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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Location (talk | contribs) at 16:43, 16 May 2023 (→‎Alleged (Re)). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

VfD Archived Debate

Article listed on Wikipedia:Votes for deletion Apr 26 to May 3 2004, consensus was to keep. Discussion:

No evidence this thing ever happened. --[[PaulinSaudi 02:50, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)]]

  • A google search for Operation Mockingbird takes one deep into the echo chamber of conspiracy theory. I think ideally this should be kept and NPOVed, but I can't find any skeptical treatment, or any confirmation from a reliable source. The original claims seem to stem from a guy named Alex Constantine, who has written several books and an essay that's been widely reprinted on the internet. --Isomorphic 07:01, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • "Echo Chamber" is exactly the right imagery. I only heard about this as someone on the Straight Dope asked about it. This story has a life of its own, but I know of no basis in fact. The CIA was established in 1948. Does anyone think that one of their earliest programs (under Harry Truman no less) was to influence American newspapers? Exceptional claims demand exceptional proof. I would like to see it.

--[[PaulinSaudi 11:54, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)]]

  • It's true that a distressing number of articles about Operation Mockingbird (OM) also mention alien abductions and such. But despite this, the op may well have been legitimate. (It's verifiable that the CIA does have, and did have, at least some journalists on its payroll.) So did OM exist? Remember that we're deciding the legitimacy of the article itself (which, please note, does not mention Harry Truman}. Here's the evidence I can find:
  1. The Alex Constantine Article (ACA) is a meandering, paranoid, POV text. It alleges a lot of CIA manipulation of the media, which is outside the scope of this specific decision about OM. All of the info it gives on OM, it gets from two sources:
    1. The book "Katherine the Great" by Deborah Davis, a former Village Voice reporter. I haven't read it. Davis says that by the 1950s, OM had arrangements with "respected members of the New York Times, Newsweek, CBS and other communications vehicles, plus stringers, four to six hundred in all, according to a former CIA analyst." Aparently, Davis found this out through researching FOIA requests. Has anyone here read the book?
    2. John Loftus, a former attorney for the Justice Department's Office of Special Investigations. According to ACA, John Loftus makes some sensational claims. "In 1952, at MCA, Actors' Guild president Ronald Reagan - a screen idol recruited by MOCKINGBIRD's Crusade for Freedom to raise funds for the resettlement of Nazis in the U.S., according to Loftus - signed a secret waiver of the conflict-of-interest rule with the mob-controlled studio, in effect granting it a labor monopoly on early television programming. In exchange, MCA made Reagan a part owner." This doesn't sound even remotely credible.
  2. Google doesn't find any Straight Dope articles or Straight Dope Message Board posts on Operation Mockingbird.
  3. There's a separate essay by Steve Kangas that claims "the CIA began a mission in the late 1940s to recruit American journalists on a wide scale, a mission it dubbed Operation MOCKINGBIRD. The agency wanted these journalists not only to relay any sensitive information they discovered, but also to write anti-communist, pro-capitalist propaganda when needed." He names Frank Wisner, Allan Dulles, Richard Helms and Philip Graham as the designers. He cites as his sources the above-mentioned book by Deborah Davis, and a web site that no longer exists.
    • Kangas also claims that "at least 400 journalists would eventually join the CIA payroll, according to the CIA's testimony before a stunned Church Committee in 1975." This doesn't refer to OM specifically, but if true it at least shows there must have been a similar widespread operation in the 60s and 70s. That's all I can find. Does anyone else have any information about it? Quadell 14:20, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)
      • This may have come from Carl Bernstein's Oct 1977 piece in Rolling Stone. --Kwantus 03:50, 2004 Dec 16 (UTC)
  • Keep. The amount that can be said about it just above proves it's encyclopedic. Even if there never was such a thing as Operation Mockingbird, clearly there's a sufficient body of belief about it to make documenting THAT worthwhile. --—Morven 21:01, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)
    • I agree that we should have an article on this, except that I don't know how we can make an NPOV article without a lot of research. If it's an unsubstantiated claim, that should be made clear in the article – but how can we call it unsubstantiated if we haven't read the sources of the claim, or seen any critical evaluation of them? If there's substantiation, it should be cited, but we can't find any. The origin of the name "Operation Mockingbird" isn't even clear from what I found. --Isomorphic 21:11, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep if can be made NPOV. --RickK 23:12, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)
    • OK. I added a bunch of modifiers and weasel words. No matter how many conditionals I add, I still think we ought to delete it. [[PaulinSaudi 02:21, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)]]
  • Keep. I just overhauled the article to make it NPOV. --Quadell 14:25, 28 Apr 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. The statements in the article are not altogether implausible, and it appears that it has a following which makes the article worthwhile.

End discussion

A black eye for Wikipedia

This is one of the worst articles in Wikipedia: a lengthy entry often viewed over 1000 times a day that is almost entirely baseless. Almost everything in this article that is not total nonsense should go in CIA influence on public opinion. I have been looking for several weeks now, and the claim that there was an "Operation Mockingbird" appears to trace back to only ONE source: Deborah Davis's biography of Katherine Graham, a book which was withdrawn by the publishers after Graham complained. As an example of how bad the article is, forget about the phrase Operation Mockingbird, the WORD Mockingbird does not seem to appear even once in the entire Church Committee report, yet there is a whole section devoted to the Church Committee report in the article. I will get back to the article when I have finished my search of the Church Committee report and the lengthy supplemental volumes. Rgr09 (talk) 16:04, 9 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I erred. There are other sources besides Davis, there is Alex Constantine's Virtual Government. Wikipedia used to have an article on Constantine, but it has been deleted (twice). Nonetheless, his writings live on in Wikipedia through this page. Rgr09 (talk) 12:37, 12 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]
What about Kevin Shipp's interview in Out Of Shadows? If he has worked for CIA, wouldn't he be a reliable source? BlueBanana (talk) 20:56, 12 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
WP:REDFLAG is very relevant. First of all, Shipp appears to have made many very questionable claims, and having worked for the CIA is not a guarantee of reliability. There are many people who have claimed to have worked for the CIA who have simply made stuff up (e.g. Tosh Plumlee, Chauncey Marvin Holt, Chuck Barris!!!, etc.), and there are many people who did work for the CIA who simply made stuff up (e.g. Victor Marchetti, Frank Sturgis, etc.). Although Shipp's statements to reliable sources might be able to be used with attribution, Out of Shadows (with its ties to Mike Smith and QAnon) would almost certainly fail as a reliable source. Perhaps Rgr09 has more on this. -Location (talk) 18:20, 28 April 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I have not heard of the source Out of Shadows and would appreciate a link. I can't offer any opinion until I know more about it. Rgr09 (talk) 07:37, 16 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I am not sure you will appreciate it, but see https://www.outofshadows.org/. -Location (talk) 21:52, 27 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the link,Location. The website has no information on who established it, who runs it, or who writes its content. This seems ironic, given the site's name. I followed the links on the site and eventually found the video. I do not really have the time to watch the whole thing just to find out if there are credits anywhere on it. Although I watched chunks off the beginning and end of it, I saw no credits. In the interview clips I saw in this limited sample, the people speaking were also unidentified. This sort of thing is the antithesis of what Wikipedia looks for in a source. It is, in fact, an anti-source, even less usable than the works of Alex Constantine, who at least has the courtesy to use a pseudonym on his books. Rgr09 (talk) 07:41, 28 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I cannot disagree. The Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism at Middlebury Institute of International Studies published a report on this "documentary" recently (see Far-Right Communities are Pushing a Q-Anon Film [summary] and Far-Right Communities are Pushing a Q-Anon Film [full report]). It's all quite bizarre. -Location (talk) 06:47, 29 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The general fact of Mockingbird was confirmed by a Congressional inquiry. It is not controversial. As far as I can tell, the alleged controversy here is whether these actions taken by the CIA fell under an umbrella that was officially called Operation Mockingbird. I don't see why this question is even relevant. Even if the CIA never used the term "Operation Mockingbird" they objectively did do the things described in this article, by their own admission, and "Operation Mockingbird" is the label that has come to be attached to those operations. The people complaining do not understand how language works and are motivated by ideological concerns, in my opinion. The fact that something was done by your government doesn't mean people aren't allowed to talk about it.
Relatedly, I think there's a perceivable difference in tone within this article, between when it is describing alleged operations by the US government and when it is describing alleged operations by the USSR. The former takes pains to qualify every statement, even when such qualifications seem unnecessary or excessive, while the latter is simply stated as fact. Do others agree that this is inappropriate? Our standard of evidence shouldn't depend on which country we're talking about. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tausami (talk • contribs) 18:13, 7 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
You say that "the general fact of Mockingbird" was confirmed by a Congressional inquiry. What do you mean by "the general fact" of Mockingbird? What was the Congressional inquiry that confirmed it? Please cite sources. You say that "Operation Mockingbird is the label that has come to be attached to those operations". Attached by whom? Attached to what? There must be sources.
Why is this so? Because Wikipedia articles must have adequate, appropriate sources. The Davis book makes claims that are found nowhere else. These include core content in her account, such as who was in charge of what and when. If Davis is this seriously flawed, another source must be found. If there is no appropriate source for 'Operation Mockingbird', the article with the title 'Operation Mockingbird' should go. Instead, there should be an appropriately titled article that addresses a clearly defined subject and gives reliably sourced claims and statements on well-established facts. I give as examples topics such as CIA funding of non-governmental organizations like the National Student Association, or CIA use of journalists. At one point there WAS an article on CIA and the Press, unfortunately merged into another article that was never completed.
Responding to your comment on Soviet practices, Davis's book originally stated that 'Operation Mockingbird' was created as a response to Soviet practices. It is simply another quote from the book, a relevant quote previously omitted. I do not see a perceivable difference in the way the article cites Davis's claims on either American or Soviet practices. Do you believe the Davis claims on 'Mockingbird'? If so, why reject the claim on the Soviets? I do NOT believe Davis's claims on Mockingbird. I therefore naturally reject the claim that Mockingbird was the U.S. response to the creation of the IOJ. Rgr09 (talk) 07:37, 16 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I’ve been reading up on all your claims on this page, and I have to say they are incredibly suspect and go well beyond the sources. Yes, there are subjects that we do not have all the information about, but that does not stop us from writing articles about them. Most of your arguments come down to perfect world and nothing but objections fallacies. Viriditas (talk) 23:38, 26 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Alleged

We need to keep the language saying that Operation Mockingbird was an "alleged" program since there are no reliable sources indicating that that a program of this name actually existed. The Davis book isn't reliable, and the reliable sources that are cited (e.g. the Hersh article) make no mention of "Operation Mockingbird" and could be about something else. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 17:25, 2 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Family Jewels, a report from the CIA, refers to a Project Mockingbird and describes it. It is not alleged. However, perhaps anything beyond what was in that report could be presented as "alleged". It would depend on the source. What parts of the article do you thing are merely alleged? Richard-of-Earth (talk) 08:33, 3 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The article distinguishes between Project Mockingbird and Operation Mockingbird, or at least I intended that it would distinguish between them when I revised it. Perhaps I did a poor job. Project Mockingbird was a 3 month wire-tap on two reporters. It was one of the subjects of the Family Jewels report, and was first made public in a 1985 book. If this were all there were to it, in my opinion this falls far below the criteria for a separate article and could easily be discussed in the Family Jewels article, where it is already mentioned. It is mentioned here because earlier versions of the article lumped it in with Operation Mockingbird. Operation Mockingbird, as described in a single source, a book by reporter Deborah Davis, is in fact a totally different thing. Davis seems to claim that ALL of the United States efforts in Cold War propaganda were part of a single monolithic program. The details for this in Davis's book are so sparse as to render a full length article very difficult to write. There are NO other sources which make this claim, except internet articles and a bizarre book by Alexander Constantine, which should not even be mentioned in the article. NO one else mentions an Operation Mockingbird AT ALL, and Davis's book suffers from serious credibility issues. It was retracted by its publisher under circumstances described in the article on the book. 'Alleged' is by no means an improper term.
I spent an inordinate amount of time trying to track down the sources originally cited in this article and it was a very frustrating experience. They do not support most of the claims made in the article, as my notes above show. That the US, through the CIA and other government organs, engaged in a serious propaganda effort during the 1950s 60s is absolutely true, and deserves a real article. I suggested that this could go in the article CIA influence on public opinion, though this is already somewhat misleading, since it suggests that the CIA was the sole, or even leading, government agency in this area, a suggestion which is probably not true. If someone ever has the time and energy to try produce or revise an article on this subject, this article should be promptly merged into it, and a dab page left here in its place Rgr09 (talk) 15:48, 3 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Rgr09, it occurred to me in reading your response that instead of moving this content into a broader article about CIA influence, we should instead by merging it into Katharine the Great. After all, this article is nothing more than a summary of the book's allegations and the distinctions between those allegations and other programs. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 17:04, 3 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@DrFleischman, Richard-of-Earth, and Rgr09: I am in agreement with all of you. As you know, it is common in these types of articles to see a WP:REDFLAG claim - often a primary source claim like this one - followed by other cherry-picked material intended to support it without direct mention of the original claim or person making the claim. (I see it so often that I wish there was a term for it!) There are reliable secondary sources that confirming that PROJECT Mockingbird was a real thing (e.g. The Washington Post, The New York Times), so my !vote would be to reverse how PROJECT Mockingbird and OPERATION Mockingbird are addressed in the article. I suggest re-titling the article Project Mockingbird, write whatever we can about that using reliable secondary sources, then near the bottom mention the allegations of Operation Mockingbird to the extent they are discussed in reliable secondary sources. I know it is a popular belief among conspiracy believers, but Davis' WP:REDFLAG claim should not even be mentioned if it is not discussed in those types of sources. Those are the rules of WP:REDFLAG. -Location (talk) 16:06, 27 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]
For future reference, this biography of John McCone by chief CIA historian David Robarge refers to Project Mockingbird on pages 328-329. There are not many more details than what we have here already. - Location (talk) 03:09, 5 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Location, Rgr09, Richard-of-Earth, and DrFleischman: I've just added a reference from Routledge's Encyclopedia of Intelligence and Counterintelligence. The encyclopedia has a full-page, two-column entry on the program and does describes it as real, not merely "alleged." -Darouet (talk) 18:44, 14 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding Encyclopedia of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, Hayden Peake was (is?) curator of CIA's Historical Intelligence Collection and he has reviewed hundreds of books of this type. In his 2005 review (p. 85), he wrote: "Professor Carlisle’s Encyclopedia of Intelligence and Counterintelligence is a good place to start when readers, students, or analysts look for historical background. Nevertheless, as a matter of prudence, check other sources where particular facts are important to the case at hand intelligence requires multiple source validation whenever possible." (The review of Spy Book is here and Peake states: "one should be cautious if detail is important to one's task".) One important thing to note is that knowledge of the Family Jewels and Project Mockingbird was not made public until 2007, so the authors and editors of Encyclopedia of Intelligence and Counterintelligence did not have access to that information. Their entry is called "Project Mockingbird" and we now have multiple reliable sources on "Project Mockingbird" that contradict what they have to say about it (i.e. that it was a propaganda program started by Frank Wisner). I also noticed that their entry on Frank Wisner cites this Newsmax article which in turn cites other unreliable sources: http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/ and http://www.grandconspiracy.com/library.html#operation. Pretty much anyone writing about "Operation Mockingbird" has the same issues of either not using citations or citing unreliable material. - Location (talk) 15:31, 5 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

There are a lot of evidence for it. It has obviously existed, so its not an "alleged" program. It is a program, and if anyone feels like like it isn't, then go ahead edit it back, but I'm gonna go edit it away. In my opinion having spent a while on this, I do not think it is alleged. It may be alleged to do some things which it didn't, or something of the sort, but the program existed, and I think its fair to say we have enough evidence.88.193.234.86 (talk) 13:59, 10 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

We need reliable sources, not unspecified "evidence." --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 00:27, 11 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]
So you need reliable sources that some people call an operation a project? Do you need a thesaurus Dr. Fleischman? Volunteer Mockingbird (talk) 21:40, 6 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Please try to keep the discussion civil and constructive. --Dr. Fleischman (talk) 22:17, 6 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I was pinged here by a discussion below and I realized I never responded to this conversation. Thank you all for your responses above. I see now that the article makes it clear that Project Mockingbird is not alleged and was acknowledged by the CIA and Operation Mockingbird is merely alleged and not acknowledged by the CIA. I support the word "alleged" in the lead sentence in regard to Operation Mockingbird. Per WP:WIKIVOICE we should not present opinions nor contested assertions as facts. I also agree that Project Mockingbird is not the same as Operation Mockingbird and should not be presented as the same in any way. I am also not interested in debating the issue. I feel sufficient arguments have already been made by others (much much more then sufficient). If I do not post again on this board, it is because nothing has been said to change my mind and I do not feel the need to try to change anyone else's mind on the matter. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 07:48, 13 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I don’t think that’s true. Neither the program nor the Operation are alleged at all in 2023. It’s been confirmed and verified with multiple official documents. Viriditas (talk) 23:12, 26 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Congressional investigations

After the Watergate scandal in 1972–1974, the U.S. Congress became concerned over possible presidential abuse of the CIA. This concern reached its height when reporter Seymour Hersh published an exposé of CIA domestic surveillance in 1975.[1] Congress authorized a series of Congressional investigations into Agency activities from 1975 to 1976. A wide range of CIA operations were examined in these investigations, including CIA ties with journalists and numerous private voluntary organizations.

The most extensive discussion of CIA relations with news media from these investigations is in the Church Committee's final report, published in April 1976. The report covered CIA ties with both foreign and domestic news media.

For foreign news media, the report concluded that:

The CIA currently maintains a network of several hundred foreign individuals around the world who provide intelligence for the CIA and at times attempt to influence opinion through the use of covert propaganda. These individuals provide the CIA with direct access to a large number of newspapers and periodicals, scores of press services and news agencies, radio and television stations, commercial book publishers, and other foreign media outlets.[2]

For U.S.-based media, the report states:

Approximately 50 of the [Agency] assets are individual American journalists or employees of U.S. media organizations. Of these, fewer than half are "accredited" by U.S. media organizations ... The remaining individuals are non-accredited freelance contributors and media representatives abroad ... More than a dozen United States news organizations and commercial publishing houses formerly provided cover for CIA agents abroad. A few of these organizations were unaware that they provided this cover.[2]

References

  1. ^ The surveillance, known as Operation CHAOS, was aimed at determining whether American opposition to the Vietnam war was being financed or manipulated by foreign governments. Ranelagh, 571–575.
  2. ^ a b Church Committee Final Report, Vol 1: Foreign and Military Intelligence, p. 455

It is not an "alleged" operation

It is not

" alleged". There is documentation in the CIA website and the New York times published a full investigation of this operation in 1976 and ran that article. This operation has never been shut down officially 47.32.139.208 (talk) 05:42, 30 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Higher up on this very Talk page, you will find the sentence As The Washington Post article above indicates, people tend to conflate the alleged "Operation Mockingbird" with the real "Project Mockingbird" and the real relationships the CIA had with journalists. --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:36, 30 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Still not alleged in any way. Abigail Sessions: "Representatives for the CIA testified in front of the Church Committee in 1975 and admitted that at the peak of mockingbird’s activities there were at least 400 journalists on the CIA payroll in at least 25 media organizations. On January 30, 1976, George H. W. Bush became the director of the CIA and instituted a new policy stating that “Effective immediately, the CIA will not enter into any paid or contract relationship with any full-time or part-time news correspondent accredited by any U.S. news service, newspaper, periodical, radio or television network or station.” In 1976 Operation mockingbird was officially shut down, although many critics speculate that the CIA continued [its] campaign of media manipulation." I removed the term. Viriditas (talk) 23:18, 26 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I self-reverted due to the obvious talk page opposition. I will have to confront this opposition first. Looking briefly at the page, there are some unusual claims here that don’t pan out, particularly the idea that we can’t trust Constantine (1997), Marks (1974), Thomas (1995), and Wilford (2008), in other words, all the sources that support the claim. Further, I’m not seeing how these authors confuse the Operation and the Project. Viriditas (talk) 23:51, 26 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]
They are simply using semantics because it is the only opposing point they could use without looking entirely crazy. It is common sense to assume "Operation" and "Project" refer to the same document. They are synonymous. The one who is actually correct (talk) 08:06, 13 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Alleged (Re)

From my own edit report: Removed alleged. I will continue to remove alleged for the next 50 years if I have to. The CIA have this file for public access on their own website. It is an officially released document. It is not alleged. It is undeniably, verifiably true and real. You are delusional if you disagree, and if you change it back I will war with you endlessly. Do not fight this. You do not want the stress and monotony. The one who is actually correct (talk) 08:09, 13 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

To add, before someone says this before me. Do not attempt to use semantics to differentiate the names "Operation Mockingbird" and "Project Mockingbird". They, in fact, describe the exact same thing. One is simply a common and widely used term, while the other is slightly different, yet official and synonymous. I will ignore any claims against my proposal which use either semantics, or "conspiracy" as the basis of their argument. Circular, closed-minded discussion is not to be had. I will not engage. The one who is actually correct (talk) 08:13, 13 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Semantics, in this case, matter. Project Mockingbird is the acknowledged scheme. It only involves wire-tapping. It is also acknowledged that the CIA has attempted to influence public opinion in various ways, but that was not part of Project Mockingbird as documented. This article is about the assertions made over the years about "Operation Mockingbird". "Operation Mockingbird" and "Project Mockingbird" are two different things. Until documentation is supplied that is acknowledged as authentic by the CIA that shows there was a scheme described by these assertions and titled "Operation Mockingbird", it will remain an alleged activity. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 20:32, 14 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Question: User:Richard-of-Earth, is there any good reason this page shouldn’t redirect to CIA influence on public opinion? It would make more sense to have this subject mentioned in that larger article. Viriditas (talk) 21:48, 14 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
There is currently no mention of Operation Mockingbird on that page, so I am assuming you would like to merge this article into it. Over time people would probably keep whittling away content about Operation Mockingbird citing WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE and perhaps eliminate it. I think the subject deserves it own article. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 04:13, 15 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Please take a look at the current version of this article. Isn't it just a summary style of CIA influence on public opinion? If it's not, and there's substance to be found, please point it out for me. Another thing, have any of the sources that originated this designation ever followed up on it? Finally, what's the best evidence we have for "Operation Mockingbird"? Isn't this just a general umbrella for the entire effort of the CIA to influence public opinion? Bonus: have any current researchers made mention of this subject? For example, has Thomas Rid ever written about it? For me, the silence is deafening. How do we explain this? Viriditas (talk) 08:55, 15 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Basically every sentence that mentions "Operation Mockingbird" is the substance of this article. You are basically suggesting we delete the article and I will not support that. I would like to see some improvement in the article. If there are WP:RS's out there that support for "Operation Mockingbird"? is a general umbrella for the entire effort of the CIA to influence public opinion, I would like to see that added. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 05:10, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
this site way too uptight wtf 50.36.161.49 (talk) 05:12, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You didn’t answer any of my questions. Instead, you made assumptions about my motives. Not a good discussion, I’m afraid. Viriditas (talk) 05:20, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You asked a total of eight questions, including the one in your first post. It is true I have only answered two. The rest seem to be putting me in a position of defending the article, or just rhetoric. I do not have to defend the article, I just have to say what I think. I think turning the page into a redirect is tantamount to deleting the article. You asked the first "what do you think about" question. I though, why are we going off on a tangent, but fine. When I gave an answer, you asked seven more argumentative questions, some of which call for WP:OR evaluations to answer and ultimately, none of it directly having to do with the subject presented by the OP. I feel like I gave you an inch in answering the first question and then you demanded a mile. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 05:48, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
the entire article goes against wiki's own anti-bias policies 50.36.161.49 (talk) 06:15, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You appear to be projecting your own argumentativeness and oddly defensive posture when I simply asked the most basic questions regarding verification. If you're confused, go back and read your responses. I have never once said that I wanted to delete the topic. I have never once argued that the topic should be eliminated. In fact, this talk page shows me making multiple comments defending its existence. However, I am now taking the opposing position, as it is the only way to be intellectually honest. In other words, we must be able to argue from both sides and figure out which side comes out on top. We cannot, as you are doing, favor one side only, and then argue from that position while neglecting the other. Viriditas (talk) 06:36, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
we must all come together. without this, the article will be problemed until 2089 50.36.161.49 (talk) 07:07, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW: I agree with Richard-of-Earth that Project Mockingbird and Operation Mockingbird are two different concepts, and that "alleged" should be used with Operation Mockingbird. I also agree with Viriditas that what people believe to be Operation Mockingbird falls under the broader topic of CIA influence on public opinion. I think I prefer the separate article on Operation Mockingbird, however, I have no strong objections to merge and redirect since I don't think either side wants to see the subject matter go away. -Location (talk) 16:43, 16 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
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