Talk:California textbook controversy over Hindu history

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URLs for the VF and the HEF.[edit]

Dear Goethean,

Why do you think it is a good idea to remove the URLs from the first mention of the Vedic Foundation and the Hindu Education Foundation? Isn't it more helpful to readers of this WP article to have those URLs available at first mention, so that they can find out who these organisations are?

Best wishes, DomLaguna (talk) 13:10, 8 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Background[edit]

For better flow, I think the quote should be moved near the top, and then how many edits all the groups give should be explained. I think the quote helps to explain why the groups gave their edits to begin with.Desasu11 (talk) 04:46, 5 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]


In the claimants section, Hindutva should lead to the Hindutva wiki page and the "Hindu ultra nationalism" bracket should be deleted as it is misleading and is not found in the citation. The wikipedia page for Hindutva also has no mention of "Hindu Ultra Nationalism". Kushagr.sharma1 (talk) 00:20, 3 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Lead In[edit]

Can we change the word "complain" to something that doesn't make it sound like all these religious groups were just whining? Desasu11 (talk) 04:48, 5 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Changed to "filed a complaint". QVVERTYVS (hm?) 08:37, 17 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

See also[edit]

@Vdhillon: You have just added way too many "See also" entries. The relationship of these entries to the present article is not clear. Please follow the guidelines at WP:SEEALSO. Also, there shouldn't be a category listed in this section unless there is a really good reason. But what is the reason? Kautilya3 (talk) 09:25, 3 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, thanks for helping me learn the guidelines.

Vdhillon (talk) 12:36, 3 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Lede reverted[edit]

SimoneReeves, I undid most of your changes to the lede. The version you restored did not actually summarize the affair. The statement that

The California Department of Education (CDE) initially resolved the controversy with the help of two content experts: Shiva Bajpai, Professor Emeritus at California State University Northridge, and Michael Witzel, Professor of Sanskrit at Harvard University.

suggest that Bajpai and Witzel formed the initial committee, which is not corroborated by any source. Bajpai was assigned to the task first; Witzel et al. only become involved later. Also, the selection of complaints in the version you posted is not representative. The really controversial part of all this was the rewriting of Indian history, not the mistake of labeling a mosque as a Hindu temple (both committees agreed that that should be changed). QVVERTYVS (hm?) 08:56, 17 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Qwertyus, I am delighted you respected WP:BLP in your latest edit, compared to the last one you made. The lede is still very one-sided, however. It needs to be neutral and summarize both sides. You are doing WP:OR when you claim "the mistake of labeling" because none of the cited source in the lede or the main article says it, and numerous errors like it, were "a labeling mistake". This is the only wikipedia article on the 2005-2009 California textbook controversy and it should be encyclopedically complete and not just an article about "really controversial part" as you explain above. You have used an op-ed, one-sided opinion article from an Indian newspaper presenting a non-neutral side in this controversy. I suggest we use The Wall Street Journal article cited in the article (or other reliable secondary sources), to build a more balanced, complete, neutral summary lede. I will make these edits shortly, and welcome your constructive collaboration. SimoneReeves (talk) 14:29, 17 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
There are no "two sides" on Wikipedia. So the idea of "one-sided" doesn't exist. An article is neutral if it represents the scholarly consensus as per WP:WEIGHT. Bajpai is the President of "Dharma Civilization Foundation" [1], whatever that is. He seems to be better known for Hindu activism than his academic work. You have deleted a valid description from a notable academic saying that he is "Hindutva-leaning". This is not what is meant by "neutral" on Wikipedia. I am afraid all that you have done is white-washing. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 20:20, 17 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
@SimoneReeves: Since there has been no response from you, I have reverted the lead to the old one. I don't believe that there is any problem with neutrality in either version, but the old lead focused better on the important points whereas your version was unfocused. To make progress, you need to explain your idea of "one-sidedness." Note that this page exists at all because of the controversy, which began with Witzel and Indologists contesting the problematic changes demanded by the Hindu groups. So that is what we must focus on. I am adding a bunch of scholarly sources that cover the issue the way it should be covered. Please take a look at them. Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 12:32, 20 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Kautilya3 found a more precise source for Bajpai's Hindutva affiliations, so we no longer need the vague claim that he is "Hindutva-leaning" in the lede. QVVERTYVS (hm?) 15:34, 20 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Kautilya3, Sorry, for the slow response, I am on holiday travel. I will check the Bajpai-related cites again, but join me in avoiding WP:Synthesis and be extra careful per WP:BLP policy (check Qwertyus's 'more precise source').

I am concerned with the rest of your lede revert. There are many sides to this story - those (Hindu) who proposed the change, those (Hindu and non-Hindus) who opposed the change, those scholars who mediated between the two sides, and the fourth side included the California officials. For NPOV, all sides need to be considered and summarized with balance. Your wholesale revert of the lead has made it one sided, because it does not present a summary of the controversy from the side who proposed the change, before some changes were accepted.

I suggest you reconsider some of the text and cites you deleted to respect WP:NPOV, or present on this talk page a proper wikipedia policy or guideline based reason to delete the lede text I had added with cites. I look forward to your reasons and constructive collaboration, and do pardon my slow response, which I expect to continue for the next few weeks. Volunteers and busy we all are in our real life, :-), SimoneReeves (talk) 19:27, 1 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I am afraid your understanding of WP:NPOV is not correct. There is no requirement of representing all sides of a dispute. We only represent all views described in reliable sources. The idea of "all sides" constitutes WP:OR, unless it exists in the reliable sources. Qwertyus is following better quality sources that I have provided, and I have no concerns about his/her edits. You can discuss further after you return from holiday. Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 10:55, 2 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Boring and confusing[edit]

I am sorry. I understand that people worked on this article for a long time, but I am afraid that the result is quite unappealing. There is too much "bureaucracy" about this organization or that, but the substance of the issues is missing. The "Background" section is not limiting itself to the real background, goes through the whole story, and then the story comes again in bits and blobs. The large table in the middle is also quite distracting and breaks up the narrative. This may be the result of too much reliance on news sources rather than scholarly articles.

This is an important article. Can we improve it please? - Kautilya3 (talk) 23:13, 20 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Of course. The table is in fact based entirely on primary sources, has no clear inclusion criterion, and is not background reading at all. Its contents should be selectively merged into the narrative. QVVERTYVS (hm?) 18:56, 21 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
confusing, irrelevant, boring, not informed - to say the least. As user to have read many members of (now what I consider the rather fully biased) American Assoc for Hinduism, and the critiques to, i find this article extraordinarly weak and misleading. -- — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.43.195.18 (talk • contribs) November 2015

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Request related to the description of the CAPEEM case[edit]

This is a request to whoever keeps deleting information related to the CAPEEM case. A lawsuit has many angles and is not merely about one subpoena. Please do not delete information related to the attorney's previous experience with ACLU, Michael Newdow joining CAPEEM's legal team, information related to the many subpoenas issued by CAPEEM, their expose of the connection to the church and also the judge's ruling. Whatever be our biases, all these are important facts.

We must also remember that the information about the lawsuit must be comprehensive and about the main players and not merely about one person who was not even the Defendant but who happened to be subpoenaed.

Diane Webber's paper in the University of Maryland's Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class is a more accurate description of the judge's ruling and it is important not to keep injecting one's biases by claiming one side won by suppressing whatever the other side obtained. See page 287 of http://digitalcommons.law.umaryland.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1199&context=rrgc for Diane Webber's paper.

We understand that Witzel himself has edited this page in the past and and it amounts to vanity edits if he is the one who has been deleting information from the page and making the description Witzel-centric, but please understand that CAPEEM's lawsuit was important for the very reason that Diane Webber has mentioned in her paper. It pioneered the use of the Equal Protection Clause in claims related to religious discrimination and CAPEEM is an important and rare case study for students of law.

Many people come to Wikipedia and find the information here useful. Please do not delete information or indulge in vanity edits. Any removal of the lawyer's prior work with ACLU, an atheist lawyer joining CAPEEM's team and CAPEEM's expose of the church connections only makes one believe that whoever is editing it has his or her own motive. Let us keep Wikipedia clean and informative without injecting our prejudices. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 103.195.98.52 (talk) 02:46, 9 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This article is not about court cases. It is about a textbook dispute, and about the political forces behind the dispute. Most of the material presently on the CAPEEM case is WP:UNDUE and should be deleted. Any points of law that are applicable to the dispute should of course be covered, but not the exact process of the case. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 14:05, 9 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I am not talking about the article but the section on the court case. The court case is pertinent because it did expose the church-state connection and if Wikipedia does have a description of the court case, it should pertain to the MAIN point of the case, not one side motion related to one man in order to boost his ego. Remember that I am not the one who put the process in there. The details of the process of the motion were put in by whoever put in the information about Witzel who was neither the defendant nor the plaintiff and who was merely one of the many side actors in the issue.

I suggest we all keep our biases out of this. The books do indoctrinate with Christianity if the affidavit on CAPEEM's website is correct in quoting the textbooks. Suppressing this information can only be due to a bias. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 103.195.98.52 (talk) 07:43, 10 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]

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Redoing HAF section[edit]

Please do not remove my edit of the entire section on Hindu American Foundation Case. The previous entry lacked details as I am sure you'd agree. I have added a lot of detail which is all corroborated in the actual case document (HINDU AMERICAN FOUNDATION, et al., v. CALIFORNIA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION, et al., Case No. 06 CS 00386). It is therefore factual.

It is very easy to claim a new editor of the page as having a "preferred version of history" and dismiss their edits. But it behooves all the editors to read the edits in an unbiased manner, go through the citations, and then make a judgment. Thank you.

Reema (talk) 16:44, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I am happy to look at your sources. But you can't remove the previously well-sourced content. As per WP:NPOV, all reliable viewpoints should be described in Wikipedia. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 16:47, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Well the reason for removing some of the previous "well-sourced" content is because those source links stopped working. It is in the interest of a reader that I have done so. Kindly do not label me as biased without knowing the reason for my edit. Reema (talk) 16:48, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Also, I would like to point out that my source is the actual court document as recorded by a court reporter. There is no more reliable a source than that.Reema (talk) 16:50, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Your edit is racist and violating WP:NPOV:
  • "Opposition to the edits of the two Hindu foundations" > "Opposition of White Indologists and Church Affiliated Groups to the proposed edits of Hindu foundations"
  • "CAPEEM case" > "CAPEEM Case - Showcases the Interference of Christian Groups and Church to Denigrate Hinduism in Californian Textbooks"
Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 17:12, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]


(edit conflict) If the links stop working, you can tag them as {{dead link}}, but you can't remove the content sourced to them. Neither can you claim the content to be "unreferenced" as you did here. The source you have removed is a journal article, which is still available. If you can't access it, you need to find a library or request it from somebody that has access.
The court documents form WP:PRIMARY sources on Wikipedia, and you are prohibited from interpreting them or summarising them. They can only be used to provide additional detail to what is written in WP:SECONDARY sources. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 17:14, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I am absolutely appalled that you both are ganging up and undoing my edits which are referenced and way more detailed than the mumbo jumbo that had existed prior to that on this page. I can tell from your lack of understanding of what I am trying to do here that you have taken a position and are trying to block an editor from highlighting a different position. You're biased against a religion and yet keep threatening me with blocks, etc. by throwing words such as "racist", etc. at me. Great going. Reema (talk) 23:20, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I am removing the word "white" from the subtitle to address the concern (which I disagree with, but am yet obliging in the interest of moving this forward) that Joshuan Jonathan raised. But I am standing by the other changes until I am convinced of having erred in adhering to WP guidelines. Reema (talk) 23:23, 11 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I am afraid if you keep reverting without obtaining consensus, you will be blocked. So, take a deep breath and start explaining. What is it you are trying to do? For what purpose? -- Kautilya3 (talk) 02:41, 12 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Your edit added/changed the following:
  • 1. "Opposition to the edits of the two Hindu foundations" -> "Opposition of Indologists and Church Affiliated Groups to the proposed edits of Hindu foundations"
  • 2. "CAPEEM case" -> "CAPEEM Case - Showcases the Interference of Christian Groups and Church to Denigrate Hinduism in Californian Textbooks"
  • 3. You wrote: "A second lawsuit was filed by Hindu American Foundation (HAF) on March 16 against the California SBE over the procedure by which revisions in sixth grade textbooks were reviewed and approved, and contended that it was not conducted under regulations required by the California's Administrative Procedures Act and also contravened the Bagley-Keene Open Meeting Act. [1]"
  • 4. You replaced
"The judge denied HAF's motions for a temporary restraining order and for a preliminary injunction to stop the printing and distribution of several textbooks.[2] The court ultimately ruled in favour of retaining the textbooks as approved by SBE in March 2006, providing extensive discussion and justification of the most contended issues (Women's rights, Dalits, Aryan invasion, Hinduism as monotheistic religion),[3] while also noting that the approval process adopted by the board had not sufficiently been updated to recent changes in California laws.[4]"
with
"The court provided a partial victory to HAF in this lawsuit in that it ruled that the approval process adopted by the State Board of Education had not sufficiently complied with the statutory mandate that it enact regulations governing its textbook approval process as formal regulations pursuant to Administrative Procedures Act. However, it also denied the petitioner's demand that SBE be required to rescind its approval of these textbooks on the basis that the court had failed to find that content of the textbooks violated the applicable legal standards.[5]"
  • 5. You added:
"Following the HAF lawsuit, adhering to the judge's mandate, the SBE published new regulations for the textbook-adoption process. "Prior to this, the state board was acting arbitrarily, without public comment and behind closed doors," as per foundation attorney Suhag Shukla. In a post-judgment settlement in June 2007, the board agreed to pay the foundation $250,000 to defray some of its costs. [6]"

References

  1. ^ http://www.rediff.com/news/report/text/20070625.htm
  2. ^ Hindu group's motion to block texts denied | Oakland Tribune | Find Articles at BNET.com[dead link]
  3. ^ http://web.archive.org/web/20061018163334/http://www.saccourt.com/courtrooms/trulings/dept19/sep1d19--06cs00386.doc
  4. ^ "US text row resolved by Indian-India-The Times of India". Articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com. September 9, 2006. Retrieved 2014-06-23.
  5. ^ http://web.archive.org/web/20061018163334/http://www.saccourt.com/courtrooms/trulings/dept19/sep1d19--06cs00386.doc
  6. ^ https://www.hinduismtoday.com/blogs-news/hindu-press-international/hindu-group-and-california-s-board-of-education-settle-in-textbook-bias-suit/8602.html
  • ad1 & 2: violation of WP:NPOV.
  • ad3: this seems to be okay, execept that it is a WP:COPYVIOLATION.
  • ad4: What's wrong with the old text? I object to the term "victory"; it's not neutral.
  • ad5: seems to be okay, excepot for the quote from Suhag Shukla; not neutral.
Joshua Jonathan -Let's talk! 05:51, 12 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Kautilya, finally you're engaging with me constructively, and so I will respond to the question raised by you here on the talk page as against reverting your edit as to what I am trying to do here. Please allow me some time as I am going to be out all day today. I will respond to your question in due time. Reema (talk) 14:59, 12 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Redoing HAF Section - Second Attempt by Reema wiki[edit]

To fellow editors:

I am compelled to redo the Hindu American Foundation section for these five reasons -

  1. As it currently stands today, it is not written clearly. Case in point - "A second lawsuit was filed by HAF on March 16 and this was the second lawsuit." Why repeat the same information (second lawsuit) twice? My edit cleans this kind of things up from the section.
  2. Most importantly, it shrouds the fact that the HAF litigation ended in a partial victory for both parties. The section, the way it is currently, seems to indicate that the State Board of Education had a victory whereas HAF just got a mere acknowledgment of its claim that due process in accordance with the state laws was not followed during the textbook revision of the section on Hindu religion (ref: "while also noting that the approval process adopted by the board had not sufficiently been updated to recent changes in California laws"). That is a BIG omission! And, it misleads the reader by hiding the fact that the court had found SBE to have violated the state laws in the way it carried out textbook revision. My version of editing clears this fact.
  3. I am removing dead links (reference # 52) and adding references to other well known sources (eg. Rediff.com, a popular Indian online news portal) that do work. I am okay with the use of the other reference that the existing version makes (reference # 53) because it goes straight to the horse's mouth (the court recorded case document of the ruling). And, as you can see in my revision ([1]) I have made a use of that already existing reference as well.
  4. The existing text in this section does not mention that the Court had asked SBE to publish the new regulation for textbook approval and adoption process. This is a BIG deal and a victory for the petitioning party, which interestingly the current version does not mention. You see, the reason HAF went to court is two pronged - a) To make SBE fix its broken process (for e.g. closed room edits) of textbook changes so that it is transparent, and b) to make SBE roll back its changes. Both these reasons are well documented in the rediff source that I reference in my revision ([2]). The fact that they got the court to rule that SBE needs to fix its broken process by publishing new regulation for textbook adoption is SIGNIFICANT. But this section in its current state omits mentioning this aspect of the ruling, while it summarily mentions that HAF lost the case on rolling back the actual revisions to the material on Hindu religion (ref: " The court ultimately ruled in favour of retaining the textbooks as approved by SBE in March 2006, providing extensive discussion and justification of the most contended issues (Women's rights, Dalits, Aryan invasion, Hinduism as monotheistic religion"). THIS is one among the many reasons why I find this section (in fact, the whole article) biased! On the other hand, my editing of this section is unbiased and balanced because it highlights BOTH aspects of the ruling.
  5. The current version of this section conveniently omits mentioning that SBE was asked to defray some of the lawsuit cost that HAF had to endure. SBE had to shell out 250K USD. This information is well sourced as you can see from my revision ([3]).

So, here I have given my reasons as requested by Kautilya. Please let me know what more I can do to make you see that my version of the edit is way better than what is currently put up, rather sloppily if I may. My editing presents well sourced information from references that still work, and provide a lot more detail on the case than the existing version. If you do not agree with me then do provide *exact* text of contention from my revision ([4]). I would not appreciate being again and again pointed to general WP editing guidelines which I am already aware of. So let me repeat - be specific with exact text of contention from my revision ([5]) in the interest of moving this discussion forward.

Also, note that once we settle editing this section I would move on to cleaning up of the other sections. Reema (talk) 04:26, 13 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Reema wiki: Let me first note that none of your points demonstrate any "anti-Hindu" bias in the article, as you were claiming earlier. The entire HAF case is about procedures, not about Hinduism or the textbooks, even though it appears that HAF hoped to block the textbooks citing procedural lapses. It didn't succeed. They can claim victory, but it hardly appears as a victory to a neutral observer. Coming to your points:
1 It is easy fixable by a copyedit.
2 I agree with the current text, which makes it appear as a "victory" for the State Board. The textbooks were neither blocked nor altered.
3 Dead links can often be fixed. When you notice them, please tag them with {{dead link}}. A bot or some other editor will find the archives or correct urls where they are available. Even if the sources are not available online, the citation continues to be valid, and the content is considered to be verified. You cannot delete it.
5 The money issue is incidental. The topic of this article is "textbook controversy".
Coming to your point 4, which is the only substantive one:
  • I don't see any mention of "closed room edits" in the Rediff source.[6] Neither do I see any BIG DEAL mentioned in the source. On the other hand, the source does make two points that are possibly a big deal. (1) that experts in Hinduism need to be involved in the process, (2) that the Hindu-American community was "outraged" that a non-Hindu academic (presumably Witzel) was able to stymie the community efforts. The source gives only Meghani's statements to this effect. No indication of the Board of Education response or what the experts said about these issues. I will look for some sources that cover these issues.
  • The Times of India article,[7] for which I corrected the URL, states: When the book came out, HAF protested against the content relating to the caste system, women and deities, origin of Aryans apart from alleging that the book was generally anti-Hindu. The court did not find anything wrong with these issues in the textbooks and it allowed the textbooks to go ahead. I don't agree that there is anything anti-Hindu about any of the parties involved, including our reporting of them. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 21:27, 13 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history&oldid=764967929#Hindu_American_Foundation_case
  2. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history&oldid=764967929#Hindu_American_Foundation_case
  3. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history&oldid=764967929#Hindu_American_Foundation_case
  4. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history&oldid=764967929#Hindu_American_Foundation_case
  5. ^ https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=California_textbook_controversy_over_Hindu_history&oldid=764967929#Hindu_American_Foundation_case
  6. ^ http://www.rediff.com/news/report/text/20070625.htm
  7. ^ "US text row resolved by Indian". The Times of India. September 9, 2006. Retrieved 2014-06-23.


@Kautilya3:

Let me begin by disagreeing with your assertion that there is no anti-Hindu bias. The fact that you do not want me to highlight that HAF had a VICTORY on one of the two fundamental claims upon which their litigation was based seems unreasonable and therefore, biased. The court did rule (not a mere acknowledgment, mind you) that the procedure used to update the textbook was not in accordance with the state laws (California Administrative Procedures Act and Bagley Keene Open Meeting Act), and that it led HAF to go to court to mandate SBE to make a change to its textbook update and adoption process. This implies in no uncertain terms that SBE did NOT have a "total" victory as a respondent. The language of the section conveniently skips this fact, hence, my claim of an anti-Hindu bias.
Also, I would not call breaking of laws "procedural". I would call it "illegal". Let us use language very precisely here since we deem ourselves to be Editors. In fact, this ruling was SIGNIFICANT as the court itself has described in its court recorded case document quoted here under :-
This court’s ruling that respondent has been conducting its textbook approval process under an invalid regulatory framework has serious consequences, in that it potentially calls into question the validity of decisions adopting many more textbooks than merely the few sixth-grade texts at issue here, even though the substance of those other texts was not challenged here
Hence, this ruling was significant with "serious consequences" since this broken process affected many more textbooks than just the sixth grade social sciences textbook, and yet, as an editor you advise to gloss over this part of the ruling? Furthermore, if the victory was not total, it means that it was partial. Implying that the judge ruled partially in favor of HAF and SBE.
So, why would you refuse to put that very relevant information in this section? I hope you realize that by refusing to put well sourced facts in this section simply because YOU don't think it is a "BIG DEAL" or that the fact that SBE was made to pay 250K is "incidental", you are coming across a bit heavy handed. As a fellow editor, I have no choice but to ponder that the reason for your disagreement to include well sourced information (of ruling re: lack of procedure and 250K legal cost) could be because it does not fit YOUR narrative of a complete loss of the Hindu side rather than a partial victory for both sides including the Hindu side, thereby highlighting an anti-Hindu bias. Let me also point the obvious that your stance in this instance is violating WP:NPOV by refusing to "represent fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic". Please note that I would address other instances of anti-Hindu biases from the rest of this wiki article when I get to them. For now, let us just focus on resolving this one section. One thing at a time.
Moving forward, let me respond to each of your comments point by point.
1. Agree. However, my point was not that it is not fixable. My point was to note the POOR quality of editing.
2. I disagree! It was a "partial" victory as I have already rested the case for in my opening comments. It would have been a "victory" if SBE were able to successfully defend themselves against *all* claims of the lawsuit, which they were not. My contention is with the blanket word "victory" that you are using here. One must see a very reasonable need to qualify it with the adjective "partial", as that is what it was in truth.
3. Noted. You can keep the dead link if you so wish. Not that it is going to help anyone in a meaningful way.
4. Surely you would have known that "closed-room edit" is a phrase I employed to bring forth the concept of non-transparency. It was not meant to be a literal phrase and should not be used as such even rhetorically as it would mar the process of working toward building consensus on this section. Text that I wish to put a literal emphasis on would be typically placed in quotation marks. I have already addressed the other point that you made as a response to my original point # 4 (the "BIG DEAL").
5. Incidental? Really? The fact that a statutory body would not respond to a non-profit organization's concern of how it conducted the state business unless that said statutory body had to be dragged all the way to court; make the non-profit spend money on litigation, which it then fought and got a favorable ruling for one out of the two claims in that the state had not followed statutory laws that their legislature had so wisely ratified; and, that the statutory agency is then mandated to defray some of the legal costs that its lack of engagement had led to be incurred is INCIDENTAL? I agree, not.
Reema (talk) 18:08, 14 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Right. Your concern is about the "victory" of HAF, and the 250K that the SBE paid them signifies that victory. My concern is about the California textbooks, and this article happens to be about California textbooks. That about sums up this pointless debate.
If there is any reliable third-party source that says that there was anything wrong with the California textbooks, please bring it forward. Otherwise, this is a dead end.
If you want to pursue the "anti-Hindu" angle, please take it to WP:NPOVN and present your case. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 22:04, 14 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Let me amend that. You are also welcome to bring information about what was wrong with the SBE textbook adoption process (as noted in reliable third party sources). But the "victory" of HAF is of no interest whatsoever. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 22:52, 14 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]


@Kautilya3:

Your argument that "this article happens to be about California textbooks" to stop me from talking about Hindu American Foundation suing SBE over not following the lawful process of updating "California textbooks", and winning squarely in so doing, does not hold water. Clever way to squirm around my allegation that you're acting in a biased manner in your supposed role as an "Editor".

Your annoyance and totally useless response to my detailed rebuttal tells me that I am on the right track. Since, you are not interested in resolving this, I am going to seek mediation. Reema (talk) 16:16, 15 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Kaultilya3:

As stated above on 02/15/2017, I was about to post to WP:NPOVN to request mediation for the Hindu American Foundation case edit. That is when I saw that this section had been thoroughly revised with a lot of relevant information - such as proper procedure was not followed, SBE agreeing to pay part of legal costs, new references both primary and secondary, etc. - to present the Hindu American Foundation litigation more accurately. As a result, I find this section much better now, and something I can live with. So, thanks, Kaultilya3 for your work in editing this to bring it to an agreeable state.

Now, may I suggest, that we move on to the next thing to make this article bring out a very important point i.e. the involvement of church affiliated and other special interest groups in the controversy? While this article makes every attempt to call out the litigating parties on the Hindu side as "Hindu nationalist" outright, the role played by Church and other organizations whose special interest it is to see Hinduism derided is not called out clearly. Just to be clear, there is text written to this effect (the intervention of church, etc.) in this article currently. However, it is buried in other sections. I was thinking of consolidating this text into a sub-section on its own, something like - 'Role played by Church affiliated groups and other Special Interest Groups' to call out the fact that both sides had vested interests, not just the Hindu side. I won't go as far as to call them fundamentalist in the interest of WP:NPOV. However, I am very certain that all the information pertaining to this deserve to be placed in its own section, and not buried inside the fine print on this page.

Let me know how you'd like me to go about this. I can take a stab at a first draft, and you can further edit/object to find a mutual consensus. I would, obviously, source whatever I write.

Reema (talk) 16:08, 24 February 2017 (UTC)Reema[reply]

Thanks for your appreciation. It was indeed hard work!
Regarding the Church affiliated groups, since you are expecting it to be contentious, your best bet would be to discuss it here first before putting it in the mainspace. It would be easiest if you can come up with bullet points that you think should be included, and provide citations for them. Once we agree on what needs to be added, then we can decide how best to structure it. Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 02:08, 26 February 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: Asian Religions in America[edit]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 7 September 2022 and 9 December 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Peer reviewers: Skidepedia23, The Purple Hamster.

— Assignment last updated by Stormageddon623 (talk) 19:17, 18 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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