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Original comments

      • Attention Everyone. For the Last time. Anwar Al-Awlaki did NOT write that stuff on his website. It was DEFINITELY someone else. The website, which myself and many others were subscribed to, had another author claiming that Anwar was not available, and that he would be responsible for posting. The website was deleted the next day. Hmmm. Anwar also stated in one of his early lecture that "Muslims in the west should not be on the offensive". On top of all that, the language on the blog was not Anwar's typical language. Again, stop blaming this Muslim for something he did NOT do. One more time, he did NOT type that blog. Thank you.***

Don't delete this page as I am working on increasing information available on this person. He is very famous and has created various audio lectures, which I have listed.

There is no information here on why he was arrested although presumably it is for links to outlawed organisations and acts of terror. The article is exceedingly partisan and references are highly contentious. 100man —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.109.110.202 (talk) 18:15, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

This whole article is just propaganda written by some of al-Awlaki's fans in Londonistan. 209.121.88.198 (talk) 05:36, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree. It is also written in strict muslimese (mix of English and Arabic terms) and not easily understandable by non-Muslims and non-Arabs.

I think that it should be reduced in size, and some other material (i.e. not only from Islamist websites) should be sought.Giordaano (talk) 16:38, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Is there any objective information on Awlaki's Islamic education? YuriGuri (talk) 19:48, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Ok then.... Please Provide a Counterpoint

It is one thing to claim that that article suffers from bias, and another thing to prove it. Please provide some legitimate counterpoint or alternate information if you are so intent on smearing the man. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.38.41.91 (talk) 18:38, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I moved the 'he is on record...' sentence down to the critical section, where it belongs.Jamal (talk) 19:47, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't mean to smear the guy, but he issues lectures promoting violent jihad against the US and non-Muslims. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 137.73.98.19 (talk) 10:40, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

He was born in New Mexico. There's not a reason in the world to think he was born in Yemen.Verypedantic (talk) 22:52, 12 November 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Verypedantic (talk • contribs) 22:50, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

That is correct. The Sperry source is inadmissible here under WP:RS, but even Sperry indicates he agrees Awlaki was born in New Mexico. ~YellowFives 07:00, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Ft Hood shootings

The two recent additions to the page - 'Connections to 9/11' and 'Connection to Nidal Malik Hasan' - come from a US military IP address 207.132.184.130 and User:Walterego, a user who consistently minimizes 'Enhanced interrogation techniques' and claims that these techniques are 'not considered torture except by a few left-leaning human-rights activist organizations'. - KappaD (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 12:02, 7 November 2009 (UTC).

His opinions do not matter, nor does his IP address. Furthermore, the subject's connections to and support of terrorism is well documented and should be expanded upon, as he was even mentioned in the 9/11 commission report. MezzoMezzo (talk) 03:48, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Stop deleting the reference to Awlaki praising the Ft. Hood shootings. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.213.25.210 (talk) 19:47, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes this article's subject's public statements on worldwide events are not "irrelevant" as stated by the editor who keeps removing the statement. 64.216.106.138 (talk) 20:24, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that the person who keeps removing that reference is connected with Awlaki's blog, and given the current media backlash they seem to be in the process of self-censoring since the blog is offline now and the post praising Hasan is no longer indexed in Google's results.Burhanb1 (talk) 20:41, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

Works

Does it make sense to list his unpublished writings? Even some of his other works may not be significant, we don't always list the entire bibliography of people. Rich Farmbrough, 02:06, 11 November 2009 (UTC).

Extremist sources

WorldNetDaily is an extremist source and can not be cited here. That goes for their publishing house WND Books, and their Washington bureau chief Paul Sperry. ~YellowFives 09:13, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

In any case the Sperry book is being misunderstood. Sperry indicates that he does not think there is any doubt that Awlaki was born in New Mexico. His claim is that Awlaki just told US officials he was born in Yemen so that he could get a visa. But I know of no reliable sources that back up this claim. ~YellowFives 09:41, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
I understand that you are new to Wikipedia, and we have a policy of not biting the newbies. But I see no evidence that the publisher is considered an extremist source. Or that the fact that one of the publishers is conservative makes it a non reliable source. Or any consideration of the other publisher. Or any consideration of what the source is being used for.--Epeefleche (talk) 09:44, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
Are you not familiar with WorldNetDaily? Openly partisan sources require special scrutiny, but WND is not merely partisan. They certainly are not "conservative" in any sense that the late William F. Buckley, Jr. would recognize. They are conspiracy theorists, the fringiest of the fringe. It is like citing the John Birch Society. They are Birthers.[http://www.wnd.com/eligibility][1] ~YellowFives 10:35, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
First, they are connected to the publisher. Not the author. And no, I'm not aware that anything by that publisher is non-RS. And there's nothing fringe in the comment that they are quoted for. And again--you seem to be ignoring this--you keep on ignoring the second publisher. There's nothing at all wrong with them. Nor is there anything fringe in what they are cited for -- they are just cited as to what was said in the book.--Epeefleche (talk) 10:40, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
His family was in New Mexico when Anwar was born. There is not any dispute about this fact. Is this like how Barack Obama's mother flew from Hawaii to Kenya at the last minute to give birth in a village? ~YellowFives 10:53, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
Don't you have to get ready for work soon?  :) Seriously, though, I read the book differently. And my other points stand. You still haven't even mentioned why you've twice deleted the ref to the book by the other publisher.--Epeefleche (talk) 11:19, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
Sperry does not believe that Awlaki was born in Yemen. You have misunderstood him. On his website he says that the US is Awlaki's real birthplace.[2] His claim is that Awlaki misrepresented his own birthplace in order to get a visa as a Yemeni national. ~YellowFives 11:55, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
  • Dave Gaubatz claims that he personally found Saddam's WMDs, but the Bush administration engineered a massive conspiracy to cover up this fact.[3]
  • Dave Gaubatz claims that Obama is a Muslim and a self-admitted crackhead.[4]
  • Dave Gaubatz claims that the US military has a secret ray gun.[5]
  • Dave Gaubatz claims that "a vote for Hussein Obama is a vote for Sharia Law."[6] ~YellowFives 12:19, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

WND has consistantly been determined to be an unreliable source on WP:RSN. If it is the sole source for a questionable fact, that fact should be removed. Hipocrite (talk) 14:04, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, Hipocrite. If you have more time, could you please also have a look at the source from Paul Sperry (a WND writer) which Epeefleche is interpreting to mean that Awlaki was born in Yemen, in context of this detail from Sperry's own website where he says that the US is Awlaki's real birthplace. ~YellowFives 14:40, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

I don't know enough about Sperry to comment, but if his book is a reliable source of fact for the biography, so is his website. If the book and the website disagree as to statements of fact (which is not clear at all, from what's provided on this talk page), perhaps the best solution is not to mention the disputed fact at all. Hipocrite (talk) 14:53, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks again. It is my contention that Sperry is not a reliable source in any case, but we'll see if anyone else comments. ~YellowFives 15:11, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
Nothing from WorldNet Daily can be used as a reliable source in this way. As Hipocrite says, we've discussed this before. Sperry's website isn't a reliable source either. Dougweller (talk) 16:23, 14 November 2009 (UTC)
That does not mirror the responses at the noticeboard, which (for the first time, best I can tell) discussed the book publisher (though the magazine had been discussed before, without consensus). In any event, the facts asserted have now been confirmed.--Epeefleche (talk) 08:19, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Infiltration: How Muslim Spies and Subversives Have Penetrated Washington

Are we discussing whether Infiltration: How Muslim Spies and Subversives Have Penetrated Washington (Thomas Nelson, 2005. ISBN 1595550038 ) meets WP:RS ?

1. Book has plenty of reviews:

2. Book has ISBN and can be found in lots of academic libraries. See here.

3. Thomas Nelson meets WP:RS.

What is it that overrides these 3 facts? --Firefly322 (talk) 14:59, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

We are discussing, I think, Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That's Conspiring to Islamize America -By P. Dave Gaubatz and Paul Sperry published by WorldNet Daily. Dougweller (talk) 16:19, 14 November 2009 (UTC)
Okay, I just created an article stub for Muslim Mafia.--Firefly322 (talk) 19:22, 14 November 2009 (UTC)
We were discussing both, as Yellow kept on deleting both.--Epeefleche (talk) 08:20, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
Definitely RS. The problem here clearly is people who think WP can't publish material which conflicts with their POV. WP is for ALL sides, Jihadists and terrorist conspiracy theories as long as they can be verified by RS. This is getting very good whoever tracked down the Awlawki interview that said he didn't tell Hasan to shoot anybody in particular (even though he's told everybody that every good muslim should shoot US soldiers, he wasn't meaning to suggest to Hasan that he really meant it, though since he did such a thing, it was a good thing anyway) Fortunately for Awlawki, it looks like the FBI (and everybody else) still hasn't come to the conclusion that there could have been any way AW could have possibly induced Hasan to attack based on the intercepts they read. Bachcell (talk) 21:04, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
There must be something in the water. This issue has now spawned this and this.--Epeefleche (talk) 21:09, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Unclassified Thesis

Check this out:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/22497764/TO-OUR-GREAT-DETRIMENT-IGNORING-WHAT-EXTREMISTS-SAY-ABOUT-JIHAD

Hopefully a thesis at the National Defence Intelligence College is a reliable source, it's been noted by many websites.Bachcell (talk) 21:24, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

To clarify a bit: It is as you say a thesis "at" the National Defense Intelligence College, not from them. It is a thesis submitted from and by Stephen Collins Coughlin to be precise and "the views expressed in this paper are those of the author...". So the question is, how to establish weight about his opinion, (which could be found out if you would provide the sources/websites that noted this thesis). Don't stop short.The Magnificent Clean-keeper (talk) 23:20, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
PS: And it's from 2007. Doesn't really matter.The Magnificent Clean-keeper(talk) 23:24, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Polemical essay or biography?

Honestly now, does anyone think that "While the western media downplayed links to terrorism and pointed to PTSD and harassment as possible motives," is even remotely appropriate for a biography of a living person? This article is turning more and more into a polemical essay. Stop it. Hipocrite (talk) 19:29, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

The important thing is that while Awlawki would never call it a "terrorist" act, he certainly agrees with those who would call it a terrorist act, based on the motivation, which is to kill US troops in defence of Islamic fighters against threats to Islam or Jihad. You would agree with that? The media's standard explanations are insanity, PTSD, and harassment, and don't you even think of calling it terrorism or you're guilty of racism/Islamaphobia. I'll tone it down, I see your point. Bachcell (talk) 19:35, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
This is a wikipedia article about a person. Your statements about the media and whatever are totally irrelevent to this article about a person. Don't talk about things that have nothing to do with the person. Hipocrite (talk) 19:39, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Did Awlawki believe Hasan acted against soldiers bound to kill Muslims?

..fight against American tyranny. Nidal has killed soldiers who were about to be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan in order to kill Muslims..

This edit was reverted as irrelevant. But it is very important to contrast the media explanations - PTSD, harassment, mental state, lone shooter, with what Awlawki very clearly outlines what he believes the motivation was - Jihad against the non-muslim enemy about to "kill muslims". So why isn't it allowed to simply state "Awlawki clearly justified the killings in military terms of killing soldiers just before they were being deployed" rather that just leaving the raw text for people to puzzle over what it means? How and where can this edit be changed/put where it works better? The FBI's failure to call it a terrorist act, or even mention it on their web page, or put Awalawki is also very curious. That would only be consistent with the entire pattern since the beginning of this case of officials consistently deciding to NOT handle this as Isalamic terrorism if at all possible, though that precedes the present administration. Bachcell (talk) 19:48, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

    • disputed edit ** Many accounts in the western media and statements by US officials such as President Obama discounted or were critical of attempts or "jumps to conclusions" linking the Fort Hood shooting to Islam, or characterising it prematurely as terrorism. But shortly after the shooting al-Awlaki's now defunct website appeared to state that the action was entirely in accordance with his viewpoint of Islam which justifies a military action, rather than a reaction to Islamaphobic harassment or PTSD. As "a Muslim and serving in an army that is fighting against his own people" Hasan's actions were justified as "Muslims today have the right -rather the duty- to fight against American tyranny." Nidal opened fire on soldiers who were on their way to be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. How can there be any dispute about the virtue of what he has done?

His entire statement reflected the following praise for Nidal Malik Hasan's actions:[1]

Your edit was OR by SYNTH. No one else compared the two different statements. Hipocrite (talk) 19:51, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference abcnews.go.com was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

Not a coatrack

Simply plastering a coatrack template is easy enough to do, but I would like to see some defense of that position. Having read what's written about the fellow, and what he is notable for, and having now reread the policy on coatrack, I think that it doesn't apply. The examples of what a coatrack is are illuminating. I don't see this fitting.--Epeefleche (talk) 20:08, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

"Shortly after the shooting, the FBI's initial conclusion by Nov 10 was "at this point, there is no information to indicate Major Malik Nidal Hasan had any co-conspirators or was part of a broader terrorist plot. The investigation to date has not identified a motive". The media did note it left open the possibility that the suspect was a lone actor in a terrorist act." - nothing to do with the subject of this article. Hipocrite (talk) 20:12, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
Read today's NY Times article. This is totally appropriate, and totally reflective of the RSs reporting on the man. To attach such templates or delete such RS material is innappropriate POV censorship.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:27, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

POV

Obviously this article is inherently POV. Attempts at finding a balance are desperately needed. This is most likely possible by reducing the amount of negative POV currently found, ie cutting back sections that aren't needed or repetitive. Grsz11 18:53, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

This article reflects, fairly, the information that exists in RSs that are accessible. It is innappropriate to say it is POV if much of that information casts a negative light on the man. As an example, if you look at the NY Times and Washington Post articles added today, you will see that the light is not any more positive in those articles than it is here. Feel free to add other RS material that has a different "V" if you like and if you find it. Putting a POV tag on this article is the same as putting one on the Bin Laden or Al Quaeda articles. As long as the Wiki article fairly reflects the RS information, it is IMHO innappropriate to affix the POV tag.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:25, 19 November 2009 (UTC)
Well, this isn't going to help: http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/major-hasans-mail-wait-join-afterlife/story?id=9130339 People with access to emails says he looked forward to meeting in the afterlife, and gave money to charities thought to be terrorist fronts. I think we'll need some help in balancing that from Grsz11. I wonder what Grsz11's point of view is, given the growing amount of evidence of what this was really about. Bachcell (talk) 02:17, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
I would like to remove the POV tag at this point. The article fairly reflcts what has been reported on Awlaki.--Epeefleche (talk) 14:39, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
@Epeefleche: What the heck are all personal messages you sent me at my IP are about? For example:

This is the last warning you will receive for your disruptive edits. If you vandalize Wikipedia again, you will be blocked from editing. Unsourced edits such as these are vandalism.--Epeefleche (talk) 17:30, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

where "these" refer to "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Template_messages/User_talk_namespace". --98.204.201.79 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.204.201.79 (talk) 18:16, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Forum posts

Forum uploads are not reliable sources for calling someone a member of a terrorist organization. This seems like pretty basic wikipedia 101. Hipocrite (talk) 18:34, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

wp:rs indicates that a scholar's statements of opinion is an acceptable source. It was directly attributed to the scholar in the main text of the article, so readers know that we are discussing someone's opinion.--Epeefleche (talk) 22:27, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Author?

Al-Awlaqi is identified as being an author, however it seems, looking through the works section, that most, if not all, of his works are lectures. Unless we consider his blogging efforts sufficient enough to deem him an author, should we not then refer to him as a speaker, lecturer, preacher or orator? Supertouch (talk) 03:19, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

I have changed it to scholar, as that's more reflective of teachings, lecturing, and the like. Grsz11 03:25, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Good catch.--Epeefleche (talk) 03:45, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Wouldn't he have needed to study the topic he lectures on in a formal academic setting to be considered a scholar? MezzoMezzo (talk) 07:04, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
The best treatment of this I've seen is the NEFA article I added to this article yesterday. It's a fair question. Apparently, though he doesn't have that formal training, he is viewed as such by many of his followers. I've no clear notion how we should treat him in this regard. Also, btw, he wrote at least one essay, which was mentioned in the article but which I've now added to his works.--Epeefleche (talk) 17:13, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
The NEFA article is good in that regard. His studying was mostly buffed up and exaggerated. "Early Islamic education in Yemen" means the same Koran stories all Muslims grow up with. And between his MA and PhD study in America, the amount of time he could have spent studying in Yemen (all with teachers whom his fans in the West have never heard of) is negligible. I think public speaker might be a more accurate term, as scholar is really an academic one. MezzoMezzo (talk) 23:23, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
I changed it to Muslim speaker and former imam earlier, scholar definitely is out of the question as that implies having studied which it seems clear this individual did not do. Supertouch (talk) 23:28, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
Part of my education here--I gather that while in some other religions (e.g., at least I think, usually w/minister, priest, rabbi) it is a title that once the person has it is not dependent upon them having a congregation, that's not the case w/imams. And, I guess another related difference, to become a priest/minister/rabbi, I think one normally gets that credential from a credential-giving school, not just from stepping in and leading a congregation. Am I right about that difference? Thanks.--Epeefleche (talk) 01:21, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Off the top of my head, there are two common uses of the word imam. The first, is the prayer leader who stands in front of the congregation to do so (the word imam is derived from the same word meaning in front of). This could be either situational, the person leading others in a prayer for a given prayer usually the one most well versed in Quranic recitation or someone who is actually appointed to be the official imam of a particular mosque or Islamic center as al-Awlaqi was. The second usage, which does not apply at all here, is in deference to an individual scholar who has surpassed all others in a particular era or discipline. The first usage is more static, in a sense, than the latter - a person either leads others in prayer and is therefore an imam, or doesn't and isn't. In the case of the second usage, there are individuals who most would not debate their being an imam - for example, Bukhari. However, it can also be a somewhat political term, loosely applied to any person achieving some marginal prominence - for example, the followers of a splinter group would refer to their leader as imam. Supertouch (talk) 02:22, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

To add to what Supertouch mentioned, the Muslim communities in the world in general seem to be pretty bad about that last point (I'm Muslim myself, that falls under the big book of politically correct rules right?). Anybody who stands up to speak becomes "alim" (scholar), "imam" (most knowledgeable leader of the time), "habeeb" (our beloved), and so forth. Given that, it's good to be cautious about the amount of respect we give to many prominent Muslim motivational speakers - especially the fundamentalists, who often have no formal education in Islamic thought. MezzoMezzo (talk) 13:44, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Wahhabism

I believe it makes sense to label him a Wahhabi rather than a made up term such as 'qutbi'. Qutbi isn't even a word and more like a term coined by Salafi's trying to differentiate from their radical roots. Using it would confuse lay people who don't have an extended knowledge in extremist groups and the like. Wahhabism on the other hand is widely recognised as a sect therefore it is justifiable to replace Qutbi with Wahhabi. --Huss4in (talk) 16:28, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Wahabism is a made-up derogatory term. Al-Wahhab is one of the glorious names of Allah. Making a perjorative title out of it is insulting and definitely non-neutral POV term. The name of the revivor of Islam is Muhammad ibn Abdul-Wahhab, not Wahhab. There is nothing in his teachings that contradict fundamental Islam of Qur'an, Sunnah of the Prophet, sal Allahu 'alaihi wa sallam and practice of first 3 righteous generations. -- contributor.

I agree with the "contributor". wahabism is a made up word in itself created by the british. The information given here about Anwar Al awlaki is absolutely biased. There are interviews he's given, where are they? There's a lot of information that's missing also. We need to edit a few places here and there. I am not the one to do that but I hope there's someone out there who can clear this mess of a so called bio. contributor2 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Billow (talk • contribs) 09:53, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Are there any sources linking Awlaqi to either? Supertouch (talk) 11:38, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
I disagree with you there. One only needs to look up the term 'Wahhabi' against the term 'Qutbi' in the Oxford English Dictionary to see which word is more established (you'll find that 'Qutbism' is altogether absent). Merriam-Webster's Dictionary yields the same result. As for sources linking him to them, currently his website is down so it will be difficult obtaining credible sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.106.47.130 (talk) 22:47, 19 December 2009 (UTC)
At this point at least the article simply reflects what the sources say, rather than characterize AAS itself. Hence, "Al-Awlaki is an adherent of the Wahhabi fundamentalist sect of Islam".--Epeefleche (talk) 22:56, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Plans on an Islamic extremist website to hijack this article

Recently, a friend emailed me a link to one of the more well-known Islamic extremist websites in the English language. Apparently, they are upset that this article is spreading "lies" against Anwar al-Awlaki and they are trying to organize an effort to change it. I would rather not post the link to give this site any more attention, but this is the message about which I am speaking:

Abu Abdallah al-Bulghari Abu Abdallah al-Bulghari is offline
Senior Member
Muslim Male

Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: US
Age: 43
Posts: 3,211
Rep Power: 12
Default Re: Shaykh 'Ubayd al-Jaabiree Warns Against Anwar al-Awlaki
I strongly encourage brothers to participate in editing a Wikipedia page of the Sheikh. I know it's an uphill battle, because editors of Wikipedia are know for their anti-Islamic bias, but this page is number one source right now on-line about the Sheikh, and we can try to use it to remove lies.

Guidelines:

1. Check the references and if the references do not support the claim in the preceding sentence, replace the reference by "citation needed" in square brackets.

2. Remove any POV (point of view) statements that are not explicitly referred as words of a public known figure.

3. Add the facts from his biography illustrating his work that is more acceptable by Westerners.

The name of this website is "Islamic Awakening." I know them well, as I was once the subject (for various reasons) of a few of their rants on that page. They are rather quick to call people infidels and openly support terrorism in many countries. Obviously, one may edit Wikipedia regardless of their political opinions. However, this does seem like a concerted effort beginning to press a specific point of view. It's something to watch out for. MezzoMezzo (talk) 07:04, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

My friend pointed out that to show it straight from the horse's mouth, I post the link. Just let it be known that I don't want to give these people any undue attention. The discussion may be found here. MezzoMezzo (talk) 23:21, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
without making a political issue out of it, I do note that their suggestions are in line with our editing principles. if people do only that, they will be helpful. The concern, of course, is that they may not so limit what they do, so your alert is appropriate. DGG ( talk ) 05:10, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
Agreed. If (if) they show up and cause problems it's easily taken care of. If there are'nt, then no harm done. Grsz11 05:21, 4 December 2009 (UTC)
Agree. Here's what else we now know, after over a week of experience. First--the above exhortation was made (at least on that website) about a week prior to its posting here. A glance at the last 25 IP edits (12.5% of all edits made during that time period) indicates that each one of them was reverted as, at minimum, inappropriate/unhelpful while some of them were manifestly vandalism.--Epeefleche (talk) 05:37, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Works section

I made this edit to note that the statement is by NEFA, as we can't claim that sort of statement as a fact, as it's clearly their opinion. Grsz11 05:27, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Tx for mentioning that here. I don't have a major problem if you find that statement controversial, other than your use of the word "claims". I would suggest "says". At the same time, I imagine some might not find the statement controversial as it was, as it is consistent with what Awlaki himself says, which immediately follows, and I could see that point of view as well. In any event, as far as my views go, I'm ok as long as the phrase claims is replaced.--Epeefleche (talk) 06:28, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Death?

Based upon the reference provided by the user adding the subjects death date, it seems premature to definitively state that he has died. The exact wording of the BBC article cited is:

Reuters news agency cited a security official saying that a radical Muslim preacher linked to the US army psychiatrist charged over the fatal shooting of 13 people at a US army base was suspected to be among those killed.

I saw we hold off on adding anything to the info boxes until we get a definite. Supertouch (talk) 14:35, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Other sources are similarly hedged.--Epeefleche (talk) 20:41, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
Imam Linked to Ft. Hood Rampage Believed to Be AliveGeo8rge (talk) 04:31, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Possible CIA connection

Can someone put a possible portion on CIA connection. Some reports and literature seem to suggest a clandestine connection with intelligence services, pointing, among many others, to Awlaki's connection with George Washington University, possibly where he was recruited. His self-imposed exile in 2002 after 9-11 despite the fact that he was pinpointed to have communicated with hijackers. Carmenphilby (talk) 04:46, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Do you have sources that could be used? Grsz11 04:54, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Automate archiving?

Does anyone object to me setting up automatic archiving for this page using MiszaBot? Unless otherwise agreed, I would set it to archive threads that have been inactive for 30 days.--Oneiros (talk) 21:52, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

 Done The bots should start in the next 24h.--Oneiros (talk) 22:54, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Charles Allen photograph

What's the purpose of this photo? He is mentioned in two sentences in the article (as someone who has talked about the subject of the article). The caption of the photo offers no context as to why it's relevant to the article. Unless the editor who insists on mainting the photo in the article (or anybody else) can give context, the photo will have to go.

If I could understand the context, I would have been more than happy to put an appropriate caption for the photo relating Charles Allen to Anwar al-Awlaki. Victor Victoria (talk) 02:43, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Hello VV. Allen is important. He is the most senior U.S. person mentioned in the story to have spoken out regarding AA's actions before the Fort Hood and NW events. He also spoke out after the Ft. Hood event as to U.S. handling of the AA-related information (and is someone who is in a position to speak credibly on the point of how the U.S. should have reacted). The photo should remain IMHO, it has been in the article for weeks without anyone objecting, and I see no consensus for its deletion. Cheers.--Epeefleche (talk) 04:01, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
Surely you realize that the fact that the photo "has been in the article for weeks without anybody objecting" is not a reason for keeping the photo. I now object. Nothing you wrote justifies the inclusion of the photo. Again, if you want to keep the photo, you better come up with a proper caption. The current caption of "Charles Allen" doesn't cut it for me. Victor Victoria (talk) 13:35, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
I disagree, for the reasons stated which IMHO justify its inclusion, and don't see a consensus for its removal.--Epeefleche (talk) 14:48, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
Consensus works both ways, and there is currently no consensus for maintaining the photo. The way the photo is presented is misleading at best, and deceptive at worst, as it suggests that there is some connection between the two men when in fact there isn't. Charles Allen is mentioned in only two sentences in the article, because he gave an opinion about the subject of the article. Two sentences do not appear to me to warrant the photo. Victor Victoria (talk) 14:59, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
1) I've enhanced the caption, to explain the first of two reasons that Allen is relevant in the article -- Hopefully this will address your concern that readers will think that Allen will be deemed to be in league w/Awlaki by virtue of his photo being included in the article. 2) As to nobody objecting to the photo over the past weeks other than you, actually I think that is relevant, as this article has had on peak days thousands of views, and other changes have been made and/or suggested. 3) There is no "number of sentences test" for inclusion of photos that I am aware of; this photo relates to the article, as indicated. Hopefully with the fuller caption this now "cuts it" for you. By the way, have we conversed before, perhaps with you editing under a different username?--Epeefleche (talk) 17:09, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

(outdent) I agree it's WP:UNDUE considering how much Allen occupies of the article. Not particularly a helpful image. Grsz11 17:23, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Well you would, wouldn't you, as the fellow who didn't believe the al-Awlaki photo belonged in the Flight 253 article, and as one who has often been against information being put in articles about Islamists. wp:undue has nothing to do with this, from what I can see.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:21, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
As laughable as that comment it is, it has no relevance to the issue at hand. Grsz11 19:24, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not seeing the great harm in the pic and don't agree with the arguments for removal. The caption clearly explained the relevance. The article is long and the pic is small, so I'm not seeing much of a WP:UNDUE problem here.--brewcrewer (yada, yada) 19:46, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree. NBeale (talk) 21:33, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
Keep the pic, people who catch on to AA need to be noted Bachcell (talk) 21:07, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Assessment comment

I think the article is good, but a lead should have a maximum of four paragraphs and the citation style is inconsistent. Please feel free to relist the article for reassessment after some tweaks. Regards Hekerui (talk) 13:03, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I've trimmed the lead, as a first step.--Epeefleche (talk) 16:07, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

More sources

http://aawsat.com/english/news.asp?section=3&id=19547 Anwar al-Awlaki: Al-Qaeda's New Pied Piper ...In the United States accusations are mounting against Anwar al-Awlaki, suggesting that he recruited Nidal Malik Hasan, and encouraged him to kill his colleagues ...He is wanted dead or alive, as indicated by the air bombing carried out by Yemen's air force last month on the Rafd area in the Shabwa Governorate, and in which at least seven members of Al-Qaeda were killed. It emerged later that the primary target of the bombing was Anwar al-Awlaki, who took shelter in the Al-Kur Mountains in order to seek the protection of his tribe (Al-Awalik) and to exploit the difficult topology of the region so that he would not be reached easily.

Article says that he was in a Japanese prison. Is that right??

Any idea why the president and FBI would not (and still does not officially) acknowledge that Awlaki / Al Queda had anything to do with Fort Hood while somebody evidently approved trying to kill the guy when he's not even on the FBI wanted terrorist list? Bachcell (talk) 01:43, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

The Japanese claim doesn't match anything anyone else has said, including other Arabic sources quoting the dad. Given that, and that it appears to conflict w/other sources including those quoting AAA, I chose not to reflect it. I read the article w/interest, but don't think it adds anything of moment to what we have. As to your last question, it would be conjecture (including the fact that he is not on the relevant US/UN lists) -- but I do see that the White House has now called Hasan's act terrorism.--Epeefleche (talk) 15:12, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
Actually it's an anonymous white house official who says it's terrorism. The White house, FBI and even the latest DOD report continue to refuse to link the incident to any particular religion or any particular terrorist organization. This is quite a remarkable point in American history and political correctness, it would be as if the president did not believe that the Japanese empire bombed Pearl Harbor months after the incident. Bachcell (talk) 17:05, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Connection to Zandini

The "pied piper" article says that in Yemen there are many stories about connections between Awlaki and Zindani, asking whether Zindani, who was his boss in the "muslim charity", helped radicalize Awlaki. Almost no one in the west has mentioned possible ties, yet Zindani's protest breaking his silence on Awlaki and fort Hood, if he is lying would indicate Zindani probably did have influence, and may have gotten advance warning , as is believed he got of the Cole bombing. That he and the other Yemen cleric oppose attacks on Al Queda, and view introduction of US forces as "foreign invaders" would indicate that Zindani and most Islamic clerics at at minimum, siding with Al Queda, if not outright condoning terrorist acts as Awlaki as done. It was possible shortly after the fort Hood shooting, merely on the basis of what was already in wikipedia to establish a link from Hasan to Awlaki to Zindani, who was (or is) a close associate of bin Laden himself, not to mention the rest of al queda in yemen. If zandini is the head of the Islamic political machine in Yemen, wouldn't that make him at least a little bit responsible for all that's been going on there? Bachcell (talk) 01:58, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

As the article reflects, there appear to be links, but Zindani denies are significant. That's all we can report now.--Epeefleche (talk) 15:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

11k hits per day?

11/10/2009 seems to say there are 10.9k hits today, up from nothing 4 days ago. Quite a popular guy now.

http://stats.grok.se/en/200911/Anwar_al-Awlaki

This can be archived.--Epeefleche (talk) 09:07, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Style of the Article

I personally have heard some of his lectures, and I have read the transcripts of the Interview where Anwar Al-Awlaki talks about his connection with Nidal, and have found nothing to assume the idea of him being a terrorist or having ever encouraged terrorism, as you should know, terrorism is strictly forbidden in Islam. I found this article quite astonishingly biased, which is very disheartening, as I, up to this moment, had always looked up to Wikipedia to be accurate and unbiased and balanced. I urge Wikipedia to rewrite this in a more fair manner, using only facts. If you want to show one side of the story, you should also be fair enough to show the other side, which in this case, is the more correct side.

He has never been a terrorist, and will never be. He is only a terrorist to criminals, the same way a policeman is a terrorist to a rapist [i.e. the policeman causes 'terror' in the heart of a rapist], the same way any Muslim, Christian, etc. should be and would be, if they followed the true teachings of their religions.

Therefore, I once again urge Wikipedia to remove and rework this article, which is very misleading. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.150.124.42 (talk) 10:42, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

As a matter of fact, there do appear to be a number of internet postings of individuals on various jihadist message boards, including the facebook "Americans against Awlaki" group expressing exactly your POV. However WP doesn't care what an editor thinks, only what is verifiable from a reliable source. NPOV doesn't mean erasing one point of view (Awlaki is a terrorist) in favor of your view (his is not a terrorist), but rather NPOV means balancing all points of contention. Now if you could find a reliable source, or even a notable op-ed, even from a muslim or Jihad-sympathetic news source like al jazeera or jihadist press that either states this claim that he is not a terrorist, or notes a number of people who make that claim, that could be done to "balance" out the POV. The article already notes that Awlaki himself as well as his father and his tribe maintain that Awlaki is not a terrorist (Just as mosque friends and family of Nidal Hasan have maintained he is a loyal American who never had radical views, was only interested in marrying a devout woman, and never practiced shooting, and that his religion played absolutely no part of his motivation which cannot be determined at this time, and we'll revert any attempt to tag Fort Hood as an Islamic terrorist incident) That would be just like quoting op eds that attack or support controversial newscasters such as Glenn Beck. Nearly all of the people who claim that Awlaki is not a terrorist also express typical taqiya statements that Fort Hood was not an act of terrorism, that Hasan was not motivated by Islam or Jihad, and that Al Queda was not involved in 9/11 but was a US/Israeli plot. Such 9/11 "truth" theories are fairly well documented on WP, and similar Awlaki "truth" theories could similarly be added without needing to delete any mention that the US government and most of the mainstream western press has finally reached the conclusion that AW is worth killing, even if it still hasn't come to the conclusion that he was a co-conspirator who chose to tell Hasan the Islamic thing was to go ahead with the Fort Hood massacre (as is sourced in the article) rather than telling him, as you believe, that Islam forbids such killings (which so far nobody has found any supporting sourced statements from Awlaki other than his followers like yourself). If you can come up with any evidence that Awlaki's spiritual guidance was anything other than his website view celebrating Hasan as a hero, please document the source and feel free to add it to the article. Bachcell (talk) 04:32, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Edit warring/deletions of relevant material

Editor Causa has engaged in a series of edits today that I believe were largely inappropriate. They have included deletions of clearly (IMHO) relevant material from the lead, which I have restored. Similar deletions were made elsewhere. He also deleted pictures that I believe are clearly relevant--of 9/11 hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi, for whom AA was reportedly spiritual advisor in both San Diego and Falls Church; investigators believe AA knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance, and Khalid al-Mihdhar, for whom AA was reportedly spiritual advisor in San Diego. I expanded the captions to more clearly reflect their relevance. He continued to delete them. I believe the pictures are relevant, that the captions clearly reflect their relevance, and that these deletions -- taken as a whole -- are disturbing ones to see coming from a sysop, as viewed as a whole they chip away at AGF. I've asked him not to edit war, but rather to start discussion here. He has failed to do so. So I'm doing so. Another editor has indicated that he believes that Causa is violating the 3RR, and I would tend to agree. One can't hide behind the apron strings of "protecting a BLP" when facially the edits lack indicia of good faith, and one's claim that "this picture is irrelevant" has been responded to properly. I would ask that Causa desist w/the edit warring, and not continue to delete relevant text and images. Others' views are welcome.--Epeefleche (talk) 22:30, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

I just looked at the series of edits that came after your contributions. I am distressed by the nature of some of those edits as well as by their edit summaries which tend to downplay the magnitude of what *really* happened with the edit. This example, for instance, suggests the editor had a problem with some pictures “(the pictures are still inappropriately suggestive)”. Right off the bat, the pictures were of two terrorists mentioned in that paragraph. Accordingly, they are “suggestive” of nothing more than providing pictures of the subject being discussed at that point in the article, which all good encyclopedias do. If the pictures are attached to text that amounts to just so much conjecture by law enforcement authorities, then the pictures would be adding undo weight to an issue; but it’s not an issue of being inappropriately “suggestive.” We can’t have a rational discourse and discuss anything if editors are providing the wrong reasons to justify what they are doing. I’m also seeing wholesale deletion of material that is seems quite relevant.
Anwar al-Awlaki is notable because he is a living person of such profound infamy, the National Security Council approved the targeted assassination of him even though he is a U.S. citizen. There is no requirement that equal balance and fair play be added with regard to how Anwar might have once adopted a stray puppy from a shelter or how he exhales carbon dioxide, which is good for plants. All facts that are germane and topical to this subject properly belong here so long as they can be given an encyclopedic treatment and are properly cited.
I suggest that all editors in this fray stop furiously editing on multiple issues without discussion. This is a collaborative writing environment and conflict is inherent—particularly if editors jump in with a particular slant they’d like to impart to the article. Discuss issues here and arrive at a consensus. If the material is germane, topical, factual, and properly cited, it should generally stay. If it can be improved upon, then improve it. Before hitting the [delete] key (which is much easier to do than it is for someone to create encyclopedic content in the first place), concerns should be discussed here first.
The reason discussion is important is the rest of the Wikipedian community can’t sufficiently get into an editor’s mind by reading just an edit summary; particularly ones that seem to misdirect from the true nature of the edit. If an editor has a logical argument that is based on facts and are supported by current Wikipedia guidelines and policies, then let them spell out their rationale here so the issue can be sanitized by the sunshine of public inspection. Greg L (talk) 23:30, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I think you make some valid points about the collaborative editing environment. However, the spirit of the WP:BLP policy is to remove potentially defamatory content from the article with haste and discuss afterward whether, and in what form, it should be reinstated. That explains the urgency of my removal, and my tendency to use reverting without discussion here. Out of respect for the subject of the article, we must discuss what content should be in the article before we put it in, not after. That's why I encourage you all to join me in discussing my objections to this content before we reinstate it. With the potentially defamatory content out of the article we can discuss civilly what, and whether, it should be put back in. Thanks. causa sui (talk) 02:37, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Well, it is possible that one might be tempted to wonder whether that is not just a mite disingenuous, isn't it? I mean, hours have gone by since you made your series of baseless deletions, and you've made no rational reasonable credible statements to support them here -- ever after your gosh-I-have-to-rush-with-great-haste-to-make-them-immediately reverts. Not one. Even your above comment is wholly content-less. I began assuming good faith. But your edits -- which began with wholesale deletions today of both footnoted paragraphs of highly relevant text and of images -- forces me to no longer labor under that assumption. In addition, you have ignored the communications of four other editors. Your apparent willing disregard of consensus, and edit warring without discussion, is conduct not befitting one who holds the mop.--Epeefleche (talk) 03:23, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Oh, come… on, Causa sui, who are you trying to kid with that post of yours? First, please desist with your “that’s final”, somewhat dismissive tone where you conclude your post with a terse “Thanks” (as in “thanks for your understanding as I lay down the law”). You have now been warned by Xeno, a Bureaucrat, here on talk:Edit warring that “BLP is only a trump card if there is a legitimate concern”, which you simply don’t have.

    At its core, BLP simply calls for common-sense stuff that applies, really, to all articles: Neutral point of view (NPOV), Verifiability (V), and No original research (NOR). Wikipedia must have special rules for biographies because of some high-profile horror stories involving living celebrities and politicians. Senator Byrd was rightly upset to read that he was now dead, according to Wikipedia. You, an Admin, of all people, should understand the principle behind WP:COMMONSENSE and its wise counsel that “Being too wrapped up in rules can cause loss of perspective.” So, since I perceive a galactic-grade degree of lack of common sense in your approach here (either that, or simply citing nonsense in an attempt to prevail at all cost), allow me to guide you along…

    WP:BLP calls for (among many other things) that “Biographies of living persons (BLPs) must be written conservatively and with regard for the subject's privacy.” Now, do tell… are you thinking that some of the most infamous people on the planet, such as Osama bin Laden and Anwar al-Awlaki, both of whom have presidential and National Security Council approval for Navy SEALs to put a bullet in their head and for the Air Force to drop a 500-pound JDAM on them, have, according to Causa sui, some sort of “right to privacy”?? Do tell; must we have a huge RfC over on WP:BLP to explicitly spell out for your benefit what is blindingly obvious to everyone else? Notable individuals of world-class infamy are an altogether different class than are people like politicians such as Teddy Kennedy and Robert Byrd, or a celebrity like David Letterman who was recently embroiled in an unfortunate blackmail/extortion attempt. That’s the sort of stuff WP:BLP is trying to address with added details such as Avoid victimization. Now…

    You will not hide your conduct behind the apron strings of WP:BLP. Your argument where you write we must discuss what content should be in the article before we put it in, not after is utterly absurd. The easy giveaway on that one was where the words preceding that whopper were Out of respect for the subject of the article… Greg L (talk) 04:13, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Just for the record, I'm an admin - not a bureaucrat, and I wouldn't really call what I wrote a warning as such. It was a general comment and I hadn't reviewed this situation entirely. (Still haven't - going to bed - maybe in the morning). If an edit war continues, it should be reported at WP:AN3 and/or WP:RFPP for uninvolved administrators to review the situation and take action if necessary. –xenotalk 06:02, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
Odd, I figured you to be a ‘Crat. Thanks nevertheless for weighing in; it makes a big difference. Greg L (talk) 17:39, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes. BLP policy applies to all people, not only including accused terrorists, but especially accused terrorists. This is a paradigm case of why BLP policy exists: the content of this article might not only damage the mere reputation of the subject, but might actually contribute to his being killed. There has hardly been a case where our obligation to get the article right has been higher. causa sui (talk) 04:32, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

I see that you have heartedly embraced the notion of “A strong defense requires a strong offense,” even if you have to resort to shear nonsense. You will 1) carry out your editing conduct just like any other editor around here, 2) won’t be using your Admin-hood as if you have some sort of “I Am Really *Really* Special”-license where you can conclude your posts with stuff that reads like “so sad – too bad and thanks for your understanding”, and 3) won’t be hiding behind the apron strings of WP:BLP to get what amounts to “I get it all my way by default until I’m happy with what I elect to discuss on the discussion page.” You will abide by the consensus view, just like anyone else. If you’re smart, you’ll slow down the pace, discuss things more, and aim to achieve a consensus instead of that slash & burn flurry-editing and reverting of yours. Greg L (talk) 04:37, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I concur. BLP does not sanction removal of reliably sourced information already widely reflected in the press or notable editorials. NPOV requires airing of ALL points of view, not removal of POV contrary to yours. Since it is widely sourced that Awlaki had contacts with 9/11 hijackers, as well as one of the Cole Bombing planners, it belongs in the article whether or not it might affect a jury trial. In general WP guidelines are no more or less strict than RS news articles. The New York Time for example does permit printing of facts that may support that a person may or may not be a terrorist or 9/11 participant. If you can find notable or reliable sources, or even a wild conspiracy theory on a notable jihadist blog like Revolution Muslim that casts doubt on whether Awlaki had anything to do with 9/11, you could ADD that, but please do not simply REMOVE a POV that you disagree with, especially if it is against consensus. Bachcell (talk) 04:43, 9 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree that we shouldn't remove reliably sourced information from the article. I assure you that I have no intent of doing so. If we could begin to discuss the actual content of the article, we could make some progress. causa sui (talk) 15:27, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

P.S. Causa, if writing something on Wikipedia’s Osama bin Laden article really could get the guy bombed into virtual vegetable soup any sooner, I’d write the CIA and give them a tip. I think they’d pass though. (*sigh*) I’m done for the evening. Goodnight. Greg L (talk) 04:49, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Well, thank you for being honest about your point of view. Personally, I have no particular love for either person. However, the BLP policy as well as common-sense standards of editorial judgment demand that we not suspend our editorial integrity when dealing with BLP's of people we don't like. In fact, if we don't like the subject, that is all the more reason to apply harsher scrutiny to the article. With that in mind, I've been combing the article for various errors, and the process isn't complete: but so far, I've identified several claims in the article that are not supported by the citations, as well as a general POV that claims made by the State Department about the subject's actual involvement in terrorism are true and the subject's denial of those claims is false. That he incites politically and religiously motivated violence against the US is nothing to debate about: we have all the sources we need for that, most of them straight from the horses mouth. But on the issue of the alleged links between the subject and the actual plotting of terrorism, this article steps well beyond what the citations actually support. We need to be honest with ourselves about what information we actually do have, and reign it in. causa sui (talk) 05:07, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Very well; that’s fine. Good job. Just slow down the pace of flurry-editing and reverting. Discuss things (that’s a two-way street) if you get reverted. Like I wrote above, discussing matters out in the open sanitizes the dispute with the sunshine of public scrutiny and results in less editwarring because both sides must think about the issue and explain their reasoning (which tends to make editors exercise logical thinking and double-check their facts). Greg L (talk) 17:14, 10 April 2010 (UTC)
Sorry for the delay; I was out of town this weekend, but I'm back and ready to get to work on this. I'm glad we're on the same page when it comes to verifying our sources. I want to make clear why I am reverting without discussion, though, as this is a tactic I also generally find distasteful and in 99% of situations I would be saying exactly what you're saying. However, in the case of BLPs, we've set a lot of precedent that getting the content out is a first priority: 3RR does not apply to potentially defamatory material and those restoring the content are expected to have found consensus first before putting it back in. I'm not trying to be a lawyer here or prove myself right or whatever, but I want to at least explain myself so I don't seem unwilling to discuss this. However, BLP policy applies to this article just like any other, and that means removing problematic material immediately and sorting out what should go back in, not the other way around. With all that said, I don't at all mind breaking precedent on the issue of who should go first, so I'll start drafting some explanations of content I want to remove, and I'll make a better effort to document what I'm doing and why as I make future edits. causa sui (talk) 14:58, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Just be exceedingly clear about what it is you want. And be sure to cite, with links straight to the relevant text, the governing policy you think applies. Because I seriously doubt that when WP:BLP had its last major re-write, the issue of known terrorists with a bounty on their heads was on anyone’s radar screen. Yeah, yeah; you’ve written here that you think Wikipedia’s articles especially need to be sanitized to keep known terrorists from being killed any sooner. It is just utterly preposterous to think that the CIA or Navy SEALs could find the guy any easier and kill him because of what’s on Wikipedia. Or that officials from America’s Executive Branch are going to harden their resolve because of what they read here; school teachers across the land routinely caution their students to not rely upon Wikipedia when doing their homework. Yet here you are, doing your part, demanding that wide swaths of text be expunged to ensure that galactic-grade terrorists aren’t given a bum rap. That sort of reasoning is just utterly inane and I’ll have none of it.

    Notable public figures of infamy of such an extreme nature that official U.S. bounties are on their heads (and they are too damned dangerous to try in any civilian court) are in an altogether different class than what was being discussed when Wikipedia falsely reported that Senator Byrd died. If you can’t figure that much out on your own, and keep on trying to remove material because it makes terrorists read like… terrorists, then this issue just might balloon into an RfC somewhere so we can finally have formal, written guideline covering people like Osama bin Laden and this creep. It would be better if you just exercised more WP:COMMONSENSE, stopped pointing to guidelines that were not intended to fully and properly govern these sort of topics, and got real rather than have to involve the rest of the community.

    I keep on hearing from you and others that Epeefleche is POV-pushing. I can certainly see that his edits to these sort of articles make him sometimes seem intent on ensuring “bad guys actually look bad.” But from what I’ve seen, he logically and politely responds to reason, and it is quite easy to edit his stuff to ensure it is germane, topical, balanced, reads encyclopedically, and is authoritatively cited. I’m not seeing the same out of you just yet; particularly not when you make hay here with garbage like your below allegation, that including pictures of two terrorists with whom al-Awlaki had many closed-door meetings “further [incites] suspicion [and] unfairly biases the reader”. That is just a metric ton of weapons-grade bullonium. Greg L (talk) 21:20, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I don't think we're going to see eye to eye on this, so further discussion is probably a waste of both our time. I will use sysop tools to enforce WP:BLP on this article if necessary, though I don't want it to come to that. Future debate about the applicability of our core content policies to all articles (not just those of people we like) will have to be carried out in front of arbcom, as I won't discuss it further. --causa sui (talk) 15:15, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Regarding edit 355656180 re: Education

On April 12, 2010, according to an ongoing investigation, it was discovered that Awlaki was educated in the United States with taxpayers money.

Should this not be integrated into the Early Life section? While it is information gained through a current investigation, it pertains solely to his early education, and the fact itself is not part of his current status. I also do not feel it is entirely neutral in tone, or at the very least puts more focus on where his scholarship money came from than on how he obtained it. Trorbes (talk) 03:07, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

The "with taxpayers money" bit is definitely not good WP:STYLE. I'm a bit embroiled with more serious issues right now (see above) but based on your comments you certainly have my blessing to rework that bit.:-) causa sui (talk) 15:22, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Alright. I don't feel entirely comfortable in editing the article myself, as I don't do much editing on Wikipedia aside from corrections and reversions, so it might not be up to standards either, but it should hopefully be less out of place now. Trorbes (talk) 16:08, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

BLP cleanup

In this section, I'll document changes I'm making on the grounds that they are against the letter or spirit of the Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons policy. If there is something I've missed, please create a new section. --causa sui (talk) 15:06, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

"Close contacts"

I removed this section of text:

There were close contacts between al-Awlaki and Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the suspect in the Northwest Airlines Flight 253 al-Qaeda terrorist attack on Christmas Day 2009.[7] According to the suspect, al-Awlaki was his recruiter, and one of his trainers.[8]

  • The CBS News article opens by stating that Abdulmutallab "may have been in contact" with al-Awlaki. 'Sources' told CBS that they 'believe' they 'communicated'. Very vague and hedges their bets, hardly supporting the strong claim that contacts concretely did exist or that if there were contacts, that they were "close". Apparently, investigators (who are they?) are "looking into" the extent of the relationship. Ultimately the article incites suspicion, but does not establish, nor claim to establish, an actual link: but we reported the suspicion as concrete fact. Nor did we report the one concrete fact reported in the article: al-Awlaki's vehement denial of the allegations.
  • Now, the NY Post article. This is a little bit better because it says the two "absolutely did" meet, though it attributes the "absolutely did" claim to an unnamed Yemeni authority, not the suspect, as our article claimed. The reason the Yemeni authority is certain that they did meet is that they were both in the area at the same time.

On the same grounds, I removed this statement from the lead:

According to Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the suspect in the Northwest Airlines Flight 253 al-Qaeda terrorist attack on Christmas Day 2009, al-Awlaki was his recruiter, and one of his trainers.[9][10][11]

The aforementioned CBS news and NYPost articles are again attributed to this claim, but it adds a Washington Post article that also does not claim Abdulmutallab named al-Alawki. causa sui (talk) 16:39, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Thanks, I'll look at these. The LA Times article is definitely better than the citations I originally found, and in some slightly adjusted form (again striking colloquial talk of "close ties"), that citation might well be enough to stand alone. The Times Online article is not quite as good. It refers to this claim in passing, saying "There are already informed reports that Mr Abdulmutallab met Mr al-Awlaki during his final weeks of training and indoctrination for his supposed suicide mission". The article in general reads more like an editorial and I suspect this part is probably based on the same report that the first citation was, though I'm not sure. I wonder if it would really add much. The third also says they were in contact, so that's good. I think we have something here in the first citation that could be the basis for a compromise revision, though we'll have to talk about our citation practices as well, and making sure that citations that do not support our claims are not cited as if they did. causa sui (talk) 05:01, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
  • As long as the text remains, I care little whether it has one ref or more. The only time I care about that as a general matter is when an editor seeks to remove a primary source, as in the removal of an actual indictment as a ref where the text discusses what is in the indictment.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:56, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

(undent) All right, let's stick with the LA Times article then, as that's clearly the strongest one. I think this is the relevant passage:

Some of the information about Awlaki comes from Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old Nigerian charged with attempting to detonate a hidden packet of PETN explosive aboard a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day, the officials said...Under questioning by the FBI, Abdulmutallab has said that he met with Awlaki and senior Al Qaeda members during an extended trip to Yemen this year, and that the cleric was involved in some elements of planning or preparing the attack and in providing religious justification for it, officials said.

This is good, since it concretely claims that Abdulmutallab named al-Awlaki. How about this:

According unnamed U.S. officials, "Christmas-Day" bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab implicated al-Awlaki in some elements of planning or preparing for his failed attack.[12]

Good? --causa sui (talk) 15:20, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Sorry -- have been away from this page for a bit. Rather than revert, let me propose here my ce changes to what you propose.

"Christmas-Day" bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab told the FBI that al-Awlaki was involved in elements of planning or preparing his failed attack, according to U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials.[13]

--Epeefleche (talk) 19:28, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Not quite. Your version didn't mention that the sources are unnamed and dropped "some" elements, which I think is an important qualifier in the original source. We need to be careful to limit our claims to what the cited articles actually say, and it looks like you're just rewording the original language. I'm also busy with other things, so conversation won't move as quickly as some would like. Regardless, do not introduce these kinds of changes unilaterally as it appears that you are reintroducing contentious and poorly sourced material. --causa sui (talk) 05:16, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

First of all, you deleted from that para the somewhat relevant quote regarding AA "working actively to kill Americans". With the edit summary "trim". That's disruptive editing, once again. Please stop.

Second, I've restored:

"Christmas Day bomber" Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab said that al-Awlaki was involved in planning or preparing his failed attack, according to U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials.[1][2][3]

Among the reasons it is superior: a) yours was not English (perhaps you were missing a word)? b) You put Christmas Day in quotes. And through in a hyphen. Neither make sense. I you will say have the relevant phrase in quotes. c) The RS didn't say "the source was unnamed". I have what the RS said, and refer to U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials. That is better than synth. d) Involved in planning or preparing his attack what cover some element, no? It doesn't suggest he was involved in all elements by any stretch of the imagination. Shorter is therefore better. e) What in the world are you talking about when you say that I introduced "contentious and poorly sourced material". There's nothing in what you write that suggest that in the slightest ... I have no idea what you are referring to.--Epeefleche (talk) 09:24, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

  • All right, I blocked you for 48 hours for violating the WP:BLP policy. You should consider yourself topic banned from this article for two weeks. If you want to appeal this decision, please go through the normal channels, as I am not interested in discussing this matter with you (or anyone else) on this page anymore. --causa sui (talk) 15:36, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

9/11 hijackers attended his sermons

The article stated:

Al-Awlaki's sermons were attended by three of the 9/11 hijackers.

I removed this claim since it was not attributed to any citation. Finding a reliable citation that supports the claim would fix it. causa sui (talk) 16:10, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

  • In the section on this subject in the article, as I expect you know since you appear to have read the article, this is in fact referenced. I'm confused why instead of moving those refs to the sentence if you feel they are necessary, you would instead choose to delete a sentence for which there is obvious RS support. That could be viewed as disruptive.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:15, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Sure. It's good to make sure we cite our claims everywhere, even if we repeat them, to avoid these kinds of situations. If you have specific suggestions I'd be happy to talk about them. causa sui (talk) 05:07, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Targeting young US-based muslims

The article stated:

He is often noted for targeting young U.S.-based Muslims with his lectures. Terrorism consultant Evan Kohlmann calls al-Awlaki "one of the principal jihadi luminaries for would-be homegrown terrorists. His fluency with English, his unabashed advocacy of jihad and mujahideen organizations, and his Web-savvy approach are a powerful combination." He calls al-Awlaki's lecture "Constants on the Path of Jihad", which he says was based on a similar document written by al-Qaeda's founder, the "virtual bible for lone-wolf Muslim extremists."[14]

All sounds well and good, with very concrete direct language and appropriate use of direct quotations, which is very helpful. There are two problems with this passage:

  1. As far as I could tell, the article does not support the "often noted" claim, as this would require a citation attributed to a secondary source that has done a review of the primary literature.
  2. The content is blended with allegations of actual planning/plotting of terrorism, whereas the cited article (and the content in our article) only refers to incitement, which is not contended.

In retrospect, it may have been hasty to remove the quotation immediately, though I do think we should talk about where it ought to be placed to avoid the appearance of "padding" the allegations of direct involvement. causa sui (talk) 16:18, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

  • There is more than one way to address this, as we could either: a) add a ref supporting directly the first sentence, or b) change it to a more direct statement, by having it say "He often targets ...", and perhaps adding a ref or two. I'll suggest the second, and adding this, this, and this, though there are many more one could choose from. Deleting accurate text is not the way to go.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:39, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • The first option would of course be the best, if a citation that supported the claim could be found, as that would solve all problems. I worry about the second solution though since that seems to be simply reversing what used to be weasel terms into concrete statement of fact, again not supported by citations because we don't have a secondary source that has done a review of primary sources. Really, I think finding a source that directly supports the claims we're making is the only way to go, and if we don't have sources, we should take it out. This is a WP:V issue more than a WP:BLP issue, though there is always some overlap. --causa sui (talk) 15:34, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

"Alleged" conections

I renamed this section [15] from "Connections to terrorism" to "Alleged connections to terrorism". Since al-Alawki is a U.S. citizen who has not been convicted in court of any terrorism-related crime, I eventually came to the conclusion that jihad (holy struggle) against America is binding upon myself just as it is binding upon every other able Muslim as such. In the future, I will be adding more such qualifiers to the article as well, where I find they are appropriate. causa sui (talk) 16:25, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

  • "Ethically" obligated? Why? He has been identified by the Chair of the U.S. House Subcommittee on Terrorism Assessment as "Terrorist" No. 1 in terms of risk to the U.S. As a result of his having been identified as such, he is on U.S. kill lists. We routinely identify people on FBI terrorism lists, for example, as terrorists. And people such as the 9/11 hijackers, who have not been convicted in a court of law, as terrorists. Your "standard" is a personal one, and doesn't reflect Wiki policies and approaches.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:09, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • As I understand it, the reason journalists accept as part of editorial integrity the concept that they should refer to people accused of crimes as "suspects" who only "allegedly" did what the government said they did is that it is understood that what is written in news print can bias future jurors or even general political opinion about the case, unfairly swinging results one way or another before the accused has had his constitutionally protected "day in court". al-Awlaki, however reprehensible we may find his political opinions and actions, will likely never get his day in court -- which I think intensifies the necessity for this kind of editorial restraint. causa sui (talk) 05:14, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
  • What is it with you, Causa sui? Quoting you: …“we are ethically obligated to refer to allegations against him”… (my emphasis). You also state that you “will be adding more such qualifiers to the article”. This U.S. citizen (that’s quite unfortunate) stated as follows:
That quote was from Reuters. You can listen to al-Awlaki threaten this in his own voice here in this CNN segment.
I dunno; it seems that if the alleged voice of an alleged CNN report where U.S. security analysts allegedly said the voice is that of al-Awlaki (you can watch al-Awlaki speak in English here), and if these words, where one might allege could be interpreted by the ear as matching the alleged transcript where he threatens jihad against America, then it seems prima facia evidence that he is—you know—dabbling with this *terrorism stuff* (index and middle fingers of both hands doing that “quotey”-thing).
Now, you can throw all your “alleged” stuff to no end, but when the Chair of the U.S. House Subcommittee on Terrorism Assessment as "Terrorist" No. 1 in terms of risk to the U.S., it is perfectly well established has “Connections to terrorism.” That is sort of a Well, Duh fact. There will likely never be some “U.S. Court” that will convict him (seemingly the only thing in your book that “proves” anything) because there is presidential and U.S. Security Council approval to bomb him out of his damned sandals. If al-Awlaki is blown to smithereens, I supposed that will liberate you to jump up and down all over Wikipedia claiming that al-Awlaki’s “terrorism thingy” will forever be just unproven *allegations*.
Methinks the Chair of the U.S. House Subcommittee on Terrorism Assessment has his finger on the pulse of the facts here better than a volunteer contributor to Wikipedia known as Causa sui. I really do hope you don’t edit against consensus here on this article. I’m not too tempted at this point to really study this article and look at the grief Epeefleche has to endure to mollify one Causa sui. I hope I don’t have to wade too deep into this turd pit to keep you acting like WP:COMMONSENSE means anything. Greg L (talk) 19:55, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
That allegations against anyone, particularly a living person, should be called just that, is fundamental Wikipedia policy. That the chair of a House committee, a US president, or even a court call or convict someone as a terrorist is not enough for us to say in Wikipedia's voice that someone is a terrorist. What is necessary is a (near) universal consensus of (reliable) sources, a lack of serious dispute as to factual accuracy. This condition is not satisfied here, as Glenn Greenwald says "it's far from clear that he has transgressed the advocacy line into violent action."[16]. Articles like this one are precisely what WP:BLP was designed to cover. By the way, the major reason journalists use "alleged" etc prior to convictions is simply that not using it exposes them and their publisher to lawsuits.John Z (talk) 00:00, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Gosh, it would be quite nice if you read again what the issue is about before weighing in on a thread. This isn’t about “calling Anwar al-Awlaki a ‘terrorist’ ”, (no proper encyclopedia would do such a thing); the dispute originated over the title of a section of the article originally titled “Later life, and connections to terrorism”. I find it the height of absurdity when the original title gets a qualifier of *alleged* connections (“Later life, and alleged connections to terrorism”). It’s absurd given that al-Awlaki has publicly stated that he has declared a personal jihad against America (hmmm… seems like an objective connection to me). “Instead of reviewing al-Awlaki’s connections to terrorism, let’s review his *alleged* connections to terrorism.” I don’t personally have much a problem over such a minor detail as an unnecessary “alleged” equivocation inserted into a section title. Such an edit, among many others, is however, highly instructive as to who might be the actual POV-pushers here (and have difficulty logically parsing English). I’m keeping an eye on what going on here. Greg L (talk) 00:54, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
A number of his connections to terrorism are admitted. If we add alleged, wouldn't we then have to say "connections and alleged connections"? I'm just saying. This could be reductio ad absurdum. I think "connections" covers within it "those that are alleged, those that are admitted, and those that are not admitted but as to which there is a (near) universal consensus of (reliable) sources". Or, then again, we could put all that in the title. Might look pretty.--Epeefleche (talk) 03:41, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Spot on, Epeefleche. That sort of thought was in my mind but I couldn’t make the stars of the logic line up in order to type anything cogent. Exactly. Keep it simple. The “alleged” is insertium bullonium. Greg L (talk) 04:12, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Epeefleche, if they are not admissions of guilt, I think it unlikely they would be enough to support "connections to terrorism", which can suggest criminal conduct or foreknowledge. What do you have in mind? Saying I am carrying on a personal jihad against America or something like "911 was a good thing" or knowing terrorists etc is not enough. Many of the statements on the talk page seem to me to not be very consistent with wikipedia practice and policy, which is why I commented above, in support of "alleged connection." Right now the most serious other problem I see is the unopposed implication, supported by a badly written passage in an NYT article, that the US government has the legal authority to order the assassination of a US citizen, a position which is likely still a minority view; it certainly was a fringe minority view a few decades ago. This is a major part of his notability, and the controversy belongs in the lead.John Z (talk) 05:07, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
We are getting way off target, but yes, you are correct, a few decades ago that was a minority view. In the time of stumbling-bumbling-I'm-ordering-no-assassinations-Gerald-Ford, to be exact. That changed post-9/11, though. No longer the case. BTW, WP is built on badly written RS passages -- you know the mantra, verifiability -- not truth.--Epeefleche (talk) 06:19, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I appreciate your honesty, but if you mean to be carrying on a referendum against core policies, this article is decidedly not the place to do it. I will use sysop tools to enforce WP:BLP on this article if necessary, though I would much rather come to a diplomatic solution, which I think is fully within reach if the parties could simply negotiate their differences peacefully. Future debate about whether our core content policies apply to all articles (not just those of people we like) will have to take place in front of arbcom, because I won't participate in it any more. I'm sorry, but we need to focus all our energy and attention on getting the article right. --causa sui (talk) 15:11, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I appreciate your candor, Causa sui, in pledging now to ignore consensus, misapply guidelines that obviously don’t apply to this case, and threaten to use Admin tools instead of behave like a regular editor, just to get your way. Smooth move. We’ll see what happens from hereon. I suggest you clearly explain your reasoning for what you do here before you let this blow up in your face.

    Your complaints, such as how this article contains images of two hijackers—with whom al-Awlaki had many closed-door meetings—and that somehow “unfairly biases the reader” is utterly absurd. That whole section of the article is not only germane, topical, and has been given a proper encyclopedic treatment here, it is central to understanding how al-Awlaki has had his fingers all over key pieces of the terrorism pie. That section helps illuminate why the U.S. president and the U.S. National Security Council approved that a U.S. citizen be targeted for direct military action and assassination in order to further protect innocent lives.

    Yet, whenever common-sense, factual, encyclopedic treatments of fact don’t come across all that charitably (by definition, that’s pretty much inevitable on these sort of topics, you know), we always somehow find you front and center demanding that it be removed—as if to make room for how al-Awlaki once adopted a stray puppy from a shelter. Or demanding that a section heading be titled “ *alleged* connections to terrorism.” I’ve got your number now. I find you to be am extreme POV-pusher who hides behind the apron strings of guidelines that don’t apply. Your POV-pushing bias seems to be increasingly apparent with each of your responses here.

    Let me be clear here: my contributions to this article have been minimal; stuff like lightening a way-dark picture of al-Awlaki. Terrorism-related articles aren’t my cup of tea. It nevertheless distresses me when I visit these venues and discover editors who edit with an agenda that has only a diaphanous veneer of being backed by guidelines. Greg L (talk) 16:26, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Perhaps someone else understands Causa's above comments and threats. ("Referendum"? "I will use sysop tools"? "Debate about whether our core content policies apply to all articles (not just those of people we like)"? "Arbcom"?) (Perhaps it was copied and pasted mistakenly from another article?)--Epeefleche (talk) 19:07, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I understand it. On this and many other similar BLP articles core WP policies have been ignored by you two. Not only ignored but the policies vociferously argued against as not applying, as wrong, or by relying on clear misreadings. Administrators are required to uphold those policies, and to enforce compliance by protection or blocks if necessary. Causa sui is offering you a chance to study the policies and to edit in accordance with their requirements. You might want to consider benefiting from his knowledge and experience. But if our policy on BLPs is repeatedly breached, then, yes, if it comes to that admin tools, or even an ArbCom case, may be required. --Slp1 (talk) 22:44, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Uh huh. You have your opinion. Greg L (talk) 22:58, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Calling it "ties" -- as the RS that serves as ref there calls it.--Epeefleche (talk) 03:47, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Images of 9/11 hijackers

Currently, the article contains two very large images of 9/11 hijacker Nawaf al-Hazmi and 9/11 hijacker Khalid al-Mihdhar bracketing a discussion of al-Alawki's alleged connections to terrorism. This is a bit less concrete, but I believe that the inclusion of these large images with captions further inciting suspicion unfairly biases the reader against the subject by juxtaposing discussion of the subject with known terrorists as universally hated as the 9/11 hijackers themselves. If we are supposed to hate the subject, his own deeds should stand on their own, rather than resting on guilt by association. causa sui (talk) 16:31, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

  • The pictures conform with MOS:IMAGES. 9/11 is somewhat notable. AA's connection with the hijackers has been widely reported in RSs. The pictures' captions carefully explain the relevance of the pictures. The discussion of the hijackers and AA is supported by RS refs--and many more of the same ilk are available, if deemed necessary. Everything points to inclusion as-is. The only reason I can imagine for deletion is POV of the deleting editor overriding Wiki standards.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:04, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
  • The picture does conform with the style guideline, though that is not my objection; nor is the notability of 9/11, which is not under dispute; nor is any mind-reading about my intentions you may wish to engage in a topic of much interest to me, or anyone else interested in discussing how to improve the article. The problem, as I see it, is that images of the hijackers might be less relevant to the article subject than just about anything else related to his life, such as say, the place of his birth. The reason the pictures are included is to emphasize the connection and remind everyone what a bad guy the subject is. That's not the kind of business we should be engaged in. causa sui (talk) 05:17, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Saaay! I never thought of it that way, Causa sui. For instance, there is this scruffy-looking photo of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed right smack in the middle of our September 11 attacks article. Talk about POV-pushing! Clearly, the only possible point of using such a photograph in that article is to remind readers that terrorists are often 18–36 year-old men of middle-eastern descent (and look like hairy monsters when rousted out of bed at 3:00 am) and amounts to so much POV-pushing by—you know—showing reality. <dripping facetiousness>There is no other possible explanation, is there, Causa sui? I utterly reject the notion that it is a *simple* matter of using encyclopedic photos to illustrate the subject in question.</dripping facetiousness>. Here are some substitutes for you to choose from. ;·) Greg L (talk) 05:42, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

    P.S. The preceding post was clearly satirical in nature and was not intended to make people with asinine suggestions feel poopy about themselves as a person. Greg L (talk) 05:50, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

    P.P.S. As for two very large images, try adjusting your preferences setting; there is no pixel-width specification on those two pictures. (Sheesh) Greg L (talk) 05:56, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

  • @Causa -- After admitting that what you first described as "very large images", and then again as "large images", which suggested to me at least that you were objecting to their size, you now agree that they conform with the wiki size/style guideline. You articulate your objection at this point as "images of the hijackers might be less relevant to the article subject than just about anything else related to his life, such as say, the place of his birth". Really? How in the world do you reach that conclusion? Not, I'm just guessing here, by reading the 100,000+ wiki hits that one arrives at by doing a search of "Awlaki 9/11 hijackers", and the 30,000+ that one arrives at by doing a search of "Awlaki 'September 11' hijackers". That's just the sort of baseless assertion that erodes assumptions of good faith. I expect more from a sysop.--Epeefleche (talk) 20:11, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Right-- again, the issue with the size isn't that they fail to conform to the style guideline, but that they don't serve an entirely encyclopedic purpose. The purpose, as I take it, is to make sure the reader knows that the subject is a very bad man and to reinforce his association with The Terrorists. It's not something I feel too strongly about, though, so I think we could compromise on this by, say, putting the images closer together and reducing the size a bit. I'll make a bold edit. --causa sui (talk) 16:21, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
Causa already agreed that thumb is the style guideline. He has expressed no reason for reducing it, other than his POV. The subject of the article and the subjects in the pictures are reflected together in text in over 100,000 ghits. That's sufficient, by any stretch of the imagination, to include their pictures at what Causa already admitted is the normal guideline size -- and demonstrates ineluctably the "encyclopedic purpose".
Causa -- if you keep this disruptive editing up, I would ask that you put yourself up for recall, because your intentional disregard of guidelines and policies is now clearly one that you engage in not only in the heat of the moment but with forethought. I don't know what damage you are doing elsewhere, but what I see here concerns me.--Epeefleche (talk) 18:55, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
I say, “Let him have his weenie-size pictures.” The whole point of having unspecified pixel width on thumbs is to allow our I.P. readership (you know, that 99.95% of our readership we write for) see pictures in the default width that the Wikipedian community has decided is best for general-purpose images in body text. I override these defaults whenever it is a decorative picture in the lead, or if there are page layout considerations such as crowding of following sections, or for other purposes, such as to control dithering in animated GIFs. Causa sui wrote It's not something I feel too strongly about but then <incredulity>flouted the guidelines over it</incredulity>; it is a minor issue over which he chose to make hay. Nevertheless, I suggest you save you ammo, Epee. C.S. has clearly earned his “involved admin”-status here with this petty stunt and may now be looked upon as a regular editor here who may not edit against consensus. Greg L (talk) 20:36, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

@GL--I understand your approach of: "Let's consider letting the admin ignore both (1) the wikipedia guidance that Causa has admitted says we should use size x photos, and (2) also ignore the consensus on the talk page". Causa may have intimidated you. When he threatened to abuse his sysop powers by -- despite being a deeply involved sysop -- using those powers to get his way, ignoring guidelines as well as consensus. That would make for a third violation, if we were to keep score. And I can understand your reaction. His threats were rather blunt. And appear fashioned to intimidate. Alternatively, if it is not that he has cowed you, perhaps you are in a mood of: "this guy is too small for me to let him ruin my day, let's keep peace by letting him do the wrong thing".

I see it a bit differently. This is yet one more in what is now a long series of manifest violations of wiki guidelines by Causa, which started just a few days ago with massive innappropriate base-less deletions at this article. Sysops are obliged to set positive examples and follow wiki guidelines. It is a concern for the wiki community when a sysop does the opposite, and then threatens to use the wrong end of the mop to get his way in a dispute, as Causa has done here. Plus, it leads to a lesser article (and, unchecked, to many lesser articles).

Causa is ignoring consensus. Ignoring wiki guidelines. Ignoring common sense and requirements of NPOV. And making baseless assertions that erode initial AgF, with his "oh, just because these three are mentioned in over 100,000 ghits together, I still feel they are not related, and will therefore unilaterally cut the pictures sizes in half".

On top of that, he threatens those who side with wiki guidelines and consensus with his ability to use the other end of his mop against them. Because he is a sysop. Because he is Causa. End of story.--Epeefleche (talk) 21:41, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

  • As to your last paragraph, Causa thinks it works that way. It doesn’t. See WP:INVOLVED. It states the following:
It goes on to add this:
Causa might allege that your edits are vandalism, or create a clear and present danger to Anwar al-Awlaki’s life (given that the U.S. is trying to drop a 2000-pound JDAM on him), or that Anwar al-Awlaki’s right to privacy like our revealing his whereabouts via citing U.S. Government documents rather than Readers Digest. That last one is, of course, hard to do since the guy is likely living in a cave today. At any rate, an involved Admin using Sysop powers here is contrary to Wikipedia’s guidelines for precisely the reason the community has such a guideline: he has lost any semblance of being objective. Accordingly, he will edit like any other editor or there will be repercussions. Period. Greg L (talk) 00:02, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Are we talking about the Awlaki article? From my browser, I see the two 9/11 hijackers' images defaulting to 150px, which is the size limitation of the stocked image. They are in no way excessively large, by any stretch. I see that cause changed them to 100px, which I believe is a bit too small. I thought Causa may have been referring to the two images further below in the article, but that does not seem to be the case. Ohconfucius ¡digame! 04:53, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
  • As it turned out, putting them on the right hand side made the situation much better. I'm still on the fence as to whether they should be in the article at all, but we can determine that at a later date as the article content evolves. --causa sui (talk) 05:36, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
  • @Oh--Yes, we are talking about the two 9/11 hijackers images in the Al-Awlaki article. Causa has a non-consensus view that -- in spite of the fact that there are 130,000+ ghits with Awlaki and the 9/11 hijackers -- "images of the hijackers might be less relevant to [Awlaki] than just about anything else related to his life, such as say, the place of his birth". I'm not clear how he reaches that conclusion. But as to his analysis, there you have it.--Epeefleche (talk) 08:55, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-na-terror-intel31-2009dec31,0,4146208,full.story
  2. ^ Soltis, Andy (December 25, 2009). "Soltis, Andy, "'fort hood' imam blown up: yemen", ''The New York Post'', December 25, 2009, accessed December 25, 2009". Nypost.com. Retrieved January 24, 2010.
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference wanted was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

"Accused"?

The text says "Al-Awlaki has been accused of Islamic fundamentalism and encouraging terrorism." Obviously terrorism is something one should stand accused of, but that word doesn't seem very neutral when applied to Islamic fundamentalism. Many proudly acknowledge it. Fell Gleaming(talk) 02:41, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Many proudly acknowledge being terrorists as well.  ;-)
But you make a good point, and I do agree with it ... wiki guidance is on your side. Something along the lines of "has been said to be a supporter of ... and to have encouraged ...." would be more appropriate.--Epeefleche (talk) 03:00, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
  • "Accused of fundamentalism" doesn't make much sense I suppose. Not a big deal to say that he is accused of inciting or encouraging terrorism either since that's pretty much unambiguous. I have no strong feelings about this either way. We need to be more careful when it comes to accusations of direct involvement, though. --causa sui (talk) 05:09, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Semantics

Re. my revert, there is a subtle, yet crucial difference between being tied to a person who has engaged in terrorism, and being tied to terrorism. Your source says the former; you cannot use it to support the latter. Fell Gleaming(talk) 04:08, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Better practice might have been to make that subtle change. I'll do it.--Epeefleche (talk) 07:56, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Your new version is worse. a) "ties to terrorists" is wrong because the "terrorists" are only alleged at this point - and your source says the links to them are only reported as well. So to correct your version, we would have to say "alleged ties to alleged terrorists", which is certainly clumsy and less preferable to "alleged ties to terrorism"

There is good reason reliable sources like ABCNews don't say he has "ties to terrorism". Please follow their example on this. Fell Gleaming(talk) 12:44, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

FamilySecurityMatters.org

This is a self-published activist site hostile to the article's subject. It cannot be used to source claims as per BLP. The claim in question appears credible, so if you want it left in, finding a WP:RS for it should not be difficult. Fell Gleaming(talk) 04:14, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree. Many of the citations in this article are editorial rants. Getting them out and finding reliable sources will be a long haul, but someone has to do it. --causa sui (talk) 05:33, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

NefaFoundation.org

Same objection as above. Unless this material can be resourced (and quick), its going to need to go. Fell Gleaming(talk) 05:44, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Not at all. It's clearly an RS.--Epeefleche (talk) 07:55, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Not according to WP:RS. It's self-published site. Allow me to quote the relevant policy, "Self-published sources should never be used as third-party sources about living persons, even if the author is a well-known professional researcher or writer". I trust that should clear up any confusion.

Please properly source the material immediately. Fell Gleaming(talk) 12:32, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Hi FellGleaming. I had my doubts about this site myself, but when I asked at the WP:RSN, it was considered to be an adequate source for copies of documents. See this. I hope that helps.--Slp1 (talk) 13:25, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Thanks Slp. The statement from the NB though is a bit different in the case of BLPs regarding crime. See this (highlighting what I believe are the relevant points):


So I believe you are correct that the source shouldn't merit a blanket removal, but we should consider whether it is a RS for specific claims. Fell Gleaming(talk) 13:34, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
I confess that I didn't look at how NEFA was being cited here and was thinking it was similarly to another article, but I see that it isn't. Sorry. What I see is....
  • "The NEFA Foundation noted that on December 23, 2008, six days after he said Hasan first e-mailed him, al-Awlaki wrote on his blog: "The bullets of the fighters of Afghanistan and Iraq are a reflection of the feelings of the Muslims towards America"." cited to New York Daily News This seems fine to me. The NYDN doesn't mention anything about 6 days and talks about a website not a blog, however, and "noted" seems weaselish. Some changes are required per V and NPOV.
  • One arrest warrant posted on NEFA, used in support of a secondary source. Fine, in my view.
  • Some NEFA produced documents, [17][18][19][20] which I didn't ask about at all at RSN. Whether they can be used depends whether NEFA is considered a reliable or self-published source. Maybe some others would like to weight in, or you could suggest asking a specific question at WP:BLPN or WP:RSN. --Slp1 (talk) 14:36, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

I think as Slp pointed out in her initial post, this has already been addressed. In addition if one spends 5 minutes on google she will see that it is relied upon as an RS by a multitude of RSs for the same purposes that it is used in this article.--Epeefleche (talk) 06:36, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

More Progress

Lede looks like a lede now, but the sources still need vast amounts of cleanup. What's up with doing things like attaching no less than seven sources to an uncontroversial claim such as where he worked on a doctorate? Fell Gleaming(talk) 04:45, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

In these cases, many of the sources don't even support the claims made. It's going to be a laborious task to unlink all the unrelated sources, but the BLP concerns are a much higher priority for me right now. --causa sui (talk) 05:10, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, I've only really read through a small percentage of them, but am seeing persistent WP:Synthesis in how many are being translated back into the article. Fell Gleaming(talk) 05:13, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Lectures

Where is this material being sourced from? I can't see what's backing it up. Fell Gleaming(talk) 05:46, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Epeefleche blocked and topic banned by Causa; Immediately reversed as Highly Inappropriate

I've blocked Epeefleche (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) for 48 hours and per the Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons policy I am declaring him topic banned from this article for two weeks. No doubt he will want to appeal this decision. I invite him (or anyone else who disagrees with my decision) to appeal it through the normal Wikipedia:Dispute resolution channels as I will not any longer suffer delays in efforts to bring this article into line with our core content policies due to tangential debates about policy. --causa sui (talk) 15:41, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Given that others have debated your application of BLP here and you are involved in the content of this article, do you really think you should be the one taking administrative action? imho to avoid even the appearance of impropriety, you should recuse and report to ANI. –xenotalk 15:48, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
I definitely agree with Xeno. Causa has been very aggressive in implementing their own understanding of BLP policy even possibly violating WP:3RR in so doing—although I failed to report this. Given this user's threats to utilize their "administrative powers" to get their point across, it is extremely inappropriate that Causa be the one to block Epeefleche.--Supertouch (talk) 16:01, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
BLP supercedes 3RR. Fell Gleaming(talk) 16:10, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
Not necessarily. If you actually read WP:3RR it is not as black and white as you present it. Read under "Exceptions to 3RR": "Libelous, biased, unsourced, or poorly sourced contentious material that violates Biographies of living persons (BLP). What counts as exempt under BLP can be controversial. Consider reporting to the BLP noticeboard instead of relying on this exemption."--Supertouch (talk) 17:07, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
A BLP violation supercedes 3RR, period. Admittedly, defining whether or not a particular edit is a BLP violation can sometimes be problematic, but that's a different issue.
  • I have just unblocked Epee. Causa, the block and topic ban are both abuses of your power since you are clearly involved in a dispute with him--Jac16888Talk 17:16, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
    • While I think the block was unwise, and support the unblock, I don't think the involvement is so clear, as it is not clear that Causa was not acting at all times as an adminstrator enforcing BLP here.John Z (talk) 00:35, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
    I don't intend to wheel war, but I would do it again in similar circumstances. I don't want to fill this talk page with debate about BLP and administrative policy, so if you think further measures are required, you should start a user conduct RFC or an arbcom case about it. That's what I meant when I said I don't want to discuss it-- I won't discuss it here, as debates about my admin conduct are a distraction and not appropriate for this talk page at all. Accordingly, in the interest of not fragmenting discussion, this will be my last comment about the matter on this talk page. If you, or others, think further discussion is necessary, I'll be happy to meet you at the appropriate venue. --causa sui (talk) 05:51, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Am I the only one who finds it mildly ironic and peculiar that Causa opened up this string on editor conduct here yesterday, and yet today he says he will not discuss his conduct on this page as it is "not appropriate"?--Epeefleche (talk) 19:58, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

No need for warning tag from involved admin

I’ve reverted this edit by Causa sui as unnecessary. That principle that “Unsourced or poorly sourced controversial claims about living people are strictly forbidden on all Wikipedia pages” applies to all biographies and is certainly understood by the active editors here. The part (in bold) as to how the article “may contain unsourced or poorly sourced controversial claims about a living person. Such content must be removed immediately” clearly amounted to nothing more than a declaration by Causa sui to Epeefleche that Causa sui reserved special editing privileges and powers and could act with impunity. It was placed there well before it was explained in several venues to Causa sui, that as an involved editor, he can’t be overstepping his authority. Greg L (talk) 22:34, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Having a dispute over a dispute tag is pretty lame. If whether a dispute tag should be on a page is a matter of dispute, then there probably is a dispute. The tag should stay. --causa sui (talk) 20:29, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
I see no need for such a tag.--Epeefleche (talk) 20:49, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Putting it there in the first place was “lame.” As my edit summary says when I again removed it is as follows: (tag inserted by editor trying to warn another editor during editwarring deleted as unseemly and unnecessary) Greg L (talk) 16:37, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

This is what I’m talking about

…with how editors can selectively quote from secondary sources. The March audio tape from CNN is now linked so readers can go listen for themselves what al-Awlaki really said in its full context. It is clear this article has suffered from some severe POV-pushing.

Just before I started getting to the bottom of some of the facts here, the Ideology section (Anwar’s dearest principles) read as follows:

Al-Awlaki said: "I lived in the U.S. for 21 years. America was my home. I was a preacher of Islam involved in non-violent Islamic activism. However, with the American invasion of Iraq and continued U.S. aggression against Muslims, I could not reconcile between living in the U.S. and being a Muslim."

Well, there you go. He appears to be a pacifist who leaves the U.S. to live his life in peace and harmony with like-minded peaceful individuals.

So I first blithely included that quote right next to another one where Awlaki pledged personal jihad against America. Realizing they came from the same CNN tape, I thought they were from wildly different segments of the audio tape. Then I discovered that the above *quote* was a fragment way out of context.

I’ve now consolidated the whole passage at the bottom, here at “In Yemen; 2004–present”. The actual quote is as follows:

I for one, was born in the U.S., and lived in the U.S. for 21 years. America was my home. I was a preacher of Islam involved in non-violent Islamic activism. However, with the American invasion of Iraq and continued U.S. aggression against Muslims, I could not reconcile between living in the U.S. and being a Muslim, and I eventually came to the conclusion that jihad against America is binding upon myself just as it is binding on every other able Muslim.

Compare the two. Look at their meaning. Hmmm… that *ideology* bit sorta left off the “jihad against America” bit. Someone had taken the first half, ended it with a period, and passed that off as al-Awlaki’s “ideology.” This stunt wherein editors come here with an agenda to spoon-feed half-truths (which is every bit as bad—or worse—than “no-truths”) has got to end.

This experience also speaks to the issue of citing right back to the horse’s mouth for the facts. In this case, it was CNN that received the tape. Reuters and everyone else was just reporting what CNN had. Now, with the YouTube video where readers can listen to the actual tape in CNN’s possession, Wikipedia (and our readership) is far better off. Greg L (talk) 01:25, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

P.S. Now I’m gonna go back and find out who pulled that little stunt… Greg L (talk) 01:29, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
P.P.S. I’m not naming names. Appears to have been an unfortunate, ill-thought-out edit. We need to be careful when quoting fragments of speeches and go to the original sources where possible rather than vomit pre-digested material from further down the informational food chain (which often tends to be selective to make a point). In this case Reuters did a piss-poor job of quoting from the tape. The “quote” that ended up here was verbatim as written on Reuters (at the very bottom of the article) but did not precisely match what al-Awlaki really said. Moreover, the period Reuters added at the end of the *quote* (added mid-sentence) totally changed its meaning. The error on the wikipedian’s part was in not appreciating that Reuters article was chock full of how the tape threatened jihad (it was also the article’s title) so it was exceedingly inappropriate for someone to take that small fragment and pass it off as somehow being properly representative of al-Awlaki’s ideology—even if he or she hadn’t listened to the tape. Greg L (talk) 02:06, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
P.P.P.S. I also took the time to make it clear about the reliability of the CNN tape. Everyone else, by quoting secondary sources like Reuters, were passing off quotes from the tape as irrefutably being attributable to the voice of al-Awlaki. To do this properly, we must mention that CNN didn’t have the capacity to authenticate the tape themselves, but relied on unnamed independent sources who said it was genuine. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth please. Greg L (talk) 02:22, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
Greg, I'm not seeing your problem with this. I don't believe it was me who made that change, but there's nothing that "totally changes the meaning". First, there are no "periods" on audio tapes and, even had it been written material, it is pure Chicago manual-of-style correct to punctuate quotes properly when terminating them. You shouldn't quote in a way that changes the meaning of the portion you are quoting, but that wasn't done in this case.
Now, had there not been such a heavy focus on the jihad aspect earlier in that section, I would definitely support including the second portion of that quote. But as it stands now, the entire section has a false light issue. The quote itself was cherry picked off a lengthy tape, and the tape itself is just one of thousands of hours and pages of his ideology. The section gives the impress that al-Aklaki does nothing whatsoever but talk jihad in every other sentence. Do you feel that's a correct, neutral interpretation? Fell Gleaming(talk) 03:00, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
1) Threatening jihad against America is highly germane, topical, and notable to this subject. 2) Because the threat comes from an individual with Security Council and presidential authority to assassinate him even though he is a U.S. citizen (unprecedented), that makes the threat extra germane, topical, and notable. 3) Two pieces of that taped segment were previously in this article but placed in ways that took them far out of context. The first part was all by itself and passed off as representative of his ideology. The second part was passed off to convey how he is dangerous. 4) As for your “thousands of hours and pages of his ideology”, all that clearly hasn’t been notable since its contents haven’t been widely—if at all—reported in the press. What has become notable are these particular portions of the taped message, which was picked up by every major news organization. That’s what makes this particular potion of the tape and its contents especially worthy of inclusion and not the other thousands of hours. Thus, it is not a matter of me “cherry picking”, as you put it. Of the 12 minutes of voice on the tape, this is the part CNN thought highly newsworthy and aired on their broadcast (which readers can now listen to themselves). 5) The two quotes are now together, as they were spoken and that is how they ought to be presented here; together, in context. Finally… 6) I actually read those authoritative, blue links editors like you are fond of employing. They think it makes them seem *right* somehow. Your False light link begins with False light is a legal term that refers to a tort concerning privacy that is similar to the tort of defamation. Your link is irrelevant, POV-pushing garbage; there’s no “defamation” nor “privacy” problems going on here because he is A) a public figure, and B) truly uttered those words, and C) sent that tape to CNN (meaning he obviously didn’t expect the words to be private.) If you don’t want the entire, verbatim, exact quote here, go reverse time and prevent Anwar from making big-time news with it. Greg L (talk) 03:34, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Section break: Do quotes from the tape belong here?

"Your link is irrelevant, POV-pushing garbage" You lost your credibility entirely right there. You also missed entirely my entire argument. There is no false light issue with that particular quote. There certainly is relevance to statements he's made concerning jihad. The issue is, are we using undue weight to present a false light? Are the majority of his idealogical statements concerning jihad?
And, before you again break WP:Civ by accusing me of POV pushing, let me explain a few things to you. First, you may find it difficult to believe, but before I began on this article yesterday, I had never heard of this chap. After reading the references, I'm thoroughly convinced he is, to mince words, "a scumbag." There are few things I hate more than Muslim fundamentalism...but one of them is bias in reporting. That includes Wikipedia entries.
I asked you a good faith question at the end of my post. I ask you again to answer it. I honestly don't know how representative that section is...but from the degree of original research, synthesis and poisoning the well I've seen in the article so far, I strongly suspect there's a real problem with it. I intend to listen to the entire audio in question, continue my research, and find the answer. Still further, I wish to remind you that this quote is not from al-Awlaki. It's allegedly his...and alleged by "unnamed sources". Try to keep that in mind.
So how about we put aside the insults, and work together to make a 'neutral, high-quality entry? Believe it or not, Anwar's fate doesn't rest in our hands. It's not our job to try to convict him in the court of public opinion. Fell Gleaming(talk) 04:16, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
But the phrase 'jihad against America' by itself is relatively informationless isn't it ? That could mean all sorts of things ranging from peacefully demonstrating to violent action. Sean.hoyland - talk 04:20, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
Update: I just listed to the clip. A 12 minute tape...and CNN picked (almost certainly) the raciest two quotes from it, about 30 seconds worth. Then you picked the worst of those two; boiling his entire philosophy down something that can be stated in 15 seconds. Does that synopsis accurately represent his viewpoint? I don't know yet -- but I care whether or not it does...and I hope you do as well. Fell Gleaming(talk) 04:26, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I see… *I* “cherry picked” the most incriminating passage from the whole tape. Yeaaaaah… You didn’t comprehend a thing I wrote. *CNN* and every other news organization, like Reuters, here picked up on that portion of the tape and that decided for us what is considered to be the key portion and is notable. It sounds like you are suggesting that Wikipedians go and choose what portions of the tape we think are notable. That’s called WP:Original Research. Anwar’s actions and fate have decided this for us. We can only present the information accurately, in context (which was sorely lacking before) and cite it to the most reliable and authoritative source. I took a horrible job where editors had split the quote mid-sentence and planted it into two different places where the meanings of the two fragments were two entirely different things. Together and properly cited, it is much improved. If you want to go strip it out, because you dislike how the world has overlooked the “thousands of hours and pages of [al-Awlaki’s] ideology” and how fate served up a raw deal as far as what is notable, and you find ‘CNN to be racist’ (and Reuters and every other news organization that picked up on that story), I can’t stop you (though I can revert you). Don’t be surprised if others revert you too for violating just about every policy we have. Goodbye and happy editing. Greg L (talk) 05:08, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

    P.S. If you don’t like the article, don’t rag on me; I hardly touched the damned thing. My contribution before this was to lighten that picture of him, which used to look like this. Besides that, I pretty much just consolidated that bifurcated quote into one seamless quote so it isn’t presented colossally out of context. So when you say the article has all sorts of shortcomings, I agree with you 100%; far too many editors with a clear bias one way or another have battled over this article and I find it sickening. If you don’t like the present state of the article, then go roll up your sleeves and improve it. You then can have people harp about your efforts. It would be exceedingly nice, however, if you followed the letter and spirit of every single guideline and policy we have while making your contributions so you just aren’t adding to its problems. Greg L (talk) 05:22, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

(undent) " It sounds like you are suggesting that Wikipedians go and choose what portions of the tape we think are notable. That’s called WP:Original Research." -- Heh, no it isn't. OR is when we express our conclusions as text in the article. Editorial decisions about what actually goes in or out is what we're here for. Why on earth do you think policies like WP:Notable and WP:UNDUE exist to guide us, if we couldn't make such decisions?

"I took a horrible job where editors had split the quote mid-sentence" -- You mean they split it exactly as the Reuters source did?

"you find ‘CNN to be racist’ " -- I'm going to suggest once more you read what I type. You're ascribing views to me that I don't hold (quite the opposite in fact). CNN's job is NOT to generate a neutral, encyclopedic image of al-Awlaki's entire life, background, and ideological views. That's our job. Different goals...and the end product will be different as well. CNN picking out the juicy bits is not racist. But its not scholarly either...nor should it be.

"If you don’t like the present state of the article, then go roll up your sleeves and improve it. " -- Well, I made over 150 changes yesterday alone, wrapped into about 10 separate transactions, cutting out nearly 10K of text, and rephrasing portions of nearly every paragraph in the text. That was the easy part though...the hard part is source verification.

In closing, and with all due respect, I'm going to suggest you try for a little emotional detachment here. I asked a good faith question...twice. You've been so busy insulting me that I don't think you even saw the question, much less thought about answering it. Fell Gleaming(talk) 05:49, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

  • You wrote The quote itself was cherry picked off a lengthy tape, and the tape itself is just one of thousands of hours and pages of his ideology. The nature of al-Awlaki’s press release and the sum of the entire world’s press decided that the taped release al‑Awlaki sent to CNN is newsworthy and stands out from the rest of his no-doubt fine works. Moreover, CNN, Reuters, and all the other world’s press point us towards what is considered the especially newsworthy passage in it: threatening jihad against America (yeah, those *silly little words*). Accordingly, mentioning the tape here and providing the highly notable passage that the world’s press is quoting means its inclusion here is germane, topical, balanced, and encyclopedic.

    You wrote The issue is, are we using undue weight to present a false light? Are the majority of his idealogical statements concerning jihad? Again, shear nonsense. Our article on Manuel Noriega states as follows: On 15 December 1989, the PRD-dominated legislature spoke of "a state of war" between the United States and Panama. Well, why would we include such a inflammatory statement—you know, that *war-thingy* stuff—in Wikipedia? Running with your logic and paraphrasing you with your emphasis, one might ask “Do the majority of the Panamanian legislature’s statements mention war?” That, of course, was a rhetorical question. The declaration of war rightfully caught the attention of the world’s press (and the United State’s government, which invaded the country). And it appears al‑Awlaki’s pledge of jihad (and likely classified items we aren’t aware of) caught the attention of the world’s press and the U.S. government because the press rightly reported it and al‑Awlaki now has been targeted for assassination by the president and National Security Council. It seems, they too find his actions notable.

    Similarly, our article on Lee Harvey Oswald might seem to give undo weight to a few hours in Dallas and not nearly enough airtime to his thousands of hours of other activities elsewhere that didn’t capture the world’s attention. Too bad. At least in that situation, they let regular Texas law enforcement authorities criminally handle the case and didn’t have the National Security Council target him for being bombed.

    I’m sorry; I find your arguments to be nonsense and embody precious little understanding of how Wikipedia works. As I mentioned before, if you think al‑Awlaki’s taped statement reflects poorly upon his character and don’t want the entire, verbatim, exact quote included here, go reverse time and prevent Anwar from making big-time news around the world with it. If you think material from his thousands of hours and pages of his ideology is somehow notable, germane, and topical to the article—and you can reliably and authoritatively cite it without viloating WP:OR, feel free to add it to this article. While you’re at it, you might go fix the clear “undo weight” problem in our Manuel Noriega article. The “thousands of hours” of other material from Panama’s legislature that doesn’t mention “a state of war” should make for interesting reading. Greg L (talk) 11:57, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Greg L on this string as to Fell's edits.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:54, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
"If you don’t want the entire, verbatim, exact quote included here, go..." The text presented is not the "entire verbatim exact quote". It's 30 seconds snipped out a twelve minute tape. From a news perspective, that is appropriate. For an encyclopedia, we have a duty to not cherry pick material to present a false light that al-Awlaki's sermons and speeches contain nothing but references to jihad. The point you keep missing is that the problem lies not with this particular quote, but the quote, considered as a whole with the rest of the article. Has a consistent effort been made to include nothing but material that casts the subject in a false light?
However, to argue your side of the issue -- it very well may be the case that al-Awlaki truly does talk of little else but jihad. I'm awaiting some further research material on the subject and will reply back here when I can speak with more authority. Fell Gleaming(talk) 20:05, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Why in the world is this point not sinking in with you?!? The passage chosen from his 12-minute-long tape is the passage that every press and new organization in the world picked up on. Per Wikipedia:Notability and WP:Original research, that defines for us what is notable about it and is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia. Look at how Paula Newton at 1:05 into her report, highlights for the television viewer what CNN considers notable in the tape. That snippet was how Reuters elected to title their written article on it: Yemen preacher urges jihad on United States: tape. The reasons we have guidelines on looking towards sources such as these for guidance as to what is and is not topical and notable is it avoids edit wars with editors who would otherwise do original research, cherry-pick non-notable, irrelevant materials, and POV-push in order to make al‑Awlaki look either especially good or especially bad. It is just that simple.

    It was al‑Awlaki who chose to send that tape knowing full well how the world would react to his threatening jihad against America (and inciting every able muslim to do the same). Perhaps you wish he hadn’t done that. You clearly wish to bury an encyclopedic treatment of this uncomfortable fact. Deal with it; the guy made big-time news with it and it is an exceedingly important point in helping the reader to understand the unprecedented move (also mentioned in the article) wherein the president of the U.S. and the National Security Council approved the targeted killing of a U.S. citizen. YOU DON’T LIKE THAT. As the saying goes in the military: So sad – too bad. Desist with your ranting about this please; it has become tedious because Wikipedia’s policies couldn’t be clearer on this issue. Greg L (talk) 21:32, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Must have balance in the article’s lead

  • Well, FellGleaming, I thought you might be in a more cooperative mood lately. Wishful thinking on my part. (*sigh*) Why? Because…

    Instead, I see the heat has apparently made you very quietly work in collaboration with Causa sui as you two “clean up” and “trim” the article. Unfortunately, you two seem to have managed to get information from late 2009 into the article’s lead where al‑Awlaki denies involvement in al-Quida while inadvertently omitting a more recent and far more notable event where he said that jihad (holy war) was binding upon himself and every other able muslim (oopsy… “that silly ol’ thing”). This strikes me as subtle POV-pushing intended to fly under the radar and slowly erode the article by you two. This has been an ongoing issue by you two and doesn’t seem to be subsiding notwithstanding some recent and extremely unfortunate incidences involving both of you (Causa sui’s being the blocking an editor over this very article even though, as an admin, he is clearly highly involved here). I really think it is time for this to stop.

    The lead now has the balance one would find in any fine encyclopedia (with the key, recent, notable events surrounding al‑Awlaki grouped together in context). That doesn’t mean I find the lead to be perfect and can’t be further improved, but both the good and the bad need to be fairly and properly presented in the lead to have a proper encyclopedic treatment of this subject. Wikipedia is noted for its tight, well-written, pithy leads and it is important for readers with little time on their hands to be able to quickly gather a balanced and complete gist of what the issue is about with this guy when deciding whether to read further. Greg L (talk) 17:33, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

I don't believe that's the case. Jihad <> al Qaeda. If we use "unnamed government sources" to twice accuse a person of being an al Qaeda operative, we are duty bound to point out that he has denied those allegations, especially when independent sources have stated the allegations are "more speculative than real". So far, in reading about 20 different sources on this subject, I have yet to see any source point out hard evidence to this connection. Fell Gleaming(talk) 18:03, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I haven’t the foggiest idea what you are driving at now. Have you somehow confused me with “the man” responsible for all that is mean and nasty in the article about al-Awlaki? Do you think my grand total of 19 edits are, in some way, largely responsible for the contents of this God-forsaken article???

    Above, you were incessantly harping about the inclusion of the key, notable passage from the tape Awlaki sent to CNN. My role was to consolidate two poorly transcribed pieces—one of which had been quoted way out of context—into a single quotation that is accurately quoted. It’s exceedingly notable, it’s al-Awlaki’s voice and he said it. “Government sources” and accusations—or lack thereof—that he is a member of al-Qaeda matter not one twit with respect to the CNN tape.

    This morning, I rearranged the lead in an attempt to make it harmonized so it didn’t have that Wikipedia “she said / he said” look of dueling editors. When I left it last, it looked like this, which prominently disclosed that al-Awlaki denied involvement with al-Qaeda and just as prominently disclosed that he declared jihad on America. Just the facts, ma’am. And, now that I think about it, I added into the lead one important detail: Since we are saying he’s an American citizen and that the president authorized that he be targeted for bombing, we should certainly mention that he now resides in Yemen (which I duly cited). When I finished, it seemed fair and balanced given what I had to start with. If you think I came here this morning to POV-push, you’re barking up the wrong tree.

    If you felt all “duty bound” to ensure the facts were properly there, then it would have been nice if you had the proper material waiting for me there when I rearranged it this morning. If you want to widen the argument onto other matters, go find someone else to complain to. Either that, or fix the shortcomings yourself. Just stop with saying that quoting the “doozy passage” from the CNN tape must be deleted from this article for [yada-yada] reason, or because it—as you say—ignores the “thousands of hours” of his other teachings where he doesn’t mention jihad. Such reasoning is utter nonsense and is completely at odds with just about every guideline and policy we have. The guy made world headlines with that tape and the world press picked right up on the part that is quoted here. You don’t like that reality. Trouble is, it’s reality. As I said before: in the military that’s called “so sad — too bad.” Greg L (talk) 23:55, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Are we willing to take this to mediation?

Jac16888 (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) wisely advised me to seek dispute resolution on this matter, and I agree with his advice. As I see it, the next step is mediation. However, it is pointless to seek mediation unless the parties involved will submit to it. Will the following users, who I think would be the parties, submit to mediation?

  1. Epeefleche (talk · contribs)
  2. Greg L (talk · contribs)
  3. FellGleaming (talk · contribs)
  4. causa sui (talk · contribs)

--causa sui (talk) 19:12, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Replies
  • Yes, formal or otherwise. This situation could use some more diplomacy. --causa sui (talk) 19:12, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Certainly. Fell Gleaming(talk) 20:55, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Comment: Please clarify as to the nature of the “matter” that is thought to be in need of “dispute resolution.” If it is arguing over the contents of this article, then I have had a relatively minor role in editing the article (19 edits in the last 500 v.s. 63 for Causa sui) and don’t much care about what is in it. My involvement has primarily been on this talk page and my posts have been largely in defense of another editor by opposing what I perceive as clear abuse-of-power violations by a (highly) involved admin. On that “matter,” are some parties here thinking mediation is the indicated remedy? If so, please direct me to a Wikipedia policy or guideline indicating as much. Greg L (talk) 23:46, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
    Speaking for myself, I don't have much interest in investigating anyone's user conduct here. I think everyone here sincerely believes they are doing the right thing. If someone wants to investigate my user conduct, I think that would be an appropriate topic for an admin conduct RFC or an arbitration committee case. I'm starting to lose count of how many times I've suggested this, but I suppose I'll have to go on suggesting it as long as I think it might be necessary. Anyway, my objective in mediation would most definitely be to come to agreement on the content of the article. The policy 'indicating' -- I would say suggesting -- that mediation is a good idea and a logical next step in situations like these would be Wikipedia:Dispute resolution. --causa sui (talk) 15:19, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
    Admin conduct RFCUs and arbitrartion cases are typically for patterns of behaviour. Do you have a history of taking administrative actions on articles with which you are involved? –xenotalk 16:01, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
    Remedies as you describe, xeno, are for that and also for someone who—even though other admins are telling him to wake up and smell the coffee—indicates that he will continue to behave this way because he wrote “what I did was absolutely right, and I would do it again in similar circumstances." That is quite troubling and it appears the community has a problem on its hands. The solution may be as simple as restricting Causa sui from terrorism-related articles, which clearly causes him to exhibit not only abusive, but intransigent and defiant behavior. I personally think this is simply a matter of an admin with a hot-button topic that evokes exceedingly emotional behavior. That’s understandable; he’s human. But we are also clearly dealing with someone who seems unable to admit he is wrong. We’ve all seen those types too. What the Wikipedian community doesn’t need is both characteristics in an admin. Admin privileges are granted by the community; the community can certainly revoke them if doing so best preserves harmony in a collaborative writing environment. As everyone knows, Causa sui is human. It’s also clear the community has tightened up on the criteria for choosing which subset of humans have the skills, maturity, character, wisdom, and temperament required for serving the Wikipedian community. Greg L (talk) 16:47, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
    I'm just of the mind that a simple post to WP:AN gathering some outside opinions on this would hopefully be just as effective at achieving the desired behaviour modification than a drawn out process like RFCU or RFAR. –xenotalk 16:49, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
  • That might be best; I don’t know. I won’t be initiating anything since it is all in the capable hands of Epeefleche. I trust he is watching this. I will certainly be weighing in regardless of where he goes. I wanted to add my 2¢ here regarding “mediation.” I see this as being somewhat analogous to a cop who drives drunk and runs the heck over a pedestrian’s foot. As the victim busies himself untying his shoes to see what the hell his foot looks like, the cop says he was in the right (his “I’m an ADMIN®™© siren” was turned on) and offers a mediation Band-Aid for that *footie problem*. I’m more interested in why he’s behind the wheel. Greg L (talk) 17:17, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
  • In my opinion, no. There's more about this on Epeefleche's talk page, since others asked me a similar question, but I don't mind going over it again. I won my RFA back in 2005 due to my work in recent changes patrol, which accounts for probably 99% of my use of editorial and admin tools; blocks are no exception, as the vast majority are due to vandalism encountered using various recent change patrol tools. I vaguely remember a debate I got into with dmcdevit (talk · contribs) back in 2005 over a block of a user he felt I was 'involved' with, though (as I recall - it was years ago) I thought my involvement was as an admin, not an editor, the policy has since made that distinction clear (it didn't back then), and the user was later banned by Arbcom for one year due to the same behavior I'd blocked him for. To my recollection the Anwar Al-Awlaki case is the first time I've used sysop tools to enforce my position in a content dispute; an ugly thing, no doubt, but necessary due to the urgency of WP:BLP.
    If you wanted to establish a pattern, my repeated statements that I would do it again under similar circumstances might be the way to go; but whether I'm right in that opinion is something that I think could be better addressed though honest, open discussion (preferably in another venue aside from this talk page, as I'm trying to minimize fragmentation of discussion). RFC has taken on a punitive connotation in the past several years, so I suppose it wouldn't be the best place for open discussion: maybe you and I could go over it on my talk page, or in emails, or whatever venue you'd be most comfortable with. --causa sui (talk) 16:57, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
    We can discuss further elsewhere if you want as this is straying off-topic from the article talk, but my position has not changed: there are hundreds of active admins, so you should recuse to avoid even the appearance of impropriety. If you feel further administrative action is required, post to ANI and see where the chips fall. –xenotalk 17:00, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
  • Comment. This comes after I raised serious issues with Causa about his behavior [21]. My reaction to his mediation suggestion is here. Furthermore, I note that the focus of sysop Jac16888's comments were that he was becoming increasingly disturbed with regards to your behaviour, and strongly suggests you either stop editing the article and attempt to resolve the dispute through the proper channels, or leave the article altogether.[22] I share his view that what we have here is a causa sui behavioral problem, and its not clear that mediation is the proper forum to address that issue. I also see that Fell's most recent comments suggest that, for him, there is no issue at the article now.[23]--Epeefleche (talk) 07:05, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I'm assuming good faith here in believing that Causa's actions are in what he believes are the best interests of the project, which I is why I suggested dispute resolution. Should you wish to pursue the issue of Causa's behaviour then you should make a report at WP:ANI--Jac16888Talk 14:11, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
    • Fine. AGF is good to start with. Someone shoots through their front door on Halloween and kills a kid. The guy says “I was afraid it was burglars.” You assume good faith but make a point by adding “Dude… it’s Halloween.” If they respond with “Oopsy,” then the assumption of good faith was well placed. If they respond “What I did was absolutely right, and I would do it again in similar circumstances,” then I’m not so sure about AGF anymore. I certainly would surmise that the guy doesn’t understand the law one twit and would highly encourage him to be more open to the possibility that what he did was a *boo-boo thing*. Greg L (talk) 17:46, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Result

I'm taking this as a "no" to mediation, so I won't submit a request. Hopefully the parties will get satisfaction through alternative channels. --causa sui (talk) 20:41, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Transparent advocacy?

Causa sui, would you please explain why The New York Times, in U.S. Approves Targeted Killing of American Cleric (only 13 days ago) wrote the following to explain the government’s rationale for targeting al-Awlaki:


The above information used to be in this article. Mind you, I hadn’t added it. I haven’t looked to be sure who added it, and—though I have a good idea—I don’t want to know for sure who added it. I do see, however, that someone thought it quite relevant to an encyclopedic treatment of this subject to include mention of the government’s rationale. So, just three hours ago, you deleted inclusion of the government’s rationale, (cited, of course, to The New York Times).

I find it quite telling that in your edit summary, you wrote “rm transparent advocacy in favor of targeted killing legality”.

So, I’m curious. Do you find that The New York Times was also engaging in “transparent advocacy” when explaining the targeted killing of al-Awlaki? Or do you just find that quoting The New York Times to explain the government’s rationale underlying its unprecedented move on a U.S. citizen here at Wikipedia amounts to “transparent advocacy”? I for one, rather welcomed reading the government’s legal rationale here and am sorry to see it missing now as I think our readership won’t be as well served.

Am I also correct that, upon reading the above, you still believe you are in the right here and would do it again? Or would you like to restore it? Greg L (talk) 18:22, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I think you make a good point that we should present the government's rationale for this. I took it out because the paragraph seemed very unbalanced in favor of that position, and the way it is worded makes it sound like we are actually making the argument. We should be able to get it back in with some tweaking, maybe by attributing it to a government agency or at least a person making the argument, and balancing it against a counter-argument, which should also be easily found. I'll cook up a compromise revision later tonight, unless you have time to produce a concrete proposal sooner. --causa sui (talk) 20:21, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
(ec)I pointed out above that both this NYT passage and our usage of it are problematic, and both badly written. The general principle clause is so vague as to be nearly meaningless, and the passive voice "are considered" obscures the considerable controversy, a major aspect of al-Awlaki's notability, over the legality of the government's assassination order, which quite arguably contravenes bans going back to the Lieber Code signed by Abraham Lincoln, not just Ford's executive order. See Glenn Greenwald's recent article on this. We must cover both sides, and not state one as a fact, as this violates WP:NPOV.John Z (talk) 20:35, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
  • John, it really doesn’t matter if a volunteer Wikipedian feels The general principle clause is so vague as to be nearly meaningless. For one thing, I don’t even know what you are talking about with “general principle clause.” The The New York Times quoted a government source as saying As a general principle, international law permits the use of lethal force against individuals and groups that pose an imminent threat to a country. Note the “As a general principle”. So are you an expert on international law now? If so, please point to reliable secondary sources that have published your work.

    The NYT cited that government official as giving the basis for the government’s legal theory underlying their designating al-Awlaki for military rather than law enforcement action. It matters not one twit if you have a different legal theory. It appears we have volunteer Wikipedians pretending to be wise enough to ponder smoking room-style deep philosophical questions pertaining to foreign policy and defense issues that are best left to officials of the U.S. government. Short of a proper citation in support of your legal theories, such musings as yours are utterly irrelevant per BLP, which was written to avoid precisely this sort of second-guessing by novices about what is notable and topical to this subject. To do otherwise would violate WP:BLP, would constitute WP:OR, and would be a clear violation of WP:NPOV. Sorry; that’s just the way Wikipedia works.

    I also got a bit of a laugh when you opined that the NYT article is badly written; now there’s a swell catch-all reason for editors to complain about WP:IDON'TLIKEIT: just state that an article in one of the United States’ largest and most influential newspapers is “poorly written” and that’s why one can’t quote from it (while you weigh in on what you apparently feel is the proper way for the United States to adhere to international law).

    This article has, in my mind, really served as a focal point for volunteer Wikipedians who fancy themselves as big-time experts on matters to opine about how the U.S. government’s legal theories are “meaningless” and The New York Times is “badly written.” Wow. I can see it now… <sound of generic teletype news lead-in>Dit-dit – dit – did-dit </sound of generic teletype news lead-in> (*deep voice of mature caucasian male with slight mid-western accent*): “This just hitting the wires; wikipedian John Z declares that The New York Times is ‘badly written’.”

    And quoting you, Causa sui: Yeah, I think you make a good point that we should present the government's rationale for this. Ya think? Greg L (talk) 21:45, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

P.S. By the way Causa sui, I agree that as translated onto Wikipedia, it could have been improved upon. It stated something as fact: International law allows the use of lethal force against people who pose an imminent threat to a country, and U.S. officials said that was the standard used in adding names to the target list. And then it gave a citation to the NYT, and then went on with other quotes. Rather than just delete it, (while adding something exculpatory to al-Awlaki cited to a Wall St. Journal article), it would have been much, much better to have simply revised that section so it started out “The New York Times quoted U.S. government officials as saying…” or “U.S. government officials were quoted…” Wholesale deletion of material you disagree with (rather than fixing it) and the persistent addition of material you like betrays a persistent bias far in excess of anything you profess to be addressing. Greg L (talk) 22:05, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

P.P.S. John Z, if you really are an expert on international law and your work has been published in reliable secondary sources, then, by all means, I will defer to your judgement here. Why? Well, I have a healthy respect for experts. Well over a half-dozen of my patents are on fuel cells and I’ve written plenty about them, including glossy white papers for handouts to customers. Yet, I’ve never even read our Fuel cell article, much less edited it. Don’t want the acid stomach that would no-doubt result after some nitwit kid deleted carefully crafted text of mine so he could vomit onto Wikipedia what he gleaned from Popular Mechanics. So if you are quite the expert on international law and journalism (mindful of your criticism of the quality of writing in The New York Times), and you are still willing to put up with the sour stomach-producing attempts at this subject by we mere amateurs, then, more power to you, dude. You are willing to tread into frustrating territory I wouldn’t venture into. Greg L (talk) 22:22, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Greg, you need to chill out. John didn't say he was an expert on law, but he did provide a pointer to someone who is, who (John says) recently covered this subject. Maybe that article could be used as a source here. His criticism of the passive voice is valid too. I see you're taking that to heart in your PS but then continue to rail on John in your PPS.
Thanks for the valuable input, John. Thundermaker (talk) 23:45, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
Thundermaker. Your ridding in here and pretending to counsel me as if you are a wise voice of reason who explains the obvious does not establish you as such. I am quite “chilled”; laughing actually. John didn’t need to say he was an expert on international law because his whole post was clearly couched in terms that he fancies himself as one (and an expert on journalism par extraordinaire, who can sit in judgement of The New York Times). His “legal” argument was The general principle clause is so vague as to be nearly meaningless, and the passive voice "are considered" obscures the considerable controversy, a major aspect of al-Awlaki's notability, over the legality of the government's assassination order, which quite arguably contravenes bans going back to the Lieber Code signed by Abraham Lincoln, not just Ford's executive order. Then he tried to buttress his point with that well-worn “it-must-be-true-because-I-made-it-blue” WP:NPOV. Like… what? We’re when we come across a New York Times article quoting a government source, we’re supposed to check with John Z to see if the government’s position is so full of crap that it violates WP:NPOV and we can’t use it on Wikipedia? It reminds me of Billy Joel’s The Piano Man where he sings “And the waitress is practicing politics.” Indeed, that is something to sing about as one sedates oneself with beer to escape the absurdity. Greg L (talk) 23:58, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
(inevitable ec, and thanks to thundermaker for his comments) No, it certainly does matter that any volunteer Wikipedian feels that a particular passage or source is badly written or making nearly meaningless statements. Wikipedia is after all written by these volunteer wikipedians, each one having every right to sit in judgment of any expert or source and whose judgments succeed to the extent they can convince their fellows - that is what wikipedia is all about. There is no rule or obligation to slavishly repeat everything every source says, and I hope all agree that we should not single out meaningless and badly written sentences to quote or use, and that these can be found everywhere, even in the NYT - even Homer nods. "International law permits the use of lethal force against individuals and groups that pose an imminent threat to a country" is said in the voice of the NYT, stated as a fact, and I reiterate is nearly meaningless, as it cites no specific law. It could refer to the UN Charter, Article 51 or the Caroline affair doctrine, but is left a complete mystery, as is who is doing the "considering" mentioned later on. One is left with an impression of an absence of controversy over the legality of the assassination order, which can easily be refuted by pointing to sources like the one I (incompletely) referred to, which among other sources notes the bad journalism surrounding this. (I believe I got the Lieber code argument from another Greenwald column.)
I did not say we should not quote the NYT article, just balance it; hopefully a better source will be found, that presents the government view better and more completely, and does not implicitly and inaccurately identify it with a universal consensus. The NYT article was badly quoted here, sentences copied without quotation marks, a copyvio. We said in wikipedia's voice what the NYT non-neutrally said in its own voice, that "international law permits ..." and copying the NYT, blithely stated in wikipedia's voice this highly controversial view that that this statement somehow implies the assassination order is legal. As I said, and as causa sui agreed, saying only this without balance is unacceptably non-neutral for Wikipedia, and as causa does, strongly felt this part of the article needed serious work. I of course was not suggesting any particular statement of mine should be used to balance, nothing I said implied I did, or was an expert in anything, or felt the government view should be eliminated. John Z (talk) 01:11, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Quoting you: nothing I said implied I did, or was an expert in anything, or felt the government view should be eliminated. Well, that’s an improvement. I won’t comment on the rest of your post as I find it to be posturing and more nonsense. When I restore the sorely needed U.S. government’s explanation for their action, as reported by the NYT, you can go busy yourself finding a better source explaining the government’s reasoning. Moreover, you can also busy yourself trying to POV-push with John Z’s counter-point®™© by locating some non-U.S. government source (China, maybe, or U.C. Berkeley professor teaching his students out on the lawn?) about how the U.S. government’s legal argument explaining their position is so very very faulty and turns its back on the teachings of Abraham Lincoln (etcetera, blah-blah, ad nauseam). Just don’t pull what Causa sui tried to pull and completely delete something that is germane, topical, and cited to reliable sources because he thought it “transparent advocacy”. That wasn’t certainly what the NYT was doing and it is not what we’re doing when we look to secondary sources in search of an authoritative statement by the government explaining their reasoning for doing as they did on this matter. If you have an even better WP:Reliable source than the NYT to explain the government’s position, great. But please desist with harping about how The New York Times is a biased and a bad source to quote (or how *our use* of unbiased material intrinsically makes it biased because WP:IDON'TLIKEIT); such arguments are absurd, aren’t supported by BLP, and already getting old. Greg L (talk) 02:02, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
  • I can see it now: I restore the passage but re-write it like this:


1.   The New York Times: U.S. Approves Targeted Killing of American Cleric
…and you follow it up with this:


2.   John Z: Wikipedia:POV-pushing
I don’t think I’m missing anything here because everything you wrote, above, amounts to precisely this. Greg L (talk) 02:28, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

"The government’s position is mean wrong and ill-though-out" -- When John puts that into the article, I'll revert it myself. In the interim, and with all due respect, you're getting far too emotionally involved in this article. I have a point of view also, and, believe it or not, it is almost certainly more negative of this individual (and Islam in general, for that matter) than yours. But I'm not expressing it, either in hyperbole and vitriol on this page, or within the article itself. Though multiple people have told you this, you still refuse to acknowledge that an encyclopedia entry and a newspaper article are two different entities, with different style, tone, goals, and criteria for inclusion. ABC News and CNN aren't writing biographies; they're educating readers on current events.

As for your patents, I myself have almost three dozen pending or applied for. I don't edit articles in my own subject area either. Fell Gleaming(talk) 02:36, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Quoting you: Though multiple people have told you this, you still refuse to acknowledge that an encyclopedia entry and a newspaper article are two different entities, with different style, tone, goals, and criteria for inclusion. ABC News and CNN aren't writing biographies; they're educating readers on current events. Yeah, I know that. And you know I know all that. So cease with more transparent posturing please. Not one diddly biit of that changes the fact that the article greatly benefits from having an explanation for the legal rationale for the government’s actions. We cite newspaper articles all the time. Greg L (talk) 02:44, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
But in quoting the NYT, whoever added that section left off a rather important bit, "as a general principle, international law permits the use of lethal force..." With that caveat, I don't have a problem with that in the article, and in fact I feel it's a rather important viewpoint to add.
Further, to offer what is honestly friendly advice that will unfortunately be likely misinterpreted, might I suggest a little more emotional detachment on your part? There's really no reason to step into every disagreement swinging a sledgehammer....nor is it good for your own blood pressure. Fell Gleaming(talk) 03:06, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
I agree that what we should do is reflect what the RSs say. The NYT is an RS, and it is fair to reflect what it says. I also agree that it is fair to reflect ... in balance, according to the balance that appears in RSs ... what is said. That means that if 90 percent of the articles say AA kills puppies, and 10 percent say he is charismatic, we give each the proportional weight -- not equal weight (a common misunderstanding of what the balance requirement is). If you think the RS such as the NYT said something poorly, or relied on a lousy source, or you don't like the source they used -- well, unless you can find a contrary RS, you better just spend your time think about the verifiability not truth mantra. By all means, go find and include a contrary source. But don't delete RS-supported material -- that's what POV-ridden editors do. --Epeefleche (talk) 07:03, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Protected

I have now fully protected this page due to the repeated insertion of information in violation of the Biography of living persons policy, and have removed the most egregious violations at this time (a highly inflammatory allegation that is attributed to an "unnamed" or "anonymous" source). I, or another administrator, will review the article further in the next 24 hours to ensure there are no further BLP violations, and these will be removed as well. Once it is fully understood that sensationalistic allegations attributed to unidentified sources are not acceptable in a BLP, regardless of who reports those allegations, we can talk about unprotecting the article. Risker (talk) 18:44, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

  • Thanks. Please note that further problems exist elsewhere in the labyrinthine body of the article, mostly related to improper use of citations, some coatracking, and neutrality issues. I'll begin compiling a list, if you think that would help. --causa sui (talk) 19:21, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
  • That would be helpful. I encourage all interested editors to identify problematic information within this article; those that are BLP violations will be removed, at least until properly sourced (extraordinary claims require extraordinary support per verifiability policy, not just one passing reference in a single news story, for example). Risker (talk) 19:52, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Please don't use administrative tools to favor your position on article content, even if based on your personal analysis of policy. I'm not clear whether the content belongs or not but it is not a clear BLP violation, and reasonable editors differ on that subject. Both of you are involved editors at this point and really ought to take a step back. - Wikidemon (talk) 20:31, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Risker is not an involved editor; he stepped in to enforce clear and overriding concerns with BLP violations. Fell Gleaming(talk) 20:34, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Wikidemon, I had never heard of the subject of this article until today. I am most certainly not an involved editor. I am, however, probably better versed in core Wikipedia and WMF policy than even longer serving editors and administrators; when I am editing content, it is almost invariably to bring articles into line with our policies, and I have always been a stickler for verifying references to their source material and ensuring that extraordinary claims are particularly well sourced. Risker (talk) 20:39, 20 April 2010 (UTC) And for the record, "she".
Is BLP not a content policy? Some editors believe that the content in question is a BLP violation and should be removed. Others believe it is not a BLP violation, and some of those believe the material should remain. Risker has taken a position on one side. That puts her on one side of a disputed content disagreement. How does this differ from copyright violations, verifiability, or any other content policy? They are all bedrock policies, and reasonable editors work on things through collaboration, not use of tools. Unless this is an emergency necessitating urgent action, Wikipedia's normal process is meant to handle content matters. I haven't seen anyone advance an argument that there is anything urgent here. - Wikidemon (talk) 20:48, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Regardless, WP:BLP is clear here; "Remove immediately any contentious material about a living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced ... the three-revert rule does not apply to such removals ... Administrators may enforce the removal of such material with page protection and blocks, even if they have been editing the article themselves. Editors who re-insert the material may be warned and blocked." and later "Beware of sources that attribute material to anonymous sources" This is clearly somewhat contentious, the source is definitely anonymous, and there is an argument that it is poorly sourced too. Given this, it should be removed until the issue is resolved. Black Kite (t) (c) 20:53, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
The 3RR exception and use of administrative tools are intended for clear cases, not for cases where the community decides there is no BLP violation. It's not clear what the community's BLP interpretation is here. Anyway, what is attributed to the anonymous source is the specific statement that al-Awlaki is plotting to kill Americans. What is reliably sourced is a very similar statement, that the US believes he is plotting attacks on the US, and that this belief (or argument, depending on the source) has been used as a justification for the assassination order. That's stated in quite a number of reliable sources.[24] - Wikidemon (talk) 21:02, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
No, the BLP policy does not require that the community decide whether or not there is a BLP violation; if that was the case, then it would not talk about "contentious material" because by definition there is no community consensus if the material is contentious. WP:BLP does not only permit removal of such material, it mandates it. In this case, what has been identified as a BLP violation is a direct quote from an anonymous source making an extraordinary claim, appearing in a single reference source, which pretty well meets every condition of BLP violation. Risker (talk) 21:13, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
This one may or may not be a BLP violation - editors disagree here. If it is not, then you're just flat wrong to use tools. All decisions are community decisions, absent special circumstance to the contrary. BLP does not give arbitrators a universal trump card to declare what is and is not a BLP violation - in fact, it describes this as a consensus matter: When material about living persons has been deleted on good-faith BLP objections, any editor wishing to add, restore, or undelete it must ensure it complies with Wikipedia's content policies. If it is to be restored without significant change, consensus must be obtained first, and wherever possible disputed deletions should be discussed first with the administrator who deleted the article. That passage, incidentally, suggests that the material should stay out unless there is a consensus to put it in, so edit warring to add it is problematic as well. Meanwhile, the way to resolve this is to have a community discussion, informed by BLP, on whether the material should be in the article, and in what form. - Wikidemon (talk) 21:37, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

" Risker has taken a position on one side. That puts her on one side of a disputed content disagreement." -- This is what's known as a tautology. Circular reasoning. By this logic, no administrator can possibly issue a ruling, because the moment they do, they've "taken a side". Risker's conclusion here is sound. BLP policy overrides most everything else in Wikipedia, if for no other reason than violations of it can result in hefty lawsuits against the site. Fell Gleaming(talk) 21:31, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

No circular reasoning at all. Administrators are not entitled to use tools to favor their content positions. They may certainly have their own take on whether an editor is misbehaving, or whether a block or page protection are necessary to prevent disruption to the article. As far as I know, blocking and page protection policy specifically state that an administrator does not become involved by virtue of enforcing behavior policy and quieting disruption. They do, however, when they form an opinion on what an article should say. - Wikidemon (talk) 21:37, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
You are quite correct that admins are not entitled to use tools to favour content positions. However, this is a WP:BLP policy enforcement situation; such enforcement almost always involves removing a disputed piece of content. An administrator by doing that does not automatically therefore form the opinion that such content is true or false; merely that in their opinion it fails a core policy. They are therefore not taking a content position, merely a policy one. Black Kite (t) (c) 21:46, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
...and if it becomes clear that the community disagrees with that opinion they must respect the community's decision. Anyway, I don't think we're all that far apart. Per the policy section I quoted above, editors should not be re-inserting the material pending consensus that there is no BLP violation. Further, I don't particularly like the statement or the way it is sourced, either. And finally, at the moment the article is protected and there is another very good reason to keep it protected for at least a short while - to keep things stable while discussion and content proposals take their course. At this point I think it makes the most sense to ask what, if anything, should be said about the US government's statements on the subject giving reasons for its approval of a targeted killing, something that is currently missing from the article. - Wikidemon (talk) 21:55, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
Yes, agreed; one would have thought there would have been far better sourced and reliable information out there about such reasons, rather than having to use such a dubious statement as the one that was removed. Black Kite (t) (c) 22:02, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
The guidelines focus on high-level (not just reliable, but high-level) sources. The NYT and the Washington Post are clearly high-level sources.--Epeefleche (talk) 22:13, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
  • @Risker--Just so we are clear, can you quote the precise language at the policy that you have in mind? We've had some difficulties on this page in the past where the phrase BLP was bandied about, but the precise language the editor had in mind was not as clear to the rest of us. I've looked carefully at the policy, and frankly my question is an honest one.--Epeefleche (talk) 05:14, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Epeefleche, as I noted on my talk page, I'm probably not going to be able to give you a full answer to this until late tomorrow; however, Black Kite in his post of 20:53, 20 April 2010 (UTC) captures a significant portion of it. What was removed as a BLP violation was a direct quote of an unidentified "government official" that made a highly inflammatory allegation, and which has only appeared in a single source; to put it simply: "unnamed source says <quote> BAD THING <unquote>, not repeated anywhere else or through official channels". This kind of statement hits just about all the potential aspects of a BLP violation: anonymous quote, inflammatory and controversial, appears in only one source, unable to confirm its exact content elsewhere. Incidentally, for those of you playing along at home, I've done some fairly thorough review of the first half of the lead, and my notes are posted at User:Risker/Anwar. Risker (talk) 06:37, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
As I said on your talk page, just so we are clear, can you quote the precise language at the policy that you have in mind?--Epeefleche (talk) 07:07, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Here we go again

Here we go again -- now we are using this talk page to discuss whether it's appropriate for Risker (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) to use his admin tools to enforce BLP on this article, and whether use of admin tools to enforce BLP by definition makes that admin "involved" (an argument so ridiculous for reasons FellGleaming (talk · contribs) summons the patience to describe that it hurts my brain to even think about it), except this time it's Risker instead of me. Can we use this talk page to discuss article content, and leave debates about policy to ANI and the relevant policy pages? --causa sui (talk) 22:57, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

I think it is an appropriate discussion for this page. Though it would also be fine if someone were to open up a pure policy (not application of policy) discussion at a policy page, and alert everyone here. These things are not always black and white. Just as nobody at the AN/I on your misbehavior required that the word "policy" not be mentioned in that discussion, so I don't think we should chill a discussion here as to the application of existing policy to this article.
First, when I sought to discuss this article with you on your talk page, you refused to respond, telling me that that was not the appropriate talk page for me to express my view.[25] Second, the next day, I expressed my view on this very page. Your response was that you blocked me. Inappropriately. Third, as sysop Xeno wrote, you: "peculiarly left a rationale for this block at Talk:Anwar_al-Awlaki#Epeefleche_blocked, with the unhelpful comment that they are "not interested in discussing this matter with [Epeefleche] (or anyone else) on this page anymore"." And you stated that you are "not interested in discussing this matter ... on [Talk:Anwar al-Alwaki] anymore" is uncollegial, and seems to run counter to Wikipedia:Administrators#Accountability ("Administrators are expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their Wikipedia-related conduct and administrator actions and to justify them when needed")." And fourth, you are now telling me I can't discuss application of existing policy to this article on this page. It seems that the only thing I agree on with you here is your titling of this section. I'm not sure why you are seeking to chill discussion contrary to your view, but it does seem to run contrary to the guidelines cited above.--Epeefleche (talk) 00:02, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
(edit conflict - addressed to Causa sui) It may seem ridiculous and worthy of a dismissive attitude to you, but not so to others. You and Risker announce above in this section that you are using tools to manage article content, and the propriety of doing so has been questioned. Using tools to enforce a nonconsensus opinion on content policy would indeed be problematic because, as I and others have noted, policy interpretation is not the sole province of administrators. The reason the discussion makes sense here, other than that it is in response to comments the two of you made, is that this page is the initial stop in deciding whether proposed content is a BLP violation. I do agree that it makes more sense now to discuss what the content should be here and whether that is a BLP violation - and escalate that to dispute resolution if necessary.- Wikidemon (talk) 00:05, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
The ArbCom special enforcement ruling is pretty clear that there is no impropriety at all on Risker's part: "Administrators are authorized to use any and all means at their disposal to ensure...full compliance with...[BLP]" and "administrators are explicitly authorized to take such measures at their own discretion". IMO it would take a lot more than local consensus to overturn such an action, probably much better to get the admin's agreement first (see the "Appeals" section of the above link). Causa sui appears disqualified to use WP:BLPSE due to their previous editorial involvement, but when an admin takes administrative action on a page where they are uninvolved, they do not become involved through their action. Obviously a BLP removal is ipso facto going to "manage article content", but that is explicitly authorized. Franamax (talk) 15:39, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Well said. –xenotalk 15:41, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Ironically, it seems that if I had protected the article in the first instance instead of removing the content and then attempting to discuss it, I would not be disqualified due to "previous editorial involement", ie, editorial involvement due to my efforts to fix the BLP problems with this article... eventually I'm going to let this die, but the irony is still very funny to me. --causa sui (talk) 17:08, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Despite your edit summary [26], I see no snark in the above comment. Please strive to increase the snarkyness or amend your edit summary. –xenotalk 17:20, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
The lesson here seems to be that next time I should simply protect the article and implement the changes without discussion, because attempting to discuss the content with interested editors makes me "involved" in an editorial role. --causa sui (talk) 17:31, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
It wasn't just a discussion but it was a disagreement over whether it was considered a BLP violation. Yes, you should use protection rather than blocks if you feel you must take administrative action once (or before becoming) 'involved'. Even saying that, WP:RFPP is but a stone's throw away. You could still err on the side of caution and ask for protection there. I make requests at RFPP fairly often - even when I'm not really that involved [27] (granting this was not a BLP issue). While I might start sounding like a broken record here, avoiding even the appearance of impropriety except in the face of clear-cut emergencies is a best practice. –xenotalk 17:35, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
On the issue of whether it actually was a BLP violation, why are we having that discussion when it was me, but not when it's Risker? And why didn't Risker make the request to WP:RFPP to avoid the appearance of involvement, if I should have? --causa sui (talk) 19:14, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
I'm not exactly sure what venue there is to resolve the disagreement about whether this is a BLP violation. And...because she's wasn't previously involved. –xenotalk 19:17, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
  • @Causa. As you can see from the above, the BLP conversation is in fact being had w/Risker. As to you questioning why Risker didn't make the request to wp:RFPP to avoid the appearance of involvement, you raise a fair point. No doubt if her use of sysop tools had risen to the level of blocking and topic-banning an editor for a revert of an edit she had termed "trim" (but now suddenly characterized as an explosive emergence situation), and if that followed 75 edits on the article and editing against consensus, we would be having that same discussion.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:25, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

(Undent) Okay, now we're getting somewhere. What was it that I did that she didn't do that made me involved whereas she isn't? --causa sui (talk) 19:22, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

[28] [29] –xenotalk 19:25, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Would you amplify your answer, please? I need you to spell it out -- trust me, I'm going somewhere with this. --causa sui (talk) 19:29, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Because you were in a dispute over it. I'm done here. You obviously feel you did nothing wrong and are infallible. –xenotalk 19:38, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
Not exactly-- though at this point, I still don't understand where I went wrong. I guess I'll go ahead. The irony I'm bringing out here is that what I did that Risker didn't do was I tried to engage with interested editors in discussion and see if I could get the problem solved without acting in an administrative capacity. That makes me "involved in the dispute", even though I was trying to fix BLP problems from square one -- except I tried diplomacy first, trying to see if I could reason with Epeefleche (talk · contribs) and Greg L (talk · contribs) so that it wouldn't be necessary to do anything as strident as page protection or blocking. Risker skipped to the end, probably appropriately, but ironically didn't hesitate to try to win consensus on the talk page for something she didn't really need consensus for at all. It really looks to me like my "involvement" in this article was removing the BLP-problematic content from the article prior to using admin tools. In any case, I appreciate your patience up to this point, and hope you'll choose to stay involved. --causa sui (talk) 19:52, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
(e/c from a crippled system) Logging in from my test system which runs Vista, apologies if this comes out as giraffes and heart symbols. :( Causa sui, I base my remarks on the reported number of edits you made to the article (65-75) and not my own analysis of your activity. Generally that number of edits would indicate "editorial involvement", which is not the case for Risker. However if your edits were all strictly to address BLP issues alone and you indicated throughout that was your only involvement or interest, I personally would consider you involved only through your administrative role. Some problems take a long time to solve. There's no question that you as an editor can address BLP concerns, just as any other editor can. But the roads diverge afterwards: an editor (and any admin or arb acting as an editor) needs to work through the "channels" to address concerns, BLP noticeboard, AN/I, RFC, blah-blah. An admin walking in from the outside has greater latitude, they can just shut the whole thing down. I would grant an exception for an "involved" admin too - if it's an emergency situation, revert and protect the page then immediately post to AN/I and let it go. The question here seems to be how closely you were involved in the content aspects, i.e. NPOV, RS, etc. which constitute "involvement". Can you demonstrate that all your involvement here was strictly concerned with the administrative aspect? Franamax (talk) 20:09, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
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