Talk:Norman Finkelstein

Adding popular interview with Finkelstein to external links or videos section

September 2020 interview with Finkelstein has over 16k views on youTube and more views on the interviewers website. The interview is titled "How true academic freedom creates intellectual conflict" Finkelstein talks about his career and why he struggled to conform to academia.

I would like to add

• Interview with Norman Finkelstein, "How True Academic Freedom Creates Intellectual Conflict" September 2020

GA Reassessment

Norman Finkelstein

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch • Watch article reassessment page • GAN review not found

Result: Delisted. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 20:27, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

A controversial figure; difficult to write a GA about. Article has not been maintained to standards since 2007:

• The lead dedicates no time to his views or academic work, but an entire paragraph to two incidents in 2007/2008
• Contains overly long quotes throughout the article. Many from Finkelstein himself, giving me some NPOV concerns
• One cn tag.
• Too many external links. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 17:35, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

  Yep, not great. There are a huge number of quotes sourced directly to Finkelstein himself, making them primary with no real sense of the appropriate weight for the extracts established in secondary sources. A large volume of material is self-published on his personal website. To produce a B-class article, let alone a GA status article, this page would basically need to be half-scrapped and rewritten from scratch. Like many GAs listed in 2007, it is not worthy of the status. Definitely one for delisting. Iskandar323 (talk) 09:49, 10 February 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

[126] "Dershowitz and Finkelstein: comrades at heart?". The Electronic Intifada. June 28, 2013. Retrieved October 4, 2020.

As the now former footnote was from a deprecated source and concerning BLP (RFC: Electronic Intifada), I have temporarily removed it. If there is an alternative reliable source, I do not disagree with someone re-adding the source. FortunateSons (talk) 20:24, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Norman Finkelstein's Parents

The article, in the Early life and education section describes Finkelstein's mother as a pacifist and both provided links are broken. However, in a recent interview on Al Jazeera with Marc Lamont Hill, he describes both his parents as ardent, lifelong Stalinists. The interview is on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELNr_ro97MI Kasablanket (talk) 18:58, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

We need secondary reliable sources per WP:BLPPRIMARY. His interview on Al Jazzeera is not a secondary source. JimRenge (talk) 19:24, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Footnote 112

Per this RFC, the use of Mondoweiss on controversial topics and BLP is not optimal. Is there a better citation for the sourced claim? FortunateSons (talk) 20:03, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

What's wrong with it? It would be more helpful if you actually described your issue with the source rather than just waving at an RFC that doesn't prohibit its use in this case. Parabolist (talk) 11:15, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Sure, thank you for your response.

Per this RfC: that it should either not be used at all — or used with great caution — for biographies of living people.

While the other uses are covered by aboutself or acceptable for other reasons, 112 was not. Based on the person, the source and the topic, I was BOLD, reflecting my understand of the limited permissibility of fringe source citations for BLP. In my opinion, the other uses are (at least with the current close) acceptable. FortunateSons (talk) 11:45, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

The RFC allows use with caution. You haven't actually explained the problem with the usage here. Iskandar323 (talk) 12:22, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

It is a rather critical review of Finkelstein (though while I am not generally opposed to those, being not ‘radical‘ enough is definitely the rarer type of criticism). The content is harmless - and if I recall, there is a video somewhere, though I couldn’t find it - and isn‘t the primary concern: I’m a lot more concerned about citing non-experts (and basically reprinted) SPS/statements about a BLP, and would prefer if we just got the content from him directly. FortunateSons (talk) 16:29, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

So your issue is that you think the source is "basically reprint[ing]" his words, and the solution is that you want the words from him directly? Seems like the source is exactly what you want? Parabolist (talk) 22:17, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

• It's definitely something to be cautious about, but I think at least this usage is fine - in the context of the rest of the section (which makes it clear he supports the two-state solution), him saying he supports it because he thinks it's more practical is fairly anodyne; it's neither BLP-sensitive nor exceptional or potentially unencyclopedic in tone. The other usages are perhaps more serious in that they attribute relatively sharp words and major statements to him using only his WP:ABOUTSELF statements in Mondoweiss as a source, so it would be ideal to find other sources for those, but I don't think we need to worry so much about a comparatively bland statement that the reason why he supports the two-state solution is because he thinks it's more practical. --Aquillion (talk) 17:35, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

  Yeah, that makes sense, thank you. I was also concerned with the source content and context, and not just the specifically cited section. I would still strongly prefer removal here as well, but understand that this is unlikely to find consensus unless I find a better source. Thank you all for taking the time. FortunateSons (talk) 17:40, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

NF connection with Unz Review

@Makeandtoss you claimed that my edit on this subject contained "ADL (ironic) defamation". Can you explain? As far as I'm aware what I wrote there in the name of the ADL had never been denied or claimed to be defamatory. Vegan416 (talk) 21:51, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

It is synth to collect information from multiple sources and coming up with one's own conclusion. Makeandtoss (talk) 09:39, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

But there was no conclusion in my edit. At any rate, I didn't ask you about SYNTH, because I don't have time now to debate what is SYNTH and what isn't. I asked you specifically about your seeming accusation against the ADL as if my edit contained some defamation that came from them. Can you explain what you meant by that? Vegan416 (talk) 13:18, 14 April 2024 (UTC)