Talk:Jan Żaryn

Statements about Żaryn - KOD

@Lembit Staan - Let’s start with this one:

In a 2016 interview to Nasz Dziennik, a clerical daily newspaper, Żaryn stated that calls of the Committee for the Defence of Democracy (KOD) to engage in massive civil disobedience were tantamount to advocating overturn of the Polish state and were approaching dangerously towards the betrayal of the national interests.

What's this all about? Sourced to the interview with Żaryn seems to be original research of whoever entered this into the article. - GizzyCatBella🍁 19:14, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Views of a person, summarized from their interview are valid sources, if the wikipedian did the job with due diligence and if there are no neutral sources to do this summarizing. I see this in Wikipedia all the time: the whole philosophical books are summarized by a wikipedian. There must be a clearly visible line: summarizing someone's view in a neutral or biased way. Lembit Staan (talk)

::The interview source should be replaced, there is independent coverage. Zaryn's claim was also fact checked as FALSE.VikingDrummer (talk) 20:08, 7 June 2021 (UTC) sock puppet of banned user-GizzyCatBella🍁 13:27, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

OKO press is not a good source for BLP’s. Second it talks entirely about something else - GizzyCatBella🍁 20:15, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

::::OKO is fine. And the piece is about Zaryn's interview in 2016 to Nasz Dziennik in which he called KOD civil disobedience as "rubbing against betrayal".VikingDrummer (talk) 20:24, 7 June 2021 (UTC) sock puppet of banned user-GizzyCatBella🍁 13:27, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

No, no it's not. And you know this. Volunteer Marek 20:33, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Putting aside the question of whether summarizing primary sources is WP:OR or not, which part of the interview is this suppose to summarize? And why this particular part? In that interview he says lots of stuff about KOD. He accuses them of "protecting" former members of the Communist Secret Police for example (like this Col. Mazgula guy). Most of the interview is about the fact that he, like many Poles, is kinda not happy about former Communist Secret Police (for non-Poles reading this, basically the Polish version of Stasi) receiving high pensions while their victims were repressed and oppressed. Volunteer Marek 20:41, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Zaryn's claim was also fact checked as FALSE -- bull. This is a typical abuse of "fact-checkers", which begin to produce more fake facts than original fake news websites. They are not arguing against facts presented by Zaryn, and their all-caps shouting "FALSE" merely means that his views disagree with theirs. And I fail to see why their opinion is better: who the heck are they? Lembit Staan (talk) 23:24, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

I looked up the interview and I see that our wikipedia text is a good piece of quoting out of context. Oko insinuates that Zaryn is confusing "state" with "gov't (panstwo vs. wladza). Reading the interview: he is not. Here is the whole piece, summarized: <<|Protesters also appeal to police [to join them], which is close to the treason of national interests. In democratic states police is supposed to be apolitical; they are supposed to guard the interests of the state. Therefore this appeal [to police] amounts to the destruction of the state.|>> -- And I have to agree that there is a grain of truth. Our wikipedia defines " state is a polity under a system of governance with a monopoly on force." And we did see what happened with the USSR when the gov't lost the monopoly on force: the state collapsed! In other words, in this part he speaks not against the disobedience per se, but about the attempt to involve the police. Whether he is right or not, OKO is FALSE by boomerang. (the exact same "sleight of hand" is in the source cited in pl-wp) Not to say that higher in the interview he expresses an opinion that <<|the protests are the result of the frustration of the losers in the democratic elections who could not win in a "normal democratic procedure".|>> - I would disagree with him, but I would not call this opinion scandalous, nor particularly original or prominent.

Therefore I am in favor of throwing out this piece, because (a) it is unfaithful summary; (b) the issue is neither particularly controversial (if read in context), and (c) nor a major point of his views. The major point would be a general statement of his disapproval of KOD. On the other hand, summarizing the whole answer (about the call to protests) the way I piecewise outlined above would look reasonable. Lembit Staan (talk) 23:57, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Oko press is a highly partisan tabloid something like a cross between The Jacobin and The Intercept back when it was under Glenn Greenwald’s control. It’s primary if not sole purpose is to publish hysterical hit pieces on politicians they don’t like. If you want a right wing analogy, they’re somewhere between The Federalist and Breitbart. Not outright “fake news” but skirting that line pretty close by manipulating quotes and presenting stuff out of context. Volunteer Marek 16:57, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

What information have they manipulated and what have they presented out of context? Can you give some examples? You can't just say a source is unreliable because you do not like it and make claims like this without any proof. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 17:51, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Lembit Stan just gave an example right above. Volunteer Marek 18:21, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

I honestly cannot understand this aversion to Oko.press. In Italy it is widely quoted by the largest center-right[1][2] and center-left[3][4] newspapers. Quite unlikely to be an unreliable source.--Mhorg (talk) 18:19, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

I don’t know about Italian sources. I do know that all they publish is opinion pieces and most of them are hit pieces and that the tone is extremely hysterical and over the top. Volunteer Marek 18:21, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

KOD

2. KOD: – W tej sytuacji z jednej strony te środowiska i ludzie wymienieni przez pana redaktora nie potrafią się pogodzić z demokratycznym werdyktem Narodu Polskiego, a jednocześnie z drugiej strony przekraczają granice, za którymi trudno się doszukiwać dialogu. Ponieważ ten apel dotyczy np. polskich obywateli, którzy mają zapisane w swoich obowiązkach wynikających z zawodu, jaki uprawiają, a więc wprost lojalności wobec interesu własnego – czyli polskiego państwa. Z tego, co wiem, ten apel jest adresowany także do służb mundurowych, a to już jest zjawisko, które ociera się o zdradę interesów narodowych. Ponieważ w tradycji demokratycznego państwa istnieje założenie o apolityczności służb, które mają chronić nasze bezpieczeństwo – służb, które mają bronić najżywotniejszych interesów państwa polskiego. Jeżeli środowiska KOD-u apelują o to, żeby nieposłuszeństwo było powszechne, to znaczy, że apelują o to, żeby nie było państwa polskiego. Translating: In this situation, on the one hand, these organisations [from the opposition] and the people whom Mr Editor has named [Wałęsa, Frasyniuk, Schetyna, Petru - my note] have not been able to come to terms with the democratic verdict of the Polish People, while on the other, they cross the lines beyond which aiming for dialogue is difficult. That is because the proclamation [of KOD] concerns e.g. the citizens of Poland, who have written in their duties of the job they have, that is, loyalty towards their interests - i.e. of the Polish state. From what I know, the proclamation is addressed i.a. to the uniformed services, and that is a phenomenon that dangerously approaches the betrayal of national interests. That is because in the tradition of a democratic state, there is an assumption that the services that are tasked with protecting us are apolitical - the services which are to protect the vital interests of the Polish state. If the organisations affiliated with KOD ask the people to adopt universal civil disobedience, that means they are arguing for [the dissolution] of the Polish state.

From which text I make the conclusions as presented in the sentence. Per WP:PSTS it would be advisable to substitute the resource, but again the one that analyses it is oko.press, which is contested, while quoting such large passages might be, well, inconvenient.

PS. The section is named "Views and controversy" - you may want to divide it into Views, and Controversy, but the Polish article did not make such differentiation (it only said "controversy" where some of the fragments were clearly views that might be considered controversial - or at least the sourcing did not indicate a scandal). As concerns the quotes, I believe I have summarised their main points, which is risky but could nevertheless be handled properly. At the time, as it was late in the night, I was tired of looking for new sources, but I can find some more now. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 22:33, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

On the second one, the obvious issue is that particular statement by Zaryn is NOT referring to "KOD". You had to add that in yourself. See how you " [of KOD]" in there. Rather he is referring specifically to the individuals mentioned, who signed some letter (Walesa, Frasyniuk, etc.). I don't know if these are all KOD people. Who's Walesa affiliated with these days? Not sure? Himself, maybe? Anyway, that part is OR

More troubling is the fact that the text in Wikipedia grossly misrepresents the source/interview. It claims that Zaryn says that KOD's (or whoever) call for "civil disobedience" were "tantamount to advocating overturn of the Polish state and were approaching dangerously towards the betrayal of the national interests". NO. What Zaryn says is that calling ON THE POLICE AND THE ARMY to disobey the democratically elected government of Poland is "tantamount etc etc"

Which is far less controversial. Imagine if Trump called on the US Armed Forces, the National Guard and the police forces across country to engage in "disobedience" against democratically elected President Biden. And some democratic politician/historian stated in an interview that this was "advocating overturn of US's democratic election". Guess what? That democratic politician would be exactly right.

The text that is being put into Wikipedia alters what Zaryn says to make it look like something fringe or extreme, but all the dude is saying is that if certain politicians are advocating for the armed forces to engage in "disobedience" against duly elected government then you don't really believe in democracy.

BTW, I met Frasyniuk (one of the people Zaryn is criticizing here) when I was a kid when he hid out, on the run from the communist authorities, in our apartment. Volunteer Marek 02:51, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Part 2. On the second one, the obvious issue [...] part is OR.

Come on, you could do better than that - it's just I didn't want to manually translate the whole quote. The question specifically asks: Among others, Wałęsa, Frasyniuk, Schetyna and Petru have signed a proclamation that urges people to deny obedience to the legally elected government in Poland. What, in your opinion, are [these] call[s] to mass protests, particularly on 13 December*? * - Martial law in Poland anniversary. All four names appear on the document and the mass protests were scheduled on 13 December, so they clearly talk about KOD and its proclamation and they understand each other on that, even if they don't state it explicitly. The interviews do not exist in a vacuum, they discuss contemporary events, which at that time could be understood without uttering "proclamation of KOD" - it was all in the news.

More troubling [...] then you don't really believe in democracy. Admittedly it did so. oko.press and Żaryn interpret the declaration from different political standpoints: Żaryn in the literalist sense of the word (civil disobedience of the military -> eliminating of one of the pillars of govt -> anarchy), while Leszczyński looks on that from the other perspective (civil disobedience as a means to defend civil rights). These are two parallel perspectives and are affected by political bias here and not reliability issues (I would say that, in a way, they are talking past each other). Since obviously a person affiliated with PiS is against KOD, I believe the sentence could be dropped altogether per Lembit Staan's suggestion of it not being notable by itself, and oko.press is the only source discussing the interview. This might be the proper conclusion. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 03:49, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

What other links? The text being inserted is based on a single primary source. If there’s some other source please provide it. Volunteer Marek 05:35, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

And on the 2nd part, am I understanding correctly that we can simply drop this part? Volunteer Marek 05:37, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Correct. After analysis, I came to the conclusion it was not salvageable. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:39, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks! Ok, see, it can be difficult and contentious but we can work it out. In the first part, if we can change the wording appropriately then we'll have taken care of that as well. Volunteer Marek 13:19, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

::I agree with Szmenderowiecki, the arguments against are empty and with no merit other than disliking the content.VikingDrummer (talk) 05:26, 8 June 2021 (UTC) sock puppet of banned user-GizzyCatBella🍁 13:27, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Your comment is content-free. There’s a detailed explanation of what is wrong with the text being inserted. It simply is not backed by sources. And this is a BLP. Volunteer Marek 05:33, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Jedwabne

Moved to Jedwabne 2

Outspoken views

Now, where this --> Jan Żaryn is known for his outspoken views on the interaction between Jews and other nationalities.^{[clarification needed]} comes from? - GizzyCatBella🍁 00:02, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

See User_talk:Lembit_Staan#Jan_Żaryn_edit_-_clarification here. I didn't throw it out right away, because it looks harmless per WP:BLP, and maybe it will attract an attention of someone knows something. But if not expanded in 1-2 days, it is out. Lembit Staan (talk) 00:15, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

I believe this is where François Robere's sources should enter if approved. I propose to remove the sentence pending RfC resolution. If approved, we should use the sources provided by Robere. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 04:01, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

As it stands now, the RfC is basically a cluster fuck of brand new accounts brigading in violation of an ArbCom restriction. Oh and it’s also not neutrally worded. I doubt we’ll get much resolution out of it. Better path is to try and work out a compromise here and then if there’s still disagreement redo the RfC properly. Volunteer Marek 05:39, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

:::This is a summary of sources covering these outspoken views. Zaryn was a bit in the spotlight after calling for the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador who complained about rising antisemitism in Poland. Looking at his media profile, he gets spurts of coverage for his outrageous statements and not much else.VikingDrummer (talk) 05:29, 8 June 2021 (UTC) sock puppet of banned user-GizzyCatBella🍁 13:27, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

@VikingDrummer are you aware that WP:BLP applies to all material about living persons anywhere on Wikipedia, including talk pages, edit summaries, user pages, images, categories, lists, article titles and drafts? - GizzyCatBella🍁 11:39, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Current issues 10.6.21

- The section on the Catholic church and his general Senate tenure is needed. I won't be able to write it soon. - The section on his political/historical views will probably see some controversy. Reverted three deletions:

Deletion with Znak source: the Znak source says: "Niestety, tym razem tak nie uczyniono. Kardynał Stanisław Dziwisz, powołując się na opinię Jana Żaryna i ją akceptując[8], skarcił wydawnictwo Znak za opublikowanie książki Grossa." [Unfortunately, it didn't happen this time. Cardinal Stanisław Dziwisz, citing Jan Żaryn's opinion and accepting it, criticised Znak for publishing a book of Gross's] (Footnote 8 says: [8] „Dopiero w (..) lustrze stosunków polsko-komunistycznych można przeglądać inne, wrażliwe tematy, takie jak relacje polsko-żydowskie” [Only in (...) the mirror of the Polish-communist relations can we look on other contentious topics, like the Polish-Jewish relations.] That source means that Żaryn is of the same opinion.

Deletion about Jasiewicz: Żaryn's reaction is important here. Jasiewicz's article is only an introduction to the topic.

Deletion about Pruchnik: Comment: "Nothing antisemitic with beating Judas, unless you identify Jews with Judas" - well, that one specifically was described by several sources as suspiciously close to a Jew (including the original article in Ekspres Jarosławski - the anatomical features were made prominent). Plus the reaction of Żaryn to that event is notable, because it sparked itself some controversy. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 04:39, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

::User:Szmenderowiecki, thank you for the wonderfully expanded and sourced views section. Your work with Polish language sources is invaluable.VikingDrummer (talk) 06:02, 10 June 2021 (UTC) sock puppet of banned user-GizzyCatBella🍁 13:30, 11 June 2021 (UTC) @Szmenderowiecki I've read the sources (and I believe Lembit Staan did too) and text you introduced into the article. I agree with @Lembit Staan that it's redundant in encyclopedic text. Would you mind reverting yourself[5] and try to reach a consensus here for that text to be included? - GizzyCatBella🍁 06:27, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Errm, that "redundancy" comment was marked as the other one, which I have not edited and left as is. But OK, I'll leave the text on hold. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:46, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, editors, please comment on this text[6] below. - GizzyCatBella🍁 09:07, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Relations between Jews and Poles

article:Żaryn believes that the relations between Jews and Poles can only be seen through the lens of the relations between Poles and communists.

• That's complete bullshit. Żaryn plentifully speaks about catholic church having effect on this. "Prawdziwy Polak to katolik". If you don't know this, you better not edit political polish subjects, especially conservative ones. Lembit Staan (talk)

The "real Pole is a Catholic" attitude is already mentioned, with the source of his review of an exposition of WWII museum of Gdańsk, where he states that in plaintext. But the question is the source itself. Whether he elsewhere speaks on that being connected with his view of Polishness is not really relevant, because the text is written as it is. And actually, it is not relevant to the edit at all. "Polak-katolik" and "Żydokomuna" are two separate topics.

If you believe the author was plainly wrong on that account, or has under-/misstated something - whatever you say, but I'm not here to analyse whether he is right or wrong, I only report what RS say (and Znak is one of the best RS that Poland has). Also, the author does not mention Żaryn anywhere else. In short, read the source. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 11:02, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I only report what RS say - one of our jobs as wwikipedians is to evaluate the quality of sources. "Polak is katolik" is an explanation why the phrase in question is bullshit whoever wrote it. Lembit Staan (talk) 16:40, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I ask you again: have you read the source? You demonstrate once again that either you haven't or you try to introduce fragments that are not pertinent to the source. Either way, that's not a good thing.

Evaluation of sources: Znak is one of the best sources Poland has. It does represent a Catholic standpoint, but otherwise it is very good.

To be sure, Weksler-Waszkinel doesn't talk about "Polak-katolik" but at the very end, not when talking about Żaryn and anyway framing it as a controversial stereotype. I urge you once again to read the source(s), probably use Ctrl+F if you are unsure, and stop asserting something that does not pertain to the source. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:01, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

And I am answering you again: the statement Zaryn believes... can only be seen through is provably false regardless who wrote it. I don't care whether the author is mistaken or quoted out of context or sloppily mistranslated. And I am not introducing anything: I am deleting everything. :-) Lembit Staan (talk) 18:07, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Then you might want to read WP:PRESERVE. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:24, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

And yes, "the statement Zaryn believes... can only be seen through is provably false regardless who wrote it" is opinionating on the subject based on your own views and not what others say.

Besides, if it is "provably" false - prove it. :) Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:27, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

"opinionating"? huh? I explained why it false, right at the top. WP:BLP trumps WP:PRESERVE. The onus is on you to defend the statements you want to keep. Lembit Staan (talk) 19:07, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

If you read onus carefully, you will see in a footnote that "Once an editor has provided any source he or she believes, in good faith, to be sufficient, then any editor who later removes the material has an obligation to articulate specific problems that would justify its exclusion from Wikipedia (e.g. why the source is unreliable; the source does not support the claim; undue emphasis; unencyclopedic content; etc.)", which I have done from the very beginning.

You have tried to assert that Żaryn cannot be arguing for what is written in that sentence because he "plentifully speaks about catholic church having effect on this". He indeed has repeatedly underlined their role in saving Jews, but that is ANOTHER and PARALLEL topic, because the book being discussed in the source is Jan Tomasz Gross's "Strach. Antysemityzm w Polsce tuż po wojnie. Historia moralnej zapaści" (what is boldened means "immediately after the war"). You can see the quote provided just below the headline, which directly says what is written in the sentence. I struggle to understand why would you want to make such a long discussion when you have the quote in Polish from the source, my translation to English (so that everyone could understand what is going on) and you could have reached for the source you have deleted, because I have identified the edit that you have questioned and there was 1 (one) source in it - paste the URL and there you go, analyse the source and tell what is the specific problem about it, just as has been done with Oko.press. Just removing a source "because I have read somewhere else he said other stuff", not analysing if it excludes each other, is at the very least wasting my time and resources, which I absolutely do not appreciate.

Besides, if you read WP:PRESERVE, it says "special care" applies for BLPs, but it doesn't mean that the guideline does not apply at all, as you try to say. It would also be useful to see next time which part of BLP (or any other policy) it allegedly violates, because BLP itself is 5000 words long and that takes some time to guess what could probably make you feel not OK about the fragment. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 19:55, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

You can see the quote provided just below the headline - OK, maybe I am looking at a wrong ref. this version says: "Żaryn believes that the relations between Jews and Poles can only be seen through the lens of the relations between Poles and communists.[49]" Here 49 is [7], which says nothing of what you say. Nevertheless, but that is ANOTHER and PARALLEL topic - so what? The disputed sentence speaks of the overall position of Zaryn about Jews vs. Poles. Therefore please provide the correct ref and the quote from it. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:21, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I suggest pausing this discussion until Żaryn can be quoted from a primary source rather than a tertiary one, and either of these might be suitable: [8][9] François Robere (talk) 20:46, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

We are not discussing Jan Gross here. I have no objections for the text about Jan Gross. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:21, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

In my understanding his comment was in relation to Gross's Fear, as was the open letter that cites it. François Robere (talk) 05:54, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Deletion about Jasiewicz

talk: Deletion about Jasiewicz: Żaryn's reaction is important here. -- no it not. Also chaotic WP:SYNTH. Also it is ridiculous that here you wrote about Jaciewicz more than in his own bio. And by the way, what was the reaction and to what? Lembit Staan (talk) 09:27, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't see any of the accusations. chaotic WP:SYNTH. Where? I don't see any at all. All three sources quote the same thing he wrote. Also it is ridiculous that here you wrote about Jaciewicz more than in his own bio. It is the problem of Jasiewicz's bio being too short and not the event being not notable enough. I didn't know how much was written about Jasiewicz in his article, and neither did I care. And by the way, what was the reaction and to what? Not fully understanding your question, but I'll try to answer the best I can. Jasiewicz was fired in mid-April; in late May, some conservative historians including Żaryn have signed a petition to restore him. This (both the article and the letter) drew criticism from some media outlets including the ones I cited in the article. But it clearly shows his attitude towards what was largely considered an anti-Semitic piece. Not to say he is an anti-Semite, but the reader will make their own conclusions. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 11:02, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

And this is called WP:SYNTH and tendentious editing in our book (putting two things side by side "so that readers draw conclusion"). Lembit Staan (talk) 16:47, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Judas

talk: as suspiciously close to a Jew - do you realize how stupid it sounds? Also you put it into section "Holocaust and anti-Semitism". I don't see who says it is an example of Zaryn's anti-Semitism. Lembit Staan (talk) 09:27, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

The section is not to allege that he is anti-Semite, the section is i.a. about his reactions to what are considered anti-Semitic attitudes; or at least the name of the section isn't intended to imply anti-Semitism (I provisionally grouped it as "the Holocaust and anti-Semitism" because the content concerned either of the topics, but I'm perfectly fine with the name you chose). do you realize how stupid it sounds? If I didn't read the sources, I would, but since I did and I saw that a large part of media that reported on Pruchnik interpreted the effigy to be looking like a Jew, no, I don't as the question presupposes it being a stupid phrase while in fact it was supported by RS, so it stops being stupid. This question, btw, only proves that you have not read the sources supporting text before deleting whole paragraphs, so the next time I'd kindly suggest you spend a few more minutes on that.

As for who suggests it was anti-Semitic: gazeta.pl source did. Z kolei Żaryn, zamiast przypomnieć sobie o ideach patrona ruchu, który współtworzył, woli ze swoich okopów rzucać oskarżeniami o niszczenie wizerunku Polski i bronić antysemickiego obrzędu. But that is an aside, because it is not intended to imply his being an anti-Semite. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 11:02, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Szmenderowiecki - Do you realize that this BLP article already doesn't look like an encyclopedic article anymore but more like the collection of trivial details of everything negative one can possibly find googling the internet? Some are not even negative but plain silly... like; who cares about what somebody somewhere said or wrote? People say or write many things...no; this is becoming ridiculous. And it looks like more such things are being advocated to be added. Like, will that ever end? Or will we have 3/4 of the article about what someone wrote something where Żaryn is mentioned? Do you know what such pages are called? - GizzyCatBella🍁 11:36, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Do you realize that this BLP article already doesn't look like an encyclopedic article anymore but more like the collection trivial details of everything negative one can possibly find googling the internet? The question is double-barreled. If I answer no, you presuppose that it is already an attack page but I am not aware of it, but I strenously disagree with the formulation of it being a WP:ATP, or that it somehow violates the spirit of BLP, or in particular, WP:IMPARTIAL.

In fact, the problem with Żaryn is that I struggle to find much positive coverage about him in RS or in scholarship. The sources which are likely to support him (Nasz Dziennik, wPolityce, w Sieci etc.) can hardly be considered reliable; while scholarly sources I had access to (and that went up to the tenth page of Google Scholar), were mostly negative about his coverage. You are wrong to believe I wasn't looking for positive coverage about him, it is that I haven't seen it because it physically hardly exists in the sources I have read.

The definition of an attack page is "an attack page is a page, in any namespace, that exists primarily to disparage or threaten its subject; or biographical material that is entirely negative in tone and unsourced or poorly sourced."

First, the article is very well-sourced to either RS or his interviews, which I quote as he originally said it, so it automatically is not an attack page. Second, his views are discussed without distortion, as he says in the interviews or in the books (as quoted by researchers). As a historian and a person widely recognised as a proponent of the current historical policy, his views on Poland, Jews, and virtually any contentious subject related to Poland are relevant, so they are mentioned as is, as he says to the interviewers. I can't help it that Żaryn is a controversial figure and makes controversial statements that are reported by RS, and I simply do the job of summing up the resources I have. However, I deny any allegations that I am trying to cast him in negative light, and, absent evidence, I will treat any similar claims as casting WP:ASPERSIONS.

As for this quote And it looks like more such things are being advocated to be added. No one is advocating here for anything, and particularly absent any evidence of my (or any other person's) illegal POV pushing and non-cooperation to fix the issue, I see it as POVRAILROAD. Sorry. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 12:34, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

tl;dr. Szmenderowiecki, just stop it. Several people are repeatedly telling you that you are wrong about what is allowed per WP:BLP and you continue to misrepresent sources. If you don't see it, you better step back and do not edit things you are passionate about. Lembit Staan (talk) 16:55, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Again you cast aspersions, perhaps you should be the one to "step back"? You do not present any "misrepresentation" of the source, you merely claim it exists while the other editor actively disproves your claims.

Szmenderowiecki has done a great job in translating the article and providing sources for it, your claims that it violates WP:BLP are unsubstantiated. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 17:17, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for reminding me about yourself. Lembit Staan (talk) 17:24, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Aside: I don't think there's any doubt that the "Judas trial" includes/is based on antisemitic motifs, but whether and how we mention Żaryn's response to it is a different question. In any case the discussion should be based on WP:POLICY, and editors shouldn't be admonished for making suggestions that comply with it. François Robere (talk) 13:03, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

There is no doubt that the "Judas trial" is based on religious motifs. Jesus Christ is a Jewish hero in Christianity. Just the same, Judas is a Jewish villain in Chrisitanity. And if Zaryn argued this way (and I may well believe he did this so), there is nothing antiSemitic in his view. Lembit Staan (talk) 16:36, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, antisemitic motifs. What Żaryn argued (implicitly or explicitly) is that it's an acceptable custom;[10] that Jewish critics are trying to insult and malign Polish Catholics,[11] and should mind their own business;[12] and that drawing attention to such events reflects a "wish to destroy [Catholic Poles'] faith".[13] François Robere (talk) 18:25, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, Burning of Judas is an acceptable practice in conservative Catholic places. Yes, it may be considered to be antiSemitic by some (okay, by many). Yes, antiSemites use it as a pretext to demonstrate antiSemitism. Please explain why this episode must be in the article. Your "Zaryn argued" is a non-argument. Over his life "Zaryn argued" a dozen of books and thousands of articles. The analysis of those as a "corpus" by scholarly sources should be the base of a coherent description of his views, not random hype by political opponents. If there is none then probably his views are not that encyclopedic. Lembit Staan (talk) 20:06, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm not saying it must be in the article, I'm saying there's enough of an argument for inclusion that one should be able to suggest it without being attacked. François Robere (talk) 00:20, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Long-standing pattern of tendentious editing

I've been wasting lots of time either fixing the texts being added recently and unfortunately deleting the unfixable. I've spent an inordinate time double checking the source cited, only to find that they've been frequently misrepresented. I have no idea whether this is a "good-faith" misunderstanding of our policies about sourcing and WP:NOR or a deliberate POV-pushing/dirt-digging accompanied with ignorance in may aspects of Poland. I am more and more inclined to file a complaint for a ban of editing this article by some people. Lembit Staan (talk) 09:27, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

You have my reinforcement; this is unworkable what is going on here. . - GizzyCatBella🍁 11:07, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Jedwabne 2

Then this one:

• Żaryn assigns most of the blame for the Jedwabne pogrom on Germans, arguing that Germans were provoking Poles to commit the crime and that the Nazis were acting behind the scenes and commanded the people who murdered Jews.

Same as the above, sourced to the interview with him. What’s going on here? - GizzyCatBella🍁 19:18, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Same as above. Is the summary decent? Did Zaryn assign "most of the blame" or he "shared the blame"? I didnt read and dont want to. I'm just giving an example of what to look for. Lembit Staan (talk) 19:38, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, here "most of the blame" is definetly POV original research. He does say that the Germans tried to "provoke" the Poles (which they did) into committing these acts and that in general they "directed" the murders. This sentence would be mostly fine if the "most of the blame" part was removed or rewritten since that is not an accurate description of the source. Volunteer Marek 20:50, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Also, once you remove the "most of the blame" OR, the rest of the statement isn't really "controversial". The Germans most certainly did try to provoke the local populations to commit pogroms and they most certainly were in charge of the events in general. There are probably some other "controversial" statements in that article but these two claims aren't. Volunteer Marek 20:53, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

P.S. I've seen an opinion that summarizing from a primary source is original research. In is no more original research than summarizing from secondary sources. I've seen plenty of twisted summarizing of secondary sources. The central issue is Verifiability: is the summary a faithful representation of what was written or not? Again: a wikipedian usually cannot judge whether the source cited says truth (unless there is a clear contradiction; also we may always judge whether the source is biased), but it is a job of what we all do all the time: verifying whether the wikipedian correctly renders the source. Of course, WP:BLP has more stringent rules about sourcing (e.g, we have to recognize when the self-source is biased towards themselves), but what I said is the basic answer to your question.Lembit Staan (talk) 20:02, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lembit Staan - I understand that you see it all the time BUT here is the policy WP:PSTS:

Articles may make an analytic, evaluative, interpretive, or synthetic claim only if that has been published by a reliable secondary source.

and

Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation.

and

Do not analyze, evaluate, interpret, or synthesize material found in a primary source yourself; instead, refer to reliable secondary sources that do so.

We should follow to the policy especially for BLP's. - GizzyCatBella🍁 20:09, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

@GizzyCatBella: Please tell me where I said otherwise. I was talking about faithful summarizing. As for "evaluating", people are often confusing "evaluation in the article text" and "evaluating in the talk page". The former is a no-no, the latter is our daily job. Lembit Staan (talk) 20:30, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

As for "Żaryn assigns most of the blame <...>, the correct wikipedia text must be In this interview Żaryn assigns most of the blame <...>. - to make it clear that it is not a synthesis from several sources. - It may be followed e.g., by: "Prof. Browarski sees this as an example of Zaryn's disagreement with an established consensus" or something. (And the established consensus is, hopefully, presented in our wp-article.) This is what I was talking about in my "Argumentative" clause in the RFC above. Lembit Staan (talk) 20:30, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lembit Staan - Oh yeah, I miss-read you, sorry. Yeah, I agree. Also, why those parts were chosen from the interviews, he talks about other things as well. I find this cherry-picking problematic; it's like notifying the readers that he was saying something inaccurately right off the bat. How do we know that he is not right in his statements? We don't, and if we don't, why is that in the section? - GizzyCatBella🍁 21:10, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lembit Staan, @GizzyCatBella: the sentences I have provided are contained in the original Polish wikipedia article. The fragments from the original text that supported the phrases are the following:

Jedwabne

1. Jedwabne: W propagandzie niemieckiej tego okresu obecna była interpretacja, według której narody uwalniane spod sowieckiej okupacji, mające być beneficjentami nowego niemieckiego porządku powinny oczyszczać z „żydokomuny” podporządkowane Niemcom ziemie. Taka interpretacja w kontekście rzekomego udziału narodu polskiego w projekcie niemieckim jest powtarzaniem kłamliwej goebbelsowskiej propagandy, wzmocnionej po wojnie niektórymi procesami – zbrodniami sądowymi czasów stalinowskich – opartymi na oskarżeniach z dekretu sierpniowego z 1944 r. „o wymiarze kary dla faszystowsko-hitlerowskich zbrodniarzy” winnych zabójstw i kolaboracji z III Rzeszą. Fakty są takie, że Niemcy próbowali prowokować Polaków do takich działań posiłkując się stanem ich rzeczywistych emocji po okupacji sowieckiej i dążyli do wprowadzenia ich w krąg nienawiści budowany przez oddziały Einsatzgruppen. Formacje te były rzeczywistymi reżyserami każdego z kilkunastu tragicznych zbrodni z czerwca i lipca 1941 r., począwszy od wydarzeń w Białymstoku, poprzez Wąsocz, Radziłów, na Jedwabnem kończąc. Wszędzie tam Niemcy próbują przymusić Polaków do uczestnictwa w tych mordach, co w większości wypadków się nie udaje, a jeśli to jedynie w formie biernej. Oczywiście w Jedwabnem znajdują folksdojczów i osoby spoza tej miejscowości, które przychodzą tam razem z Niemcami. Wszystko jednak dzieje się pod dyktando niemieckie. Loosely translated: In the German propaganda of that period, there was an intepretation according to which the people who were liberated from the Soviet occupation and who were to be profiting from the new German order were to clean the conquered lands by Germans from "Żydokomuna". The interpretation, in the context of the alleged participation of the Polish people in the German project, is repeating deceitful Goebbels propaganda that was amplified after [WWII] by some processes - [namely], the judicial crimes of Stalinist times - that were based on accusations [coming] from the August 1944 decree "On the terms of punishment for the Fascist-Hitlerite criminals" who were guilty of murders and collaboration with the Third Reich. The facts are such that Germans were trying to provoke Poles to such activities, making use of the state of their real emotions after the Soviet occupation, and were striving to introduce them to the circle of hate that was being developed by the Einsatzgruppen. These formations were the real directors of each of the [dozen - used word for 11-19] tragic crimes of June and July 1941, starting from the events in Białystok, through Wąsocz, Radziłów and finishing in Jedwabne. In every place, Germans try to force Poles to participate in the massacres, which does not happen in most cases, and even if it does, only in the passive form. Of course, they find the Volksdeutsche in Jedwabne [as well as] people from outside the settlement who come there with the Germans. All that happens, however, under German instructions.

From which text I made the following conclusions: 1. Żaryn states that he considers Germans as the directors and arguably the principal perpetrators of the crimes in summer 1941 in Podlasie 2. That Germans were provoking Poles to participate; 3. That Żaryn doubts that Poles have actually taken part in the massacres.

So what’s so scandalous or out of the ordinary in what that scholar discusses? Is he saying that the earth is flat? To me this is an WP:UNDUE original interpretation of a primary sources on top entered in the wrong section. Biographies of living persons must be written conservatively. I’m going to remove that right away since it’s a WP:BLP article and must adhere strictly to Neutral point of view (WP:NPOV), Verifiability (WP:V) and no original research (WP:NOR). Please keep in mind that the burden of evidence rests with the editor who adds or restores the material. - GizzyCatBella🍁 23:54, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

So what’s so scandalous or out of the ordinary in what that scholar discusses?

A debate on the issue of whether Poles were in any way coerced to commit the massacre is still happening after the publication of Sąsiedzi, and he is on the side of those who believe that Poles were coerced (cf. citation of Michlic and Hackmann in the article, who criticise the general attitude of trying to exonerate the Poles). For instance, this article from Univ. of Łódź opines that "if IPN organises a conference on Polish-Jewish relations,b then the people who will be admitted could be Marek Chodakiewicz, Jerzy Robert Nowak or Jan Żaryn, while Barbara Engelking, Jan Grabowski or Dariusz Libionka will be disqualified, because their participation would be a blunder*" *-alluding to an earlier quote of Jarosław Szarek. Libionka himself states in Żaryn's generally negative book review that he is one of the greatest opponents of the view pitched by Jan Tomasz Gross. Since the topic is controversial and Żaryn has made extensive comments on Jedwabne in general, his POV on Jedwabne should be included, and at least a mention of his strenuous opposition to Jan Tomasz Gross. See also [14], [15].

In other words, change the source; don't change the sentence much.

As for KOD and his declaration about "betrayal" - I don't see your argument at all. Is this info verifiable? It is - it has even been published in two media resources, of which I cited Nasz Dziennik as the original one and not the analysis by oko.press, as was in the original. Has it been published in a reliable source? I stand by the previous discussion, in which both you and Volunteer Marek have voted against, but most other editors were in favour. There is one more problem - as I have noted in the translation, he regularly publishes in conservative publications and seldom outside them; unfortunately, I see great reliability issues with most of the right-wing Polish media, which he favours to publish in and speak to (exception: some Catholic journals are good enough, but certainly not Nasz Dziennik). That said, his political views, particularly since he was a senator at the time of publication, certainly belong to the article.

Has this been original research? Rewriting source material in your own words, while substantially retaining the meaning of the references, is not considered to be original research.

I may propose to divide the chapter about views and controversies into two parts (political views; controversies) if possible. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 02:53, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

@Szmenderowiecki - quoting you here -->Since the topic is controversial and Żaryn has made extensive comments on Jedwabne in general, his POV on Jedwabne should be included, and at least a mention of his strenuous opposition to Jan Tomasz Gross. Are you planning to add the fact that Żaryn is one of these scholars that dispute Gross's findings in the dedicated controversies section[16] of Jan Tomasz Gross's article? - GizzyCatBella🍁 03:06, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Could be, if determined notable enough. No objections for that. The quotes are provided in the sources; in Żaryn's article, we could essentially copy the fragment. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 03:53, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

If according to you it's notable here, then it is notable there as well, don't you agree? - GizzyCatBella🍁 04:14, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Absolutely. But I don't know if it is notable enough in the first place. I think I could introduce a paragraph or a couple of sentences for evaluation before copypasting it here. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:45, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Ok, Szmenderowiecki, thanks for providing these quotes, that clarifies which part of the source they're supposedly based on. Here are the issues:

1. Żaryn states that he considers Germans as the directors and arguably the principal perpetrators of the crimes in summer 1941 in Podlasie 2. That Germans were provoking Poles to participate; 3. That Żaryn doubts that Poles have actually taken part in the massacres. 1 is fine in the part where Zaryn says he considers Germans "as the directors". It is not fine in the part where it says Zaryn considers Germans "principal perpetrators". You yourself seem to be aware of that since you add the word "arguably". If it's "arguably" then it shouldn't be in here since this is a BLP. It's also a flag that this part is WP:OR

2 is fine. 3 however is NOWHERE in the source. Zaryn simply does not say anything like this. Not even close. In fact he obviously acknowledges that Poles took part.

So this is, like 1/3 ok and 2/3 original research. Remove the WP:OR BLP violating parts and it may be fine. Volunteer Marek 02:42, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Part 1. Please review other links that state Żaryn's view that Germans were principal perpetrators of Jedwabne (from 4 scholarly sources), that may change the proposal. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 03:49, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

• @Volunteer Marek and Szmenderowiecki: Żaryn's own words, for reference: [17][18] François Robere (talk) 19:00, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, that is indeed the interview that is being discussed in this section. Volunteer Marek 20:37, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Just quote him:

Żaryn believes that the perception of Poles during WWII as antisemitic and xenophobic is a "false stereotype", that is contrary to the nation's Christian identity.

Żaryn believes that "Germans tried to provoke Poles to [acts of violence against Jews] by taking advantage of their emotional state after the Soviet occupation... in most cases they failed, but when they didn't, [the Polish participation] was only passive." He blames the Jedwabne pogrom on Volksdeutsche, "outsiders", and German direction; and has stated that "even if some of the Polish locals participated in this 'spectacle' under duress... the majority looked on in disgust at what the Germans did...". Żaryn has supported the efforts to exhume the bodies of Jedwabne's victims, led by Ewa Kurek over objections of the Jewish community, for both scientific and political reasons.

François Robere (talk) 08:27, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

François Robere, Assuming this is accurate, I think quoting him is acceptable. Although is the word "believes" neutral? Maybe "states" would be better? As an aside, Erving Goffman said that we can never be sure what one truly believes. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:19, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

@Piotrus: I'd say that's context-dependent, but "states" or "claims" are okay as well. The only problem is that there's a different precision/conciseness trade-off with "states" vs. "claims" or "believes", so we might end up with a slightly longer text. François Robere (talk) 11:11, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

I am fine with the "states" version. Also, accuracy is more important than length. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 11:44, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Done. François Robere (talk) 12:42, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Wait, what exactly is Kurek "leading" and where is that in the source? The exhumation was in 2001 (iirc). And what exactly is "controversial" about this position? Volunteer Marek 13:00, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Currently it is in two places. Please collect into one, otherwise difficult to read and understand. Lembit Staan (talk) 09:56, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Done. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 12:56, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I suggest to restrict the section "Controversy" to isolated events involving him. Criticism of the views is not "controversy". For example Wałęsa and Azari are controversies. Jedwabne is an ongoing subject in his views. Lembit Staan (talk)

Agreed, and done (due Szmenderowiecki). François Robere (talk) 12:41, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Please don't add highly controversial stuff without getting consensus on talk first. There's explicit opposition if not outright consensus against inclusion of some of this stuff above. Volunteer Marek 14:45, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

As before, VM, other than deleting and disputing others' suggestions,[19] do you have any constructive proposal? You're the last one arguing on what looks like a settled discussion (last comments from five days ago), and deleting everything now is pretty contentious. François Robere (talk) 15:01, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

There was 23k bytes of text added by Szmenderowiecki [20] without consensus for most of it. And no, I'm not the only one who has objected to this text, seeing as how it misrepresents sources or strays into WP:OR and WP:SYNTH in a BLP.

And so the account that created the RfC above turned out to be another Icewhiz sock (funny that). And yet somehow, as soon as the account gets banned, the text gets added anyway? How the hey does that work? Volunteer Marek 16:37, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

And btw, I've removed less than half of that no-consensus-addition. Honestly, there is still stuff in there that should go.

Also, you've never replied to my points above (like wth does Kurek have to do with anything and what exactly is she "leading")? Volunteer Marek 16:38, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

Also, there's just some basic factual errors in this text (not present in sources) like the claim that his comments about ONR "not being fascist" refer to present rather than the interwar organization (he's wrong on that but we should at least get what he says right). Volunteer Marek 16:47, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

There was 23k bytes of text added by Szmenderowiecki We've been discussing this addition across six threads, there was no reason for you to remove it unilaterally.

And so the account that created the RfC above turned out to be another Icewhiz sock You're welcome to open another RfC if you think it'll change the 6:1 vote in favor of addition.

as soon as the account gets banned, the text gets added anyway The text was added two days prior - there's no connection between the two.

like wth does Kurek have to do with anything and what exactly is she "leading" WP:GIYF: [21][22][23]

Also, there's just some basic factual errors in this text And can you fix them, or at least bring them here? François Robere (talk) 18:24, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, we’ve been discussing it across several threads and there’s been no consensus to include this material. So why unilaterally plop down 20k worth of stuff into the article that’s already been objected to? Volunteer Marek 01:36, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Also no idea where you pulled this “6:1” thing out of. Not interested in starting an RfC and doing a sock’s job for them right now. Volunteer Marek 01:59, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Counting, and you can either accept it or start an RfC of your own, but not both. François Robere (talk) 14:34, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

The addition preceded the discussion, VM, not the other way around. You deleting it while discussion is ongoing (or in some cases after it has settled for inclusion) is exactly the problem. François Robere (talk) 14:34, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

That’s a funny way to “count” (sic). Is that the “new math”? And why in the world should I “accept” an RfC which 1) was started by a sock of an indef banned user (now banned), one who you had an extensive history of collaborating with , and 2) it was withdrawn (!). I’m not following your logic here. Even if we ignore the fact that the RfC was started by Icewhiz, or the fact that good number of votes were from brand new accounts violating the 500/30 restriction, it was withdrawn. Why should I start anything? Volunteer Marek 15:25, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Oh, right - it's actually 7:2 (earlier I only counted the bold votes):[24]

For: Szmenderowiecki, François Robere, BSMRD, Mhorg, Piotrus (on one), Darouet, CPCEnjoyer

Against: Lembit Staan, My very best wishes

I don't care what you do as long as you don't stonewall well-sourced, compromise additions, that others have worked on for several weeks.[25] Now, I'm asking again: do you have a constructive proposal? François Robere (talk) 16:01, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

@François Robere:: Add me to the editors who support inclusion. Feel free to update your list of "votes" accordingly. I follow and occasionally edit Polish topics on Wikipedia and it's clear the article at hand is being subjected to a whitewash by a small number of users. Yes, I've read these articles in Haaretz and Gazeta Wyborcza so it doesn't surprise me at all. And no, I'm not one of these "suspicious brandnew accounts" or "Icewhiz sockpuppets". There's no such rule that newcomers are prohibited from editing articles that Volunteer Marek and his ring wanna treat as their personal playground.Potugin (talk) 16:10, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

This never ends does it? Are you sure you’re past the 500/30 threshold? Volunteer Marek 16:33, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: - feel free to link the relevant guideline, I've heard about it but I don't know what exactly does it mean and how it's relevant here. Talk pages I reckon were exempt from restrictions, I do remember someone said. Also, FYI, the only reason I haven't nominated this garbage: Gestapo–NKVD conferences for deletion yet is indeed the fact that some kind of restrictions on relatively new accounts/infrequent editors are in place. So again, I'd appreciate if you could give a link to an authoritative rule. Potugin (talk) 16:58, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

No idea what that article has to do with anything. Volunteer Marek 17:14, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

With regard to this sentence, the problem is with how the info is presented: On several separate occasions, he argued that there existed szmalcownik Jews,[49][50] alongside Ukrainians, the Volksdeutsche, and Germans

It basically makes it seem as if the claim was false (it isn't, Jewish szmalcowniks did exist, though most likely not that many) rather than the fact that the problem with Zaryn is that he *overemphasizes* this aspect of the phenomenon. It also reads like a bit of OR based on primary sources. Volunteer Marek 17:04, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, that actually should go, it states something obvious but is written as if it was not. See page 70 here ---> I’ll remove that. - GizzyCatBella🍁 17:26, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

On the issue of the exhumations at Jedwabne. Why is this notable? Oreven controversial for that matter? You can disagree on this issue but seeing as how Jan T Gross, the guy who brought the Jedwabne massacre to public attention, himself supported exhumations [26] why is this noteworthy? (Answer: it’s not which is why all that we have here is one sensationalist ideological tabloid and a bunch of primary sources). Volunteer Marek 16:00, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Because: a) we're already covering his stance on Jedwabne; b) this is part of that stance; and c) he's very vocal about it.

Jan Gross supported one exhumation that was done with representatives of the Jewish community and human rights groups; it's not at all clear that he'd support one pushed by Ewa Kurek and Żaryn in a climate of politicized historiography. François Robere (talk) 16:33, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

without context it’s meaningless though. And as far as Jan Gross goes, no, your statement is completely false. Please actually read the source I linked. Gross argued that the “one exhumation” that you refer to was grossly inadequate and demanded that further exhumations be conducted. Just like Zaryn. I know this is, like, very inconvenient, since then you can’t line up the little pieces on the two sides of the “bad guys” and “good guys” line but this isn’t a Hollywood movie. Volunteer Marek 16:40, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

What's missing from the context, in your opinion?

p. 456 of your source:

30 May and 3 June 2001 The IPN conducts a partial exhumation... Present at the exhumation are representatives of IPN... Rabbi Menachem Ekstein... [Rabbi] Michael Schudrich... young members of the Warsaw Jewish community... [and] Dr. William Haglund [from Physicians for Human Rights]... The exhumation lasts only five days owing to pressure from various Jewish Orthodox religious groups...

Early June 2001 Jan T. Gross issues appeal to the IPN not to stop the exhumation... [He] estimates that the entire exhumation of the remains... should last many months, if not a year.

François Robere (talk) 17:05, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

... ... ... Are you aware of the fact that with those quotes you just confirmed what I just wrote and completely contradicted what you claimed earlier? ... ... ... ? Volunteer Marek 17:23, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Not really. The problem is that your statement (with "grossly inadequate" and "further exhumations") can be read in more than one way: that the exhumations were conducted improperly, and that other exhumations should be arranged; or that the exhumations were done properly and should've been prolonged (which is what the source implies was Gross's position). Hence the statement Jan Gross supported one exhumation that was done with representatives of the Jewish community and human rights groups is very much correct, otherwise why would he "appeal" to prolong it?

Anything else? François Robere (talk) 17:57, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

It is not correct. It is nothing like “correct”. It is the opposite of correct. Words have meaning, usually they don’t mean the opposite of what they do. If a guy says “I think there should be more exhumations” that actually surprisingly shockingly amazingly DOES NOT mean he’s actually saying “I support only the one exhumation that happened”. This right here is the problem with these discussions. When one editor just straight up pretends that if someone says “X” then what they really said was “not X” then I just don’t see how constructive discussion of resolution of the disagreement can take place. Volunteer Marek 22:08, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

So... anything else? François Robere (talk) 23:13, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

References

Relocating comments

Szmenderowiecki - Please stop moving my comments around all here is confusing already as it is. Please move them back to their original positions or if now it’s too late because it will generate further confusion, please don’t do it again.- GizzyCatBella🍁 20:15, 10 June 2021 (UTC) THIS I’m talking about - [27]. I’m lost.. don’t do it again please. - GizzyCatBella🍁 20:21, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I thought Lembit Staan asked to refactor the talk page: "Currently it is in two places. Please collect into one, otherwise difficult to read and understand." If Lembit Staan confirms this is not what he wanted, I will revert to the older version. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 21:21, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I was talking about the article; Robere addressed that. The action of Szmenderowiecki here was harmless, so I think let it be. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:25, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Okay, I got it; I found all now; it’s my old head that resists cooperating if things are moved around. - GizzyCatBella🍁 21:55, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

It's all right, sorry for any inconvenience I might have caused by that. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:39, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Restoring deleted content

User Mhorg restored this edit[28] into the WP:BLP article, likely violating policies WP:BLPUNDEL and WP:BLPREQUESTRESTORE that state:

"When material about living persons has been deleted on good-faith BLP objections, any editor wishing to add, restore, or undelete it must ensure it complies with Wikipedia's content policies. If it is to be restored without significant change, consensus must be obtained first."

The rationale behind their revert was "I think it is interesting"[29] I'm asking user Mhorg to self revert and gain WP:CON following the above policies. - GizzyCatBella🍁 10:54, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

This is a question I really don't know how to deal with yet. If a user declares something "Undue", what can I answer other than "For me is Due"? The removed part concerns a historian and politician who says a pro-nationalist statement like "the Polish side does everything to civilise the Ukrainian nation", I don't know, if this isn't interesting for a BLP page, what is it? However, having not yet fully understood these rules on revert and consensus, I will auto-revert my restore, waiting for the opinion of some other more experienced colleague.--Mhorg (talk) 11:03, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Mhorg: You have the beginning of an answer right there! The other part (cf. WP:PROPORTION) is to cite as much reliable, published material on the subject as you can, to demonstrate that not only you think it's "a thing", but also RS. The better and the more sources you have, the stronger your argument for inclusion will be. François Robere (talk) 18:45, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Removal of Ukraine section

I am against this removal of VolunteerMarek[30], I think a statement like "the Polish side does everything to civilise the Ukrainian nation[, while] the Ukrainian side does everything to distance itself from the European civilisation" is notable for a politician/historian. The user insists that Oko.press is not reliable, yet what is reported and verifiable in the source of radiomaryja.pl. So his motivation does not seem legitimate to me. Also, please avoid using phrases in the edit summary like "oko not reliable despite what Icewhiz socks claim", because in this way the user also accuses several of us of being socks of that user.--Mhorg (talk) 13:14, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

You must realize that WP:BLP bio's are not compilations of comments editors find "interesting"[31]. So no, I also don't think it is notable at all. - GizzyCatBella🍁 15:21, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

Is there any other source here which would indicate this received attention? We can’t have a criticism section which is just “here’s something the guy said that somebody didn’t like”. Volunteer Marek 02:42, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

I suspect Żaryn's general approach to Ukraine might be more notable than any particular quote, if we can source it. François Robere (talk) 14:28, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Well, when and if you source it, then we can discuss it. Volunteer Marek 16:01, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

ANI discussion

To all whom it may concern, there is a case filed at the administrators noticeboard due to an editorial impasse as concerns this article. Users will be notified on their respective talk pages shortly. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 17:14, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

I have no judgement on content, but

1. Any new materials can be included on the page only based on WP:Consensus, and especially in BLP pages. Not by edit war, and not by filing litigious complaints.
2. Just looking at this page editing history [32], the trouble/edit war started from this revert [33]. The previous revert was made by VM per WP:BRD. My very best wishes (talk) 01:03, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

   I respectfully disagree with your second point. While Mhorg reverting Vm reverting Mhorg wasn't the best idea, they didn't break WP:3RR nor WP:EDITWAR. They're a relatively inexperienced editor, and should be shown some leniency as long as they don't cause any disruption (and they didn't). The problem started with this thread: VM took to talk, as he should, but immediately accused Mhorg of "[attempting] to turn the article into an attack page", "straight up misrepresentation of sources" and "an indirect form of WP:CANVASS"; then me of "[trying] to escalate" and "constant WP:BATTLEGROUND" for pinging an admin. What's more, his claims that the sources are being misrepresented ended up being more semantic than substantial.[34][35] Two months and 28 deletions later,[36] and here we are. François Robere (talk) 14:31, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

his claims that the sources are being misrepresented ended up being more semantic than substantial. Right below you made a proposal to include text which smears the subject of this BLP by pretending he said THE OPPOSITE of what he actually said. If you think that concern is "more semantic than substantial" you really shouldn't be editing this article, or any BLPs for that matter. Volunteer Marek 22:15, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

My very best wishes, I suppose you came here by accident and not because you are following me (I don't think there is a lot of international attention on Zaryn, but that's okay...) and trying to attacking me (again[37]). "the trouble/edit war started from this revert[38]" you wrote... please look at the summaries. VM wrote "yeah this is BLP vio (at least part of it) with questionable sources" and I restored the part with this explanation "Please, if "part of it" is BLP vio, delete that "part" and explain why". Where is the mistake in this? Why remove all of a contribution if the user thinks there is only one part that is not right?
Volunteer Marek, currently, you have contested the sources of two lines of that huge proposed text. You are talking about it as if all the insertion made by François Robere and Szmenderowiecki is written by distorting the sources. Which does not reflect reality. I find that your observations were correct, regarding the text I introduced at the beginning. But now the situation is different, could you comment on the parts of the text that simply report what Zaryn declares?--Mhorg (talk) 09:22, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

That wasn't part of my proposal, it was part of the existing text. As for the diffs I cited[39][40] - the sources mentioned there ended up either stating or heavily implying what was claimed, as did Korycki (which you removed as "I don't think Korycki says this" [41]) and Libionka (which you claimed was "SYNTH and OR" [42]). It may be that you were right on one or two points (we do have some fresh editors, and training takes time), but by and large your claims of misrepresentation ended up being hot air. François Robere (talk) 14:20, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

I stand by my comment. Moreover, there is troubling pattern: some accounts with few edits who never edited this page before (one of them is blocked sockpuppet) suddenly appear only to revert VM and restore disputed content on this and other pages. P.S. I commented here because I saw the discussion on the ANI. My very best wishes (talk) 17:02, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Then rest assured that that's not what happened here, and AFAIK both new users who have persisted in this article have reasonable explanations for how they got here and what they wanted to achieve - not that they any, this being an open encyclopedia. I would think a more troubling pattern is how our "veterans" treat "newbies", and how quickly and often this treatment throws the discussion into a spin. François Robere (talk) 17:44, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Mmmm, no, it’s exactly what happened here. How is it these socks always show up to these articles, FR? And pretend to be “newbies”? Volunteer Marek 18:04, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

If you're referring to Mhorg and Szmenderowiecki, then that's not what happened and making those accusations here would not be in your best interest. If you're not referring to them, then how is your message related to mine? François Robere (talk) 19:01, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

VM please, if you have any doubts about me, open an SPI (if the one you participated in against me was not enough for you) and get a definitive answer. I ask you to stop here with these insinuations that I would be a sockpuppet.--Mhorg (talk) 20:42, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Concerning this particular article I'm very obviously referring to VikingDrummer who was just literally banned as a sock of Icewhiz. You know, pretending to be a "newbie". Volunteer Marek 22:00, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Resolving disputes one-by-one

The way I see it, we have five ongoing discussions:

1. On the inclusion of Libionka and Korycki (Talk:Jan Żaryn/Archive 1#BLP vio, #RFC on François Robere's second proposal: Views and lead).
2. On Żaryn's expressions of nationalist and antisemitic positions, and...
3. ...his 1968 resolution proposal and comments on the Israeli ambassador (#Recent text deletions (topic separate from RfC))
4. On Żaryn's view on "Judeo-Communism" and its importance for the #Relations between Jews and Poles
5. On Żaryn's view of the Jedwabne pogrom and its aftermath (#Jedwabne 2)

I propose an RfC on this edit (not mentioning these discussions, just the edit), in which I attempted to address these issues. François Robere (talk) 13:26, 21 June 2021 (UTC) (Clarified François Robere (talk) 11:53, 22 June 2021 (UTC))

No, you cannot have a single RFC on several issues. It will be a horrible mess, worse than now. Please file RFC for items already discussed in separate sections, such as #Jedwabne 2. If a certain piece was not discussed, please start a section for it (RFC is called only if there is no consensus by regular editing discussion). Lembit Staan (talk) 18:15, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

But I can have an RfC on a single edit, which is often what voters ask for anyway. AFAIC that revision captures the state of the discussion at that point in time; I can segment the RfC, but I'm not going to write five separate ones after all the work it took to get to that point. François Robere (talk) 11:17, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

François Robere, you can, but I think it would be a terrible idea which will only turn up the heat. Drmies (talk) 12:00, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

If there are five different issues it makes no sense to have a single RfC for all of them. You're basically asking for an RfC to legitimize your edits which is not the purpose of the RfC. Also your presentation of these issues isn't exactly neutral. Volunteer Marek 18:43, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

What are you waiting for? Propose the text which would, in your opinion, be neutral and would account for the sources. Expand the article for once. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 06:43, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

How would you segment it, then? I'm not going to write up five separate RfCs. François Robere (talk) 11:36, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

I think a single RFC is enough to understand users' views on how to handle this issue. At the most it could be separated into two RFCs, but to expect one to be done for each line of text seems to me only a way to discourage the enrichment of the article.--Mhorg (talk) 11:47, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

one for each line - that's correct. But not exactly. One for each topic, because some lines may be acceptable or salvageable, and some are not. We are not in American parliament to pass omnibus bills . Lembit Staan (talk) 16:04, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Right of then top of this text: " antisemitic positions". AFAIU, antisemitism is a punishable offense. If nobody sued him for antisemitism, then any statements to this end are to be immediately defenestrated without wasting time in talk page, per WP:BLP. Lembit Staan (talk) 02:18, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

The top is only meant for reference in this discussion, not for the RfC (I'll add a clarification). We can, of course, RfC the statement "Żaryn has been criticized for expressing antisemitic positions (ref1)(ref2)(ref3)" or somesuch. François Robere (talk) 11:53, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

More to the point, if no source says this - and no source says this, Polityka doesn't say it (though perhaps it insinuates it, which is different) - that's straight up BLP VIO and BLP applies to talk pages as well as article. Volunteer Marek 02:30, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

We already discussed the sources ad nauseum. Would you like to suggest phrasing that you think is more representative? François Robere (talk) 11:58, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

If, as already stated multiple times, no source states this then we simply don’t include anything. I don’t have to propose any “phrasing” or “text”. I propose we don’t misrepresent sources. Thats it. There’s no divine mandate here from high above that we *must* include “something”. Volunteer Marek 00:49, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Of course. The question is what to do with the sources we do have - and we have plenty. If you don't want to make suggestions of your own that's your prerogative, but it's not particularly helpful. WP:TALKDONTREVERT is a thing. François Robere (talk) 19:13, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Initial proposal

Choices: "include", "include part" or "exclude". Where bold text is present, only it is in question. Comments? François Robere (talk) 12:13, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Section 1

Jan Żaryn is commonly considered to be a conservative historian arguing from the ethnonationalist and anti-communist side of historical debate. Żaryn is also thought of as one of the main proponents of the historical policy of the Law and Justice party, though he denies that it is dictated by the party. He sees Poles as “loving freedom, Catholicism, patriotism and especially being proud of their history.”, and he sees his role as creating "positive myths" on Polishness.

Section 2
Żaryn argues that the tensions between Jews and other nations in Interwar Poland were mostly due to economic reasons. Scholars dispute this characterization.

Section 3

Żaryn, a co-editor of a two-volume monograph on the Kielce pogrom, has stated that "a significant proportion of Jewish individuals... supported the communist authorities or... joined their ranks"; he blames those individuals for "censorship and propaganda, slander... and deceitfully remaining silent about Soviet massacres." This, he believes, "intensified anti-Semitic attitudes" that resulted in the Kielce pogrom. His critics characterize these opinions as resorting to the stereotype of Żydokomuna. Kate Korycki writes that this narrative "unwittingly recycles many Polish anti-Semitic tropes", adding that Żaryn "[uses] a description of the post-war pogrom in Kielce, perpetrated on Jews by Poles, [as] an opportunity to blame the Jews".

Section 4

Żaryn has stated that the Germans were directors of the Jedwabne pogrom and also assigned blame to the Volksdeutsche and "outsiders" who came from other villages. Poles, in his opinion, were provoked and oftentimes coerced to participate in it. He added that "even if some of the Polish locals participated in this 'spectacle' under duress... the majority looked in disgust at what the Germans have done..." and that the "deceitful narrative [of Jedwabne] burdens the Poles and Poland with co-responsibility for the Holocaust", since, according to Żaryn, there were no Poles who collaborated with the Germans on the crime scene. Żaryn has stated that the current narrative about the Jedwabne events had become a "founding myth" about the "allegedly proven" organized massacres of Jews by Poles, supposedly rooted in inherent Polish anti-Semitism. He has suggested that these stereotypes stem from insufficient documentation of some World War II events in Poland. Consequently, Żaryn has supported the efforts to exhume the bodies of Jedwabne's victims, led by Ewa Kurek over objections of the Jewish community, for both scientific and political reasons.

Section 5

In 2018, two controversies arose connected with the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the March 1968 political crisis. In late February that year, Żaryn entered a project of Senate resolution to commemorate the event, an excerpt from which said that "the communist government, by arranging anti-Semitic demonstrations and forcing Poles to take part in them, and also by introducing pathological anti-Jewish sentiments into public discourse, did not represent the will of the People, but only of Moscow and its intra-communist and international interests". The wording has been criticised by historians Jacek Leociak from the Polish Center for Holocaust Research and Piotr Osęka as an attempt of whitewashing Polish history; and it proved controversial even among party colleagues and was therefore abandoned. Two weeks later, a scandal erupted when Anna Azari, Israel's ambassador to Poland, stated that the anti-Semitic events that had happened in Poland in March 1968 occurred nowhere else in the Soviet Bloc. Żaryn perceived this as an attempt to associate the current ruling party with these events and suggested in harsh words that the ambassador should be expelled for such statements.

@François Robere: - Some refs are broken/missing. PLease review. Lembit Staan (talk) 16:20, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. I was aware of it, but since the refs were defined elsewhere in the text, I wasn't sure I could add them without risking ref errors later. Now it's fixed. François Robere (talk) 18:03, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek, Szmenderowiecki, Lembit Staan, Mhorg, CPCEnjoyer, Piotrus, and My very best wishes: It just occurred to me that we can shorten this RfC significantly if we trim sections that aren't controversial, specifically #2-4. I'd like to have a rough count of who supports what, and if there are any objections then what are they (in short!). François Robere (talk) 18:41, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Are you referring to sections 2, 3 and 4 above? Some of that is most certainly controversial. For example #2 is WP:OR and WP:SYNTH. Volunteer Marek 19:47, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: We'll discuss it in a bit. Anything else? François Robere (talk) 19:48, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, a whole bunch. Onet.pl isn't a reliable source but nevermind that part. The real stinker is the claim that "according to Żaryn, there were no Poles who collaborated with the Germans on the crime scene." This is THE FREAKIN' OPPOSITE of what he says. I can't believe you're actually proposing such a blatant BLPVIO which straight up falsifies what a source says about subject of a BLP. You should really withdraw that, since BLP applies to talk pages as well. Volunteer Marek 20:48, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

But VM, that's not part of the RfC - the statement in question in that section is about Ewa Kurek. François Robere (talk) 12:26, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Dude. Stop. It was part of the RfC when I posted my comment (6/22/21 20:48), you just REMOVED IT subsequently [43] (6/23/21 13:57) and are now trying to play it off like “it’s not part of the RfC, what are you talking about”. Why do you do this? How do you expect other editors to engage with you in a good faith manner when you try to pull stunts like these? Volunteer Marek 15:56, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: Please read what you're about to vote on. The intro to the RfC clearly states that where bold text is present, only the bold text is in question. That part of the text wasn't marked in bold when I posted this[44] nor at any time later. It's simply not in the scope of the RfC and never was, since the RfC follows this edit and that wasn't part of it. Me removing that statement was to stop your bickering, otherwise I couldn't care less. François Robere (talk) 17:06, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

??? Are you saying that the dispute is only about the bolded text but the other parts everyone agrees on? Nope. This isn’t how RfCs are done. Volunteer Marek 17:31, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Where's the policy to support this claim, exactly? François Robere (talk) 19:21, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

More (already pointed out - not sure why this has to be repeated in response to this endless WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT) For the "ethnonationalist" claim, the fifth source is this and calls him "right wing" not "ethnonationalist". The second source, this one is a PORTAL of a city. It's nowhere near being RS for such a claim in a BLP nor does it meet the sourcing requirements in this topic area. The fourth source, this one likewise doesn't call him an "ethnonationalist" and AFAICT it's a self published source. The Mink source, the third one [45] also doesn't call him "ethnonationalist" just that he's defended the interwar right wing party. Haven't checked the other one, but so far the track record ain't good. Even if that one last source actually supports the text it's pretty obvious that there are FOUR sources which are being flagrantly misrepresented in order to make the given text look legit. Again, this is straight up misrepresentation of sources that's sanctionable. Volunteer Marek 21:19, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

To be clear, Onet is cited for Żaryn's words only, which are verifiable because you have two accompanying videos to that. I'm not aware of Onet ever manipulating videos of interviews. Having not heard the "nie" part (the host was interrupting), I strike out the passage. The rest stays valid. Again, waiting for your text. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 21:35, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

It's not Onet manipulting any interviews - the interview is what it is. It's whoever put the text in the article that manipulated what was said. But AGF I guess, though the track record here is stretching that to the limit. Volunteer Marek 22:09, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm also unclear as to why you and Francois Robere are editing each other's comments. Volunteer Marek 22:14, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

It's a work in progress, so I'm okay with it as long as edits are done carefully and I don't miss changes. This one looks reasonable and consensual, and since the text was stricken it was also visible. I've now proceeded to remove the statement and attached source, so this should be resolved. François Robere (talk) 14:06, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

I reiterate my support for all the info that has been deleted (having been its author, which is fairly obvious). However, I am still waiting for whatever proposal VM, or Lembit Staan, or GizzyCatBella (of their authorship) propose for the text that would in their opinion be fine (including his statements on Ukraine and Pruchnik, which were not included here for some reason but were well covered, including in academia, and their exclusion from discussion unnecessarily narrows the scope of his senatorial career under discussion - there may appear no consensus for inclusion but at least we should discuss before dismissing/approving it) + any additional RS that could be found by them to expand the text, and from that we could probably select portions from each of the texts as it may seem most appropriate. If we don't want omnibus bills to be passed, we need to have two versions to compare, and we should take the best of both worlds. Ping me or write on the talk page about the article only after that proposal is published, as I see no further need to comment before this happens. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 21:21, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Are you reiterating your support for the claim that "according to Żaryn, there were no Poles who collaborated with the Germans on the crime scene."?

My proposal is simply NOT to include text which falsifies sources. That's it. Why should it be something different? Volunteer Marek 21:55, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

We just keep going around in circles here. - GizzyCatBella🍁 23:11, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek and Szmenderowiecki: Take it slowly, please. I want to address points one by one. François Robere (talk) 11:41, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

• About "ethnonationalist" part, I can't find it in the proposed sources. I don't know if I was wrong in the search. If not, that part simply needs to be removed.
  About "anti-Semitism", in this source[46] already proposed in the text above I find: "Professor Jan Żaryn, ardent defender of the nationalist and anti-Semitic current of "Endecja"". This could be a very interesting part to add.
  About this part: "according to Żaryn, there were no Poles who collaborated with the Germans on the crime scene." if sources have been misinterpreted, we just remove that part. For the rest, if there are no objections, the sources are there and the inserted text explains Zaryn's thought very well. So I am in favor of including the text in the article.--Mhorg (talk) 08:50, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

  Easy as that: Ethnic nationalism, also known as ethnonationalism, is a form of nationalism wherein the nation and nationality are defined in terms of ethnicity, with emphasis on ethnocentric approach to various political issues related to national affirmation of a particular ethnic group.

  What is essentially being described in all these sources is exactly attempts to reinforce the narrative of Polishness via positive myths. We have the nationalist side mentioned explicitly, the "ethno" one is described by Zalewski: "he appears as one of the propagators of the positive national narrative, condemning any forme of historical criticism". Mink, in the paragraph where Żaryn is mentioned, described the general historical policy of PiS, and mentions a few people tied to the historical current of the party (briefly described there), including Andrzej Nowak and Żaryn. Behr says essentially the same (nationalist - explicitly), with the "ethno" part also described thoroughly thoughout the text, matching the definition.

  I wonder why Duch-Dyngosz was removed though. She specialises in Jewish studies. Probably it's not the best of the best sources, but just because it is not a scholarly paper doesn't mean they should not be included. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:34, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

  I agree that it would be hard for a reasonable person not to conclude that Żaryn is an ethno-nationalist, but seeing as this is a very contentious TA (and a BLP within it), we should only use a particular descriptor if an RS already uses it (though it doesn't have to be in English, as long as it's easily translatable).

  I removed Duch-Dyngosz for a couple of reasons, one being that it wasn't clear to me that she's discussing "ethno-nationalist discourse" in the context of Żaryn's positions. I may have misread - an excerpt establishing that connection would be useful. François Robere (talk) 19:38, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Ok, in Italian this term is not used much. The term "nationalist" is enough for us. I don't know, if the word "ethno" is there, then I think it can be used.--Mhorg (talk) 20:32, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

References

References
References

Section 1

Section 1

Żaryn is commonly considered a conservative historian promoting nationalist and anti-communist narratives, and one of the main advocates of the historical policy of the Law and Justice party. He views Polish historical policy as a "battle under the banners of sovereignty, justice [and] freedom", with the state exercising it "so that Poles don't mistake where there is good and where there is evil", and wishes to "strengthen the educational role of history" so it becomes a "widely accepted... positive myth". Żaryn describes Poles as “loving freedom, Catholicism, patriotism and especially being proud of their history”.

@Volunteer Marek and Mhorg:

"Nationalist" or "ethnonationalist": I'm not sure who changed the phrasing from the first to the second. I think the first is better.

1. I'm all for citing OKO.press ("nationalist"), GW (states that his work is "representative of Catholic nationalism") and Jacek Leociak on naTemat (says that Żaryn's 1968 resolution draft is "saturated with nationalism").[47]
2. Frederic Zalewski, Les Marches de l’Indépendance à Varsovie, 2020: "Jan Żaryn... is one of the most active "memory promoters" of PiS and appears to be one of the propagators of a positive national narrative, condemning all forms of critical history. His commitment to the [Independence] March reflects one of the forms of fusion between PiS, which criticizes the "pedagogy of shame" - an expression that... leads, among other things, to a rehabilitation of the anti-Semitic pre-war national right - and the "national" extreme right, which insists on the Polish nationalist political heritage..."
3. Georges Mink, Les historiens polonais, 2017: "...Professor Jan Żaryn, an ardent defender of the nationalist and anti-Semitic current of 'Endecja', which he propagates..."
4. Valentin Behr, Les discussions sur la Shoah en Pologne, 2019: "historians who are very present in the nationalist media, often not specialists in the Shoah (among them Bogdan Musiał, Piotr Gontarczyk, Jan Żaryn and Andrzej Nowak)".
5. Sebastian Łupak and Marta Duch-Dyngosz aren't the best sources for this purpose, so I'll remove them. François Robere (talk) 13:53, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

One. More. Time. Oko press and Natemat are not RS for claims about BLPs. Please stop it with the WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. Volunteer Marek 14:52, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Oko press and Natemat are not RS for claims about BLPs That's your opinion, not the consensus. Feel free to make an entry regarding oko press on WP:RSN if you disagree. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 17:11, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes there is no consensus. Examples are given right in this talk page of twists and spins by oko. Therefore it is out of this bio article regardless any consensuses. Lembit Staan (talk) 19:55, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Again, you are the one claiming oko press is unreliable without providing anything than allegations of "twists and spins", you can't disqualify sources because they disagree with your world view. There is no consensus that oko is unreliable, this is simply a WP:IDONTLIKEIT situation. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 20:34, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Behr appears to be self published. Volunteer Marek 14:53, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

As for Behr, the header says "La version définitive de cet article est parue in Les Polonais et la Shoah. Une nouvelle école historique, Audrey Kichelewski, Judith Lyon-Caen, Jean-Charles Szurek, Anette Wieviorka (dir.), CNRS Éditions, Paris, 2019, p. 275-290." (The final version of this article appears in %bookname%). CNRS Editions is legit. The chapter is linked as courtesy.

PS. Invoking WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT means that you allege that the editor breaches consensus. There is, however no consensus for (un)reliability of oko.press (as by latest edition by Rosguill, and for which the main point for change of status has not been shown to be true), and certainly not for naTemat, which was not at all discussed in RSN. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 16:41, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

1. We can argue about Oko.press later, it's just one source.
2. Think what you may about naTemat, but it's quoting Jacek Leociak and he is an RS. He was probably quoted elsewhere as well.
3. Have you any objections to stating, based on the other sources, that he supports nationalist positions? If not, then how would you summarize them? François Robere (talk) 19:46, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

though he denies that it is dictated by the party - this is incorrect interpretation of what Zaryn said in the interview. The quote in question was torn out of context and put at the top of the interview, as a "clickbait", I guess. In fact in this respect Zaryn's argument is four-pronged (in the context of the questioned text): (A) He reasonably indicates that history politics (HP) is carried out by nearly all governments via their functionaries. (B) HP of the state is not the same as HP of a party. (C) these functionaries are, by the election of Polish people, happen to be associated with PiS (D) these functionaries may screw up. -- In other words he "denies" nothing of the sort, only splits hairs. Therefore this sentence must be removed. Lembit Staan (talk) 23:29, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

The problem is, the linked interview clearly says (twice) that the policy is prepared not by the party but by the government (Jeżeli ktoś rzeczywiście tworzy cokolwiek w kwestii nie historii jako nauki, ale w kwestii, którą nazywamy polityką historyczną, to oczywiście nie PiS, tylko państwo polskie i jego urzędnicy and Ta teza w formie zarzutu jest tezą wewnętrznie zakłamaną, bo to nie PiS, a państwo polskie prowadzi politykę historyczną.), so it's not "clickbait" - he addresses accusations of extra-governmental management of HP coming i.a. from the interview with Rafał Wnuk from Sep 2016.

The "he "denies" nothing of the sort, only splits hairs" shows that you don't see a distinction between state HP and party HP, but he does, or at least argues so to defend the party he is affiliated to from accusations.

It could be reformulated that "though he asserts that it is regulated on the government and not party level". Szmenderowiecki (talk) 08:33, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

policy is prepared not by the party but by the government - he didnt say that and there is no document of this kind prepared by the govt . Lembit Staan (talk) 17:49, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm okay with either solution. Is this better? François Robere (talk) 09:04, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

Once again, no. Wrong summary of his words. " którą nazywamy polityką historyczną, to oczywiście nie PiS, tylko państwo polskie i jego urzędnicy. Tymi urzędnikami stali się decyzją narodu Polskiego ludzie związani z Prawem i Sprawiedliwością, bądź członkowie PiS." - i.e., he says "not PiS, but govt carries it out, but de facto members of PiS carry out this policy. "Pytanie natomiast, czy prowadzi dobrze, czy źle." - i.e. here he weasels out of responsibility. Since you cannot correctly summarize it yourself, you have to find a neutral secondary source which covers this moment. Lembit Staan (talk)

@Szmenderowiecki: regarding Rafał Wnuk: Wnuk speaks of politisation of historians, that they try to suit the interests of a particular party. Therefore the answer of Zaryn focusing on "history politics" being the function of a state is a straw man argument. And once again, this episode of Zaryn's bio must come from secondary sources, because you are right: the answer of Zaryn makes no sense without the "question" of Wnuk, and to cover this "dialog" would be a full-blown original research. Lembit Staan (talk) 18:01, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

This statement may be too complex, but not important enough to justify the length that would be required to explain it. I suggest we drop it. François Robere (talk) 19:24, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't know how many times you have to be reminded that as a rule primary sources must be used only as a corroboration of secondary sources. Wikipedians cannot drastically summarize primary sources because they are not qualified for that. Lembit Staan (talk) 18:01, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

WP:ABOUTSELF. It's his attributed opinions in his article. François Robere (talk) 19:24, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I've been explaining all along, taken out of context it makes little sense. Yes, PiS has its policy. Yes, state has its policy. So what? Not to say that your summary "is not dictated by the party" is wrong, if not exactly opposite what he said. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:16, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I've removed it. What do you think of the section after the removal? François Robere (talk) 09:24, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

"Promoting" is still POV. This source - what is it and does it meet sourcing requirements? There's also mistranslation of going on with regard to the word "mit". In English mit --> myth --> implies something false. Here it just means a "story" or "narrative" or "set of shared values". It's false equivocation. So that's also POV. Volunteer Marek 17:09, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't think it is POV - he talks about "historical PR" a lot. The alternatives were "holds", which is arguably less encyclopedic; and "advocates", which is basically the same. Other options?

Znad Wilii is a small Polish-Lithuanian outlet headed by Česlav Okinčic with financial support from the Polish gov. The piece covers a public debate between Żaryn and Rimvydas Valatka, organized by the the Polish Institute. It was probably used as a source on Żaryn views on state historiography ("Polish historical policy... is a battle under the banners of sovereignty, justice, freedom. The state should exercise historical policy so that Poles don't mistake where there is good and where there is evil"). I'll correct that.

Not necessarily, but it does carry grand historical connotations that aren't replicated with "story", or even with "narrative".[48][49] Plus, dictionary says that's the correct translation.[50] François Robere (talk) 20:28, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

If you have to look up a dictionary for the word 'mit', you probably should not translate sensitive things. FYI 'mit' also means "spiced up, embellished, exaggerated story". (Znad Wilii quote sounds correct. BTW any govt can subscribe under this kind of statement. The real issue is how it is implemented. Whitewashing its own history it not a trademark of the Soviet Union.) Lembit Staan (talk) 20:40, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't have to do anything other than follow WP:POLICY, and Policy dictates that our statements be grounded in sources. VM disagreed on the translation, so I cited a dictionary. According to the dictionary, "mit" and "mitologia"[51] translate to English cleanly, so I see no reason to change the wording. François Robere (talk) 10:41, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

As an aside, I'm amused astounded by the fact that VM, an advocate of accurate translations and word-for-word quotes throughout these discussions, is suddenly asking that we modify a perfectly good translation because the BLP's choice of words might paint him negatively... François Robere (talk) 12:22, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

If the translation is word for word, there is no reason to object. Furthermore, it seems clear to me that the word "myth" refers precisely to a way of telling the history for political purposes, an attitude that reflects the personality of Zaryn, according to what we read around.--Mhorg (talk) 12:43, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

I happen to agree with the second statement, but the logic in "If the translation is word for word, there is no reason to object" is out of whack. Words have different meanings, some of them are not literal and understood only from context. You and I know that the meaning on question is "national myth", but how would the reader of the short wikipedia blurb know that and not conclude that Zaryn suggests to write fairy tales? And this is exactly one of the problems with wikipedian's original research based on primary sources. In fact, even biased secondary sources can grab this opportunity to add some extra smear. Lembit Staan (talk) 19:16, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm fairly sure no one wants to dive into that rabbit hole, so let's just assume Mhorg meant "accurate" and be done with. Also, I suggest we treat our reader as sufficiently acquainted with the material that they're either aware of, or are willing to learn about "national myths" by clicking the link.

Translation alone does not count as WP:OR, BTW (see WP:TRANSCRIPTION, WP:NONENG and WP:TRLA). François Robere (talk) 20:07, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

Of course Zaryn shoots himself in the foot by using terminology "positive myths", "national mythology", etc. In order to understand what he means, you have to know the context. Let me give you an example from the mentioned article in Znad Wilii, where he speaks about "Cursed soldiers". Their generalized image is what he calls a "positive myth": they did fight the Soviet occupation after all. At the same time many of them were far from being "valiant heroes" and Lithuanians may have a less than positive memories about them as well. But certainly you are not going to teach kids at school that Wojciech "Wolf" Wilczynski burned a house of the chief of the local PGS, together with him, his wife and his gramps. What Zaryn says there is: leave history to historians, but the public historical narrative must be in a positive light. Do we have any neutral secondary sources which discuss this element of Zaryn's worldview? Lembit Staan (talk) 21:04, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

That said, I see no glaring issues with the current state of Section 1: it has no obvious nonsense. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:04, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

P.S. Zaryn has the whole book, "Polska pamięć. O historii i polityce historycznej”, and the source of wisdom about Zaryn's views on history politics must be a neutral review this book, rather than random blurbs from random newspapers. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:15, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

I understand perfectly what he means, and indeed he is shooting himself in the foot. We're not liable for his choice of words, and can't edit translations to suit our fancy. If context is needed, we can link national myth.

The thing is Żaryn is also a public figure, and he lets loose on newspapers and other media often enough that, were we to discard their timely coverage, we'd wrong both him and our readers. François Robere (talk) 12:10, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm ok with the use of "national myth" wikilink, that's pretty much what Zaryn meant, impossible to get around it.--Mhorg (talk) 12:43, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

@CPCEnjoyer, Lembit Staan, Mhorg, Szmenderowiecki, and Volunteer Marek: Seems to me that we've exhausted the discussion on section 1. The final draft is here. Are there any other objections? Can we move ahead with inclusion, or does this still require an RfC? François Robere (talk) 15:40, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 16:56, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

All good with me, I think it is fine as it is. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 01:08, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

For me the part is ready to be inserted in the article.--Mhorg (talk) 08:57, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I have no objections with the usage of the sources cited, although the "reference bombing" leaves bad impression and clearly several of them are irrelevant to this section or redundant. Lembit Staan (talk) 15:43, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

This is mainly the result of trying to deal with objections by condensing the text as much as possible, while keeping as many good sources as possible. Perhaps instead of cutting sources we can combine them in a footnote, as is sometimes done? François Robere (talk) 15:53, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I see. You cut the text, but left the footnotes. Some of them, good or bad, IMO became irrelevant. Please review. Lembit Staan (talk) 17:16, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

It's been done before in similar situations, though IIRC there's a way to do that that exposes the refs directly in the footnote.

Any particular refs that you deem irrelevant? François Robere (talk) 19:00, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

State of the consensus (section 1)

I believe we have consensus to include this section as presented. Correct? François Robere (talk) 11:51, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

It’s too long for what info it’s trying to convey and good chunk of it is undue. It’s just… better than the rest of the proposals here but that’s not saying much. Volunteer Marek 22:56, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

Actually looking at it again this one suffers from the questionable-translation-of-primary-sources which is OR as well. Volunteer Marek 23:27, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

In my opinion for this section we have come to do a good job. We can move on to other sections.--Mhorg (talk) 08:11, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

References

References
References

Section 2

Section 2

Żaryn believes that anti-Semitism in Interwar Poland was reinforced by "rational thinking", further arguing that Polish-Jewish "tensions" intensified mostly due to economic reasons. Historian Dariusz Libionka disagrees with the latter statement. Criticizing Żaryn's article Holocaust, Libionka points out many errors and sloppy statements, and states that Żaryn "does not know basic facts" about World War II. He notes that, while Żaryn's works on other subjects are often "valuable historical literature", those on Polish-Jewish relations are tainted by his "ideological sympathies and inspirations". Criticizing Żaryn's introduction to the educational booklet Polacy ratujący Żydów w latach II wojny światowej (Polish rescuers of Jews during World War II), Ewa Koźmińska-Frejlak writes that Żaryn is advancing his own views rather than simply presenting facts, leaving the impression that he is trying to "blame the victim" (the Jews) in order to diminish the responsibility assigned to Poles.

@Volunteer Marek:

Żaryn argues that the tensions between Jews and other nations in Interwar Poland were mostly due to economic reasons. Scholars dispute this characterization.

References

1. Koźmińska-Frejlak, Edukacja czy dialog z cieniami, 2009: @Mhorg and Szmenderowiecki: Could you kindly give us an excerpt from pp. 471-472?
2. Libionka, “Truth About Camps” or the Uneventful 1942, 2013: Extensive quote given at Talk:Jan Żaryn/Archive 1#Other sources: "Żaryn repeats the ritual formula that the Polish-Jewish “tensions” intensified at the end of the 1930s “primarily on economic grounds.” It shows that the author understood neither the texts... [of several authors] and by hundreds of their imitators nor articles from the nationalist press... Anti-Jewish writers and leaders of anti-Semitic organizations would surely have been surprised if they had heard that they reduced the “Jewish threat” to economic considerations."
3. Libionka, W poszukiwaniu miliona Sprawiedliwych, 2015: Don't have time ATM to look for the specific quote. @Mhorg and Szmenderowiecki: Help would be appreciated.

These are all open sources, and links have been provided. François Robere (talk) 12:23, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

The issue here is with the bolded part. First, this isn’t “scholars”. This is two authors. Libionka and Kozminsks Frejlak. So “scholars” would need to be replaced with their names. Attributed. However, it’s not two either. It’s really one. Libionka. While Kozminska-Frejlak’s tone seems to be derogatory in her review she never actually “disputed” anything. At least in that part. She just says “Zaryn thinks this. Zaryn says that”.

Separate question is whether this is actually WP:DUE. Is this important? Central to this guy’s BLP? Volunteer Marek 12:45, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Once this is attributed it may be ok except as VM says above - is this central to him? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 15:00, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

No, it’s not. - GizzyCatBella🍁 16:25, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

About Edukacja czy dialog z cieniami source, I read: "Konflikt polsko-żydowski – często bardzo ostry w słowach antysemityzm – dotyczył głównie kwestii ekonomicznych” (The Polish-Jewish conflict - often very sharp in words anti-Semitism - mainly concerned economic issues"). So, this part is confirmed.--Mhorg (talk) 20:11, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

@Francois Robere

Quotes

Koźmińska-Frejlak: Lektura napisanego przez Jana Żaryna „Wprowadzenia” do Materiałów dla nauczyciela również nie pozostawia złudzeń, że bardziej niż na przedstawieniu faktów autorowi zależało na przybliżeniu stanowiska zajmowanego przez niego w sporach o stosunek polskiego społeczeństwa do Zagłady, a przy okazji na obronie określonej wizji Polski i polskości [...] (detailed explanation of his train of thought) Rozumowanie Żaryna w tej części nieuchronnie prowadzi do wniosku, zresztą wyrażonego explicite, że to sami Żydzi swym postępowaniem kolosalnie utrudnili przyjście im z pomocą w latach próby. Czytamy: „Polonizacja Żydów w czasie okupacji niemieckiej warunkowała szansę ich uratowania, w tym podjęcie przez nich heroicznej decyzji o przejściu na »stronę aryjską«”18. Jak w takiej sytuacji można rozliczać polskie społeczeństwo – chciałoby się zapytać... Żaryn nie stroni także od ukazywania „przewin” polskiego społeczeństwa. Tyle tylko, że zawsze znajduje dla nich na pozór racjonalne uzasadnienie (jak w przypadku numerus nullus), czasem pokazuje, że symetryczne zasady dyskryminacyjne stosowane były także po stronie żydowskiej, niekiedy je po prostu bagatelizuje i zbywa. Libionka (3): remove, have "Truth about camps" text stay. It's anyway the same scholar. Please don't ask for confirmation.

Szmenderowiecki (talk) 17:47, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Besides, for starter, what I have originally written was "though some scholars have disputed this characterisation of Polish-Jewish relations" instead of the bolded sentence, which IMHO sounds more appropriate.

For the "mainly economic reasons", I'd propose citing Żaryn in addition to the sources, in which he claims that the nationalist parties were trying to soothe tensions while trying to appeal to the Polish peasantry and artisans. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Szmenderowiecki (talk • contribs) 21:03, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

@Szmenderowiecki and Mhorg: Thanks for the translation. There's one particular statement there I find outrageous, assuming I read it correctly: "the Jewish minority... was shut off from the needs of the common folk, became competitive and rejected modernization... which under the conditions the economic crisis gave rise to conflicts"...

@Volunteer Marek and Piotrus: The importance of this is twofold: first, it's a form of denial of antisemitism which connects very well with everything else we have on him. Second, as an historian, such harsh criticisms by other historians (who are no less qualified in those areas, to say the least) is notable. We should probably quote more from the sources (with attribution), rather than the approach we took thus far to keep everyone happy - less. François Robere (talk) 20:34, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

No this is not a denial of antisemitism. I strongly recommend you to re-read the antisemitism article (unless it was radically rewritten since the last time (long ago) I edited it. Economic excuses is one of the three (or four) major roots of antisemitism. Lembit Staan (talk) 23:36, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

So just to be clear, you are saying it is antisemitism? _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 08:00, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I've added more content to #2 from previous revisions, and removed the highlight. Please review. François Robere (talk) 10:11, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

The stuff on "immaculate" (???)? No. We just went over how you guys were mistranslating the interview to have it say the opposite of what the man actually said. Right above. His quote was falsified. Now you want to use the same source for some other quote. No. This is exactly why we generally avoid WP:PRIMARY sources. Translating such sources is original research even under the best of circumstances. And here we are far from best circumstances as the total misrepresentation of one quote already shows. Volunteer Marek 17:04, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

It's WP:ABOUTSELF, and I've no problem adding his exact words in a footnote: "Nie, nie jesteśmy niepokalanym narodem. Przed wojną też był antysemityzm, ale on też miał swoje umocowanie w racjonalnym myśleniu".[52] How would you translate this? François Robere (talk) 20:38, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: No, translating text is not considered WP:OR, see WP:TRANSCRIPTION. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 17:06, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

When you mistranslated the source to say the opposite of what it says? Yeah I guess that’s not “OR” but even worse. But yeah translating primary sources is indeed OR. Volunteer Marek 19:20, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

No, it is not original research, read what I sent. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 20:26, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, it is WP:OR.- GizzyCatBella🍁 21:13, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Faithfully translating sourced material into English, or transcribing spoken words from audio or video sources, is not considered original research. For information on how to handle sources that require translation, see WP:Verifiability § Non-English sources. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 21:20, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Do not analyze, evaluate, interpret, or synthesize material found in a primary source yourself; instead, refer to reliable secondary sources that do so. - GizzyCatBella🍁 21:28, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Don't feed trolls. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:42, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Resorting to WP:PA because you can't provide an argument for your stonewalling?

Also @GizzyCatBella: did you not read what I sent? CPCEnjoyer (talk) 22:08, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

People who translate primary sources receive copyrights for their translations. It’s considered scholarly original research. What WP:TRANSCRIPTION is talking about is *faithful* translation of secondary sources. That’s not the case here. Neither the “faithful” nor the “secondary” part. Volunteer Marek 14:20, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

People who translate primary sources receive copyrights for their translations. It’s considered scholarly original research. Receiving copyrights is in no way "scholarly original research". If you read the terms under which we contribute, everyone who writes here retains copyright, regardless in which language it is published and from which source something is published, so long as we don't violate their copyrights (see WP:C and this). Copyrights are not violated if someone is misquoted, though obviously it is not desired for other reasons. Not that I particularly care about the legalese or the copyright at all, but that's how it looks.

The stuff contributed isn't always perfect (as has been demonstrated), but correcting it to a better translation rectifies the problem. And, again, I have tried my best, and if I misheard something and someone pointed that out and indeed you were right, I corrected it swiftly, and that is how I see the discussion going smoothly.

WP:TRANSCRIPTION and WP:RSUE are two parts of guidelines that expressly permit translating stuff, and, given the not-so-large amount of sources in English, we are forced to do that with Polish. While translations published by reliable sources are preferred over translations by Wikipedians, it isn't true that translations by Wikipedians are not allowed as OR. If you are able to find an RS translation for all these fragments - go and add it, if it is any different from mine. Again, if you aren't fine with the translation given - provide yours. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 17:37, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

Are everyone done now? Can we get back to the text? @Volunteer Marek: any objections not addressed above? François Robere (talk) 12:38, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes. Same one as before. The stuff based on someone’s clumsy (“immaculate”) if not outright wrong (pretending Zaryn said the opposite of what he actually said) translation of a primary source is a NO. Volunteer Marek 14:20, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

1. According to what policy? WP:TRANSCRIPTION says nothing about "secondary sources", just "sourced material".
2. WP:TRLA gives a list of Wikipedians who are capable, among others, of "[helping] you with translating reliable sources that are used to support parts of articles". Piotrus is on that list - shall we ping him?
3. Alternatively, you can suggest a translation yourself.[53] François Robere (talk) 15:19, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

We have WP:PRIMARY. And we *just saw* an instance where an editor tried to translate a primary source and ended up claiming that the BLP subject said the OPPOSITE of what the subject actually said. And then you insisted on including that false translation in the article. Now you’re trying to brush it off as nothing serious (it was quite serious) and are trying to include more user-generated translations from a primary source. And this for something that’s not all that DUE in the first place. How about we learn our lesson and don’t? Volunteer Marek 05:08, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

1. WP:PRIMARY has an exception for "straightforward, descriptive statements of facts" - like Żaryn's words, which also fall under WP:ABOUTSELF. There's also WP:TRANSCRIPTION and WP:RSUE, both of which support this use.
2. That "instance" was part of the existing text, not my suggestion,[54] and I did not "insist" on including it - in fact I clearly stated that I couldn't care less.[55] You've read my comment, you replied to it (with yet another claim that isn't backed by Policy [56][57]), and now you're circling back to something you know isn't true?
3. Since we started these discussions the article grew almost seventeenfold, from less than 2.5k to over 39k. There are bound to be errors - you just happen to have found the worst of them, and now you're hanging on to it like the future of Wikipedia depended on it. It doesn't. Multiple policies support this use, and there's no reason not to follow them. François Robere (talk) 10:08, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Obviously this isn’t a case of “straightforward descriptive statements of facts” as we just saw with the false translation of what he said about Jedwabne. Same here with difficult to translate words like “immaculate” and “umocowani”. The exception in WP:PRIMARY is there for non controversial stuff. This here? It’s controversial. Volunteer Marek 17:18, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't know about that. I looked in several dictionaries and they all translate "niepokalany" as "immaculate", as do our Polish colleagues. But again, you're more than welcome to suggest a translation of your own. François Robere (talk) 19:57, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

As anyone who's done translations knows, the meaning of words depends on context. Like "cool". Or "troll". Here the word just means "not guiltless" or, simpler, "innocent". Volunteer Marek 02:05, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Right. And if we changed "immaculate" to "innocent", will the meaning of the quote change substantially? Will it suddenly mean something completely different? It won't, which means the quote is accurate enough, and this whole discussion on on policy was useless. As for the word itself: Żaryn's entire public persona is based on two things: that he's an historian, and that he's a devout Catholic. One can assume he knows what "immaculate" means. Can we change it? Yes, we can - there are other words that we can use that won't change the essence of the quote, such as "perfect" ("innocent" is too mellow) - but then we'd be taking out the subtext that Żaryn himself injected to the phrase with his choice of words. François Robere (talk) 11:46, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

@CPCEnjoyer, Lembit Staan, Mhorg, Piotrus, Szmenderowiecki, and Volunteer Marek: Any other comments on section 2? Note the final draft is here, and now includes the entire paragraph (when we started it was only about the statement "scholars dispute this characterization"). Again I want to know if this is something we should discuss further, include as-is, or RfC. François Robere (talk) 10:25, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I believe it's fine content-wise, though I would propose a little change in the structuring of the sentence.

He argues that the tensions between Jews and other peoples in Interwar Poland were mostly due to economic reasons. Scholars dispute this characterization;

I think it would be good to perhaps join these two sentences together, like:

"He argues that the tensions between Jews and other peoples in Interwar Poland were mostly due to economic reasons, a characterization disputed by scholars;"

Though this really is a minor "issue", if you can call it that, and more of a suggestion. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 10:38, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I see a problem with "Scholars dispute this characterization". Right now this is really "Two scholars dispute this". Libionka is named and cited. Unless more scholars are found the other scholar should attributed in a single sentence, or this formulation dropped. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:40, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I think "Scholars dispute this characterization;" is mostly used to preface Dariusz's comments on the matter. Though you are right, perhaps we should also include what the other scholar said and attribute it after. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 10:48, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

It is, though it's also factually correct (scholars have refuted that claim numerous times, just not in the context of Żaryn). @Piotrus and CPCEnjoyer: How about this? François Robere (talk) 11:01, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

François Robere, That would be fine with me. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 04:32, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

"not in the context of Zaryn". Gee. Maybe this is ... WP:SYNTHesis? Volunteer Marek 02:03, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Can you like, read the dif or the Section 2 above? The comment you claim to be synthesis was rewritten. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 11:19, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

That's exactly my point..? François Robere (talk) 11:47, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Nothing more is to be found specifically in the context of Jan Żaryn ("JŻ says X and this is BS" or something similar), but there are many other scholars who have said "Some historians said X and this is BS" (same X), so yes, I'd agree with François Robere that, at least from the non-conservative side of historians, the claim is hotly contested in general, and not specifically about Żaryn. While I'd prefer the earlier version, if that's the only bone of contention, I think we should simply move on. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 15:18, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I wasted quite some time to read carefully the sources cited, and as usual in this article, I have serious objections to most of the text of part 2. I will write them down later, because I have a real life as well. (I have no issues with the sources, but, as usual with this bio, with misuse of the sources.) Lembit Staan (talk) 15:32, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

"miał swoje umocowanie w racjonalnym myśleniu"

OK, let me start with the issue debated above.

While the "nepokalany" piece has its translation issues, the "umocowanie" is a glaring example of what can go wrong with "dictinoary-based" translation and quoting out of context. If you read the suggested translation, the anti-Semitism "also had its roots in rational thinking.", you will probably think: "This Zaryn must be out of his mind. I am a computer scientist, rational thinking is my whole, so now what? Because of this I am bound to become an anti-Semite? And this doped tramp in a tent in Philadelphia streets is safe?" Really???" If the translator was not so eager to cherry-pick something negative of Zyran, they would read the original text a bit further and maybe, just maybe, would have guessed the correct translation: "the anti-Semitism was reinforced by rational arguments [here goes the skipped continuation:] .... such as: the Jews who lived in the territories of Pomerania, Greater Poland Voivodship and Silesia were much in favor for these lands to belong to Germany. Certainly this didn't improve Polish attitudes to the Jews." - And let me think a bit: what does this resemble? Let me read Wikipedia a bit... Yes!! This is one of the standard elements of anti-Semitism: reinforcement by rationalizing!

Concluding, wikipedian's ignorant translation makes it exactly upside down: it posits Zaryn as a moron, while in fact he was explaining a bullet from "Anti-Semitism-101" slides. In order to render this small piece of a primary source correctly, the translator must know well at least 4 (four) things: (A) Polish language (B) Polish culture and history (C) what is anti-Semitism, and finally, (D) that cherry-picking is bad idea. Lembit Staan (talk) 23:31, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

First, I hope that all other editors and I are not writing about him as if that person were a moron. Whether his arguments make sense for me, or you, is irrelevant. Second, it's not even my fragment, but it was supported by the text.

Looking at the whole argument, I don't really see your point. On the one hand, you write that economic excuses is one of the three (or four) major roots of antisemitism. (addressing "denial of antisemitism" claim); we have another example here (political excuse, let's name it); on the other hand, you say that he was somehow misquoted/taken out of context which makes him look somehow worse than he is. I have hard times understanding what exactly you want to do with the fragment.

Addressing my (and my colleagues') supposed total ignorance about points A-C: the mere fact he says that anti-Semitism "had its roots in rational thinking" at any point is more than enough for me. It doesn't matter which reasoning/excuse he picked. Note that he's not saying that "they thought they were being rational while being hostile against Jews, seeing them as detrimental to the Polish independence", as we'd write in Wikipedia, but says it without attributing that opinion to Poles of the time. To rephrase his quote, "anti-Semitism was a phenomenon based on rational arguments. For instance, in 1918-19 Jews were hindering efforts to create an independent Polish state in the German partition - sure, they could have had their arguments to do so, but they also drew the ire of Poles". It sounds like a pretty lousy rationalisation attempt to me.

Tl;dr: the quote should stay as is. The example he gives contributes nothing to the context and does not distort his opinion, contrary to what some say here. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 13:27, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

the mere fact he says that anti-Semitism "had its roots in rational thinking" at any point is more than enough for me He doesn't freaking say that!!! That's the whole freaking point!!! He says something completely different. BLP applies to freaking talk pages so STOP VIOLATING BLP by smearing this guy with your POV false translations!

This is the second time you've done this. First you falsely translated where he says "there were Polish collaborators in Jedwabne" to "there were NO Polish collaborators in Jedwabne". Now you're trying to falsely translate the fact that he said that anti-semities tried to "rationalize" their prejudice to pretend he said that "anti-semitism had roots in rational thinking".

Just stop. BLP is a policy. Volunteer Marek 14:51, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

VM, we're all entitled to our opinions on this TP, and you should give others the benefit of the doubt that they're reading the text differently than you do, rather than trying to intentionally smear the BLP. Szmenderowiecki's reading, which is also mine and CPCEnjoyer's, is at least as valid as yours and Lembit Staan's. François Robere (talk) 16:28, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

No, “your reading” of the translation is not “just as valid” anymore than translating when the guy says “there were Polish collaborators” to “there were NO Polish collaborators” is. This isn’t about “different reading of the text” or some such post modernist nonsense, it’s, just, wrong. Volunteer Marek 14:05, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Note that he's not saying that "they thought they were being rational while being hostile against Jews, seeing them as detrimental to the Polish independence", as we'd write in Wikipedia, but says it without attributing that opinion to Poles of the time. This. François Robere (talk) 16:28, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

(more to follow; with tentative conclusion that the whole section 2 should go) Lembit Staan (talk) 01:12, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

You have "umocowanie w racjonalnym myśleniu" that's for sure Lembit Staan. Congrats on your strength to endure all of this. - GizzyCatBella🍁 01:22, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Right. He's not saying that these were "rational" arguments, he's saying that people who made the arguments tried to rationalize their attidues. ... ... ... Ahem: THIS IS WHY WE DON'T TRANSLATE PRIMARY SOURCES OURSELVES!!!! It's original research! Usually bad, POV, original research. Volunteer Marek 02:02, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I will just ignore the strawman in the first part of your reply, because no rational human being would respond like that and frankly might be the most ridiculous thing I have ever read.

To address your "proper translation" here is the original quote:

Przed wojną też był antysemityzm, ale on też miał swoje umocowanie w racjonalnym myśleniu, np. w takim, że na terenie powiedzmy Pomorza, Wielkopolski i Śląska, Żydzi, którzy tam mieszkali, optowali w roku 1918, żeby te tereny należały do Niemiec. Mieli swoje racje, ale to miało wywołać prożydowskie emocje?[58]

It is very obvious what he means to imply with his "umocowanie w racjonalnym myśleniu" comment, this is further supported by his last sentence: "Mieli swoje racje, ale to miało wywołać prożydowskie emocje?" You imply that the translation is "ignorant" because we do not understand "Polish language, culture & history", yet clearly you are the one who does not understand the implications of what he said. @Szmenderowiecki, what do you think? I believe the "roots in rational thinking" translation is correct and that the last comment really lets Jan's opinion regarding anti-semitism shine. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 12:19, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I will just ignore the strawman in the first part of your reply, because no rational human being would respond like that and frankly might be the most ridiculous thing I have ever read. Please read WP:NPA. Volunteer Marek 12:56, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

What personal attack? Me saying that Lembit Staan's strawman's arguments are ridiculous? Basically everything in the sentence you quoted is addressed to him, not Lembit Staan. Also, civility goes both ways, WP:STRAWMAN: Quoting others out of context and other forms of straw man argument are against the civility policy CPCEnjoyer (talk) 13:08, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Yeah that as well as the insult in your statement "no rational human being". Read WP:NPA. Volunteer Marek 14:53, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

But I've read it? Nowhere did I make a comment regarding Lembit Staan themselves, everything I've said was directed at his strawman, I commented on the content, not the contributor. Please stop trying to spin this. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 14:58, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

So when you wrote "most ridiculous thing I've ever read" that... wasn't about "Lembit Staan themselves". Come on. Who's spinning here? Volunteer Marek 15:14, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, it was about the argument his strawman presented, though if he has taken offense from that I apologize as it was not my intention to "personally attack" him.

Also, could you please help us with translation? Since you disagree with our version, I am sure you can provide the "proper" version and we can take a look at it, thank you, CPCEnjoyer (talk) 15:20, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

First of all, calm down. This is not a question of translation but of interpretation, and we could have the same argument in English or any other language.

Nie, nie jesteśmy niepokalanym narodem. Przed wojną też był antysemityzm, ale on też miał swoje umocowanie w racjonalnym myśleniu, np. w takim, że na terenie powiedzmy Pomorza, Wielkopolski i Śląska, Żydzi, którzy tam mieszkali, optowali w roku 1918, żeby te tereny należały do Niemiec. Mieli swoje racje, ale to miało wywołać prożydowskie emocje?

He starts with "We're not perfect. Antisemitism existed, but it was also grounded in rational thinking." That "but"? Not a lot of ways you can read that.

Then the last sentence - "Mieli swoje racje, ale to miało wywołać prożydowskie emocje?" - "[The Jews] had their reasons, but were [their acts] supposed to evoke pro-Jewish emotions?" reads as "When the Jews did so and so, how were the Poles supposed to react?", which seems like a rationalization of antisemitic attitudes, rather than a scholarly explanation on the formation of stereotypes. After all, the whole point of stereotypes (and conspiracy theories, and blood libels, and prejudice, and a whole lot more) is that of rational elements embedded in an irrational framework - but that's not what Żaryn suggests; Żaryn just suggests that the prejudice was a rational reaction. Therein lies the problem, and our disagreement.

Is there anything in that interview that could establish one reading over the other? François Robere (talk) 12:41, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Please don't tell other editors to "calm down". That's a violation of WP:CIVIL. Yes, multiple editors are frustrated with these repeated attempts at falsely translating a primary source in a very POV way, in a way which says the OPPOSITE of what the subject says, since that's a sanctionable BLP violation, and the persistent WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT that accompanies these efforts, but doesn't give you the right to insult them. Volunteer Marek 12:53, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I think it would be more productive to address the actual arguments instead of casting aspersions, you have the whole quote listed out and its meaning is very obvious; but sure, can you provide your own "proper" translation so we can examine it? CPCEnjoyer (talk) 13:13, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Or... an appeal to an editor to put their emotions aside and stay on-topic, since they're not the only ones who are tired of this discussion and have better things to do.[59] It was either that or something about WP:AGF, and I figured that would be less empathic. François Robere (talk) 13:57, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Stop insulting other editors. Stop trying to taunt other editors by condescending to them. And most of all stop it with the POV original research where you keep falsely mis-translating WP:PRIMARY sources and then try to "rationalize" it with some irrelevant policies about transcription.

BLP applies to talk pages. Icewhiz got banned for creating attack pages on BLPs. In one instance he falsified a quote by a BLP subject to smear them. When that was brought up you defended that by claiming it was just "about self" and other such (even though "about self" is irrelevant when we're talking about a straight up falsification of what the subject said). This is deja vu. Why are we going through the same problem again, after all this time and all the warnings and blocks? Volunteer Marek 14:57, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

To stop this chat, let me notice that regardless who is right and who is wrong, since we have here two opposite readings of the primary source, this statement is out of the window, since it is no longer a trivial translation, but an interpretation by a wikipedian. Lembit Staan (talk) 18:47, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lembit Staan: I agree it's no longer trivial, which is why I wanted to ask what you'd think about asking for advice in some other venue, or moving this statement to its own RfC section. François Robere (talk) 18:56, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

There is nothing to ask; Since one cannot read Zaryn's brain, any choice of interpretation of what he said would be original research no matter how many wikipedians !vote. Lembit Staan (talk) 19:44, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

What?

No one is claiming we should read his brain, it's simply you claiming that a translation is "false" when it clearly is not. CPCEnjoyer (talk) 19:59, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I disagree. Your translation and mine are not substantially different, but our reading of the quote is; and you can see some native speakers disagree with yours, just as some agree. So it's not a matter of translation, but of interpretation, and for that an RfC could be useful.

Regarding mind reading - why bother when you can just email the man and ask? Granted, it won't hold for WP:RS, but I'll take your word for it. François Robere (talk) 20:20, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I'd agree third party opinion is badly needed here. I'm afraid we are bound to arrive (or have arrived) at an editorial impasse (again!), so I'd be all for requesting it. We anyway have nothing to lose in terms of quality if we do that, and hopefully we will be able to move forward instead of writing treatises over the meaning of a single phrase (c'mon, we are not scholars of the US Constitution).

Btw, the draft in the collapsible box does not give an interpretation of his quote (which we obviously shouldn't), so there's no OR to begin with. Whether he was misquoted (or any other contentious issues) can be resolved by advice/input of fellow Wikipedians. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 21:32, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

That’s not how this works. This is not how any of it works. You can’t do OR and put it in the article. You guys already badly mistranslated one quote, now you want to mistranslate another and when other editors object you’re like “let’s get a third opinion”. Just no. It’s original research, this is a BLP, stop trying to turn this into an attack page with your false translations of primary sources. Volunteer Marek 14:03, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

BTW (thanks for reminding me), Ewa Koźmińska-Frejak (Edukacja czy dialog z cieniami, 2009) writes this about one of his texts: "Żaryn's reasoning... leads inevitably to the conclusion, which he states explicitly, that it was the conduct of the Jews themselves that made them colossally difficult to aid... How could Polish society be held accountable under such circumstances, one could ask... Żaryn does not shy away from exposing the "faults" of Polish society, but he always finds a seemingly rational justification for them...". Rings a bell? François Robere (talk) 21:28, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lembit Staan: Putting interpretation aside, are these translation fragments accurate? "We're not perfect. Antisemitism existed, but it was also grounded in rational thinking.", "[The Jews] had their reasons, but were [their acts] supposed to evoke pro-Jewish emotions?" François Robere (talk) 08:55, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

No. These are not correct. This has already been pointed out half a dozen times. WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. Volunteer Marek 14:08, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Why are they not correct? How would you translate it, word for word? I'm asking because Lembit Staan's translation was interspersed with commentary, and since I think it's more about the commentary than the actual translation, I'd like to see how your (or his) verbatim translation fairs vs. mine. Will they really be so different, or - as Szmenderowiecki suggests - we'd end up realizing again[60] that the statement in the text adequately summarizes both? François Robere (talk) 14:42, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

This proposed text is based on a WP:PRIMARY source, in a language that people who want to put the text in don’t even speak - so they’re google translating or projecting their own opinions onto this guys words. This is classic no-no as far as Wikipedia policy goes.

Just drop it. Volunteer Marek 14:10, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't recall anyone being asked, or stating on their own accord what languages they speak. Assuming that anyone who disagrees with you must be illiterate is not appropriate. François Robere (talk) 14:53, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I’m not assuming anyone is illiterate. Stop it. Stop accusing me of things I didn’t do. That is also a personal attack and incivil. I did “assume” that the people mistranslating some of this text don't actually speak Polish as a native language because... they’ve said so themselves.

Regardless, we’re simply not putting in any original research based on POV mistranslations of WP:PRIMARY sources. This is a BLP and even if somehow you got local consensus here - which you’re not even close to having, site wide consensus regarding BLPs trumps that. So seriously, just let this one go. Volunteer Marek 21:35, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

This is the problem with doing OR based on primary sources. Leave it to others. Just drop the whole “rationalize” vs “rational thinking” part and move on to other parts. Volunteer Marek 21:38, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

"mostly due to economic reasons"

The suggested text says "a characterization disputed by sociologist Ewa Koźmińska-Frejak and historian Dariusz Libionka" -- I say, no it is not. I may be mistaken or missed something in the source cited, but if you disagree, please provide quotes which dispute this characterization.

Please keep in mind that the suggested quote -- "Anti-Jewish writers and leaders of anti-Semitic organizations would surely have been surprised if they had heard that they reduced the “Jewish threat” to economic considerations" -- is a non-argument and goes out, because it is a false straw-man argument, because Zaryn wrote "mostly due to", therefore he did not imply that "they reduced the “Jewish threat” to economic.." In fact, Zaryn mentions other sources of anti-Semitism as well.

Also, I doubt that someone may disprove his "mostly"; one may only question it, because I doubt there is any statistics that 30% of antiS in Poland was economic, 34% was religious, 45% was racism, 13% was belief in antisemitic canards, and 27% was politically motivated. In fact many reputable researchers argue that economic antisemitism is most dangerous because it hits the "most valuable" an average person has: his money and well-being. Yes, blood libel case are very noisy, but they are rare and in the everyday life the thought that world Jewry steals my money would bother me more than the belief that Jews crucified Jesus. Lembit Staan (talk) 19:25, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't think there's any doubt about what Libionka wrote in the quote that was already provided multiple times, and as long as he's as notable a source as he is, we're not going to OR analyses of his arguments.

A quote for KF was provided earlier in this discussion, in a frame titled "quotes"; for more context we should ping Szmenderowiecki, who was kind enough to find it. François Robere (talk) 21:14, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm not asking to analyze Libionka's arguments. A'm asking to prove that he delivered any, i.e., the wikipedian's statement "a characterization disputed " is true. Kozminska-Frejak certainly delivered none beyond the sniggering remark cited. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:57, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Libionka explicitly contradicts Żaryn. What else? François Robere (talk) 22:19, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I have answered to that. This is a strawman argument, see above. It addition, Zaryn speaks about "Jews vs. others" not "Jews vs. Polish fascists". Not to say that there was various kind of anti-semite among Polish fascists. Please keep in mind that the major force of fascists were "middle class", i.e., those among which economic basis of anti-semitism was strongest. Lembit Staan (talk) 23:30, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

It doesn't matter. The fact is Libionka explicitly contradicts Żaryn's claim ("primarily on economic grounds") Whether you agree with him or not is beside the point. François Robere (talk) 08:39, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

The fact is that Dariusz Libionka does not contradict Żaryn's claim. He contradicts a slightly twisted Zaryn's claim, which is called "straw man argument" (which was further twisted by the wikipedian who cited it here). And it is sad, because I consider him a reasonable historian. Given his knowledge on the issue, I would expect him to write something substantial. But this is a major problem with most scientists: they quickly go dismissive, rather than argumentative when criticizing a person they dislike.

That said, at most what I would agree is the following text:

"Zaryn did not deny that there was anti-Semitism existed in the Interwar Poland and argued that it was supported by rational reasoning. He further argues that the Jewish-Polish tensions in Interwar Poland intensified mostly due to economic reasons. Historian Dariusz Libionka disagrees with the latter statement."

From the same DL's article, IMO the following overall judgement ma be used in wikipedia elsewhere:

"Criticizing Zaryn's article Holocaust at the IPN educational portal, he indicates many errors and sloppy statements in it and suggests that Zaryn does not know basic facts about World War II. Libionka further says that many works of Zaryn do have scientific importance, but his works on Jewish-Polish issues are tainted by his ideological preferences."

I do not see Ewa Koźmińska-Frejlak as a comparable expert in the issue, the authority of Libionka is sufficient here. At the same time I may consider the following piece worth of inclusion (as it goes hand in hand with Zaryn's idea about "national mythology"):

"Criticizing Zaryn's introduction to Polacy ratujący Żydów w latach II wojny światowej from the "Educational Files of IPN", Ewa Koźmińska-Frejlak writes that rather than presenting facts, Zaryn is trying to put forth his point of view on the attitude of the Poles to the Holocaust and that the text leaves an impression of "blaming the victim" to diminish the blame put on the Poles."

Lembit Staan (talk) 16:52, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lembit Staan: Thank you. Something like this?

Żaryn does not deny that there was anti-Semitism in Interwar Poland, but argues that it was grounded in "rational thinking", and further argues that Polish-Jewish "tensions" in Interwar Poland intensified mostly due to economic reasons. Historian Dariusz Libionka disagrees with the latter statement; criticizing Żaryn's article Holocaust[ref] he points out many errors and sloppy statements, and states that Żaryn "does not know basic facts" about World War II. He notes that, while Żaryn's works on other subjects are often "valuable historical literature", those on Polish-Jewish relations are tainted by his "ideological sympathies and inspirations".

Criticizing Żaryn's introduction to the educational booklet Polacy ratujący Żydów w latach II wojny światowej (Polish rescuers of Jews during World War II),[ref] Ewa Koźmińska-Frejlak writes that Żaryn is advancing his own views rather than simply presenting facts, leaving the impression that he is trying to "blame the victim" (the Jews) in order to diminish the responsibility assigned to Poles.

François Robere (talk) 18:59, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

No. It was not "grounded in rational thinking". It was "finding support in..". "Grounded" without any further explanations implies the sole mentioned origin. I suggest you to buy a good explanatory dictionary of Polish language and read what "umocowac" means.

Also you do not need so many quotation marks.

The rest is IMO close to the sources cited (sure it is, because I wrote it :-). Lembit Staan (talk) 16:20, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

I know what it means, it's just that you can't exactly say that an idea was "fastened" or "fixed" in something in English. "Grounded", "anchored" - even "bolstered" - seemed like reasonable alternatives. We'll find something.

The quotation marks are just to stress that these are indeed the sources' words, and also to avoid copyright questions. François Robere (talk) 20:17, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

The context (omitted for the purpose of the quote) was this:

Koźmińska-Frejlak summarised some of the main points of Żaryn's book. In short:

• Jews largely considered Polish as a foreign language, which was made possible because Interwar Poland did not force Jews to assimilate politically or culturally
• Nationalists of the time were no obstacle for Jews, as "the Polish-Jewish conflict - oftentimes very strongly worded anti-Semitism" was mostly based on economical grounds
• The economic tensions were exacerbated by the Great Depression, which led folks to introduce numerus nullus (=banning Jews from enrolling at universities) as a means to protect the Polish intelligentsia from unemployment; the economical boycott was motivated by the fact Jewish businesses were sieving out applicants on a religious basis and fellow Jews were shunned if they employed Christians;
• Catholics were accusing Jews of being detrimental to the culture; Jews were becoming increasingly sympathetical to Zionist and left-wing (particularly Communist) parties, which were effectively hostile to Poland.

For these reasons, Żaryn says, Jews used the autonomy granted by the Polish state in full, all while not being loyal to Poland or attached to Polishness. And then comes the quote I posted. I hope this helps. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 21:52, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

This summary of the summary is basically correct, to my eyes. But I asked a very specific question, raising doubts in a wikipedian's text. Lembit Staan (talk) 21:57, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I couldn't have addressed that question in the answer, as you first posted it 5 minutes after I wrote the summary. But now that the question is here, I will answer it.

The problem with the argument (even if I largely agree with it on the merits) is that it's not us who decide what is a straw man, what is a valid line of reasoning etc., as this is exactly doing original research. He makes some argument, which two scholars don't agree with. You may believe that the criticism is right (or the argument is stillborn), but we are not the ones who decide it or determine truthfulness - scholars do that hard job for us, thank you very much. If there was a work by, say, Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, that praised Żaryn's attitude as regards this book, or his attitude towards Polish-Jewish relations (I haven't found one), we would cite it too, regardless the quality of the argument as we feel it (unless that statement is WP:UNDUE or WP:FRINGE, but AFAIK there is a rather sizeable and vocal minority that makes the argument, so the only concern is WP:PROPORTION for me).

@Francois Robere: As you see it, yes, she does. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 04:22, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

So she specifically mentions his economic argument before criticizing his entire line of reasoning? François Robere (talk) 22:19, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

State of the consensus (section 2)

I believe we have consensus to include this section as presented. Correct? François Robere (talk) 11:51, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

We obviously don’t what with the issue of mistranslations still not addressed at all. Volunteer Marek 22:58, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

"Żaryn does not deny that there was anti-Semitism in Interwar Poland" please remove this pointless sentence. Do I need to spell why? Hint: it's true for 99.99% of people if not more. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 04:31, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Done. François Robere (talk) 23:49, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

References

References
References

Section 3 (Kielce pogrom)

Section 3

Co-editor of a two-volume monograph on the Kielce pogrom, Żaryn has stated that "a significant proportion of Jewish individuals... supported the communist authorities or... joined their ranks"; he blames those individuals for "censorship and propaganda, slander... and deceitfully remaining silent about Soviet massacres." This, he believes, "intensified anti-Semitic attitudes" that resulted in the Kielce pogrom. This narrative is criticized by Rafał Pankowski as evoking the stereotype of Żydokomuna.

Minor remark: The test says "Zaryn stated", "Zaryn uses", but there are no refs to Zaryn. Please add.

This is really a sad and ugly matter. I didnt have a chance to read the sources cited through but the first this I see at once is that opinions of Korycki must be thrown out: Kate Korycki - Assistant Professor - Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies -- she is not qualified to be an expert in Holocaust to be cited on controversial issues. (An example of her dubious statement: "unwittingly recycles many Polish anti-Semitic tropes". First of all, the language is unscholarly disrespectful and demonstrates bias. Second, I didn't look yet how Zaryn phrased it (there are no refs here), but I may readily believe that he was not "recycling" but simply describing the attitudes in Polish society which had led to the formation of the Zydokomuna stereotype.) Lembit Staan (talk) 17:04, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

I've added the ref.

I checked her bio earlier. She's a "comparative political sociologist", and has a couple of published articles on memory politics in EE, as well as her Ph.D thesis.[61][62][63] She may lack Libionka's gravitas (she's also 20-something years younger), but she seems well-positioned to comment on what we cite her for.

She gives the whole paragraph from Żaryn before... tearing into him (see here).François Robere (talk) 10:12, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for reminding about the quotes. And it confirms what I thought. Quoting the quote, she wrote that Zaryn wrote:

"and a significant proportion of Jewish individuals either supported the communist authorities or else simply joined their ranks. Many worked in the UB <...> This intensified anti-Semitic attitudes" (emphasis is mine).

From here I see: (A) Zaryn does not deny that there was anti-S before "Zydokomuna". (B) Jews in commie govt and most notoriously in the secret service (UB) intensified anti-S. The B part is undeniable. Exactly same happened in the early Soviet Union; just read about Cheka in Kiev for the most atrocious deeds. So this is just what I wrote: in her hatred towards PiS, she misrepresented Zaryn's writings by saying that he embraced these anti-Semitic tropes. From here I conclude she is not a reliable source for this article, both because of her bias and of her lack of brains making her to confuse someone's position with someone's description of someones' else position. Lembit Staan (talk) 00:40, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

She's a "comparative political sociologist" -- sure thing. She wrote about cultural genocide in canada, and about queers in iran, and about Polish politics... What a polymath she is. ... Not. She is not a recognized expert. While Ph.D. students may be cited for facts they collected (and which can be double checked, after all), their opinions have little value. Lembit Staan (talk) 00:40, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Lembit Staan - I %100 agree with your investigation. Thanks. We are done here. - GizzyCatBella🍁 02:25, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Not yet.

Just in the very same manner we could say that Jan Żaryn is not qualified to talk about the Holocaust, because he, well, specialises in the deeds of the Catholic Church and the Polish pre-war right-wing movements but suddenly speaks about how Poles were saving Jews, what were the true reasons for anti-Semitism in Poland etc.; he somehow quickly becomes a recognised expert in WWII or in the Cursed Soldiers (as seen from his participation in the historical boards of the respective museums), even though originally it's just the Catholic Church and, understandably, the Polish pre-war right, which was tightly connected with the Catholic thought. Yet he does. Theoretically we could just stick to what he says about the Church, but 1) no one cared to add the info (and I no longer do, given the fear of insta-reverts), while GizzyCatBella removed the suggestion to expand the then empty section and 2) that's not what he speaks about like, 80% of the time?

The argument you try to make boils down to two points: a) she's not an SME; b) it's not something worth mentioning anyway.

Let's start from the first one. As Piotrus has rightly noted, social science is pretty interdisciplinary (see Archive), so, unlike in the hard sciences like chemistry or physics, where you stick to the topic of, let's say, bioinorganic chemistry or quantum mechanics or lepidopterology, the border between each is fluid, so in fact, all of these can appear to be absolutely detached from each other but have one main thread in common (so your assumption of her incompetence based on an apparent incompatible diversity of topics is probably incorrect already based on that, unless you can confirm to have analysed all of her papers). And from the summaries of the papers, they seem to revolve around identity politics a lot, even if one is about Communists and the other about LGBT.

Now let's see, from link 62, the research interests of the person: Identity politics, collective memory politics, [...] Central-Eastern European politics These three categories ideally fit for the subject of the article. It's Central-Eastern Europe; the historical policy of PiS is clearly about identity/collective memory topics. Her PhD thesis is about dealing with the legacy of Communism in Poland, and somewhere in the time of preparation of her thesis, she's published the paper in question. We can therefore assume she has researched the topic well.

The refutation of her work based on lack of PhD is countered by the fact that ref 4 was published after she defended her PhD (her thesis was submitted in Nov 2017, while the work is from 2019), and the one from 2017 (prepared while making the PhD) is cited 11 times - not bad for a supposedly incompetent scholar. She probably doesn't have the legacy status, but at least her work seems to be used in the scientific community. According to your logic, this should disqualify whatever scientist used her work based on apparent hatred of the currently ruling party. The problem is, (other) scientists from abroad are also predominantly critical of the current policy. Is it because of collective researcher bias ("those nit-picking liberals constantly misportray conservatives and employ censorship cancel culture to suppress conservative thought")? Probably. Are we the ones who should deal with it? No. Besides, do we have evidence of her hatred of PiS? No, contrary to your claim. Criticism =/= hatred.

Is she then a subject-matter expert? In identity/collective memory politics, certainly. That's enough, thank you - if she is a specialist in that domain (and she has taught about Eastern Europe, as can be seen in link 61), she can easily make research on Poland, too. If you have the problem with the peer review of that particular journal, go to WikiProject History and discuss it there.

Now, to the second point. The selective quote from the whole paragraph that Korycki is analysing (you can access it legally in the 2019 paper) makes it hard to address the rest of the argument about Korycki's exclusion. She does not make the argument from that sentence only. Her full reasoning is behind the paywall but you can access it on Sci-Hub if you have no problem with that (no endorsement meant). We already know Żaryn does not deny anti-Semitism existed beforehand, so I will only return to the discussion when you read the whole paper.

In short, the problem Korycki has with the argument is not that Żaryn says perceptions of Żydokomuna existed (they did) but that he quotes from the Home Army report which contains anti-Semitic tropes (among other issues); makes a narrative about the Jews in a way that makes them lose personhood (which he says they have survived by either impersonating Poles or by becoming tyrants/Communists) and makes other manipulations, such as the invocation of otherwise unrelated Katyń, in order to make the blame shift on Jews (aka commies, as it appears in the narrative). In other words, he makes it appear as if Żydokomuna was real. And if that paper received 11 citations, the opinions she presents are not worthless as you try to suggest. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 07:29, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Szmenderowiecki's argument about Korycki's competence seems legitimate and reasonable to me, I don't think it's fair to discredit her works for the reasons set out by other users at the beginning of the discussion. Also, the 11 citations seem to me sufficient to demonstrate that her work has been recognized as having a certain authority in the scientific community. As for the content of what Korycki claims, it is clear that she wants to highlight how Zaryn is trying in every way to clear Poland from any responsibility about anti-Semitism, that overlap between Jews-Communists is the key point of this historical-political operation.--Mhorg (talk) 09:45, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Other than everything else that I agree with, good point on no one caring to expand the article (other than you, I should add [64][65]) - there's been a lot of accusations from one editor that this is article is turning into an "attack page", but I'm not exactly seeing editors swarming to summarize Żaryn extensive (and per Libionka - valuable) writings on the Church.[66] Another good point is the fact that Żaryn would be mainly notable to a lay reader for his positions on Polish-Jewish relations. If a reader sees him on the news and comes here to see what he's about, only to find a dry {{infobox officeholder}}-style bio, then we're really doing them a disservice. François Robere (talk) 11:37, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

First of all a reminder that we're not RS, and commenting on a source's motives ("hatred towards PiS") without supporting sources is OR, and a potential WP:BLP vio. Second, recall Żaryn uses phrases like "deceitfully remaining silent about Soviet massacres" - by your logic that would make him a "Jew hater", which I doubt is what you intended. Third, the whole point of Żydokomuna is shifting responsibility from the perpetrators to the victims, who supposedly served the repressive Soviet regime - that's exactly what Żaryn is doing, and it's wrong on several factual levels. But again - we're not the RS here, so having this sort of discussion among ourselves is WP:FORUM-y. The fact of the matter is we have multiple scholarly sources who are in agreement regarding Żaryn's message, who the objectors repeatedly claim are wrong; so either Żaryn is the most misunderstood fella in Poland, or he really does "recycle many antisemitic tropes". François Robere (talk) 09:53, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

And just to be explicit on her relevant publications (re: my and Szmenderowiecki's comments):

• “Memory as Politics: Narratives of Communism and the Shape of a Community.” 2017. University of Toronto, Ph.D thesis.
• “Memory and Politics in Post-Transition Space: The Case of Poland.” East European Politics and Societies, and Cultures. 31, Issue 3, August 2017. Pages: 518-544.
• “Politicized Memory in Poland: Anti-communism and the Holocaust.” The Holocaust Studies, 2018.
• “Memory, Identity, Tourism and Photography - review of David Walkowitz’s Remembered and Forgotten Jewish World, and Jonathan Webber’s Rediscovering Traces of Memory, with photographs by Chris Schwarz and Jason Francisco. The Polish Review, 2020.

François Robere (talk) 10:42, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Szmenderowiecki --> I'm afraid I have to disagree with your assertions; none of your arguments presented thus far persuaded me her opinion is due for inclusion. Żaryn is an accepted mainstream expert in historiography. I can't see any compelling argument why these random cherry-picked opinions carry any particular weight on BLP Żaryn's biography page and why this random cherry-picked opinions are of any particular importance. That being said, this is also WP:UNDUE - so considering the lack of consensus and problematical UNDUE for WP:BLP - please see WP:ONUS (and part of WP:V): "The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content." - GizzyCatBella🍁 10:44, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Żaryn is an accepted mainstream expert in historiography. Depends on how you define "accepted", "mainstream" and in which fields. In Catholic Church, certainly. In right-wing movements, I'd sort of agree, but even there there are some doubts. But in the Holocaust, Polish-Jewish relations - errrm, no. His works are controversial, as can be seen from the mass of academic (and not only) sources I have retrieved; controversy precludes universal acceptance, and it can't be reasonably argued that all the scholars critical of Żaryn have conspired to manufacture it. Among the Polish conservative elites, he's surely mainstream and accepted, but if to look from a non-partisan bias, it is far from clear. There can't be two mainstreams. But anyway, this is not a place to discuss his "mainstreamness", as this is not a WP:FORUM.

I can't see any compelling argument why these random cherry-picked opinions carry any particular weight on BLP Żaryn's biography page and why this random cherry-picked opinions are of any particular importance. Because you haven't proved them to be cherry-picked in the first place. You were free to do that for almost the month that has passed since the saga with article expansion began, and yet you didn't care to, not even after being reminded at ANI (2 weeks ago) that expansion is also a thing. Which means that either you have tried to do so but failed, or you didn't try at all, which invalidates the WP:UNDUE evaluation as you haven't actually researched the prominence of arguments in the first place (about Żaryn specifically), or that you thought you could get away with deleting sourced content because you don't like it (and be aware that you won't be able to do that if that's the only reason you have). I can't comment on sources I haven't seen and probably exist but are nowhere to be found for me.

As for WP:ONUS invocation, I remind you that 6 people is most often not a representative sample to establish consensus in a dispute that is more or less equally split, and that the consensus is not about the vote tally, it's about quality of arguments, and since we are all involved parties, it'd be best to have the quality of opinions evaluated by third-party editors (which I hope will be done but for some reason which VM has not wanted to endorse, which I find puzzling). Szmenderowiecki (talk) 13:34, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

@Szmenderowiecki - as you haven't actually researched the prominence of arguments in the first place - Excuse me?! - GizzyCatBella🍁 20:00, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

"His critics characterize these opinions". Please name the critics, avoiding weaseling generic plural. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 04:32, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Done. I just want to note for the record (as I have in once or twice before) that one of the causes of issues like this is the repeated back-and-forth between editors: if you try to be precise with full names and quotes, then your text is too long; but if you try to shorten it by combining statements and omitting details, then you're inaccurate. It's an unavoidable trade-off, and sometimes just a matter of taste. François Robere (talk) 05:52, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

@Lembit Staan: Other than this, do you support inclusion? If you're okay with Pankowski, then perhaps we can just include this and RfC the removed bit. François Robere (talk) 08:44, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, not yet. Someone added a ref to Pankowski. I cannot see its full text. Please quote the piece which supports your suggestion. Lembit Staan (talk) 18:12, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Also, the quotation of Zaryn is variously misinterpreted. I am pretty low of WP:AGF now. Until now I tried to help y'all assuming that you simply cannot work with sources and cannot recognize your own original research, but now, after my numerous fixes in your text in this respect, with explanations, I am left only with an impression that this kind of editing is derived from a particular POV which makes the writers to spin Zaryn's texts in most negative ways.

That said, our text says " he blames those individuals for "censorship and propaganda, slander... and... " Well, he is not. His text says: "Many worked in the UB <...> and also in censorship and propaganda, slandering..." Here "in censorship and propaganda" refers to the corresponding departments of the Communist party/state (whatever). And an important omission is the UB part, which was most visible and painful for ordinary Poles (and which contributed to anti-Semitism mightily), because the Poles quickly learned to read communist propaganda properly.

He also didn't write "that resulted in Kielce pogrom". He wrote cautiously: " This intensified anti-Semitic attitudes which <...> could have led to the uncontrolled impulses toward the pogroms. Such was the case, especially in Kielce." - and I see nothing wrong with this. Certainly, individual Jews in UB didn't make Poles love all Jews. That's how negative stereotypes are created: highly visible individuals project their blame on the whole their category. In other words, he does not "recycle" anti-Semitic tropes, he explains how they were generated.

FYI, I am not defending Zaryn; there are numerous idiotic blunders in his texts. Even in the quote discussed: First he writes about the Jews: "many worked in the UB". A couple of phrases later he writes about pogroms: "with clear support of UB". I don't think it was his intention to say that Jews themselves directly fomented pogroms against themselves (which is different from the anti-Semitic trope that the Jews "deserved it".) In best traditions of Wikipedian's WP:SYNTHESIS, he "mixed and matched" two completely different narrations, producing a really weird result. In other words, until now Zaryn may be accused of really sloppy scholarship (an some refs cited really do this), but not in "an opportunity to blame the Jews". - Lembit Staan (talk) 18:12, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Another few reasons not to include this...thanks for the analysis Lembit Staan, to me this section is absolutely no go. - GizzyCatBella🍁 18:42, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Rafał Pankowski. The Resurgence of Antisemitic Discourse in Poland. 2018. pp. 6-7:

"Representatives of the ruling party also repeatedly alluded to the stereotype of Żydokomuna in discussions surrounding the new legislation. Jewish participation in communist crimes against Poland was stressed by several politicians. For example, a summary of Senator Jan Żaryn’s interview on state radio included the following passage: “Professor Żaryn discussed on Radio 3 the participation of Jews in the mass killings of Poles in the Eastern territories, and the assistance provided by Jews in the occupation of Poland by the Red Army.”

pp. 9-10 (unrelated):

Many of the public comments made in the wake of the passage of the history law were accompanied by thinly veiled conspiracy theories. A direct reference to imagined Jewish power was made by MP Janusz Sanocki... A similar point about the existential clash of Polish and Jewish identities, and disproportionate Jewish international influence, was made by Professor Mieczysław Ryba... In a similar vein, Senator Jan Żaryn, a historian-turned-politician who plays a key role in the ruling party’ s “history policy,” gave an interview (published on February 1, 2018) to a pro-government media outlet, and spoke in the same breath about the US, its powerful Jewish lobby, and property claims, as well as the “Jewish German Russian alliance.”

Regarding Żaryn's quote - we had a longer version of it,[67] but I trimmed it for conciseness. Feel free to restore whatever part of it you see fit + Wikilinks, as long as no one takes issue with length. François Robere (talk) 10:59, 10 July 2021 (UTC)

State of the consensus (section 3)

I believe there's consensus to include this section as presented, except for the bit in bold, which may require an RfC. Correct? François Robere (talk) 00:49, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

References

References
References

Section 4

Section 4

Żaryn has stated that the accepted narrative of the Jedwabne pogrom is a "founding myth" of the "allegedly proven" organized massacres of Jews by Poles, supposedly rooted in inherent Polish anti-Semitism and xenophobia, which he believes is are "false stereotypes" that could be clarified with further research. According to Żaryn, the Jedwabne events were directed by the Germans with the participation of Volksdeutsche and "outsiders" who came from other villages. He adds that "even if some of the Polish locals participated in this 'spectacle' under duress... the majority looked in disgust at what the Germans have done...". Żaryn states that "the deceitful narrative [of Jedwabne] burdens the Poles and Poland with co-responsibility for the Holocaust". Consequently, he has supported the efforts to exhume the bodies of Jedwabne's victims, led by Ewa Kurek over objections of the Jewish community, for both scientific and political reasons.

This one’s fine as long as the “Ewa Kurek” non sequitur and irrelevancy gets dropped. It has no reason to be there except as a BLP violating attempt at smear-by-association, especially since people like Jan Gross ALSO supported exhumations. Volunteer Marek 21:42, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

Żaryn makes that connection, not us.[68][69][70] François Robere (talk) 13:37, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

They were panelists on the same interview so of course they referred to each other. That’s not a “connection”. Come on. Volunteer Marek 22:11, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

Oh, I knew you'd pick on that! The reason they were interviewed together was his public letter of support of her efforts, which also lent him some interview questions (that's the other two links). As I said - he made that connection, not us. François Robere (talk) 11:14, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

So? As pointed out over and over and over and over again, lots of people from across the political spectrum, and of various opinions on Jedwabne support/supported the exhumations. And lots of people from across the political spectrum were against them. Again, this is trying to manufacture a "controversy" by stringing together some primary sources and a couple of shady opinion pieces. Volunteer Marek 07:34, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Let's recount the story: Żaryn publicly supports an historian that was compared by two subject matter experts to David Irving.[71][72][73] The media notices[74] and he gets asked about it.[75][76][77] He's the one that, according to one source, "convinces" her to drop the case (which we should also mention).[78] That's more than just "some primary sources and a couple of shady opinion pieces". François Robere (talk) 10:04, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

If we’re “recounting” then let’s recount how your wiki-collaborator Icewhiz was topic banned for BLP violations, specifically (as in the ArbCom provided the diffs in their decision) with regard to the same Ewa Kurek who you just compared to a Holocaust denier. And who really is irrelevant to this article here. BLP applies to talk pages so I suggest you strike that BLP vio. Volunteer Marek 05:00, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

Oh, and the sources you linked above are opinion pieces in online tabloids like oko press, salon24, wpolityce etc and an interview in tysol (primary source) so my description “some primary sources and a couple of shady opinion pieces” is right on the nose. You literally just proved my point. Thanks. Volunteer Marek 05:05, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

BTW, are you okay with the rest of the par.? François Robere (talk) 10:11, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Serious question, do you think salon24 is a reliable source? Volunteer Marek 05:09, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

Serious question, are you okay with the rest of the par.? François Robere (talk) 11:31, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

Please strike your BLP vio above. Volunteer Marek 23:05, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

David Silberklang is a senior historian at the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem, and former editor-in-chief of Yad Vashem Studies.[79][80] Berel Lang is a professor emeritus at University at Albany, SUNY and the author of 21 books, including Act and Idea in the Nazi Genocide,[81] Holocaust Representation,[82] and Heidegger's Silence[83][84] (between them these three books have ~900 citations). I'm not going to apologize for deferring to authorities like Silberklang and Lang over the woman who said COVID-19 is causing a "Judaisation of Western Europe".[85][86] Get some perspective, Marek. François Robere (talk) 06:21, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

And what does that have to do with your BLP vio? Your choice. Volunteer Marek 16:45, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

VM, you realize WP:BLPTALK doesn't actually ban claims regarding BLPs, right? It only applies to those that are "unsourced or poorly sourced and not related to making content choices", and this isn't it. François Robere (talk) 17:15, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

References

References
References

Section 5

Section 5

In 2018 Żaryn had proposed a Senate resolution for the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the March 1968 political crisis. An excerpt of the resolution stated that "in arranging anti-Semitic demonstrations and forcing Poles to take part, as well as by introducing pathological anti-Jewish sentiments into the public discourse, the communist government did not represent the will of the People, but only that of Moscow and its intra-communist and international interests". This has been criticized by historians as an attempt at whitewashing Polish history, and proved controversial even in Żaryn's own party. Two weeks after the proposal was abandoned, Żaryn proposed that Israeli ambassador Anna Azari, who commented on the anti-Semitic events of March 1968, be deported.

This part is just straight up WP:UNDUE and not supported by sources, at least the ones worth anything. Zaryn’s statement here isn’t all that controversial. The 1968 anti Semitic campaign *was* indeed organized by the communist party. Last part of this paragraph doesn’t even make sense - how is PiS suppose to be associated with what Communists did in 1968? Wtf??? This is just an incoherent jarbled mess that’s only barely connected to what the sources say. Volunteer Marek 21:46, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

With the last four sources at the end there, three of them merely say that he made an off hand comment saying “perhaps they should be asked to leave” in reference to the ambassador making critical statements about the country they’re in, and the fourth one is a straight up wacky opinion piece. “Harsh words” is ridiculously POV too. Anyway, all this is WP:NOTNEWS. Not actually of any importance to this guy’s life. This is a BLP. Volunteer Marek 21:58, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

No, I think this is Due, his statement clearly wants to reinterpret history and paint Poland as a completely separate entity from the authorities of the time (not a fair move for a historian). He obviously wants to bring back one of his "positive myths" about the Polish nation, and that's exactly why the Israeli ambassador made that comment. Furthermore, how could his request to expel the ambassador be of little importance? These are very serious statements.--Mhorg (talk) 22:02, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

Oh, ffs, he didn’t “request to expel the ambassador”! Stop making BLP violations on talk page. He made an off hand comment in an interview where he said that if an ambassador insults the country they’re based in “perhaps they should be asked to leave”. Other people were also critical of Azari’s comments. For a diplomat, it was pretty undiplomatic. Volunteer Marek 22:08, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

You both seem to unintentionally misinterpret WP:DUE. DUE is not about need of inclusion (an issue of notability), it's about significance of viewpoints (which is an issue of neutral point of view), and as far as the prominence of their opinions go, they seem to be at least equally prominent as compared to the viewpoint of Żaryn, so this one is definitely due (which is notable in this case, as I explain below, but not all DUE opinions are automatically worthy of inclusion).

The fragment about "harsh words" as appears now was converted from a quote to a rephrasing of a quote by Lembit Staan. The concept is pretty good, but the sentence might need remaking, I'll see if the change is good.

Speaking of WP:NOTNEWS concern (which is a notability issue): this would be OK if we talked about a simple, routine news event that was just a flash. But then we have at least two historians, which I think were originally in the Polish version of the article.

As WP:NTEMP says, "notability is not temporary; once a topic has been the subject of "significant coverage" in accordance with the general notability guideline, it does not need to have ongoing coverage", of which "significant coverage" is [addressing] the topic directly and in detail, so that no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention, but it does not need to be the main topic of the source material. In the news sources given, these events clearly are the main topic of the reporting (both in late Feb and early Mar), and no OR is needed to understand what he is saying, or to quote him (if, of course, we reject the frivolous (as seen from the guidelines) claim that any translation of what someone said is OR). Moreover, the sources in late Feb quote two historians who directly address his way of phrasing the resolution, while coverage of his March suggestion was, in fact, international. From there it seems that the WP:NOTNEWS argument falls flat.

As for constant claims of mistranslation: we are yet to see yours. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 11:13, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Going through the sources, the first one, Haaretz, afaict does not call his statement “harsh” although it does falsely report them (his statement was responding to a comparison of PiS and the communist party not to claim that antisemitism is on the rise). 2nd source doesn’t call his “words” anything. Just reports the. Third source, Polityka, does call them scandalous but that’s because it’s a hysterical overblown highly partisan opinion column so who cares. Fourth source calls them “strong words” or something like that.

Several of the sources note that Zaryn wasn’t the only one to criticize the ambassador’s statement so why is he being singled out here?

Again this is a pretty clear attempt to turn this article into a BLP vio hit piece by misrepresenting and cherry picking sources. Just drop it. Other editors have been banned for similar attempts. Volunteer Marek 22:05, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

We can CE this to be more concise and less editorializing, but the mention itself seems DUE. I don't have time to do this myself ATM, so if anyone want to go ahead feel free. François Robere (talk) 13:52, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

Or we can just acknowledge that it’s UNDUE and WP:NOTNEWS. Volunteer Marek 22:10, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

We need to clarify what we mean by "abandoned" in the context of his Senate proposal - does it mean that the proposal was withdrawn? Also, we need some conclusion to the Azari story. François Robere (talk) 18:00, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Or we don't include this non-story in at all this being a BLP and all. WP:NOTNEWS. Volunteer Marek 18:33, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

If the proposal to the Senate, where he was the promoter or one of the main actors, has been withdrawn by the same party (with attached controversy), we have already entered the field of serious issues. This could also show that Zaryn represents the most extreme wing of his party. This is not a small piece of information.--Mhorg (talk) 07:28, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

THis is pure original research. Volunteer Marek 07:32, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Rephrasing Mhorg's argument in more familiar terms: the fact that a senator submits to the Senate a bill that is so widely criticized that it has to be withdrawn, then suggests a foreign ambassador should be expelled for commenting on the subject, is both unusual and "high level" enough to merit inclusion in some form. François Robere (talk) 10:21, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Except that’s not what happened here. Bills are revised and amended all the time. Off hand comment in an interview is not same as “demanding a foreign ambassador should be expelled”. Stop trying to manufacture controversy and please make an effort at observing BLP. Volunteer Marek 05:02, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

Bills are revised and amended all the time True, but that doesn't usually involve historians going on record to berate the colleague who tabled them. Also, please quote accurately, that's not what I wrote. François Robere (talk) 11:41, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

Also, I just want to stress what was already mentioned twice before - memory politics is what Żaryn is known for. If we don't cover this, what should we cover?

I've shortened the paragraph. I think something in the range of three sentences is enough. François Robere (talk) 12:16, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

An excerpt from the resolution stated that "in arranging anti-Semitic demonstrations and forcing Poles to take part, as well as by introducing pathological anti-Jewish sentiments into the public discourse, the communist government did not represent the will of the People, but only that of Moscow and its intra-communist and international interests" I think removing this part doesn't make the point well understood by the reader. In my opinion it should be restored.--Mhorg (talk) 12:31, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

I agree it's not as clear, but the full quote might be too long. This is inelegant, but shorter: "The resolution stated, among others, that 'anti-Semitic demonstrations... [and] pathological anti-Jewish sentiments... [were not] the will of the People, but of Moscow alone". Alternatively, perhaps we can use a quote from one of the experts? François Robere (talk) 14:23, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

I've restored the excerpt. François Robere (talk) 06:31, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

This may actually be expanded with a quote showing the controversial wording, and explaining why it was controversial. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 04:34, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

The problem is that the sources don’t really support the “scandal erupted” nonsense. There’s one source - a hysterical opinion piece - that uses the phrase “scandalous words” in a headline but that’s it. Volunteer Marek 06:16, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Easy fix. Anything else? François Robere (talk) 06:29, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

The claim "proved controversial even in Żaryn's own party." is not supported by the source (I guess if you squint really hard) and this source is not sufficient to establish this. Volunteer Marek 16:57, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

"Projekt okazał się zbyt kontrowersyjny nawet dla samego PiS. Przegłosowano więc alternatywne stanowisko, a tekst Jana Żaryna zarzucono." François Robere (talk) 17:27, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

@VM - Yeah, I agree; the entire section is WP:UNDUE for WP:BLP bio and should be withdrawn. - GizzyCatBella🍁 19:17, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

References

References
References

For the later record (June 23, 2021)

Discussed/rejected/explained topics in Archive 1[87] - contrast the current discussions above to Archive 1. - GizzyCatBella🍁 03:19, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

For the record, those who have no desire to go through the miles of text above. As of July 1, 2021, there is NO consensus to include any of the disputed. - GizzyCatBella🍁 17:37, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

See also - Related WP:ANI record [88] "Disruptive mass deletion behaviour" - GizzyCatBella🍁 20:20, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

For the record, as of July 1, The proposed texts of "Section 1" and "Section 2" are modified so that I have no objections in terms of the reliability of sources and the reasonable accuracy of our text with respect to the source cited. Lembit Staan (talk) 17:58, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

@François Robere: It was probably a bad idea to modify the suggested text directly in place of the original proposal. Reading the talk now, it is sometimes impossible to understand what was this fuss about. Now that I made the copies, may be you can restore the original proposals in the beginning? Lembit Staan (talk) 18:17, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

That's a good idea. I'll do that. Thanks! François Robere (talk) 20:24, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

PS I've seen your other comments - I'll go over them tomorrow. François Robere (talk) 20:37, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

Honestly, I’m confused as to what the current proposals are, they’ve been refurbished so many times. Up above, as far as section 1 goes that seems now to be fine, section 2 still has the problematic “rational thought” mistranslation in it. In general, anything that relies on problematic translations of WP:PRIMARY sources is a no. Volunteer Marek 21:32, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

The current proposals are given in separate subsections; the original is given at the top. François Robere (talk) 13:59, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

• I am not that familiar with Polish politics, but everything above seems to be an epic struggle about nothing. The subject of this page is only modestly notable, and there is already an excessive description of him and his activities on the page. I would say —everything under discussion above is arguably undue on the page. My very best wishes (talk) 18:43, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

I agree. There are also likewise several issues in the text currently written into the article that needs correction or should be removed, but I’ll get to it once the above jumble is over. No hurry. - GizzyCatBella🍁 18:59, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

• • I mostly agree. I didn't consider Żaryn important enough to get involved with this article before, and were it not for the way Mhorg was treated[89] I probably wouldn't bother; but it's one of those cases where the harder some editors fight against something, the more motivated I am to learn about it - and the more I learn about it, the more obvious it becomes that we aren't following WP:DUE.
    Żaryn is a notable figure in Polish memory politics in general and PiS in particular. This entire discussion is merely about representing his activities in that context. François Robere (talk) 19:36, 9 July 2021 (UTC)
    • Wait, MVBW says everything under discussion above is arguably undue on the page, you then say “I mostly agree” and then you say that we aren’t “following DUE”. Does that mean that you agree that pretty much all of the stuff discussed above shouldn’t be included? Volunteer Marek 22:49, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Yeh, I mean everything in the section "Resolving one by one" above. It just hurts me looking at such discussions. I could only read your suggestions in green boxes at the top and below. All of that can be included or not included. Who cares? If I were VM, I would just agree with François and be done with it. If I were François, I would agree with VM. But if it were my personal choice, I would not include any of that. This is just excessive. A lot of low-significance content can be sourced and included. But we should not do it. My very best wishes (talk) 01:52, 10 July 2021 (UTC)

A lot of low-significance content: literally all the historical manipulation work of Zaryn (defined by GizzyCatBella as "an accepted mainstream expert in historiography"), and consequently of the PiS, for political purposes. No, François' data collection work and Szmenderowiecki's translation have been very useful and the proposed sections can be enriched or modified, but it is impossible to call them "Undue". Also, MVBW, I remind you that an administrator had already warned you to not follow me anymore.[90] There is almost no chance that you could have found this article without checking my history. Behind your "neutral" words, you have taken, for the umpteenth time, the position of declaring something controversial "Undue": it seems to me that you're bringing again your battleground mentality in this dispute.--Mhorg (talk) 14:26, 10 July 2021 (UTC)

@ Mhorg - I'm going to remind for the last time that this is WP:BLP article and that rules apply for the talk pages as well. Please familiarize yourself with WP:BLP. - GizzyCatBella🍁 14:50, 10 July 2021 (UTC)

GizzyCatBella, sorry, which BLP rule did I violate? I do not think that to bring the point of view of different academics and newspapers on Zaryn (as shown in the discussions above) is a violation. Or, maybe you are referring to something else?--Mhorg (talk) 15:06, 10 July 2021 (UTC)

Accusing the BLP of “ historical manipulation work of Zaryn” is a BLP vio.

Francois Robere hasn’t done any “data collection” whatever that is suppose to be.

Szmender *mis* translated at least one passage and actually a couple more, in a way that also constituted egregious BLP vio s, so I’m not sure what you’re praising there. Volunteer Marek 21:54, 10 July 2021 (UTC)

I have already reported in May about two articles of Wyborcza in which his contacts with the nationalists inside the institute were shown, and in which he was accused of historical falsehoods. I don't see where my BLP violation is.[91]--Mhorg (talk) 08:49, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

Just to be on the safe side, always link your sources whenever you make a statement that can be perceived as a BLP vio, and make sure to follow their wording as closely as you can. Here, for example, "manipulation" can be understood as Żaryn falsifying sources or misrepresenting them intentionally; here "misinterpreting", "promoting debunked interpretations", and even "promoting falsehoods" are better options. Volunteer Marek there's an ESL factor here; maybe educate instead of WP:BITE? François Robere (talk) 10:48, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

Mhorg - Cherry picked findings of opinion pieces from newspapers simply does not establish facts. You stating --> quote - literally all the historical manipulation work of Żaryn is a severe WP:BLP policy violation. You delivered comparable statements in the past; as an example, here[92], you called BLP a neo-Nazi in your edit summary without any source supporting it. You were advised several times about WP:BLP violations on this very page as well - see this discussion[93]. I will not remind you anymore if similar issues continue, and those mentioned above will be directed somewhere else. - GizzyCatBella🍁 17:36, 11 July 2021 (UTC)