply evil the US establishment is, then I guess it would be a huge struggle (against both pro-Trump and anti-Trump editors), requiring an amount of time that I can't even afford: The U.S. Military Mission was instrumental in introducing and implementing the use of para-militarism by the Guatemalan army and security forces. U.S. Army Colonel John Webber referred to it "a technique of counter-terror." U.S. Army journals and counter-terror experts outlined the basic premise of this strategy as "the tactic of intimidating, kidnapping, or assassinating carefully selected members of the opposition in a manner that will reap the maximum psychological benefit," the objective being, "to frighten everyone from collaborating with the guerrilla movement." and During Ríos Montt's tenure, the army's abuse of the civilian population approached overkill. Civilians are reported to have been beheaded, garroted, burned alive, bludgeoned to death, or hacked to death with machetes. Soldiers killed children in front of their parents by smashing their heads against trees and rocks [3] - USA is using plain terrorism in their fight for "freedom", "democracy" and "human rights". It's these profoundly evil people (or maybe I should call them satanists?) who are very good at Public Relations and they are capable to divide the USA society in two camps and to convince them to hate each other more and more every day. They understand humans' and society's flaws and they exploit the bugs. Unfortunately I have no time for such a struggle so here we are talking about Glenn Greenwald and about liberal bias.

I know it's not desirable to talk about politics. But the fact that in our debate we arrived at such evident political views reveals that the deep political choices of the editors are an important factor for developing Wikipedia. What you said confirms Ivan VA's statement that editors simply try to stop history from going the wrong way. We can't pretend that such deep political fears that engulfed the whole US society do not affect Wikipedia. It's unproductive to pretend they don't exist. I don't have a solution. Maybe the editors should find a space for dispelling their deep fears and aversions. Whoever wants to talk about the politics, propaganda and agendas that influences Wikipedia, I am ready to join an external forum to talk about it. I would only make this statement: For many Americans and Wikipedia editors, they became so passionate in their struggle for "justice" that they completely ignore the real causes and they (liberals) would be more than happy to transform USA in a living hell like Haiti or Mexico in their fear that the alternative is for USA to become a "dictatorship" like Phillipines or like Poland where people can live and raise their children relatively safe and have a decent life. Whoever thinks that the former is a better alternative than the latter, I can only say they talk from a position of privilege, they are spoiled and they are completely insane.

But I will answer though: I think your view is fundamentally focused on Western society and ideology and ignores too much of the rest. Along the history, you can find a lot of societies with absolute monarchies where the power was concentrated in the hands of the few and the people could enjoy a relatively good life, the leaders were wise and they cared about their people. I'm not even sure that class struggle always existed. Sure communism can look very bad but China proves that communism can actually be improved a lot when you focus on reducing corruption and on increasing competence. Some communist countries were far better than others. For example Hungary vs. Cuba. The Hungarian president had zero tolerance for corruption. The life was infinitely better in communist Hungary than in the democratic Haiti or in current-day Mexico. Corruption doesn't originate only from the top. The leaders at county, city, town and village level had a lot of power to reduce or increase corruption in their own communities. It is the culture of a population that prevails, not capitalism, not communism, not democracy, not freedom and not any other concept that can be sold as cheap propaganda catchphrase. Because any system is the sum of all of it's components. The Scandinavian culture makes socialism awesome and the American culture makes socialism dreadful. The anti-Trump warriors who want to save the world and who demonize Poland, they support some "socialists" who are anything but socialists. This is a very recent proof. Their "socialism" is reduced to insane amounts of hate towards anyone who dares to disagree with them and to creating chaos. I agree that corruption creates poverty, but not sure power always creates poverty. China proves that power can also create prosperity, and that's not an exception. A big part of Eastern Europe enjoyed a good life in communism. As a component of a system, I have to do my job and to be against what is wrong or evil. Many people try to do that but probably their views are too conceptual, too theoretical, too abstract (which defines the Western mindset which seems to be mesmerized by theories) and too little practical. Let's make sure we stand against corruption and let's not allow general concepts to drive our fascination or out deep dislikes (e.g. I love Communism - I hate Capitalism). Democracy is very good but actually too few people actually care about it. People don't make democracy in their own families and in their own local communities. That's why a communist country can be way better than a democratic country. The people are lazy and they prefer to believe that ideologies can save them while in reality their own effort to apply their ideas can save them. I agree with your view that the Scandinavian countries work very well and that's a highly desirable model. I support all the things you mentioned: democracy, voting rights, high taxes for the rich etc. I hate crony capitalism because it's corrupt ofc and I embrace real capitalism. The socialism term is used way to vaguely to have any view on it. I don't believe in communism but I also don't hate it just like I can't hate knives. It all depends how you are using it. Responsible leadership stands above any ideology. But believing in insane people who pretend to be socialists who will create a Scandinavian paradise anywhere is profoundly wrong. Same with putting any ideology above the fight against corruption. It can drive you into misguided, fierce, useless and deeply disruptive conflicts and transformations. I think this is what is going on today - especially in USA but even in Scandinavian countries. Real life example: The Scandinavian politicians call Hungary "fascists" and "ant-feminists" because Hungary is encouraging people to have more children. Scandinavia is great but it is also changing because the people are misguided, the politicians are nuts and the situation going to be worse year by year. Of course they will always claim that it's all because of the people who dare to disagree and will call those people racists, dictators, anti-democratic etc. The righteous justice of the people who pretend to be morally superior. The outrage machine works the same everywhere in the Western world. Sorry for the long message, I was trying to dispel wrong assumptions about my motivations.

I believe your attempt to find a common ground is essentially good and very useful. I think the most fundamental thing we agree about is that corruption is the most important problem. I think the people can find common grounds if they try to do that. Maybe we should stop pretending that Wikipedia has nothing to do with politics and maybe we should find an external forum where the Wikipedians can reveal their political motivations (mostly driven by fears today), their beliefs, their conceptualizations and where they focus on finding the real causes of things - which can help them to find their common grounds and their divergent views where they can respectfully disagree. That can help them to remove misunderstandings, suspicions, aversions and it can reduce conflicts. Maybe I'm wrong, it's just a thought. -- Barecode (talk) 11:24, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

I just wanted to leave a note here which is not necessarily WP related, just my own view (user talk pages are a bit less strict). When I look at the events it's unfortunate that someone who used to be a journalist published by more reputable sources suddenly went to do paid activism instead. I'm not sure how often this happens, but I understand how many people would keep trusting a familiar face. It's also concerning for me to see how the Fox GOP propaganda machine keeps mixing somewhat decent news and ridiculous opinion shows, causing so many victims of that disinformation and how it radicalized over the years. I also saw radical parties (like the Tea Party) indoctrinating their members to fight unreasonably against their own interests and needs (including services they massively benefit from and require). And the rise of all those extremist grassrooting propaganda "news sites" and free "news papers" left at doorsteps (including by cults). I say this from a non-American perspective, but Canadians also unfortunately started to be targetted this way, especially some provinces. It's clear that some fragments of society are heading "post-truth" (also some at the extreme left).

And as someone who was raised in a fundamentalist cult but who learned better through education, time and research, it's unfortunate to see how societies can progress and retrograde again anytime. Politics indeed affect everyone (and can even deprive kids of a proper scientific education, like biology untainted by creationism, if it manages to; not that it's out of place in a general nondenominational moral and religion course or theology). But on WP WP:ACTIVISM matters. Editors are from many countries and backgrounds and a collaborative encyclopedia that attempts to be mainstream rather than confessional or ideological (compare to Conservapedia or RationalWiki), can only get somewhere with policies and acceptable sources that promote that... It of course also is an ideal that can never fully be met (but so is democracy and other great ideas that went far). —PaleoNeonate – 20:09, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

PaleoNeonate - I live in Spain but I watch US politics because it affects us all. You can find plenty of evidence that Europe gets a lot of orders and directions from the US. I know Republicans and Fox have a bad reputation for pushing conspiracy theories in the past. I think The Power of Nightmares (BBC) is an eye opening movie. I was told that Fox and Koch promoted all kind of false accusations and theories. But after 2016, the entire media landscape is completely different. CNN was helping Bush but now it's hysterical about Trump. Today Fox News is ready to attack both Republicans and Democrats - link. The insanity of the left is overwhelming, they scream "racists", "white supremacists", "dictators", "anti-democrats" and create outrage all day just to help Dems to to get more votes. A German guy that I know told me that today there is a lot of suppression in his country, and it's coming from the people, not from the government. So the process is very similar in Europe. If you disagree then you are racist and you are not human. Fortunately, the liberals are not so many in Eastern Europe. I am watching Fox News a lot (on YouTube). Never interested in Alex Jones or QAnon & stuff. Today, Fox News is busy all day to show the hypocrisy and the insanity of the left (most of it it's about the liberal media). They simply have no time for anything else - there is too much work to do on that topic. They have no time for inventing conspiracy theories or to make much false accusations. They can't even process it all, the rest of the job is done by The Babylon Bee, Mark Dice, The Right to Bear Memes (on Twitter) and others. Sometimes I watch some CNN videos but they are all the same: Biden is great, Trump is the biggest threat to humanity, parents worried about education of children are terrorists and so on. It's very hard to watch that stuff, it's sickening. Then I watch Fox News and read on Twitter and I crack laughing seeing all those memes which are so funny and also tell so much truth. Today Fox News is totally different. But of course, for those hating Trump, Fox News is evil simply because they support Trump, and they will fight to death to "prove" that Fox News is an unreliable source and to "prove" that CNN, ABC, NBC were not hysterical. This prediction proved to be true: "Veteran journalist Ted Koppel said "CNN's ratings would be in the toilet without Donald Trump" in a 2018 interview .. MSNBC - Is there a moment of the day when they are not focusing on Donald Trump?" [4]. Truth or Wikipedia don't matter anymore, it's all about Trump. I know the hate is too great and nothing will change their minds. Even if I bring millions of facts and evidence they don't care. If you live in Germany 1940 then you can't convince fascists to stop being fascists. How can you communicate with people who think you are a white supremacist fascist moron simply because you dare to disagree? I can only say that such fears like creating a conservative, single party, authoritarian, religious dictatorship is never going to happen because that is incompatible with the vast majority of Americans, including with most republicans. And the super-rich have way too much power to prevent that from happening. So the liberals are fighting against windmills. I can provide a gazillion of evidence that it's the liberals who are the most numerous ones who moved into the post-truth era.

About those blinded by their hate who think they are fighting to stop the history from going the wrong way (i.e. prevent Trump to come in power), I will say this only for the record: The history is already going the wrong way. The establishment (both parties and the super-rich who control the politicians) are increasing poverty and chaos everywhere, including in the USA. Add the ever-increasing debts and inflation, bailouts-based economy and the virtualization of the economy. They (the liberals) are only accelerating the process with their hate, outrage, fanaticism and hysteria used to bring votes for the Democrat party who are doing their best to speed up the whole process. I don't feel like I can do anything to prevent the history from going the wrong way therefore unlike the liberals, I have no reason whatsoever to wreck Wikipedia "to save the world". -- Barecode (talk) 23:12, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

You're right that the world is watching concerned. I agree with much of what you wrote, although I don't think that caring about RS means "wrecking WP to save the world", it's just fundamental to the encyclopedia... I visited Spain but more than a decade ago, unfortunately recent events that I'm aware of were about the devastating pandemic, with the repurposed arena, etc. I'm a fan of flamenco (and play some) and of Balearic beats. —PaleoNeonate – 04:29, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

PaleoNeonate - I believe the way that many Wikipedia editors care about RS is unproductive because they are biased. Before the economic crisis in 2008, Spain's economy was thriving, it was an abundance of jobs, commerce was flourishing, today the economy works but not really great, the people are squeezed, the streets are full of unused commercial spaces from closed shops, the small companies are under too much pressure from the limited and small demand. The jobs move to the cloud - too many jobs in telemarketing and similar stuff so the economy is becoming virtual. Companies hire people and fire them after one year so they don't have rights from a permanent contract. Entire classes of shops are taken over by immigrants (from Pakistan in general) who hire people without papers and pay starving wages. The politicians on the right show they are only interested to reduce the taxes for the rich, entire economic sectors were exported to China and the socialists are extremely enthusiastic about that, they tell you that's a good thing because the money come from Research and Development which is a lie - they have no data to prove their claims. An unconvincing, weak and fragile economy ready to collapse any moment and a very corrupt political class which is evidently paid by the super-rich to keep pouring nonsense. If you want to see some more credible politicians you have to look at the right-wing politicians in Eastern Europe. The rest of the politicians are all the same - two faces of the same monster. -- Barecode (talk) 08:06, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

The "real problem: the liberal bias"

Barecode, above you state: "real problem: the liberal bias". Okay, so what if others were to say that a "conservative bias" was a "real problem"? Since that isn't a problem at Wikipedia, let's make this more relevant to our actual situation here:

1. Do you think that Wikipedia condones or allows editors to judge the "real problem" with a source based on its perceived "conservative" or "liberal" bias?
2. Where does "reliability" fit into this equation?
3. Do you see hypocrisy as a problem?

We use "reliability" and "verifiability" as our guides, not the bias of the source. Put another way, when the extreme bias of a source pushes it into counterfactual (unreliable) territory, it could easily (and mistakenly) appear that editors are rejecting the source because of its bias, when actually they are doing so because it isn't reliable. -- Valjean (talk) 22:03, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

Valjean - I have a deep and profound dislike for conservative bias like the kind of bias that was used to help to pulverize Iraq and to kill more than half a million people. I am disgusted by the conservative bias which demonizes socialism and labels whoever they don't like as "communists" and then they call the "free world" to kill those "communists". Also about the messianic propaganda against China and Russia. I am also against religious bias, fundementalism, evangelibans, creationism etc. Just a few days ago, the Republican Ted Cruz uttered miserable lies about Russia [5]. Therefore I would be and I already am strongly against conservative bias. If the problem at Wikipedia would be the conservative bias, I would do exactly the same - reporting the issue and suggest fixes. It just happens that today it's the liberals who are leading in this process of wrecking everything, including Wikipedia.

I think Wikipedia definitely allows unbiased editors to make a clear judgement of the problems with biased sources. But in the same time, when the biased editors are the majority, Wikipedia allows them to misjudge sources and to mislabel them as unreliable or reliable. The Wikipedia policies are close to perfect. But when the people who maintain the mechanism are biased, the mechanism will produce biased products (articles). I haven't noticed any liberal bias in the Wikipedia policies. But I have seen liberal bias in the way the Wikipedia policies are used in order to apply wrong labels to sources and to create articles with liberal bias. If the majority of editors would have pro-Cuba bias then they would decide that only the pro-Cuba sources are reliable and then they would be free to flood Wikipedia the great achievements of Fidel Castro and his gang. A perfect machine used by imperfect people.

I haven't noticed hypocrisy, but there is denial. The main problem is the (passionate) partisanship, so the byproducts are denial, irritation, and some anger, dishonesty and bullying. When a veteran journalist (Ted Koppel) says "Let’s go to MSNBC, is there a moment of the day when they are not focusing on Donald Trump or some intimately related subject? It is essentially — Oh, I know. Every once in a while. You know, if the number of people who died in Indonesia gets up to a 1000, they will give it a mention or two." [6] [7]. Le Monde diplomatique talks about the liberal hysteria and the media war against Trump. [8] Then France24 says "Tensions have cooled between the news media and the White House after four tumultuous years (..) The so-called "Trump bump" which boosted viewers and subscriptions at outlets such as CNN and the New York Times now appears to have turned into a slump following the departure of Donald Trump from the presidency." [9] - Journalists and the presidential team sing happy birthday to each others [10] [11] - Like North Korea, CNN's Don Lemon SINGS his joy for Biden (about Joe Biden reducing the price of gas) [12] - There is a lot of overjoy and love between the media and the president. To pretend the liberal media is not heavily biased means being in denial.

Later edit - This is what Disney is teaching the children about the Vice President Kamala Harris: "Once there was a young girl who used her voice to make the world around her a better place. (..) She had freedom fighting in her blood. She led a successful protest so kids could continue to play … And became part of a divine group of leaders" [13] - and compare that with "Mount Paektu has long been considered the spiritual birthplace of the Korean nation and Kim Jong Il, son of the North's founder Kim Il Sung, came into the world at a secret guerrilla camp on its slopes, where his father was directing the fight against Korea's Japanese colonial overlords." [14] - Now the Biden's team is a group of divine leaders if you listen to the liberal Hollywood. In a Soviet-Style propaganda, Kamala Harris is getting her own section in LA Times [15] - The post-truth journalist teaching viewers to love the dear leader: CNBC’s Jim Cramer: “Today we have the strongest economy, perhaps, I’ve ever seen.” [16]

The fact that all the president-unfriendly media is considered unreliable should be an indication that something is going wrong. There is no balance at all. This is not a normal situation. Also considering that the president-friendly media has a strong bias too, Wikipedia editors should look for a solution. One solution that I can think about is to decide that Fox News and NYP are generally reliable with the exception of strange allegations - those allegations can be discussed in talk pages of the articles. This looks like a good compromise to me. The society, the media and Wikipedia are too polarized, it's an exceptional situation and IMO the best thing to do is to find a solution to that. But first the editors must decide if the current situation is indeed exceptional. After that, I think that, for the sake of balance and neutrality, a few sources like Fox News and NYP should be declared as generally reliable - with some exceptions for certain kind of articles. When you got to the situation where only the president-friendly media is considered reliable you have to stop, to think about consequences, to try to maintain a balance and neutrality and to admit the binary solution of 1 and 0 (RS and not RS) doesn't work anymore and the solution should be more nuanced with some shades of gray. -- Barecode (talk) 00:51, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

Why do you keep banging on about Fox News, which has had to apologize repeatedly for editing photos to add people who weren't there, or to remove people who were present, instead of the more fact-based conservative news outlets, such as National Review or The Washington Free Beacon? Are you unaware of Fox News' many scandals, or are you unaware that it is possible to find conservative media that doesn't have a history of just making stuff up and pretending that it's news? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:24, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - Sorry, I'm kind of confused, I am starting to get lost. I don't have time to read all policies. And those parts that I've read maybe I missed something. Considering that there's an ongoing attempt to block me for allegedly not knowing when to drop the stick, I have to ask: what do you mean by "banging on about Fox News"? You mean talking about Fox News? Can I get banned for that? I am not allowed to talk about Fox News? I'm asking because I'm trying to make sure I'm not accused again of "not knowing when to drop the stick". If I dare to answer you then I increase my chances of accused of using Wkipedia as a forum and getting banned? This whole charade makes me feel like I'm trying to walk in a mine field. It's kind of boring and disgusting, to be honest. -- Barecode (talk) 01:30, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - Are you trying to get a reaction from me and to ban me because I reacted? -- Barecode (talk) 01:42, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

I'm trying to figure out whether your problem is that you (correctly) believe that Fox News is (mostly) unwanted, or if you (incorrectly) believe that no conservative media outlets at all are acceptable.

If you don't feel comfortable talking about it right now, that's okay. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:09, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - I didn't know about those two conservative sources, I have to check them later. But I lost my appetite of talking anymore. Too many accusations and it gives me the feeling that too many editors try to set up traps. At WP:RSN#RfC on Glenn Greenwald I was asking everyone to close that conversation and then I was accused that I am hanging myself. Similar thing now. I'm quite disgusted, sorry. Maybe another time. Barecode (talk) 03:02, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

If you need to take a break, I wonder whether you would be interested in helping set up and proofread the pages for s:Index:The Federalist, on the new Constitution.djvu The Federalist Papers is one of the classic texts of American conservatism, and something anyone who is interested in conservatism should find time to read. Wikisource tries to make the pages match the original as much as possible (although they remove hyphens from the middle of a word, because the line breaks don't match the printed version, depending on your screen and font sizes), so it's often just a matter of correcting OCR errors, removing unwanted line breaks, and finding the right templates for the formatting. Click on this link to get an idea of how it works. That page doesn't exist, and the wikitext is being generated automatically, based on the scanned page from the book. The first line (the page number and title) belongs in the "header" area, and the rest just needs basic clean up work, like removing stray characters and unwanted line breaks. You don't have to get everything perfect on the first try. I'd bet that you could be pretty useful there. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:04, 22 December 2021 (UTC)

BLP violation

Your addition of content sourced to Project Veritas is a serious BLP violation and has been reverted. No RS have commented on this matter, and the source you used did not say what you wrote in your edit. Be more careful. Project Veritas is not a RS.

The name of that CNN person is mentioned on Fox News (we generally try to avoid using Fox News) from a story in 2019 where he revealed and commented on the unseemly behavior of another CNN producer who stepped down.[17] These are two very different stories. -- Valjean (talk) 04:42, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

There is an arbitration request you are involved in

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#User_Barecode Lmharding (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 00:18, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Technicality to consider

I didn't count the words of your section at AE but there is a default 500 words limit unless a clerk or admin allows an exception. But I have noticed that some of your posts elsewhere were also often extensive. Editors are more likely to carefully read short and concise posts. Then there is the frequency: if you look at the Biden RFC, most editors who participate don't engage in excessive debate. I personally doubt that you will immediately receive a siteban and thought that if you can realize this and adapt to "WP pace" it will generally help during collaborative processes... —PaleoNeonate – 05:01, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

PaleoNeonate - Throwing unintelligible, baseless and absurd accusations is easy to do with few words. Exposing and debunking them requires a lot more words. If the "WP pace" is to keep your mouth shut or to not answer to pings or to accept absurd accusations and not to answer to such accusations then please don't count me in. Biden RFC? What is that? -- Barecode (talk) 18:30, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

I meant the RFC at Talk:Biden–Ukraine conspiracy theory. For the rest of your reply, it's your defensive twist, not what I was saying above, unless you also mean that all participants there are "silenced". My suggestion was to look at their behavior and learn from it. In any case, accusations of censorship don't really stand on WP considering that it's not for free speech but for articles to reflect reliable sources... WP has no power to silence bloggers on their own platforms or to retract independent sources and is not the government, its data is also not public space (WP:FREESPEECH is a pretty good explanation of the situation). —PaleoNeonate – 20:58, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

PaleoNeonate - You realize that the term "excessive debate" can be used to silence anyone who dares to disagree? I was accused of exactly that, for answering to pings and even after asking everyone to close a conversation. Which is disingenuous at best. Well, when the people start to manufacture evidence against you, then you will surely show a defensive twist, isn't it? To be honest I've seen quite a lot of deplorable behavior already. WP has no power to silence blogs but abusive editors and admins surely have enough power to silence editors they dislike. -- Barecode (talk) 21:14, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

PaleoNeonate - Using the term "excessive debate", abusive editors can gather a pile of lies against an editor they dislike, and when that editor tries to debunk the lies, they can be shut down that editor for "creating an excessive debate" and for "creating a time sink" an for "clearly not getting it". If you make 20 accusations against a person then it's only fair that person should be allowed to write 20 paragraphs in order to defend against each accusation. This looks like common sense to me. If Wikipedia doesn't allow editors to defend themselves in front of a flurry of false accusations then that means this place is screwed really hard. -- Barecode (talk) 21:27, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Well this digresses to some political editor battles. In any case I'll leave you alone, since when I try to help it doesn't. It's up to you to read again what others wrote, if you care. As for AE, it's designed to also receive your response. My above suggestion was to help in relation to future WP participation, not about this particular AE report, except for the mention of the word limit. —PaleoNeonate – 22:48, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

PaleoNeonate - Ok, thanks anyways. -- 22:53, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Greenwald is encyclopedic material. An encyclopedia cant hide behind some internal rules when it comes to relevance to content. They cant ban u if u express ureselves so lengthy. Thats not ban reason and i will reducle that. We are all here as a hobby, as volunteers. --Ivan VA (talk) 23:46, 20 December 2021 (UTC)

Ivan VA - We can't ask Wikipedia to not apply rules for Glenn Greenwald. That's not reasonable IMO. At best we can ask for making an exception for him - by adding an exception to the rule. But that's not the main issue. The main issue is that Wikipedia considers to be Reliable Sources only the president-friendly sources who would never quote Glenn Greenwald. IMO the solution is to allow using a source like Fox News in some cases like for example when they give a voice to someone like Greenwald. IMO that's a much better solution because allows quoting Greenwald without making an exception from the rules just for him. Thanks for your support. This ship show should serve as an good example of how the uncomfortable editors can be banned simply by throwing a pile of trash on top of them. How repeating past false accusations makes them look like valid accusations. And it should serve as a warning to editors that on Wikipedia simply talking about certain issues can get other editors angry on them and hunting them and banning them with the righteous woke justice at the first error they make. For them, if you think different then you are guilty of coming with "rants", you are forum shopping, you are wasting everyone's time and so on. For them, your different views are toxic here. It should serve as an example to why thinking different can get you banned for "not being here". And, of course, how defending yourself or noticing that you are harassed "amounts to multiple violations of Wikipedia policy". -- Barecode (talk) 00:39, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

Not allowing Greenwald as a socurce is a violation of the 5 pillars rule, on which the whole project is based on. Thats the decisive thing. They cnt play with that, nor is there any other tactical approach to adress this. Its st8forward. If 5 pillars is no longer applied, this is not an encyclopedia anymore. --Ivan VA (talk) 10:44, 22 December 2021 (UTC)

Ivan VA - I admit you are right, I didn't think about that before. It points to making exceptions (be bold) If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it. - Yet many editors disagree that using Glenn Greenwald as a source is improving Wikipedia. There is no way we can force or convince them of the contrary. It is not wise to risk to be banned by trying to prove the contrary. They will claim that you do not improve Wikipedia but you disrupt it when using Greenwald as a source. My point was to make a RfC about Glenn Greenwald and let them show what they think about this topic. Let that RfC serve as Wikipedia community's official statement about Glenn Greenwald. To avoid ambiguities and misunderstandings. Because today they hide behind excuses like "oh well it was just a discussion about Greenwald on a talk page". My point was to find a way to make it clear what they think about Glenn Greenwald using a RfC therefore removing any chance of allowing room for excuses, ambiguity and duplicity. A RfC can prove (for those who will look at it after some years) that you and me respect the 5 pillars rule while in the same time they break that rule. That's why I wanted a RfC, to make things clear. Without a RfC your effort is wasted. -- Barecode (talk) 16:09, 22 December 2021 (UTC)

Ivan VA - If they have such strong views about Glenn Greenwald then why they are so afraid about making an official statement about Greenwald (a RfC that contains the community consensus)? And instead they try to shut me down before I can even open that RfC. It's because they know they are wrong, they know that their own firm statements prove that they work against the very principle of building a neutral encyclopedia. And that's why they think this debate in terms of warfare and that's why they see the call for an official view as nothing else than an insurrection. Because the plain truth is a threat for their own questionable activities. Because they want to maintain the confusion so they can later find excuses that they didn't know about it or they thought this is just a matter of a debate somewhere in a talk page of one of the millions of Wikipedia articles. At the corners they tell you that Glenn Greenwald is a traitor but they have no courage to officially admit that. -- Barecode (talk) 19:37, 22 December 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Five pillars is not some sort of holy scripture. It's just an essay written by someone who thought that Wikipedia:Trifecta wasn't good enough. It's turned out to be popular, but Wikipedia was an encyclopedia before it was written, and it would continue to be an encyclopedia even if it were deleted. All the other encyclopedias throughout history seem to have managed to be encyclopedias without 5P, so presumably we can, too. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:56, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - Yet a lot of editors are scared about making an official Wikipedia statement about Glenn Greenwald. Because that exposes them being against Wikipedia:Trifecta just as much as against Wikipedia:Five pillars and beyond that, it exposes them as being against writing a neutral encyclopedia. If they think the Glenn Greenwald issue is so clear then why they are afraid to make a RfC about it and why they are doing their best to prevent such a RfC ? As for ignoring the rules part, in my view it's ok to ignore the rules once, then the next logical step is to ask for adjusting the rules to make sure such edits don't go against the rules anymore. -- Barecode (talk) 08:14, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - If I'm going to open a RfC about Glenn Greenwald at this moment then they will do their best to close that RfC invoking technicalities and pretending that it's wrongly worded. They will not try to suggest any re-wording in order to make it a valid RfC but they will do their best to shut me down instead for "forum shopping", "excessive debate", "long rants" just like they did last time and just like they are doing right now. -- Barecode (talk) 08:19, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Which "Wikipedia office" exists, and what "Wikipedia officers" do you think would be making those "official Wikipedia statements"? That's not what happens at an RFC. RFCs are normal talk-page discussions that (we hope) determine what the current community consensus is. Nothing "official" happens there.

If you are concerned about an RFC getting shut down over technicalities, then you might seek advice at Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment about how to get the technicalities right. But I really do think you would be wasting your time. The FAQ at the top of WT:V already has your answer. No source (including Greenwald) is always reliable, and no source (including Greenwald) is always unreliable. The handful of things that Greenwald wrote may be unreliable – and, more relevantly, is UNDUE – for his story about that one conspiracy theory, but that doesn't mean that everything Greenwald ever wrote is banned from all articles.

I believe you've been told this several times. Does this feel like a complicated concept to you? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:20, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - By Wikipedia official view on Glenn Greenwald I mean the result of a RFC about Glenn Greenwald at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard. That's the unequivocal community consensus, which, for using shorter terms, I call it "official".

Sorry but it looks like you try to create confusion. What I meant everything Greenwald wrote after leaving The intercept is practically banned from all articles (except the Glenn Greenwald article). If the FAQ at the top of WT:V already has the answer and it's a waste of time to make a RfC about Greenwald that means the same applies to every other source (say for example Fox News) - which is obviously false. And no, nobody told me this, you are the first one to make such a claim. You are probably just trying to add to the previous false accusations that I am wasting the patience of the editors. Which is quite predictable, tbh. -- Barecode (talk) 20:18, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

The English Wikipedia currently has 38,000 (thirty-eight thousand) links to Fox News.[18] [19] Fox News is cited in about 16,000 (sixteen thousand) articles right now. I wonder if this surprises you, since you seem to be claiming that Fox News is practically banned. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:34, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - I did not claim that. What I claim is that a RfC about Fox News makes sense, therefore a RfC about Glenn Greenwald also makes sense. Which counters your previous point that such a RfC is a waste of time. Also Fox News is mostly banned for political stuff but not for the rest of stuff (sports, celebrities, events etc). And it's banned since year X. You removed context to provide a simplified and irrelevant view. -- Barecode (talk) 20:41, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing - Your reply just added more stuff to the "I also tried to explain him but he just doesn't get it" narrative. -- Barecode (talk)

WhatamIdoing - Later I realized that maybe you didn't know there was a RfC for Fox News - in that case, you can find at one at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_303#RfC:_Fox_News and more such links at WP:FOX. You can see there the community consensus was that Fox News can be used as a source, except for politics and science but it can be used for other things . -- Barecode (talk) 01:41, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

Notice that you are now subject to an arbitration enforcement topic ban

The following topic ban now applies to you:

You have been indefinitely topic banned from all pages and discussions concerning post-1992 American politics

You have been sanctioned for the reasons provided in response to this arbitration enforcement request.

This topic ban is imposed in my capacity as an uninvolved administrator under the authority of the Arbitration Committee's decision at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/American politics 2#Final decision and, if applicable, the procedure described at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions. This sanction has been recorded in the log of sanctions. Please read WP:TBAN to understand what a topic ban is. If you do not comply with the topic ban, you may be blocked for an extended period to enforce the ban.

If you wish to appeal the ban, please read the appeals process. You are free to contact me on my talk page if anything of the above is unclear to you. Doug Weller talk 17:08, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

Doug Weller talk 17:08, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

Doug Weller - Thanks for the notice. Can you please fix the broken link you posted above? -- Barecode (talk) 17:49, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia and copyright

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It's very important that contributors understand and follow these practices, as policy requires that people who persistently do not must be blocked from editing. If you have any questions about this, you are welcome to leave me a message on my talk page. Thank you. — Diannaa (talk) 18:15, 16 February 2022 (UTC)

Hello, I can't remember the content you deleted, according to which policy you removed access to old edits? Completely deleting content about sensitive BLP stuff makes sense, but even positive statements about a company? Barecode (talk) 21:55, 16 February 2022 (UTC)

Copying within Wikipedia requires attribution (2nd request)

Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia. It appears that you copied or moved text from one or more pages to Mushroom spawn. While you are welcome to re-use Wikipedia's content, here or elsewhere, Wikipedia's licensing does require that you provide attribution to the original contributor(s). When copying within Wikipedia, this is supplied at minimum in an edit summary at the page into which you've copied content, disclosing the copying and linking to the copied page, e.g., copied content from [[page name]]; see that page's history for attribution. It is good practice, especially if copying is extensive, to also place a properly formatted {{copied}} template on the talk pages of the source and destination. Please provide attribution for this duplication if it has not already been supplied by another editor, and if you have copied material between pages before, even if it was a long time ago, you should provide attribution for that also. You can read more about the procedure and the reasons at Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia. Thank you. DanCherek (talk) 14:12, 21 February 2022 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of PT Kalimantan Industrial Park Indonesia

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A tag has been placed on PT Kalimantan Industrial Park Indonesia requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section G12 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the page appears to be an unambiguous copyright infringement. This page appears to be a direct copy from http://www.thejakartapost.com/business/2021/12/22/green-industrial-park-in-n-kalimantan-begins-construction.html. For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images taken from other web sites or printed material, and as a consequence, your addition will most likely be deleted. You may use external websites or other printed material as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences. This part is crucial: say it in your own words. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously and persistent violators will be blocked from editing.

If the external website or image belongs to you, and you want to allow Wikipedia to use the text or image — which means allowing other people to use it for any reason — then you must verify that externally by one of the processes explained at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. The same holds if you are not the owner but have their permission. If you are not the owner and do not have permission, see Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission for how you may obtain it. You might want to look at Wikipedia's copyright policy for more details, or ask a question here.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Onel5969 ^{TT me} 13:04, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Concern regarding Draft:List of orbital launches by year

Hello, Barecode. This is a bot-delivered message letting you know that Draft:List of orbital launches by year, a page you created, has not been edited in at least 5 months. Drafts that have not been edited for six months may be deleted, so if you wish to retain the page, please edit it again or request that it be moved to your userspace.

If the page has already been deleted, you can request it be undeleted so you can continue working on it.

Thank you for your submission to Wikipedia. FireflyBot (talk) 16:03, 17 May 2022 (UTC)

Nomination of Space Perspective for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Space Perspective is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Space Perspective until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article.

Ari T. Benchaim (talk) 21:20, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

Your draft article, Draft:List of orbital launches by year

Hello, Barecode. It has been over six months since you last edited the Articles for Creation submission or Draft page you started, "List of orbital launches by year".

In accordance with our policy that Wikipedia is not for the indefinite hosting of material deemed unsuitable for the encyclopedia mainspace, the draft has been deleted. If you plan on working on it further and you wish to retrieve it, you can request its undeletion. An administrator will, in most cases, restore the submission so you can continue to work on it.

Thanks for your submission to Wikipedia, and happy editing. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 16:06, 15 June 2022 (UTC)

Gina Champion-Cain moved to draftspace

An article you recently created, Gina Champion-Cain, is not suitable as written to remain published. It needs more citations from reliable, independent sources. (?) Information that can't be referenced should be removed (verifiability is of central importance on Wikipedia). I've moved your draft to draftspace (with a prefix of "Draft:" before the article title) where you can incubate the article with minimal disruption. When you feel the article meets Wikipedia's general notability guideline and thus is ready for mainspace, please click on the "Submit your draft for review!" button at the top of the page. Dr vulpes ^{(💬 • 📝)} 07:22, 11 July 2022 (UTC)

Ways to improve IIBX

Hello, Barecode,

Thank you for creating IIBX.

I have tagged the page as having some issues to fix, as a part of our page curation process and note that:

Hello, thank you for the article. Please consider expanding the article and formatting the references. MOS:CITE

The tags can be removed by you or another editor once the issues they mention are addressed. If you have questions, leave a comment here and begin it with {{Re|Bruxton}}. Remember to sign your reply with ~~~~. For broader editing help, please visit the Teahouse.

Delivered via the Page Curation tool, on behalf of the reviewer.

Bruxton (talk) 02:18, 31 July 2022 (UTC)

August 2022

Do not add personal information about other contributors to Wikipedia without their explicit permission, as you did at Talk:Peter Schechter. Wikipedia operates on the principle that every contributor has the right to remain completely anonymous. Posting personal information about another user is strictly prohibited under Wikipedia's harassment policy. Wikipedia's policy on this issue is strictly enforced and your edits have been reverted and/or suppressed, not least because such information can appear on web searches. Wikipedia's privacy policy is to protect the privacy of every user, including you. Persistently adding personal information about other contributors will result in being blocked from editing. — Newslinger talk 07:50, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Hi Barecode, please see Wikipedia:Harassment § Posting of personal information (WP:DOX) for details, in particular, the phrase "whether such information is accurate or not". Thank you. — Newslinger talk 07:53, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Newslinger - I just wanted to report a possible very severe conflict of interrest. I guess it's in the interrest of Wikipedia to investigate that possible conflict of interrest, as opposed to find excuses for not investigating it and for silencing those who try to report such things. There is no intention from me to harrass or dox anyone, neither to touch post-1992 US politics topics where I am banned, my interrest was to report a potential conflict of interrest. One that seems to focus on raising tensions between the two most powerful countries in the world. Such an escalation can have horrible consequences for everyone - by the way the guy that wanted to obliterate me and completely ban me (Valjean) is very worried that certain parties want to enforce a religious dictatorship in the USA and he tries to protect Wikipedia from this inexistant enemy, which is absolutely a fancy conspiracy theory with absolutely no evidence and not even the slightest indication for such a thing. Yet, I am the one considered to be promoting ridiculous conspiracy theories. Meanwhile such conspiracy theorists like him are considered to be the very "guardians of the truth" here on Wikipedia. The situation is the same everywhere in the Western Europe, just like the situation at the Wikipedia - the woke liberals dictate the truth and thinking different is a crime. They are building the path for an inclusive society where you can get excluded for thinking different.

Anyways, thanks for telling me all this, and for not asking for me to be banned, I will not report possible conflicts of interrest anymore of course. Barecode (talk) 11:32, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Topic ban violation at Talk:Peter Schechter

Also, please note that your now-removed edit at Talk:Peter Schechter was a violation of your topic ban from all pages and discussions concerning post-1992 American politics, since the Peter Schechter article describes the individual as an "American political consultant". Please take care not to violate this topic ban again. — Newslinger talk 08:00, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Controversial topic area alert

This is a standard message to notify contributors about an administrative ruling in effect. It does not imply that there are any issues with your contributions to date.

You have shown interest in articles about living or recently deceased people, and edits relating to the subject (living or recently deceased) of such biographical articles. Due to past disruption in this topic area, a more stringent set of rules called discretionary sanctions is in effect. Any administrator may impose sanctions on editors who do not strictly follow Wikipedia's policies, or the page-specific restrictions, when making edits related to the topic.

To opt out of receiving messages like this one, place {{Ds/aware}} on your user talk page and specify in the template the topic areas that you would like to opt out of alerts about. For additional information, please see the guidance on discretionary sanctions and the Arbitration Committee's decision here. If you have any questions, or any doubts regarding what edits are appropriate, you are welcome to discuss them with me or any other editor. — Newslinger talk 09:39, 26 August 2022 (UTC)