User talk:Ridintherails
The reason is use quotes around "annual report" is because the "annual report" on the Elevation webpage in no way resembles a real annual report, it is a propaganda piece.
Here's the definition of an annual report: http://onswipe.investopedia.com/investopedia/#!/entry/,5228d01fda27f5d9d017b380
Sure... Talk:Steven Furtick#"Church paying for much of the advertising". StAnselm (talk) 22:05, 27 October 2013 (UTC)
Hi Ridintherails, we seem to have a bit of a dispute going on, but I think we're on the same side. The side of truth and transparency. The reason I have removed much of what you have added is that for the most part, you have used very biased phrasing including placing "quotes" around things like annual report, which is not something normally surrounded by quotes. That makes it seem like you, the editor, have a bias against a church calling something an annual report and it casts doubt on your dedication to clarity rather than harm to the subject. On Elevation Church's article, for example, you cited the stat on the wikipedia article itself as a reason the church may be lying, but that data was almost three years old and the article you cited had a new number in it. Then when I edited it, you suggested the annual report had been updated, when, if you had looked at my edit, you would have seen I only added a reference to the wcnc article citing the new figure. What that means is that the news report, which was very critical, pointed out that the church had given $10MM, making your paragraph questioning which figure is correct a moot point, since the article itself verified that the church was not lying about how much they give.
Additionally, on the page for Steven Furtick, your edits attempted to connect dots that the original author did not connect. The author included a refutation of the co-mingling of money describing how the publisher paid the church for the marketing work, which actually benefits the church because of Furtick's status as an author, rather than the other way around. Be careful citing places like Huffington Post as well, which often (and in this case, definitely) contain no new reporting and are mostly paraphrase of the original author. Going back to the original source of I-Team reporter Stuart Watson, you find that while Watson finds plenty of problems with the church's reluctance to release financial information, all he can do is report on what they aren't saying, there is no damning information in his article, or reporting that proves any wrongdoing. He simply asks questions and poses potential answers. That does not belong on wikipedia. What belongs on wikipedia is the report of the house, it's value, the fact that it is controversial, and the fact that, at this point the church has still not released financial information to prove what it asserts. Otherwise we cannot and should not report as encyclopedic what has not been shown to be true, but rather just shown to be unclear.
Appreciate you and your desire to help improve the article, can we move forward trying to do that together, following NPOV, BLP, and Assuming Good Faith in each other? I'd love to work with you to ensure the article is completely true, more complete, covers both sides of the issue, and stays within the guidelines of wikipedia.Eventhewise (talk) 03:33, 28 October 2013 (UTC)