Talk:Andrea Dworkin/Archive 6

This is an archive of past discussions about Andrea Dworkin. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

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Archive 4

Jurist? That is pushing it.

Andrea Dworkin is not a trained lawyer. The "Jurist" catagory is really pushing it. AWM -- 68.122.118.161 10:35, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

She does not make the grade. I am removing the cat. -- 68.122.118.161 10:40, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Good catch. Radgeek 22:12, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Oh, by the way, it is not a "good catch." Just removing some insanity -- Andrea was no more a jurist than is Paris the capital of New Zealand. --Mare Nostrum 19:34, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Why no picture?

There are pictures of most other famous people on here. Why not of her?

Because nobody has uploaded a GFDL-licensed picture and added it to the article. Thank you for your suggestion! When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make whatever changes you feel are needed. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the Edit this page link at the top. You don't even need to log in! (Although there are some reasons why you might like to…) The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes—they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills. New contributors are always welcome.. If you have a picture that is not copyrighted, go right ahead and add it. moink 03:04, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

My experience is that the NNDB photo is often public domain. You can use it if nothing else. -- 75.26.4.46 05:04, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

LET ANDREA BE REVEALED!!!--Mare Nostrum 19:25, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Hey, I like that current photo!! Thanks, to whoever supplied it!! Sort of puts the uninitiated into the picture as to just what an oafish oddity we're dealing with here!! 82.146.162.228 09:02, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

NPOV Removal

Agree or disgaree with Dworkin, this article by far satisfies the NPOV requirement, is heavily sourced, and the critics of the NPOV can only come up with their own POV as a reply. If you think Dworkin lied on her autobiography, you are entitled to that, but thats POV. A NPOV is the one that says what we *know*: that she described being raped. -- Cerejota|Cerejota 04:42, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

NO, SHE ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY, ABSOLUTELY DID **NOT.**

And this one of the real Big Lies of the Dworkin-loving fanatics. Read her own account of it -- the fat, hate-filled, repulsive, misandrist cow had no recollection of any rape whatsoever, and it is right there plainly in her own ludicrous account of it in the Guardian. Oh, yes: She pieced it together. She decided she must have been raped (pity the poor perpetrator, eh?). She made it up. She bullshitted us. She raved. She free-associated. She channeled back to the non-event. "Realized" what must have happened. Like one might "realize" that one must have been been kidnapped by aliens or otherwise how could one possibly have fallen asleep with the TV still on. She accused.

And she made an idiot of herself. And exposed herself as one flamboyant nut case. But she never claimed to recall any such event. And I know you hate that, and I know you'll find a way not to admit it, and you'll dearly want to mock those of us who point it out. But that's the fact, Jack. And it's on the written record. In her own delirious words. Mare Nostrum

If you notice, the article doesnt say she said the truth, nor that she lied. It takes a NEUTRAL stance. What part of neutral you need to understand? --Cerejota 04:42, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Liked those sanctimonious 13 reversions from the fansite operator, speaking of POV. Mare Nostrum

Oh by the way,*this* is NPOV? That Newsweek wouldn't publish another of her nutball accounts, "to protect the identity of the batterer"? Is that an actual Newsweek quote? I mean, did the Public Affairs department of Newsweek authorize that language? Or is our regrettable article actually something out of the Dworkin zealotry looney bin?

And this **UNBELIEVABLE** insanity about her and the Nobel Prize for Literature, I see that's still in there!!! I can't even fathom that it didn't get taken out (or did the reverters again triumph?)!!! Oh my goodness! And listen, this stuff about her losing her crackpot defamation lawsuit because of some marketplace-of-ideas jazz is another callous, direct attempt to disinform us: it is provided only to confuse us into believing that she lost the suit on a technicality. She actually lost it because she claimed that Hustler falsely accused her of calling for incest with children. But she did call for incest with children, in print. Whatever the hell she meant by that, Hustler was right and she was wrong, plain and simple. The court was pretty stunned that she would bring a suit despite those clear facts, but she did for some reason, and naturally she lost. This isn't really a POV issue by the way: including the false explanation in the article is a calculated misrepresentation to the reader. Deliberately meant to confuse and misinform. Don't let anybody tell you different. --Mare Nostrum 19:06, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Could we hold off on the name-calling?

Folks, let us agree on something: Andrea Dworking was abrasive. But now she is dead so let us just all pretend like she has been dead for 100 years, calm down and summarize who she was. We do not have to like who she was, we just have to get her biography right. For perspective: if she said some stupid things in her life, then perhaps they are, in the end, not-so-notable. If she wrote and published something controversial, OK, that is fair game. Let us try to figure out what she left behind that is worth remembering. It is not as if she ever had much real political power: she was an activist. And another thing: if she was not the prettiest, slimmest sexist woman in history, well... her appearance probably had more to do with how the world treated her and how she might have lashed back at it, but that is all non-notable pettiness that probably the majority of the people in the world have to deal with. Let us just figure out what is worth remembering about her. I am not looking to rehabilitate her or apologize for her, I am just asking that we take a scholarly approach, which tends to avoid trivial issues like simple physical appearance. OK? -- 75.24.213.40 00:49, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, it is not PC to say this, but many or most of us think that her acute physical repugnancy is very relevant in considering her most absurd claim to have been raped at a fierecly ugly 50 years of age or whatever (whereas obviously many 50 year old women are beautiful, kind, balanced, yet still strong, in the modern day). Shoot, many or most of us also think PC is truly stupid BTW. So, no, I kindly will not be silenced by your note here. As to figuring out what is worth remembering about her, "let us agree" that the main things she is famous for are two:

(a) being a bombastic polemicist bigot, and (b) hitching the unfortunate name of feminism to extreme, virulent misandry. That should be the lead of the article, i.e., as has been said of her legacy, most women today would rather be bit by a rabid dog than call themselves feminists. She certainly isn't famous for impacting the pornography world in any way, one of the world's healthiest industries that has grown truly exponentially since she became active. Although, yes, Attorney General Meese's office at the time found her to be a convenient willing dupe for its censorship polices, until an appalled Supreme Court smacked them down.

In reality, "us" figuring this out is much in doubt -- the history of this article has been a sad parade of endless, daily, recalcitrant reverting and vituperation when any of her "achievements" (such as narrowly missing the Noble Prize for Literature) were questioned. So there is no "us" unfortunately, this article has been all about bullying by the zealots against the thoughtful. And that is one of the weaknesses of Wikipedia that has been laid bare here, there is no effective sanction for this kind of serial abuse, however apparent and prolonged. Men of good will tire and move on. Then some good-hearted sort like yourself comes along pretending to be neutal while bemoaning how "the world treated her." Poor "preacher of hate" that she was, as Cathy Young put it. But how about the way **she** treated the world, while you're being so generous with your thoughts? What about **us?** If she said the same things about blacks or Jews or Hispanics, would you be so conciliatory and sentimental? Or do you have a double standard, when you speak of "pettiness"?

As to what was important, really, about her? It could be done in three paragraphs, maybe two. All this bloated blarney about her ground-breaking authorship and all is lunacy. And, hey, where's that picture? If her appearance is truly of such little concern as you assure us, let's plaster it up there! Oh, and, Freudian slip there when you called her "sexist" there, huh?! Better watch that next time! - Mare Nostrum 82.146.162.228 18:29, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Mare Nostrum, this is wikipedia. In other words it is an encyclopedic compendium. It attempts to collect all human knowledge. This includes all things, wether you like them or you don't. From the perspective of the wiki you are entitled to your opinion, but you are not entitled to diminish the quality of the factual information on a given topic simply because of your dislike of the topic.

If you want to wax poetic about your obvious dislike of Andrea Dworkin, fine. No problem. Go ahead an do it. Just not on Wikipedia.

I will ask you again:

1) Stop the vandalising of the page by including the POV tag. It is not warranted under the rules, as the article satisfies all of Wikipedia Rules. This also go out to to those who are putting it up as a form of wiki vandalism. The POV tag is meant a guide towards substantial discussions on the topics, not as a way for vadals to show their dislike of a topic.

2) Stop using this page as a way to vent your own personal point of views on Dworkin. In particular the use of weasel words is discouraged.

3) Stop disrespecting fellow wikipedians.

Thank you. --Cerejota 00:58, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Hey, thanks, and if I had a quarter for every time a disinforming friend of Andrea on here instructed me to shut up I'd be doing okay. (Then they say, "Oh, I never asked you stop contributing", Li'l Bo Beep style.) I won't shut up, we have already treated this process with gentility and it absolutely doesn't work in the face of revereting bullying (how **many** of us have been abused on here!!!) which Wiki regrettably allows, a majority of the people above don't agree with you anyway, and damn sure don't again waste your breath trying to give me orders. It doesn't meet NPOV because it is full of POV. Respect begins with the reader --respect them and us with an honest attempt at the truth. Rather than, for example, coyly making up false statements like you did claiming that Andrea's raving Guardian article indicated she had a clear recollection of being raped. If you have an opinion that up is down, fine, but kindly treat your fellow Wikipedians with enough decorum not to spread known falsehoods. --Mare Nostrum 05:45, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

No one is asking you to shut up, just to follow the wikipedia rules. Or care to elaborate on why you are so special these rules don't apply to you?

I also ask you, again, to refrain from name-calling and weasel words. Perhaps you don't know that under conflict resolution rules, my attempts are considered good faith attempts to prevent continued vadalism on an encyclopedic entry? And that if these good faith attempts fail, it will mean that escalation might be in order?

Again: if you feel this article is somehow lacking in terms of what is expected of an encyclopedic article and Wikipedia's rules, feel free to contribute any of those positive elements. I will be the first to defend a positive contribution, even if it goes against the grain of the tone set by the original author.

--Cerejota 09:43, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I recently reinstated the POV tag because I believe this article is not neutral. I have explained above why this is, but let me summarise yet again.

Firstly, it includes little information about her serious critics, instead devoting more space to Hustler magazine. When it does mention critics their views are immediately counterposed with assertions from Dworkin (e.g. about the "all sex is rape" claim), as if these somehow implicitly negate the semantic content of her books.

Secondly, Radgeek has adopted an exculpatory narratory framework, and uses this to pass off his own ruminations as unimpeachable fact, while simultaneously disparaging (and deleting) contrary interpretations as "original research". He holds to this "original research" line even though he is the one who has provided no third party sources to justify his stance.

He has over the past few months repeatedly failed to reply to serious arguments and the presentation of evidence, in spite of his supposed demand for these. He has found the time, since I last responded to him, to make various contributions to this article, Wikipedia in general, and his Dworkin fansite. Yet he has, mysteriously, found no time to add any critical material to this article, or to even respond on the talk page.

There is no better illustration of his bias than the sequence of events following my insertion of material about "Intercourse":

1) I add some quotes and minimal explanatory material that show why people have interpreted her as suggesting penetrative heterosexual intercourse is inherently violative.

2) Radgeek deletes the quotes and associated material, saying this latter is original research. He then reinstates some of the quotes, with a passage suggesting that they mean something entirely different.

3) I provide a long list of citations of authors who have indeed interpreted her as having the above view of sex, as well as detailed arguments about why this is at the least a reasonable interpretation of "Intercourse".

4) Radgeek never replies to the detailed arguments about "Intercourse", and never introduces any of the critical material I have provided. Instead in the following months he devotes his energies to battling talk page vandals and improving the footnote style.

5) The debate restarts. I respond to his ongoing attempts to wriggle out of applying the same evidential standards to himself as he does to others. He never replies, but continues to tinker with the page instead.

In summary, the page as it stands is largely the result of a Dworkin partisan, and is unsurprisingly biased. Previous attempts to correct this have met with reversions and hypocritical bluster.

Stuarta 12:12, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Stuarta,

Given the volume of material above between you and I on the interpretation of Intercourse and of the specific passages you have cited, it is frankly absurd for you to claim that I have "never replied" to the detalied arguments that you have introduced. I have not insisted on getting the last word on every point that you have tried to make, not because I think you are right, but because I think that a great deal of this argument is irrelevant to the writing of the article; because my time and my energy, even for topics that I care a great deal about, is not infinite; and because whenever I do attempt to reply in detail I am abused by you for "Clintonian word-wrangling," etc., and no matter how much effort I devote to replying to you and drawing your attention to selective quotations, parts of the book that you have neglected, etc., I am repeatedly met with the charge that I have "never replied" to whatever shining insight you think that you have presented, in spite of having written several pages of material and spent quite a bit of time reading and transcribing sections of the book. You may think that you have every right to make charges that I'm being sophistical, that I'm imposing double-standards, that my replies are not responsive to whatever point you're trying to urge, etc. because (you think) those charges are true. But you can hardly expect me to agree with you, and you can hardly be surprised if I find this more trouble than it's worth for more than a few exchanges at a time.

I have repeatedly encouraged you and others to incorporate material like that which you quoted on this Talk page into the article. I have not done it myself because this article is not my sole responsibility, because I do have to work for a living, and because I have other things to do, both here and elsewhere. You may think that it's not worth taking the trouble of adding yourself because you feel that your efforts will be unfairly reverted or otherwise amount to wasted labor. If so, I'm sorry you feel that way, but that does not make it incumbent on me to devote time solely to fixing up all the things I'd like to see fixed with this article--let alone to fixing it to your specifications.

I am also not sure what possible objection you could have to the fact that Dworkin's replies to her critics are allowed space in the article. How is presenting an author's interpretive statements about her own work, and replies to criticism of it, a violation of WP:NPOV?

As a side note, I do not run a "Dworkin fansite." I run several websites, one of which (Rad Geek People's Daily) is a general-interest weblog where I've posted some articles favorable to Andrea Dworkin. That is no more an "Dworkin fansite" than Instapundit (which has, after all, posted some articles favorable to Christopher Hitchens) is a "Hitchens fansite." This claim, endlessly repeated by Mare Nostrum and now by you, is sheer misrepresentation, and I'd prefer if you stopped it.

Radgeek 21:49, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Apparently the “volume of material above” renders “frankly absurd” the suggestion that you have evaded my “detailed arguments” on “Intercourse”. This is so even though the contribution I made on 21st February, which contained the the fullest presentation of the reasons why I do not believe Dworkin could have been referring purely to depiction, provoked no response.

Curiously, however, even though what I said on 21st February had supposedly been preempted by the great “volume of material” preceding it, you felt the need to produce a new barrage of Carollian hair-splitting on 9th June about precisely the same subject. I suppose this reiteration was generous, given your enormously busy schedule, but it would have been more worthwhile to have addressed the argument as it actually stood, rather than less complete remarks from the beginning of February.

I shan't pursue the wider implications of your idea that discussion beyond a certain volume implicitly renders answered any points – they are too absurd for reasoned consideration; and besides, I do have work to do.

Anyway, you have some other excuses. You didn't insist “on getting the last word on every point”. How kind. I suppose this polite reticence is why you never explained, despite being asked repeatedly, just what criteria apply when distinguishing between your neutral “summary” and my “personal exegesis”, or why your editorialising requires no third party sources and mine does. Apparently this matter, along with what Dworkin actually meant in “Intercourse” (see above), is “irrelevant to the writing of the article”.

Apparently I can “hardly expect” agreement on whether your double standards are acceptable. It was foolish of me, clearly, to expect any consistent application of editorial standards, or even an attempt at a defence of your stance thereon. Point taken.

As it is a side-issue, I'll also quickly pass over the alleged Dworkin “fansite”. You're right – I apologise – it isn't a site purely devoted to worship of Andrea Dworkin. I confess I was thrown by Google's report of 78 mentions of Andrea Dworkin, apparently all positive, and the six-parter titled “Andrea Dworkin Was Right”.

I am more interested, in any case, in the standards that you apply to editorialising on this site. Given that you are unwilling to defend your application of double standards I am left wondering what the odds are of making any substantial change that will not provoke a revert war. I'm willing, given your inclination only to add positive material, to try. I just hope that your related inclination to excise negative material will be restrained.

As for Dworkin's replies, they certainly belong in the article. But I do not believe her critics are presently given a fair hearing alongside her categorical responses. It is possible, as I have pointed out before, that Dworkin was self-contradictory. Since I and many others take “Intercourse” to equate sex with rape, and yet she disavowed this position, it is hard to reach any conclusion other than that she wanted to have it both ways. This possibility is at present excluded by the article.

Stuarta 17:01, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Stuarta:

I have read all your justifications for a POV tag and all they amount to is weasel words and your own POV, and ad hominem attacks at Radgeek. Yet you seem to ignore what constitutes NPOV under wikipedia rules.

This article as it stands today (see my sig for time) is NPOV compliant. It is so because NPOV is not a capricious definition you create to suit your wants and needs but because it has some verifiable standards set out in the relevant NPOV page. This article as it stands today meets all and fail none of the criteria:

In other words, NPOV IS NOT THE SAME AS EQUAL TIME. Get it? NOT THE SAME. NOT EQUAL. There is NO RULE, AGREEMENT or ANYTHING in the entire Wikipedia about equal time within a single article. What is ENCOURAGED is to make an article much more complete by adding all the relevant information possible, PRESENTED in a NPOV. If an article fails to have equal time, but this is due to lack of research, it is still NPOV.

(Don't like it? Take it up in the talk pages about wikipedia administration. But dont try to weasel it in by the backdoor.)

Wikipedia IN GENERAL gives equal time. Thats the beauty of wikipedia. You post on Andrea Dworkin, and then add stuff against Andrea Dworkin and let the readers decide. You and others who continue to vandalize this page by stating that the article, IN GENERAL violates NPOV, when this is OBVIOUSLY not the case, do not understand this simple idea.

Be a wikipedian, and add relevant critcism to Andrea Dworkin. Otherwise stop the weasel words, which is all the arguements I have heard here about POV since I joined the fray amount to.

--Cerejota 21:02, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't see a lot of value in devoting much attention to this outburst. You once again removed the POV tag on 4th July, and I didn't reinstate it because I think changes to correct the POV problem are more important than signalling it. You got your way, in other words, so what are you stamping your foot about? (It's probably worth also adding that I reinstated the POV tag precisely once, and did not initially add it, even though I believe it to be warranted.)

What your RANDOMLY CAPITALISED splurge appears to neglect is the biased narratory voice about which I have written repeatedly above. Even if your argument regarding equal time held, it would not eliminate this problem. Indeed, you concede that information should be "PRESENTED in a NPOV". This is exactly what I have argued is not the case -- an argument that you have not felt moved to address.

But then, you have not addressed a single substantive point: everything above is just a stream of generalised accusations. I can't respond to them until you provide examples of these weasel words and ad hominem attacks (I regard your charge of my "own POV" as implicitly empty). Until you do, I shall ignore your complaints.

Incidentally, I don't quite see where your obsession with "equal time" comes from. Perhaps you can enlighten me without hitting that caps key? On the NPOV page to which you directed me (three times) I read that "NPOV says that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints, in proportion to the prominence of each". A significant viewpoint is that Dworkin was anti-sex. This is not fairly represented. The article is therefore POV, surely?

Stuarta 10:54, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes I am biased because this surely is one of the ugliest talk pages in all of wikipedia.

One of my pet peeves in wikipedia, call it a convert's zeal, are both weasel words and wrong interpretations of NPOV. Concrete examples on your part of both abound, but I will give two each:

Stuarta:"Anyway, you have some other excuses. You didn't insist “on getting the last word on every point”. How kind. I suppose this polite reticence is why you never explained, despite being asked repeatedly, just what criteria apply when distinguishing between your neutral “summary” and my “personal exegesis”, or why your editorialising requires no third party sources and mine does. Apparently this matter, along with what Dworkin actually meant in “Intercourse” (see above), is “irrelevant to the writing of the article”."

Classic example of Ad Hominem. A beautiful, imho, example of parlamentary sarcasm that would make Disraeli weep in pride. Alas, well-worded form makes not for incisive substance.

You do not appear to understand what argumentum ad hominem is. I did not attack Radgeek personally in these words you quote: I attacked what he had said, and pointed out what he had not said. As you admit below, "the discussion of ideas presented by individuals" is not ad hominem. My point was, and remains, that he had not addressed the key issues.

Stuarta"Radgeek never replies to the detailed arguments about "Intercourse", and never introduces any of the critical material I have provided. Instead in the following months he devotes his energies to battling talk page vandals and improving the footnote style."

This is wikipedia. You can edit the page yourselve if you want material added. Preferiably after engaging in discussion. This actually has a bit of strawman in it too. You weaseling out from actually subjecting your crticical material to standards of the community by not publishing it in the main page. Go ahead and do it if you feel its relevant. I certainly think that it might compromise NPOV by being disproportionate in comparising to the NPOV information and to the the POV material from supporters, but maybe am wrong.

You appear to be selectively ignoring what has already been written. It is my plan to make changes to the page. This entire debate was sparked by my making changes to the main page. Radgeek then deleted those changes, as you know, because I made this clear in text that you partially quote above. I have not, therefore, "weasel[ed] out from actually subjecting [my] crticical material to standards of the community", because I have published it.

As I have also stated, I held back from making changes because of Radgeek's responses. After a further exchange with Radgeek I made it clear I did intend to try again with the critical material, in the hope that it wouldn't be immediately reverted as previously. So why are you further bloating this talk page with at best obsolete accusations?

Of course, references to what a person argued, and the discussion of ideas presented by individuals are not Ad Hominem. You do that too, like I am doing to you now. But you also engage in some kind of contest with Radgeek that does nothing to elevate the substantial quality of the encyclopedic article on Andrea Dworkin, and does a lot to further clutter this talk page with irrelevant stuff, included my exasperated and general calls to refocus on the consensus goal of the article on Andrea Dworkin (develop an encyclopedia article meeting certain standards) and of its talk page (to help develop the article to those standards by engaging the community of wikipedians). Your comments and those most others in this talk page sometimes prove useful and follow those general guidelines, but most of the time they don't, and sometimes have been egregious examples of vandalism.

I agree, the debate has become too much like a contest. But I do not believe your starting a new contest is helpful. As I have pointed out, both your complaints about the POV tag removal and your complaints about my not adding critical material are not relevant because they no longer apply. Your general complaint that "most of the time" my comments are not "useful" is more applicable to your contributions, in my view. I have had a detailed discussion on the meaning of "Intercourse", and provided a lot of references thereon. You have so far provided nothing.

(My basic point is that this article is as complete as any in wikipedia, and that by continually questioning its POV simply based on a lack of percieved completeness (without any apparent effort to complete it!), people are vandalising it.)

But my complaint is not restricted to completeness! I have repeatedly stated that I object to the biased narratory tone. It is manifestly false to describe my critical stance as "simply based on a lack of percieved completeness". As it is, the NPOV page mandates fair coverage of major points of view, and the article currently lacks this. Since there do exist pages with fair coverage of major points of view, it is quite evidently false to maintain, as you do, that this page is "as complete as any in wikipedia" or as "NPOV as any in Wikipedia".

I will not address your further ad hominems, appeals to motive, and other such fallacies as their are irrelevant to the article and editing it. I have engaged in the above two clarifications only to show that I have indeed read your writings, and that my exasperation is grounded on them, not what you want the perception of them, post-facto, to be. I will no longer do this, and will indeed consider this the last words that I will engage with you that are not directly related to the article and its editing.

I'm encouraged that these are to be your last words, because I regard your contributions, unlike Radgeek's, to be uniformly unhelpful. Just when I had settled on editing the page to reflect my criticisms of it, you start wasting my time with these nebulous imprecations. Instead of doing the editing, I'm instead pushed to defend myself.

Talk pages are neither about us, not about what we believe about a given article, but rather about how we can make that article better.

Right. So please go away, unless you wish to discuss how to make the article better.

You raise points that are addressed, and refuse to either accept them or edit the main article to reflect the changes you feel are necessary, except the weasel cop-out of putting a simple POV tag (which you know say you will refrain from doing). I call you on that as a wikipedian: If you dont like something, edit it by adding or substracting, not by engaging in vacous unproductive debates in the talk pages. I know you know how to do this. Saves us all time to edit other articles, and saves you time from trying micro-edit an article for which you have nothing concrete to add or edit. Perhaps I need to point you to Talk Page Guidelines?

Again with the unsubstantiated generalisations. Which points were addressed? Not the ones regarding missing critical material or editorial double standards. As I have noted, I re-added the POV tag exactly once. It can hardly, then, be fair to characterise my response to points, addressed or not, as "the weasel cop-out of putting a simple POV tag".

The hypocrisy of accusing me of "vacous unproductive debates in the talk pages" is quite extraordinary, given what you have just written. There is no specific mention of Dworkin's work in any of your shapeless gripes, and your only contribution to the article has been to remove the POV tag. To repeat myself, your main points (the POV tag, my lack of recent editing) have explicitly already been addressed. I therefore cannot fathom what motivates you to continue. I have previously added material, and presented more for addition. Unlike you, I certainly have something "concrete" to add, as simply scrolling up would show. Perhaps I need to point you to anywhere but here, so that we can get on without being distracted by your playground insults?

As to a substantive point: "On the NPOV page to which you directed me (three times) I read that "NPOV says that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints, in proportion to the prominence of each". A significant viewpoint is that Dworkin was anti-sex. This is not fairly represented. The article is therefore POV, surely?"

That is another example of weasel words. Wikipedia hates armchair editors: if you feel an article fails to meet a standard, you have a right to edit or talk about it, but also a responsibility to make sure that talk and editing is done in good faith, doesn't eliminate relevant information and is NPOV. This indeed has been the case: Radgeek's heavy POV article has been shaped into a NPOV precisely due to community input (including yours!!!). Yet there is a point when an article reaches a certain level of quality when tags become innecesary. I offer this article has reached that point, and all I hear is ad hominems and weasel words. I will continue to remove any tags that question the NPOV of this article, and will revert all malicious or irrelevant edits, unless a fair, good faith effort is done to discuss it and seek consensus. I will stop doing so when I am convinced this page is no longer a target of vandals and bias peddlers.

A stirring peroration, but you appear to extend the term "weasel words" to anything that you don't like, thus rendering it meaningless. By quoting the NPOV page, to which you repeatedly directed me, I am engaging in "weasel words"? You claim that the article is not POV, and therefore does not warrant the POV tag. I point out that it does not conform to the standards on the NPOV page, and therefore is POV (and could reasonably tagged POV, although I don't plan to do so). And these are "weasel words" because... I haven't immediately edited the page to eliminate the POV? This non sequitur pirouetting might warrant some sort of comedy award, but plainly no serious response is possible.

Just so I dont get accused of not being substantial: I take an NPOV with you assertion that "A significant viewpoint is that Dworkin was anti-sex". This seems to be the case, and indeed the page as it stands address this.

I see. So this is your one attempt at showing any concrete evidence for your hazy accusations. I do not agree, and unlike you I have provided documentation of why. All that is currently addressed in the article is the false accusation that Dworkin's work contains words along the lines of "all sex is rape". Nowhere is addressed the widespread critical opinion that her written work -- in particular "Intercourse" -- carries the strong implication, inasfar as its ambiguity allows interpretation at all, that this is so. I have quoted numerous writers on this subject, and I have made clear from internal evidence why I believe it is so. You have rebutted none of this, yet feel free to baldly aver that "the page as it stands [addresses] this". Why on earth would I take this ex cathedra pronouncement as anything but uninformed dogma?

Yet your POV is that it is not "fairly" represented. But why? Only your POV? And those of biased vandals? Yes, unfortunately the burden of proof falls with the editor. Convince us that the view point of Dworkin as anti-sex is not represented in proportion to the topic at hand. Mind you, this article is about Andrea Dworkin, not Radical Feminism, not Gender Studies, not Anti-Feminism, nor any other such related article. It is about Andrea Dworkin in a biographical and encyclopedic way. In that sense, what you call my "obsession" with equal time becomes relevant: in spite of your and other's weasel words and ad hominems, the placing of the POV tag, when not pure vandalism, has been a result of what has been argued as to what amounts to a lack of equal time. I am not obsessed with equal time: those who place POV are! They equate NPOV with equal time, which it isn't neccesarily. If NO time where given to critics, if the article had the rather POV editorials it had, etc, then the POV tag would be justified.

I have written at length about why I believe the critical view is under-represented. I am not going to repeat myself purely on account of your limited ability or unwillingness to comprehend written English.

As for "equal time", I have already pointed out that the NPOV page of which you are so fond says that "all significant viewpoints" should be "fairly represent[ed]" according to their "prominence". It is my contention that this is not so. You apparently dispute this contention, but regardless of the truth of that, you suggest that I am advocating "equal time" for all viewpoints. I am not, and you could have resolved this misapprehension, along with so many others, by the simple expedient of reading what I wrote. I'm not even slightly interested in these other vandals, apparently "obsessed with equal time". It isn't a concept that I raised, and is not one I'm advocating. I cannot make myself clearer than this.

I sm sorry, but if we were to tag every page in Wikipedia in which the opposing view point is addressed, but someone without proof argues it isn't, then all of wikipedia would be marked with a POV tag!!! This is a apagogical argument and would break down the usefulness of the POV tag, and probably of all Wikipedia, if accepted as logical.

The operative, unjustified qualifier here is "without proof". You cannot wave away by repeated assertion what I have argued. It is not persuasive to turn up, ignore everything that has been discussed, and simply state your opinion as if it is unquestionable.

You must surely understand that while we all have our POV, the attempt to seek, in good faith, to achieve NPOV must not mean that articles must be perfectly balanced and fine-tuned before all warning tags are removed?

--Cerejota 09:47, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

There is a non-issue because, as you knew before you wrote this, I was not advocating the reinstatement of the POV tag. I would rather edit the article. You could help me in this by restraining your predilection for inane mouthing of "weasel words" and "ad hominem" at anybody with whom you disagree. So poor is your evidence that I cannot even see what are supposed to be the "two each" examples of ad hominem and weasel words. All I could see was one absurd attempt to paint reasoned argument as ad hominem, and an even more ludicrous implication that failing to edit the article was "weasel wording". If you do respond -- and I hope you don't, because I have better things to do -- then please label them more clearly.

I have contributed to this article, and to the debate. You have done nothing beyond lowering the level of discourse.

Stuarta 13:15, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

inline references

I am trying to inlien most of the references. My approach is that if they link points to a book and has a label title, then I let it me. Otherwise, I am adding some simple label to the reference so that the numbered references are true footnotes and there are no unlabeled external links, just to avoid those auto-numbered links. The next step is to use the proper "Cite" templates, mostly Template:Cite_web . -- 75.24.213.40 01:14, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Another style point of these footnotes: they should almost always go at the end of the sentence. The sentence is the unit of meaure and each sentence should make a clear, factual assertion (and not just somebody else's opinion). Some of these footnotes are still documenting things like an adjective and a noun. It is very annoying. If it takes more than one sentence to express the idea, then break the sentence up. The justification is that when you go to fact-check this article, you want to verify an entire sentence, no just a sentance fragment. -- 75.25.181.242 03:27, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

These online chapters

I see that Nikki Craft has some chapters of Dworkin's books online. I am trying to avoid these internal links. It is a small matter of style. What do you all think? Should we leave the links in the text or somehow consolidate them in the footnotes? Also: six or seven footnote in a row are excessive. Those two cases of many footnotes (labled as "View"s and "Mem"s) really should just be a list of external links within its own subsection. It is a usability issue. -- 75.26.4.46 04:00, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm inclined to prefer inline links rather than footnotes for links to online sources, for the simple reason that an inline link takes only one click, rather than two, to follow, and I can't see how consolidating them into endnotes improves the look or the readability of the text. If anything, it worsens it, since it adds the extra noise of the numbered superscript. I'm not firmly committed either way, however, and I'd be interested to know what others think. Radgeek 21:52, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Let's aim high: Feature Articles use footnotes (inline refs using the <ref> tag) almost exclusively. That way, the focus is all on the brilliant prose and not on the supporting documentation referred to. Sure, the citation needs to be there, but we should keep "other" documents out of the way. -- 75.25.181.242 02:34, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I have inlined even more and I still find all the titles of the "other" documents to be intrusive. We are supposed to talk about Dworkin in our own voice - not just string together the titles of her works. We will get there eventually. -- 75.25.181.242 02:54, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

The legacy section

I am getting less comfortable with this "legacy" section. Having the subject's allies and critics line up and spout off is not really information. Was Dworkin insane like Cathy Young says? Is Young qualified (she does not have an M.D. or anything like that) to make that claim or is Young just trying to indicate that she disagrees with Dworkin? Well, this is the Dworkin page. If we want to put that info back on the Young's page, that would be fine. The links to the obits and eulogies at the bottom of the page are fine. My question is: what did anyone do about Dworkin's legacy after she was dead and buried? Talk is cheap. The whole legacy section is just a bunch of other people either grieving or gloating about her death, but that is all just transient opining. What else is there? I think that the facts of Dworkin's legacy can be summarized much more briefly. -- 75.25.181.242 03:13, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

The opinions of Dworkin's allies and critics is information about how her life's work is viewed at this time. Since that is a topic of considerable controversy, WP:NPOV requires that many different views get a hearing.

Given that Dworkin has been dead for just over a year, I'm not sure what more you expect than this. A lot of the "facts of Dworkin's legacy" are not yet attainable, because we do not have the historical perspective with which to see them.

Radgeek 06:10, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. Her supporters and critics are still fighting the battles she fought and are biased and subject to resorting to manipulation to yet prevail. Wikipedia is supposed to develop its own understanding of the subject, speak in its own authoritative voice (with supporting citations, of course) and describe Dworkin's philosophy and thesis and convey that to the reader. These other people are footnotes, at best, and only when they provide fact. If she had wielded any real political or professional power, well, that might be more complex, but all she ever did was talk, protest, write and, to a limited degree, litigate. My view is that she can be summarized in terms of her intellectual legacy and all of that other stuff is not-so-notable. For instance: it is of little concern to be if, late in life, she was raped or not. Even if such a rape did happen, she never asserted that it was some sort of political act in an attempt to stifle her message. It is a rather minor point from a historical point of view. OK, we might not want to drive the point home while she is alive, but she is not alive. I mean, we can take years worring about the feelings of her surviving personal friends, or we can wrap her up now, in terms of her lasting legacy to mankind, and have a stable, NPOV article. I am not trying to be cruel, but I am looking for an article of lasting value and and incidental facts about her that are not part of a larger context are, from a historical perspective, just isolated fragments that should be treatly briefly. I really want something thaItalic textBold textt will be relevant 100 years from now. It is a hard, cold view (time and history are sort of like that), but I thought that this is what NPOV was about. On the eulogy stuff: If MacKinnon wants to praise her and Flint wants to vilify her, so what? That is just talk: it is not objectivitely about Dworkin's life unless they tell us some fact that we did not previously know. It is Dworkin's own words and facts that should establish her importance. In my opinion, Wikipedia should not rely upon individual eulogies to establish the importance of the subject. If some eulogy established new facts, then fit the facts back into the timeline of the narrative, which should march forward in as monotonic a fashion as much as possible. -- 64.175.41.114 02:08, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

This boring article, conceived by Andrea's worshippers, is over eight times recommended length.

Recommended length is 32 KB, this one is well over 260 KB. Could the following blather be shortened, for example, what she did or did not *read in high school*??? "Dworkin began writing poetry and fiction in the sixth grade. Throughout high school, she read heavily (with encouragement from her mother and father). She was particularly influenced by Arthur Rimbaud, Charles Baudelaire, Henry Miller, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Che Guevara, and the Beat poets, especially Allen Ginsberg."

That was with encouragement from them both, huh? From the mother *and* the father? How very informative indeed! Anyhow, this can't be shortened easily now, because *somebody* has gotten this loopy, meandering, dizzy, hagiography designated as "semi-protected." That means it is "an official policy" and "a standard." And what does that mean? It is done, "to prevent sockpuppets of banned users [here,read as, "critics of Andrea"] from editing it." Sound faschistic? You decide.

But be careful, lest you should become a "banned user" in case you don't hold the right views. Because the piece is "a standard" right down to the lunacy of Andrea being arguably eligible for the Nobel Prize in Literature. (A *standard*??? I can't even believe this as I write it, but that's the quote on the site: a standard. Great God in heaven!)

Somehow I feel myself subject to becoming a future "banned user." I haven't tried to edit the embarassing article in a long time, but I fear that even my comments will cause me to be banned if I don't get with the Wiki program of joyously celebrating Andrea as one of America's greatest, um, what was she again? Not bigot, I am told. And not misandrist, nor misanthrope, and not androphobe, not preacher of hate, not eccentric, not polemicist, not crackpot, not man-hater, not psycho, not sociopath, not stooge of Ed Meese, not misfit, and certainly not hideously ugly, but what was she again? Loving mother? No? I guess she can't be devoted wife since she denounced her gay "husband" in the Guardian as sometimes supporting her and sometimes not. (That sort of disagreement belongs more at home than on the front page of the weekend magazine, eh?) What, then? We seemed to rule out the previously offered, "jurist", since she is no more a lawyer than is a gerbil one. Successful reformer, maybe? Naw. De facto destroyer of the women's movement? Symbol of everything wrong with American feminism? Shrike?

Shucks, I don't know. Maybe you can get banned for even thinking the wrong thing, so I had better take it easy. The article is a little long though. Like almost nine times too long. "Official policy" or not. Oh, and it is not widely accepted by editors either, like the tagline wrongly refers, most of us are appalled and bewildered by it. But it is "widely" accepted by a favored few on here, I guess you'd say. Like people who are comfortable with Andrea saying that a surgeon performing a caesarian section on a woman struggling to bear a healthy child is society's "new rapist," because he invades the woman's body. Or her colorful quotes like, "every woman's son is her potential betrayer and also the inevitable rapist or exploiter of another woman." On that subject, critics might ask what Andrea knew about family life, though, apart from the fact that she wanted to mate with her father and her tomes excused incest? But I digress, and perhaps I can be banned for that, too. User:Mare Nostrum.

This is a good point. It only takes one sentence to spell out: "Andrea Dworkin was a man-hating, feminazi dyke"

I've been reading this talk page for a while, and it occurs to me that maybe people with extreme opinions on either side of an issue should recuse themselves from editing further.Thedoorhinge 14:00, 27 August 2006 (UTC)