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Discussion regarding East Germany led to nothing

We had all of this discussion after I linked a news report quoting two different groups of historians, both of which are definitely not communist sympathisers, putting the total number of confirmed deaths during the whole existence of the GDR at 1841 or lower. These people are doing actual archival research, yet this article was locked in a version quoting as unrefuted truth a number two orders of magnitude higher that appears to be some kind of ballpark guess not backed by actual archival research. This divergence must be represented somehow, e.g. with a paragaph Other historians put the number far lower. A group of German researchers based at the German Wall Museum in Berlin has confirmed a number of 1841 deaths by state repression during the existence of the GDR, which includes people killed when trying to leave the country, Soviet Army deserters, and capital punishment. Other researchers of the Forschungsverbund SED-Staat put the number even lower. (News report as source). -- Seelefant (talk) 19:25, 20 January 2017 (UTC)

Agree, we go by what the majority of WP:BESTSOURCES say, and they don't say anything that remotely approaches the description from Valentino, who is clearly WP:FRINGE on this issue. It is not clear where he gets this number, or what he means by it. Charitably, he is referring to the use of Forced labor of Germans in the Soviet Union, however this has very little to do with either "East Germany" or "Political repression" (or "Communism" since slave labor, ethnic cleansing, and interment in wretched conditions were generally-accepted Allied policies after the war). The mortality of the Westarbeiters (Germans from all over Eastern Europe) in the USSR was indeed very high (about 60,000 died by 1949). Since this article is WP:SYNTH, there is nothing to prevent editors from including both German POW's and civilians who died in Soviet captivity during and after the war. But the facts should at least be presented accurately. Guccisamsclub (talk) 23:22, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
PS There's no divergence of the kind you desribe. Valentino is referring to the deaths from "political repression" by the Soviet Union in "East Germany" after "1945?" (presumably not the GDR, which came into existence in 1949). According to good sources on this issue, 60,000 Germans from Eastern Europe died in the USSR after the war, where they were employed as forced labor as part of the Allied reparations scheme. So Valentino's description of these post-war deaths "diverges" from good sources like Pavel Polyan. Your sources are about the GDR, which is a different topic. Obviously there were no mass killing, nevermind political mass killings, by the GDR—though I can see how readers might get such an impression from this sloppy article.Guccisamsclub (talk) 23:42, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
So what is the way to proceed to at least get those sourced, divering opinions into the article? The article has been locked for years, and it looks like those who have the permissions to improve it have no interest in doing so. -- Seelefant (talk) 11:51, 31 January 2017 (UTC)
It is not clear what Valentino is referring to or where he got his information, which is presented on p. 75 of his book.[1] Generally we would want a better source. Generally an estimate made by scholars in 2016 would be better than an estimate made in 2004, since it relies on more recent information. I suggest providing a specific edit recommendation either to remove the section or to provide a specific text reliably sourced. TFD (talk) 14:29, 31 January 2017 (UTC)

Mass killings under Capitalist regimes

It would be interesting to link this page to the Mass killings under Capitalist regimes page but I can't find it anywhere. Is there any reason for it? Some other name?

At any rate, if there is anyone interested in building that page, let me know. We'll need a very big team cause this topic is sure to be immensely more work demanding than this one. (please sign here)

The used to be one, but it got deleted. You'd have to start with sources that define the topic. To my knowledge, the only sources that can serve as a skeleton for the topic you're proposing are the "The Black Book(s) of Capitalism" (one in French and another in German), "The Black book of Colonialism" (French) and maybe Chomsky's "Political Economy of Human Rights". From there, you'd have to tack on a lot of original research (most of it quite labor and capital intensive) to create the desired WP:POV-WP:COATRACK that can measure up to the POV-COATRACK par excellence we see here. I think it's a cool topic, but I am not sure I can commit to any serious effort. The resulting article will still cover each "mass-killing" much more poorly than the specialized articles that already exist. If you want to go through with it, create a sandbox and maybe we'll have an article in a year. Guccisamsclub (talk) 22:57, 2 December 2016 (UTC)
Maybe it could be linked to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalist_peace — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.110.131.148 (talk) 06:42, 3 July 2017 (UTC)
It is a bogus "theory". Look up World War I and World War II as striking examples that falsify anything about this appalling hypothsis. RhinoMind (talk) 19:25, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

See Anti-communist mass killings which is a weird mélange. Collect (talk) 23:09, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

I agree that articles of this sort inherently tend to "cover each 'mass-killing' much more poorly than the specialized articles that already exist," but it is a ludicrous false equivalence to claim that "mass killings under communism" is no more notable as a topic than "mass killings under capitalist regimes." (Communism is an all-encompassing political and economic system, and there have been many avowedly communist governments that declared themselves to be communist or Marxist-Leninist in their constitutions. The same is simply not true of capitalism. Nor is capitalism, the economic system, synonymous with colonialism or Chomsky's fictitious version of U.S. foreign policy.) In addition, your reference to "the desired WP:POV-WP:COATRACK" may come back to haunt you in the inevitable deletion discussion, as evidence that you are merely trying make a point about this article.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 23:59, 2 December 2016 (UTC)
Laugh all you want Times. This article appears to have been started by a total hack editor who's since been blocked. Guccisamsclub (talk) 00:04, 3 December 2016 (UTC)
If you refer to the article for which this is the talk page, I would suggest you read all the past AfDs on it, and the fact that you find the first editor to have been a "hack" is not relevant at this point at all. Collect (talk) 12:50, 3 December 2016 (UTC)
I was obviously responding to Times, who was saying that the motives of the article-creator are relevant when deciding on article deletion. Guccisamsclub (talk) 13:31, 3 December 2016 (UTC)
I did not mean to infer anything improper on your part. <g>. Collect (talk) 19:43, 3 December 2016 (UTC)
I have stated it before, and would like to state it again: If editors simply focused on describing and listing "mass-kilings", everything would be much more transparent, informative and objective.
Whenever someone tries to analyze or interprets motivations behind mass-killings, things gets murky and almost always a matter of a subjective, contextual viewpoint. RhinoMind (talk) 21:22, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

India

The number is not like genocide of other countries but together can they be included?

West Bengal under Communist Party of India

Whether or not to include something is based on having reliable sources that justify it. That is, it depends on whether there are reliable sources that characterize the killing in a way equivalent to "communist mass killing". Otherwise, collecting things like this is a violation of the policy against original research. AmateurEditor (talk) 04:48, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
The other issue is that they did not occur under Communist regimes. TFD (talk) 05:11, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
Not terribly familiar with this particular state, but I have worked with south Asian politics, and IMO this does not fit. These governments were elected, and constitutionally bound; the killings were not premeditated government actions; they weren't mass killings in the sense that this article describes; and the sources do not support this assertion. Is there any evidence of reliable sources comparing these deaths to Stalin's purges (or the equivalent)? I'm not seeing any. Vanamonde (talk) 05:45, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
The numbers don't matter. As every Indian state is not ruled by communists. Change this to West Bengal instead of India. --Marvellous Spider-Man 06:01, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

Hi. I am interested in knowing whether these violent incidents were rooted in personal and individual hatred or if they were a deliberate political strategy? Violent conflicts at the workplace or among groups of people are not necessarily the same as political violence. If a member of a certain party or organization commits a crime, it doesn't imply that the crime was a deliberate strategy by that party or organization. That would obviously be a far-fetched conclusion. RhinoMind (talk) 18:43, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Please refer to this too – https://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article2234.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mkv22 (talk • contribs) 16:28, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Reply


  • So many sources can't be ignored. I am not going to comment about other editors. If anyone disagrees with me, then they are doing according to policy. But as many people have stated in Vanamonde93's RFA, he is very biased in his edits in Indian political articles. If this violence would have been linked to right wing political parties, then Vanamonde93 would have taken a different stand. Marvellous Spider-Man 05:40, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
  • That, presumably, is why I passed my RFA, and why you supported it? Making suggestions of bias is not going to help your case. These sources merely suggest that the Indian communist parties have engaged in politically motivated murder, as is quite common with South Asian parties. The article covers something quite different; as you would know, if you had read the sources. The governments here are authoritarian, which none of the Indian ones are, because they are elected. The killings discussed here are mass killings; not isolated murders. If you want to create an article about "political murder in India" or something, go right ahead; but in any case, this is content related to Assassination, not mass killing.Vanamonde (talk) 06:11, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
  • In the second part I have given sources that all these group murders are linked to CPM's policy of killing political rivals. And they are not plain assassination as killing 11 people, killing 18 people together is also mass murder. Marvellous Spider-Man 06:48, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
Hi and thank you very much! There is definitely a lot to read about this issue. I am not very well acquainted with South Asian everyday politics, so it is great to have some links to pursue in this interesting matter. I will try to read up on things. RhinoMind (talk) 20:06, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
Perhaps I should also state that I can only agree with Vanamonde93 about the "Regime argument". But as I believe I have stated already in previous posts, this entire article has some fundamental flaws in its scope. It is not very clear what the subject covers and this is a big problem. However, I don't think I have a quick solution to this fundamental problem right now, right here. Your info is nontheless interesting and important in some ways, I just don't know how to categorize it properly here on Wikipedia. I will look into it to see if we could at least categorize it as some kind of political violence in the first place. But there are many feelings and opinions in this, so it might be difficult to extract objective information. RhinoMind (talk) 20:06, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
Also: Do we have a page about "Political violence in South Asia" (or India for that matter)? Does anybody know? RhinoMind (talk) 20:11, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
  • Since India was not a Communist regime, it is outside the scope of this article. If you decide to create a new article, bear in mind that you need a reliable secondary source that connects the killings. TFD (talk) 01:00, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

I've opened an Arbcom amendment request to get full protection removed.

Here. While WP:AE gives administrators broad leeway, I feel that leaving an article fully protected for six years over a content dispute is flatly not acceptable under any circumstances. No matter how frustrating they might get, this isn't how we're supposed to deal with disputes. --Aquillion (talk) 06:07, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

Full Protection of a very poor quality article. Why?

Hi. I would like to express concern about the current "full protection" of this article.

While the locking certainly protects the article from vandalism, it also enforces acceptance of a very poor quality article. Is that intentional perhaps?

The article is of a very poor quality for many reasons and most of them should be obvious to even the most inexperienced WP editor. For the sake of documentation, I can immediately list the following:

  • The structure and prose is overly confusing while at other times the information is extremely limited, bordering nonsense.
    • Example: Conjectures and speculation about the reasons behind the claimed killings are discussed in the beginning, even before the killings themselves has been documented or even discussed.
    • Killings under communist regimes in a number of states is only mentioned in very brief sentences, without any explanation at all. See the Others section specifically. Also the sections of East Germany and Romania (the "further information" is useless and misleading).
  • The article includes a lot of detail about other activities than killings. There is no explanation why these bits of information are relevant to the article. See the Hungary section for example.
  • Many deaths that obviously cannot be categorized as "killings" are included and without any explanation why they are categorized as killings.
  • The controversial claims in the article is not nuanced. Neither by obvious reservations nor critical sources and books discussing the issues.

What was the purpose of locking the article? Why was is done? Who did it?

The most pressing issue is to insert tags in the article. Tags that explain the problems and suggests basic improvements. As the article appears now it does not comply with Wikipedias standards.

Please notice, that the article is read by an average of 1000 individual readers each day (lately a maximum of 10,000 individual readers was reached!). In this context, Wikipedia should not present the contents as reliable facts or the article to be of a proper acceptable quality. It compromises Wikipedias entire credibility as a source of anything. RhinoMind (talk) 10:42, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

There were enough (five or six?) strong supporters of the article to prevent an effort to remove it as unencyclopedic. The major effort at the time of its creation was to remove it rather than to improve it. That is why it is fully protected. I agree that it is an embarrassment to Wikipedia. One weakness of Wikipedia is that a small number of people willing to devoted a large portion of their time and energy to keeping an article can override a large number of people who do not have or are not willing to spend that much time and energy. Rick Norwood (talk) 10:58, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
Thanks for the info. I agree about the systemic problem. An important point. I have encountered it in other areas as well, and it can be quite discouraging. RhinoMind (talk) 12:53, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
I have never seen an article under full protection for years and years on end like this one. My position: remove full protection or delete the article. Perhaps it's time for another RfC?--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:16, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
The topic lacks "Notability". While there have been a few studies comparing mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, there are no reliable sources that compare them all. But it has survived AfDs because there is an avid group of supporters and a lot of editors who will vote to keep anything. TFD (talk) 23:38, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
The article is certainly notable, it was subjected to five AfD's within a twelve month period, the last two resulting in solid keeps. Making WP:BADFAITH claims about the motivations of mostly uninvolved editors who voted to keep the article is symptomatic of a wider disruptive tendency that exists which has led to the article being fully protected as it is today. --Nug (talk) 00:48, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

That said, it is certainly possible to improve the article. The mechanism is to post a draft of the proposed changes to this talk page (or a sub-page if the changes are substantial), and if a consensus exists for the improvement then an admin will update the article. --Nug (talk) 01:02, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

If it's that notable, why doesn't Encyclopedia Britannica or any other reputable (or even disreputable) encyclopedia have an article about it? Why are there no university courses about the subject? TFD (talk) 01:16, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
Communism has its very own entry on page 81 in the Dictionary of Genocide, however no entry for capitalism. The dictionary sums up the essence of communism thus: "In most cases, the revolutionary nature of communism saw the new regimes tear down existing socioeconomic structures using brutal, even exterminatory, methods"[2]. --Nug (talk) 05:32, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
@Nug: Good point about the mechanism. At least that is an option I guess. RhinoMind (talk) 12:50, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
Nug, so the best you can find is a single sentence in a dictionary of genocide. Why not include that piece of information in the article about Communism and delete this article. TFD (talk) 14:34, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
You should have checked for yourself before declaring there wasn't one. AmateurEditor (talk) 18:12, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

Note that there have been extended and repeated discussions about this, and the fact is that rejecting prior consensus is iffy at this point. Collect (talk) 14:41, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

Why aren't there university courses? but there are. [3] PSCI 214 - Mass Murder and Genocide Under Communism [4] HISTORY 4N: A World History of Genocide [...] settler genocides in America, Australia, and Africa; the Armenian genocide and the Holocaust; genocide in communist societies; and late 20th century genocide. Not to mention dozens and dozens of books, and scholarly articles about the topic. One can certainly debate the topic, but the fact there there is a debate at all... is a sign of notability ;) ResultingConstant (talk) 15:30, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

ResultingConstant, as I wrote above, "While there have been a few studies comparing mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, there are no reliable sources that compare them all." The course outline says, "This course explores the origins, motivations and consequences of the brutal and deadly policies adopted in three very different communist regimes (the Soviet Union, China and Cambodia)." TFD (talk) 16:23, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
Again, you should have checked for yourself before declaring there were none. AmateurEditor (talk) 18:12, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
There are none. TFD (talk) 18:46, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
No true Scotsman. AmateurEditor (talk) 19:05, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
Is there any relevance to the link or do you just like posting random links? I said that other than sources that compared mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, there were no courses that discussed mass killings under Communist regimes in general. An editor then provided a link to a course about mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. TFD (talk) 19:36, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
You made false blanket assertions (No other encyclopedia articles, reputable or disreputable; no university courses about the subject), then modified your assertions to try to exclude the counter-examples provided to you. This reaction is called the "No true Scotsman" fallacy, as explained at the link. And ResultingConstant linked to two different university courses, not one. AmateurEditor (talk) 21:18, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
You obviously did not read what I said before responding. That is typical of ideologues. I will repeat for the third time: "other than sources that compared mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, there were no courses that discussed mass killings under Communist regimes in general." If you want to pursue your ideological position "duh I don't understand," post it to my talk page and stop wasting time to readers of this talk page. TFD (talk) 03:34, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
And that's an ad hominem (and mis-quote). AmateurEditor (talk) 04:25, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

ResultingConstant makes a valid point, and the back and forth between two good editors serves no purpose. As in the college course he describes, where communist genocide is one sub-head along with others, the proper place for the material in this article is in genocide, as an example of one of several kinds of genocide. To have a separate article singling out "communist" genocides and not, say, an article on "genocides by White men", which would be equally objectionable, is to use Wikipedia to propagandize when its mission is to inform. Rick Norwood (talk) 10:58, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

I fear you did not look anything up on Wikipedia -- see Genocide of indigenous peoples, Anti-communist mass killings, Genocide, Democide, Policide, Ethnocide, Definitions of politicide and a few others. Looks to me like you wish to shut one door when a dozen others are open already. Collect (talk) 13:03, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
Rick Norwood, the course outline says, "This course explores the origins, motivations and consequences of the brutal and deadly policies adopted in three very different communist regimes (the Soviet Union, China and Cambodia)." That might establish notability for an article about mass killings in those countries. The article, without providing any sources, implies that Putin, Castro, Syriza, and Podemos would given the opportunity kill millions of people. TFD (talk) 14:30, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
Rick Norwood, there were actually two university courses linked by ResultingConstant. The first was a more specialized course titled "PSCI 214 - Mass Murder and Genocide Under Communism". The second was a more generalized course titled "HISTORY 4N: A World History of Genocide", which included the sub-topic "genocide in communist societies". So the courses (and the other publications already identified in the article) support the idea of Wikipedia having both a dedicated article and a section in the genocide article about communism. And both courses characterize the phenomenon as applying to communist countries generally, even if they (like the written sources - and like this Wikipedia article) focus on the big three. AmateurEditor (talk) 14:55, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
That's a course at Stanford that was taught for 6 years by Norman Naimark who wrote a book based on the course, Genocide: A World History. That book has a chapter called "Communist Genocides", which is about mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot and makes no reference to any other Communist regime. It's not enough to say that the courses imply that it applies to communist countries generally, you need to show that statement is explicitly made, otherwise it is original research. There is for example a chapter called "Modern Genocides." That does not imply that genocide is a characteristic of modern states. TFD (talk) 16:08, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
The chapter is titled "Communist Genocides". That would support renaming the article to something like "Communist genocides". The "Modern Genocides" chapter would support an article on modern genocide. I have not read the chapter, so I am not going to presume to know what is not in there. Neither should you, especially given your recent track record on such blanket statements. AmateurEditor (talk) 18:14, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Collect: you are right. I should have looked up other articles on genocide. My choice would be to group them all as subheads in the genocide article, where it would be easier to find them. AmateurEditor: How about an article titled Communist countries that have not committed genocide? I am not a communist, I'm a devout capitalist. But my patience with anti-communists is limited. Rick Norwood (talk) 16:56, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

How many of those other articles on genocide have been fully protected for years on end? Not one. There is a reason for that. TFD makes a good point and he has made it numerous times: most historical scholarship focuses on killings by Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, and not on communist regimes in general. This is part of the problem here. Indeed, Valentino himself says on pg 91 that "most regimes that have described themselves as communist or have been described as such by others have not engaged in mass killing." How is this not mentioned in the lede of this article given that much of it is based on Valentino's work???--C.J. Griffin (talk) 17:14, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
C.J. Griffin, I was against protecting this article at the time and have proposed more than once since then to reduce the protection level. I agree that most sources focus on the big three of Stalin's Soviet Union, Mao's China, and Pol Pot's Cambodia, but it is wrong to say they do not focus on communist regimes in general since they typically label their chapters/books/course topics with "communist". The article reflects this, labeling the topic as applying to "communist" regimes and dedicating one section for each of those three. Some sources also mention other communist regimes, as you acknowledge, so it is appropriate that they be included here but given less weight, as we have done by lumping them into an "Others" section. As for why the lede isn't better, it's because of the article protection and editor apathy. Let's improve it now. AmateurEditor (talk) 18:14, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
Rick Norwood, there should be both (sub-sections in a genocide article and dedicated articles on each distinct topic, like this one, that has enough material to justify it). Here is the Wikipedia criteria for an article: "If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject, it is presumed to be suitable for a stand-alone article or list." With "presumed" referring to the possibility of situations like those described in "What Wikipedia is not". If there are reliable sources that include a distinct topic of "Communist countries that have not committed genocide", then it could have a Wikipedia article, according to Wikipedia. I don't think you are going to find such sources. AmateurEditor (talk) 18:14, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
I suggest we change the name and scope of the article to "Mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot." That would resolve the neutrality issues since there is an actual body of work about that subject. We could also mention in passing, as writers such as Valentino do that there have been mass killings in other Communist regimes, but that it was not typical. I note that Valentino writes about mass killings in Afghanistan but puts it in a chapter called "Counterguerrilla Mass Killings: Guatemala and Afghanistan". He also mentions the U.S. occupation of the Philippines (1899-1902) and war in Vietnam and other mass killings by non-Communists.
Rick, with anti-Communists you don't get to decide whether or not you are a Communist, they do. If you support civil rights, fluoridation of water or teaching evolution in public schools, that might be enough.
TFD (talk) 17:44, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

The Four Deuces With respect (seriously, I do respect you as an editor), but in this case, your argument is bunk for two reasons. 1) Everyone agrees that these are mass killings BY communist regimes. Because a topic does not cover every conceivable aspect or instance of that topic does not invalidate that topic. We could never have an article for almost any topic under that standard. The "implications" which you describe can easily be dealth with in the body of the article, just like they are for every article. 2) The courses and books scope themselves. Your scope disagrees. Too bad. Your scope is WP:OR and their scope is WP:RS, per WP:NPOV we should follow their lead as to what the topic means, not yours. While of course there is room in this room for dissenting and contrary opinions (per WP:NPOV) this topic is indisputable notable as both a collective topic, and as the least common umbrella topic for the individual incidents. ResultingConstant (talk) 17:57, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

The two courses and Valentino's chapter limit themselves to mass killings under Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. WP:NPOV means "representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.". Also, "An article...should strive to treat each aspect with a weight proportional to its treatment in the body of reliable, published material on the subject." It also says, "In some cases, the choice of name used for a topic can give an appearance of bias. While neutral terms are generally preferable, this must be balanced against clarity." Finally, WP:OR says, "Policy: Reliable tertiary sources can be helpful in providing broad summaries of topics that involve many primary and secondary sources, and may be helpful in evaluating due weight." My recommendation is entirely consistent with policy. Set the scope of the article according to that found in the sources that you have provided and provide a neutral and accurately descriptive name. TFD (talk) 18:41, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Update needed to edit notice

The edit notice on this article and on this talk page, currently visible only to administrators and those others who click "view source" appears not to have been adjusted since being written in February 2011. This is despite, in October 2011, the discretionary sanctions remedy linked to being superceded by standard discretionary sanctions and the case being renamed in March 2012. Linking to "WP:DIGWUREN#Discretionary sanctions" (WP:ARBEE#Discretionary sanctions on this talk page) is not particularly informative as (a) that remedy has been superceded, (b) it isn't immediately clear what has superceded it as the link barely moves the focus (down literally 2 lines when the box is in its default collapsed state), and (c) the new remedy is just an authorisation for standard discretionary sanctions that, unlike the original one, contains no details at all (those now being at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions).

While far from the biggest problem affecting this article, a simple update to this should be uncontroversial, harmless and may even be beneficial. Thryduulf (talk) 23:57, 28 August 2017 (UTC)

That's fine with me. AmateurEditor (talk) 00:03, 31 August 2017 (UTC)
Good idea. RhinoMind (talk) 16:32, 2 September 2017 (UTC)

Total Mass Killings Not Truly Addressed

In the article, a solid figure of total killings is not evident within the first two paragraphs. Excuses are made and rough estimates of the total. An apologetic license is used to mask the true figures, with references made to colonial era capitalist empires of the 19th century with regards to the rough numbers such empires killed. That said, even by the authors and his reference information, the admission that communism killed far more people than so called capitalist regimes and fascist dictatorships have for the last 1000 years. A general figure for the 20th century has been around 150 million persons killed by direct and indirect efforts of communist regimes. Direct killings can be estimated to be approximately 70-80 million with an additional approximate of 50 to 60 million killed by directed secondary actions such as forced starvation and migration.[2] [3] (1993).[4] Bronze06 (talk) 08:41, 6 August 2017 (UTC)

No solid figures, because the Wikipedia imbeciles are purposely wanting to hide the fact that communism = mass murder. No way around that fact. But the dingle-berries here at Wikipedia continue to deny the overwhelming evidence of 100 years of non stop communist deaths. 2602:306:3062:D180:8413:A60B:66F3:4257 (talk) 05:07, 23 October 2017 (UTC)
The article has a lot of room for improvement. Some work was begun in that direction on a sub-page, due to the editing restrictions. I added a box to the talk page header with a link to it. If you want to write something that would improve the article, you could take advantage of what is there to come up with a specific edit to propose here on the talk page, according to the guidelines in the discretionary sanctions header box above. AmateurEditor (talk) 01:40, 9 August 2017 (UTC)
That's because there is no agreed number. Note that the Black Book, which you cite, says that the Great Leap Forward killed between 20-43 million people. That's a wide range. TFD (talk) 02:28, 9 August 2017 (UTC)
Before seeing this thread I noticed that the lede doesn't actually mention any figure of total killings within the first two paragraphs despite the fact it is central to the topic, so Bronze06 has a valid point. Sure there is a wide range (20-43 million people in case of the Great Leap Forward), so what's the problem in mentioning "tens of millions of people were killed" within the first paragraph? --Nug (talk) 09:20, 23 August 2017 (UTC)
Also, and probably more important than the uncertainty of the total amount, there is disagreement whether people dying from starvation or other indirect causes can be categorized as "killings". There has been discussions of this in various books and sources, but to give a quick idea of why this is a major issue, think of the political weapon of Sanctions for example.
Sanctions against countries such as Iraq, Iran, Cambodia, North Korea and others (in modern times) has often caused elevated child mortality rates, starvation, general health problems and other lethal issues in these areas. Sanctions are a deliberate strategy and the possible lethal consequences have often been well-known prior to their effectuation. Yet, sanctions are seldom categorized as mass-killings.
If we include a larger span of history, deaths during slavery has seldom been categorized as mass-killings neither. This compromises the categorization of deaths during forced labour as mass-killings. RhinoMind (talk) 11:06, 24 August 2017 (UTC)
As you say, sanctions and deaths during slavery have seldom been categorized as mass killings. The key point is that Wikipedia editors do not get to decide how reliable sources characterize the deaths here. We are only supposed to accurately reflect what reliable sources do say, including the controversies. It's not about our opinions at all, we just need to try to accurately reflect the content in the reliable sources. That there is a wide range of estimated deaths is not a problem for us to solve, it is an aspect of this topic to be presented. I'm fine with mentioning "tens of millions of people were killed" in the first paragraph. Even the low range estimates are at least 20 million. AmateurEditor (talk) 03:41, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
Hi. I think it is quite clear that I wasn't expressing personal opinions.
All the instances that could - under certain quite politicized conjectures - push the "mass killings" into the tens of millions are indirect deaths caused by failed planning. To base a whole article on some highly controversial and un-acedemic claims from a few selected authors and present it as fact, is not acceptable. This is not to say that there is no place for presenting these controversial claims at all in an encyclopedia, as they have been notable and used in quite a lot of debates, but to present it as fact is - as said - unacceptable and even fraudulent.
The article appears as an uncritical conjecture with very specific political aims. It should be edited and nuanced heavily, even in its present form, to comply with Wikipedia standards. If you want to improve anything, I believe the area demanding the most serious attention is the nuancing of controversial claims and the inclusion of sources and books critical to the conjectures. RhinoMind (talk) 09:21, 25 August 2017 (UTC)
Surely to "nuance heavily" is to inject your own WP:POV. As AmateurEditor states,"It's not about our opinions at all, we just need to try to accurately reflect the content in the reliable sources." --Nug (talk) 00:26, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
@Nug I am challenging that "reliability". How have you established that they were reliable in the first place? RhinoMind (talk) 12:45, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
RhinoMind, with respect, you offered one assertion after another and did not cite a single source that you want included or statement/source in the article that you think should be excluded. If you want to change the article, please be specific. AmateurEditor (talk) 02:59, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
Well, I am not the one who was interested in changing the leed to include a sum total of mass killings, based on the figures mentioned in the article-body. That was Bronze06 and Nug. And I have adressed that interest.
Some of the nuancing is already included in the article as is, see the section "Inclusion of famine as killing" for example. Perhaps more disturbing is the haphazard mention of mass killing figures that aren't even sourced or explained. Also death toll figures from wars, are explicitly not categorized as mass killings by scholarly records. See here for example as a quick link: Final Solutions - Mass Killing and Genocide in the 20th Century (a main source for the article). The short summary explains that death of combatants are explictly not catagorized as killings.
On top of that, I would certainly like to nuance the article as needed and of course include proper sources, but I haven't got the time for any proper editing right now. Besides, the article is locked, so even if I had, I would not be able to do anything. However, my personal situation does not change the fact that the article is in need of nuancing and proper sourcing.
I am not against the whole idea of a sum total, but before that could happen, the individual figures needs proper sourcing, explaining and nuancing. When or if I find the time, I could try to post a list of sorts of sources that nuance or are critical. Until then there is a quite big task ahead of simply sourcing and explaining what is already in the article as is. RhinoMind (talk) 12:33, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
Unsourced figures should be removed from the article. What unsourced figures are you referring to? And what death toll figures from war are included in the article? AmateurEditor (talk) 18:21, 26 August 2017 (UTC)
Hi. I am not sure they should be deleted outright, maybe a cn-tag or some basic explanation could do it? Anyway, I have mentioned a few examples in the thread below, but might as well state it again for the sake of clarity:
  • The section of Others just casually mentions mass killings in a number of countries. No explanation of what is meant, what it was about or any indication of the death toll.
  • The section of East Germany and Romania just lists some numbers. Again, no explanation of what it was about, which renders it useless.
  • The section Hungary states that the "communist State Protection Authority" committed mass genocides. No ref, no explanation, no nothing.
  • The section on Democratic People's Republic of Korea has several problems. 1,3 million Korean killed during the Korean war would probably comprise combatants? Without explanation that would be assumed. Also, without explanation it does not make sense to include executions as killings, as executions would assume some kind of criminal activity and deaths from death penalties are never registered as killings. Also, death from forced labour and concentration camps (what does that term even mean outside a WWII context?) does not make much sense without any explanation. How was it established to be killings? In general it could also be questioned if NK should even be categorized under communist regimes. (disclaimer: No, I do not approve of North Korea's policies, but this is Wikipedia, not a ranting web-page).
There might be more in this category, but this is what immediately comes to mind in relation to this discussion.
And then of course there is the general critique, that the conjecture that all the killings is somehow related to the ideology of communism is left unexplained throughout. Yes, people kill people, a sad lesson from the history of mankind, but how is this related to communism specifically and not just ordinary power struggles? Why are mass killings "under communist regimes" so different from mass killings in general? This is probably why some editors would like to see the entire page deleted I guess.
RhinoMind (talk) 11:41, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
RhinoMind, thank you for taking the time to write this out. Here are my responses to your specifics.
In the "Others" section, the numbers cited for East Germany and Romania do have sources. We could try to find more contextual information to flesh those sections out, but I don't think they should be removed.
In the Hungary sub-section, having no references means it should be removed or a reference added. If the original editor who added that (Fakibakir)cannot supply a reference, then we should remove it rather than wait for someone else to find one. I have left a message on the user's talk page here.
I agree that the 1.3 million killed during the Korean War refers to combatants (this appears to be an argument on the part of the writer that is not adopted by the editor in the foreward total for communism in general, by the way). Following the reference to the source, it says "To the 100,000 who have died in Party purges and the 1.5 million deaths in concentration camps must be added at least 1.3 million deaths stemming from the war, which was organized and instigated by the Communists, a war that continues in small but murderous actions, including commando attacks on the South and acts of terrorism; and the uncertain but growing number of direct and indirect victims of malnutrition." We should either edit the sentence to make it clear that he is referring to combat deaths, move it to a controversies section about war deaths, or remove it from the article. I would prefer to add context to the existing sentence to avoid imposing my own opinions on what is and is not appropriate to include, but would also support moving it to a new controversies section about war deaths if there were other sources that also include war deaths (and others that contest that).
Your critique about how these deaths are related to communism specifically is something I would support fleshing out from reliable sources. It is found there. AmateurEditor (talk) 15:48, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "Why corpses of a 1982 killing are stirring again".
  2. ^ https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/COM.ART.HTM
  3. ^ Brzezinski, Zbigniew, Out of Control: Global Turmoil on the Eve of the Twenty-first Century
  4. ^ Agence France Press (25 Sept. 1999) citing at length from Courtois, Stephane, Le Livre Noir du Communism: Rural purges, 1946-49: 2-5M deaths Urban purges, 1950-57: 1M Great Leap Forward: 20-43M Cultural Revolution: 2-7M Labor Camps: 20M Tibet: 0.6-1.2M TOTAL: 44.5 to 72M

Protected edit request on 16 November 2017

Please change |trans_title= to |trans-title= in the one place where it occurs. The "trans_title" parameter alias has been deprecated. Thank you. – Jonesey95 (talk) 03:38, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

Done — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 08:48, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 19 February 2018

Cite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page).

Section 4.1

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn has suggested that over 60 million Soviet civilians were murdered by the Soviet government in concentration camps(1). Danielwarwick240 (talk) 18:52, 19 February 2018 (UTC) [1]

The estimate is already in the article. In order to add the information, you would need to provide exact phrasing. You should also use a source specifically about mass killings in the USSR, rather than an obituary. While the obituary shows that it was relevant to Solzhenitsyn's article, it does not in itself establish significance in this article. And we would probably also want to say something about him and his credibility on this topic. TFD (talk) 19:31, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/04/books/04solzhenitsyn.html
 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 20:46, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

Peer review?

An article must be pretty good if it has as few edits as this one. After all, such few edits on a page with over 1,000 views per day must indicate that there's nothing to change - that the article's in a pretty good place, right?

In most cases, absolutely! However, this is a unique page - perhaps the most unique on Wikipedia. There is no other article, outside of various vandalistic repeatedly deleted wikitionary entries, that has been protected for so long with no expiry in sight. Of course, one could make an edit request if there's something they want to see changed. But the gold padlock does scare off a lot of editors - people who could make a positive contribution here. There's only been one substantive edit request here in the past six months! I think that's unacceptable.

Bearing in mind that Wikipedia is a work in progress, and that progress has stalled on this article, I think a few fresh sets of eyes, such as those found at Peer Review, or even at GA/FA, might be of benefit here. I intend to nominate this article for one of those review processes. Perhaps this article does stack up as one of the best Wikipedia has to offer. If it does, it should be honored as such. But if it doesn't, it should be improved, and perhaps the review processes could help do just that.

I'm providing prior notice on this talk page to gauge which process would be most appropriate for this page. I've been a (mostly) active editor for over a decade, but I've never saw fit to nominate an article until now. I think peer review would be the best place to go, but I'm curious as to your views. So folks, which shall it be? schetm (talk) 06:06, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

Honestly I don't think a peer review will help very much, because any change to the article requires consensus here; so we couldn't implement changes suggested at a peer review without a discussion here too. The article isn't in very good shape at the moment; it gives rather heavy weight to BBOC, a heavily partisan source, and could afford to give more weight to the other scholarly sources available. What this really needs is for someone to make a draft copy, and then move through it paragraph by paragraph, writing-workshop style. But I haven't the time or motivation to do so right now, and I doubt many others do either. Vanamonde (talk) 12:23, 23 March 2018 (UTC)
Yes, the problem is that the very special sanctions on this article empower editors who don't want to see the article changed, for whatever reason. This is not the way Wikipedia is supposed to operate. I'm fine with a peer review but I agree that it does not address the reason there has been so little progress on the article. AmateurEditor (talk) 12:37, 24 March 2018 (UTC)

In relation to this discussion, please note that the issue discussed here: Total Mass Killings Not Truly Addressed has not been settled yet. Nothing happened.

Also, the important issues in I've opened an Arbcom amendment request to get full protection removed. and Full Protection of a very poor quality article. Why? in Archive 37 haven't been tackled neither. It just bled into the sand. RhinoMind (talk) 14:36, 24 March 2018 (UTC)

I looked for the Arbcom case you referenced, and I couldn't find the one you opened. Is there any way you could link to it, so that interested editors can see where that case ultimately led? schetm (talk) 18:22, 24 March 2018 (UTC)
@Schetm: Yeah, you are right I guess, I can't find it either. Strange. I remember seeing it when the debate was still hot in August 2017, but there seems to be nothing now. I think the best perosn to contact in this regard is @Aquillion:? RhinoMind (talk) 19:12, 25 March 2018 (UTC)
I opened one months ago and mentioned it on this page, but the only people to contribute were people who were in favor of locking it originally and who feel the current version is ideal, so I mostly gave up - obviously the arbitrators are going to agree to keep protection in place when virtually everyone who bothers to show up for discussions breathlessly argues that it is vital and that the total lack of progress is fine because they love the current version as-is. I would suggest raising the issue both there and on WP:AN; the idea of locking a page for six years is patiently absurd, and it is clear that the article has seen little or no progress since the last request, which supports the idea that protection is harming it. Part of the problem is that editors have little motivation to devote time to contributing to a locked page; every so often someone will come here, note the article's numerous serious problems, get few replies, then leave because they can't actually do anything. This is why permanent protection is not a permissible solution under current policy. But again, I would suggest taking it to various boards for discussion - I am 100% certain that the community, as a whole, wouldn't support locking a page for six years for content dispute reasons under any circumstances. --Aquillion (talk) 23:32, 25 March 2018 (UTC)
I don't see this as having any potential of being an encylopedic article because of its inherently polemical nature. This article draws an implicit connection between communism and mass killings, while a balanced article would present views for and against this thesis and explain the weight of the opposing views in reliable sources. There's an interesting article in Jewish Currents, "The "Double Genocide" Theory: The New and Official Form of Holocaust Denial," which explains the nature of this type of narrative. TFD (talk) 16:00, 25 March 2018 (UTC)
It's been eight years since the last WP:AFD request, so you could go for that if you want. The total lack of progress over the past six years might suggest that there's a basic problem with the topic, at least, since a healthy article should be attracting more attention than that. Some of the previous discussions seemed to suggest that improvement was possible, which doesn't seem to have happened. Alternatively, we could suggest a rename - that is something that requires less dedicated work than a full rewrite (the core problem with the protection is that it discourages editors from putting the time in necessary for the rewrites this requires.) But a third option would be to present a full rewrite, which we could then call an RFC on - the low quality of the current version makes me think that it would not be hard to produce a version that could essentially replace it entirely, and in any case the RFC would itself call attention to the problems stemming from leaving this article locked for so long. I suspect that many of the people who eagerly argue to keep it locked would rapidly change their tune if a successful RFC got the text replaced with a version they disagreed with, allowing for more incremental compromises after that. --Aquillion (talk) 23:40, 25 March 2018 (UTC)
It's history that connects them, TFD, and ofc it's history that people want to suppress. Saturnalia0 (talk) 05:33, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

I think the best thing for this article is to get as many uninvolved eyes on it. As such, I am nominating it for peer review. We'll see what happens. I do not want to see the status quo of this article maintained, and I will work in the coming weeks, now that I have a bit more time on my hands, to raise this article's unique situation at various forums on Wikipedia. schetm (talk) 02:54, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 6 April 2018

MoS fixes to the lead—"In his summary of the estimates in the Black Book of Communism, Martin Malia suggested" should be "In his summary of the estimates in ''[[The Black Book of Communism]]'', Martin Malia suggested" Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 10:29, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

 Done — xaosflux Talk 19:06, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 15 April 2018

Can you please change "Mass killings occurred under some Communist regimes" to "Mass killings ocurred under Communist regimes"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 179.183.239.68 (talk) 16:29, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

Page restrictions removed

Per a request on my talk page, I am removing the following page-level restrictions. Sandstein 21:46, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

possible rewriting of lead

Mass killings were observed under some twentieth century Communist regimes. Death estimate vary widely, depending on the definitions of deaths included. The highest estimates of mass killings include not only direct mass murders or executions, but also lives lost due to effects of war, famine, disease and other factors, including deliberate mismanagement by the regimes. Terms used include "mass killing", "democide", "politicide", "classicide", and a broad definition of "genocide." The higher death estimates range in the tens of millions, while some scholars, counting only direct government actions, use lower totals. In his summary of the estimates inclusive of indirect government acts, in The Black Book of Communism, Martin Malia suggested a total death toll of between 85 and 100 million people.

Is presented as a substantially shorter version of the current (bloated) first paragraph of the lead. Collect (talk) 23:01, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Both the current and proposed lead texts have a serious NPOW issues. Only a small fraction of sources devoted to mass mortality events in Communist countries combine all these events into one category, and name them "mass killing", "democide", "politicide", "classicide", etc. Majority of scholars do not use this terminology, so there is no possibility to reflect their point of view, otherwise it may be considered synthesis.
In addition, the Black Book is a highly controversial source, which by no means can neutrally summarize the subject. It must be excluded from the lead.
The statement "The higher death estimates range in the tens of millions, while some scholars, counting only direct government actions, use lower totals. In his summary of the estimates inclusive of indirect government acts, in The Black Book of Communism, Martin Malia suggested a total death toll of between 85 and 100 million people" is misleading, because it implies that 85 millions are attributed to direct government actions, and other 15 million are famine victims. That is obviously false, because majority of the "Communist mass killing deaths" are deaths from Chinese famine Soviet famine.
To fix that, I propose a different version:
Numerous mass deaths occurred under some twentieth century Communist regimes. Many of them were a direct result of repressions against real or perceived political opponents, whereas others were caused by war, famine, disease and similar factors, including deliberate or unintended mismanagement by the regimes. A number of scholar combine all these mass deaths under a single category using the terms "mass killing", "democide", "politicide", "classicide", and a broad definition of "genocide." The higher death estimates amounts to 100 million people, although the authors counting only direct government actions use significantly lower totals.
Paul Siebert (talk) 00:50, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
@Collect and Paul Siebert: I was involved with formulating the current version of the lede. I am not necessarily wedded to it, but I do think we require clarity on what problem we are trying to address. Is the lead really too long? I don't think so, but I'm willing to be persuaded. On the other hand, it's the controversial nature of the BBoC which requires us to mention it in the lede; a source which does not represent scholarly consensus cannot be used in Wikipedia's voice (and that is a problem with Collect's version, as it, unintentionally, I believe, makes it sound as though Malia were summarizing scholarly views, rather than views in the BBoC. Regards, Vanamonde (talk) 04:56, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
First of all, the lead is misleading. There are many problems with it, I'll tell about two of them for the beginning. First, the Black Book cannot be used as a source, because it is highly controversial. There was a strong disagreement even between the authors of this collective volume and its editor, Malia. His introduction is the most problematic part of the book, and the figures (85-100 million) was among the most controversioal part of the introduction.
Second, even this, highly controversial introduction is interpreted in a highly misleading way: the lead says: "The higher death estimates range in the tens of millions, while some scholars, counting only direct government actions, use lower totals. In his summary of the estimates inclusive of indirect government acts, in The Black Book of Communism, Martin Malia suggested a total death toll of between 85 and 100 million people.", thereby creating a false impression that the figure of 85 million was obtained when the victims of indirect government acts were excluded. But that is simply a false statement.
Actually, more than a half of all victims of Communist regimes were famine victims, and most scholars, for example, O'Grada, who study a history of the most deadly famine, Great Leap famine, do not consider it mass killing. Moreover, the idea to combine all mass mortality events in different Communist countries into a single category is by no means universally supported by a scholarly community. Many authors see more commonality, for example, between Cambodian (Communist) and Indonesian (anti-Communist) genocides, or between what happened in Cambodia and Rwanda, not USSR, and so on.
Another totally misleading statement is: "A number of scholar combine all these mass deaths under a single category using the terms "mass killing", "democide", "politicide", "classicide", and a broad definition of "genocide."" Rummel, a creator of the Democide concept, did NOT combine MKUCR using the term "democide": his "democide" combines Stalinist mass killing, Nazi Holocaust and other events. "Genocide" is also a term used to describe MKUCR, because neither Great Leap or Great Soviet famines (more than 60% of total Communist death toll) are not considered a genocide, and so on. Not only this statement is a synthesis, it is simply wrong.
Actually, the article tells about the topic that was invented by the Wikipedians and is not recognized by scholars. To demonstrate my point, compare the article's topic with, for example, the Holocaust. There IS a full consensus about it among all scholars, everybody agrees what it was (with small variations; for example, some authors include Soviet POWs, whereas others do not). In contrast, MKUCR is a very poorly defined topic, and many scholars simply do not believe this is a single topic. In addition, Mass Killings UNDER Communist Regimes: what does it means? Do we include, for example all civil war victims (both opposing sides), or just one side? Actually, there is a huge difference between killings UNDER some regime and killings BY this regime. Frankly, I even am not sure if such a topic exists at all. If you try google it, you get mostly the pages that cite this Wikipedia article. The Google Scholar source gives just 8 results: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=%22mass+killings+under+communist+regimes%22&btnG=, and, again, one of these eight papers cites this Wikipedia article.
I think it is senseless to tell that similar search using such keywords as "the Holocaust", "Holodomor", "Great Purge", "Cambodian Genocide", etc gives thousands of results, because each of them IS a topic. The keyword "Democide" IS a topic too: it is a concept proposed by Rummel and supported by several authors. However, MKUCR is the topic invented by us, Wikipedians, by selective combining several concepts advocated by some authors who do not represent the whole scientific community.
I see two ways to fix a huge NPOW and SYNTH problem. First, the article should be converted into the list, and all content split among the Democide, Politicide, Genocide etc articles (each of which tells about some pretty well defined concepts). Second, it should be reorganized to make clear it tells about several concepts developed by few authors (Democide, etc), who do not represent a scholarly consensus on that subject.
I am very surprised to learn that such a pure example of original research and synthesis stays in Wikipedia for so long period of time. We must do something with that, because this case is extraordinary.
Paul Siebert (talk) 07:02, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
Aware of the risk that I might open a pandora's box of issues that have already been debated many times before, I would still like say that: yes, the whole concept of MKUCR might be controversial, but it is nevertheless a subject that has been notable in many debates, even in academia. That does not mean that the concept is all fine and perfectly ok, but it means that at least it has a place on Wikipedia. Even if it is a synthesis. I don't see it as a matter of right or wrong, but simply a matter of explaining what this MKUCR concept is all about. And then supply the article with a discussion about all these cautions and problematic syntheses that you also mentions in your comment above. There are many sources of this critique and a few are already in the article as is. So all-in-all: Why not just improve critical parts? RhinoMind (talk) 15:31, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
PS. Still, we would of course need to point to other sources of the MKUCR concept than simply The Black Book, otherwise the whole page could just redirect to the wiki-page on The Black Book itself. RhinoMind (talk) 15:40, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

My suggestion was an attempt to make a readable lead. Those who are using this as yet another "delete discussion" are not going to reach a consensus now any more than they did before. The first thing anyone reads is the lead, which is supposed to summarize the content of the article. That is all I was doing. Opening up the "Communism killed no one in the Ukraine"-type of debate will not get us anywhere at all. Can we stick to the purpose of the lead and not get back into the (seeming) two hundred AfDs on the topic? The article is here, and the principle is that we make it readable first of all. If not, then shut the discussions down. Collect (talk) 15:43, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

By the way "estimates inclusive of indirect government acts" seems to me to indicate that the BB estimate includes indirect government acts and is thus entirely in line with the article statements. Collect (talk) 15:47, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't think the leed is the best place to start if anyone wants to improve anything in this article. If the purpose of the leed is simply to summarize the main points in the article (in which I agree), then the main article should be fixed first. And this main article has a plethora of issues. It was difficult to fix some of them, the system of request at Talk, approval, and then fixing, was broken and this was a main reason why the lock was lifted. The leed is of least concern, compared to the rest of the article. RhinoMind (talk) 15:56, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
I agree, RhinoMind (except about the synthesis part). I am fine with any of the proposed changes to the lead, but I would rather we did not focus on it and work to flesh out the body of the article first. To Collect, I also agree that we do not want to get into AfD discussions that we have already had (and resolved), but Paul has been gone for a while and deserves to be taken seriously. To Paul Siebert:
1) "the Black Book cannot be used as a source, because it is highly controversial" - I completely disagree because other reliable sources, such as Valentino, reference the Black Book and we all agree they are reliable sources. Saying it is too controversial to use requires substantial sourcing on your part to overcome the reliable sources that accept it as a legitimate contributor.
2) "Moreover, the idea to combine all mass mortality events in different Communist countries into a single category is by no means universally supported by a scholarly community." - Any sources that explicitly state this should have their views included in the article, but we cannot assume that because a scholar focuses their attention on a different topic that they oppose the idea of this topic. We would need a reliable source that states this explicitly.
3) "Rummel, a creator of the Democide concept, did NOT combine MKUCR using the term "democide"" - You can read his essay "How Many Did Communist Regimes Murder?" on his website here, in which he says "...Not all the democide totals I mention here may be complete...".
4) ""Genocide" is also a term used to describe MKUCR, because neither Great Leap or Great Soviet famines (more than 60% of total Communist death toll) are not considered a genocide" - I assume you made typos in here and meant to say that genocide is NOT a term used to describe MKUCR and neither of the famines ARE considered a genocide. However, there are sources (identified in the dumping ground page here) that do discuss the term in the context of a broader discussion of terms (often to explain why they don't think it applies).
5) "Actually, the article tells about the topic that was invented by the Wikipedians and is not recognized by scholars."; "In contrast, MKUCR is a very poorly defined topic, and many scholars simply do not believe this is a single topic. In addition, Mass Killings UNDER Communist Regimes: what does it means? Do we include, for example all civil war victims (both opposing sides), or just one side? Actually, there is a huge difference between killings UNDER some regime and killings BY this regime. Frankly, I even am not sure if such a topic exists at all." - As you know, the title of this article is a descriptive title because of the lack of a single consensus term among scholars, but it is not original research. Many of the sources include a section discussing the lack of a consensus on terms. We have a Terminology section in the article for that reason (which needs filling out - see the dumping ground page for a start on that) and that explains why your Google searches turn out as they do. The title "Mass killings under Communist Regimes" is a bit awkward, but it is functional, and similar in form to "Crimes against humanity under communist regimes", which is a scholarly work. I don't think the ambiguity of the word "under" is anything we need to be concerned about.
6) "Second, it should be reorganized to make clear it tells about several concepts developed by few authors (Democide, etc), who do not represent a scholarly consensus on that subject." - If you want a statement in the article to that effect, you will need to source it to a reliable source just as every other statement in the article should be. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:23, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
Good. Let's do it step by step.
1) Let's remember what exactly we are talking about. It is incorrect to talk about the BB as whole, because itis very inhomogeneous volume, it is a collection of chapters written by independent scholars supplemented by the Malia's introduction. Whereas many chapters (for example the Werth's one) are good, the introduction is very controversial. Some sources do use Malia's introduction, whereas many others (including Malia's coauthor, Werth) severely criticise it. If you need sources in support of that statement, I can provide them.Paul Siebert (talk) 05:02, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

After some reflection, I have gone ahead and implemented the version of the lead suggested by Collect. I do not see this as a final solution for the lead, but after reading it several times, I believe it serves to condense a very verbose paragraph without sacrificing detail. This does not in any way preclude further discussion on the issues of neutrality, and the specific issue of how to discuss the BBoC. Vanamonde (talk) 07:25, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Please, remember the article is still under edit restrictions

I noticed some edits have been made during last day: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mass_killings_under_Communist_regimes&type=revision&diff=840000941&oldid=839956333

Please, remember, the restrictions applied to this article require that all edits of that kind must be discussed on the talk page first. Can I please ask the editors who made these changes to self-revert and start a talk page discussion?

Paul Siebert (talk) 04:55, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
Could you please point to the editing restrictions that this page is still under? Sandstein explicitly removed the restrictions in place since 2011, and those are the only restrictions of the nature you describe that I am aware of. schetm (talk) 05:10, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
I myself started to doubt. The article was under 1RR restriction (see above) AND it was fully protected. It was unprotected recently, but I thought other restrictions are still in force. Maybe I am wrong, and ALL restrictions has been lifted. That seems a little bit odd, taking into account that less than one year ago this question was discussed, and the decision was to keep all restrictions and protection. It seems Sandstein unilaterally decided to lift all restrictions that doesn't seem totally reasonable, because it is unclear what happened during last months that changed the situation. We probably need a clarification from him.Paul Siebert (talk) 14:16, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
I asked Sandstein about that. Let's wait what he says.Paul Siebert (talk) 15:21, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Proposed rewriting of lead

Mass killings were committed under many Communist regimes in the twentieth century. Death estimate vary widely, depending on the definitions of deaths included. The highest estimates of mass killings include not only direct mass murders or executions, but also lives lost due to famine, disease and other factors, including deliberate mismanagement by the regimes. Terms used include "mass killing", "democide", "politicide", "classicide", and a broad definition of "genocide." The higher death estimates range in the tens of millions, while some scholars, counting only direct government actions, use lower totals. In his summary of the estimates inclusive of indirect government acts, in The Black Book of Communism, Martin Malia suggested a total death toll of between 85 and 100 million people.

I think this would be more appropriate, "some" makes it seen like mass killings only happened under a few, like two or three regimes, also when was effects of war counted among deaths? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pedro8790 (talk • contribs) 20:14, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

The section below provides a criticism of Malia, which makes it incorrect to use this source in the lead, because it by no means reflects a scholarly consensus.Paul Siebert (talk) 21:45, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Consensus required restriction

The "consensus required" restriction has been lifted, but I would strongly suggest that everyone continue to act as though it applies; in particular, I would suggest that unless a change is believed to be non-contentious, it not be made without discussion. I would also strongly recommend against further AfDs, and against "is this a valid topic" type of discussions. Otherwise, it is likely that we will end up with full-protection again very very soon. Vanamonde (talk) 07:27, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

  • Eh, that is probably too restrictive rather if a change is reverted I'd suggest coming straight to the talk page and gain a consensus. (a la 1RR+consensus-required-before-restoration used in American Politics articles)Galobtter (pingó mió) 07:42, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  • @Galobtter: possibly, but a 1RR restriction is also a recipe for a slow-moving multi-party edit-war, and god knows there's enough people here for that to happen. In any case, I cannot enforce this; I'm merely pointing out a likely consequence that nobody wants, and a means of avoiding it. Vanamonde (talk) 07:52, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
  • Indeed, hence the consensus required before restoration, so that one edit cannot be reverted more than once, even if by different people..I know, that is a likely consequence and not an enforcement, I'm just spelling out an alternative that people can hopefully follow even if they don't follow consensus before changing anything major Galobtter (pingó mió) 08:03, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

The edit restrictions seem to be lifted completely

From Sandstein's talk page discussion I conclude that he, assuming that the old conflict has died out, has lifted all restrictions, although the page remains subject to discretionary sanctions. However, I am afraid the major controversy around this article still exists, so I propose to use a scientific approach to avoid possible problems.

A scientific way to make consensus unavoidable

Per Aumann's agreement theorem, logically thinking persons inevitably come to a consensus about the subject that belongs to their common knowledge domain. That is not an assertion, but a mathematically proven theorem. That means, if we failed to achieve a consensus, it implies at least one of us is either incapable of thinking logically or dishonest (i.e. has some secret agenda and does not disclose their actual goals). Since I assume we all are good faith Bayesians, I believe we are quite capable of resolving all major disputes about MKUCR.

I suggest to start truly Aumann's discussion about the core issues of the article. To do that, every participant should explain clearly and exhaustively:

- their real intentions regarding this article; for example "I believe Communist was worse than Nazism and I want the article state about that clearly", or "I think criticism of Communism is unjustified, and I want the statement about Communism evil to be placed in a broader context", etc;
- the main sources their opinion is based on.

By providing an open and explicit description of all essential information each of us has, and by disclosing our actual intentions we create a common knowledge domain thereby making a truly Aumann's discussion possible.

Major article's problems as I see them

Upon having read the article authored by Michael David-Fox (On the Primacy of Ideology: Soviet Revisionists and Holocaust Deniers (In Response to Martin Malia), Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, Volume 5, Number1, Winter 2004 (New Series), pp. 81-105), I realized how two main weaknesses of this article can be formulated. First, the current version of the article is written based on the concept of Generic Communism (which was explicitly coined by Malia). This concept defines Communism as "the common denominator of party movements founded by intellectuals. (Pol Pot's study of Marxism in Paris thus comes across as historically more important than the gulf between radical Soviet industrialism and the Khmer Rouge's murderous anti-urbanism.)" (I use the quote from David-Fox, who both summarized this concept and criticized its weaknesses). However, the article does not explain explicitly that the "generic Communism" concept is not a mainstream idea, which gives an undue weight to a single point of view, which is against our policy. A Second major flaw of the article is that it "does not mention the literature addressing the statistical-demographic, methodological, or moral dilemmas of coming to an overall communist victim count, especially in terms of the key issue of how to include victims of disease and hunger. In the context of the Soviet-Nazi comparison Stephen Wheatcroft insisted before the publication of The Black Book on the relevance of distinguishing between "purposive killing" and "deaths from criminal neglect and irresponsibility." In response to The Black Book, Hiroaki Kuromiya has criticized the results when "'indirect deaths' are indiscriminately lumped together with deliberate political killings." Again, I quote David-Fox's words that are quite applicable to the current version of the MCuCR article.

In my opinion, a cosmetic modifications of the article, for example, by adding reservations like "however, according to David-Fox .... etc" cannot resolve the problem, because the very structure of the article implies that "generic Communism + famine as murder" point of view is a mainstream view, whereas scholars like David-Fox represent a minority viewpoint.

I propose to fix this. To this end, I propose to start two separate discussions on two topics: 1. Generic Communism, and 2. The way famine and disease should be described.

As an act of a good will, I declare I will abstain from any editing of the article until a consensus is achieved (the article did not change for many years, so it can wait). I also expect (although do not demand it) other participants will do the same.

Does anybody want to participate?

Generic Communism

The literature available to me tells that different Communist regimes are poorly connected to each other, so the authors who study them pay more attention to historical aspects and other factors to describe the events there. For example, many authors prefer to describe North Korean regime as neo-Confutian rather than Communist. The monographs about Cambodian Genocide outline at least two other factors (in addition to ultra-Maoist ideology) that caused killings: extreme Khmer nationalism (Khmers were desperately poor and rural, ethnic Vietnamese and Chinese were much more wealthy and urban, and Khmer's revenge tradition.

I think it would be correct to minimize the sections that contain any generalisations, leaving just a small paragraph describing the concept of Generic Communism, and create subsections devoted to different regimes (instead of not countries). For example, there should be no USSR section, but "Russian Civil War" section and "Stalinism" section (I believe everybody agrees Stalinism was totally different from pre-Stalin USSR and post-stalin USSR, and a mainstream point of view is there were no mass killings in the USSR after Stalin; that means we do not need anything else, although some information about Afghan war can be added).

Every section should contain a brief explanation of a historical context. It should also explain which concrete action of the regime caused the deaths. For example, it must be explained that mass killings in Soviet Russia during the revolution were partially a result of overall brutality of the First World War and partially the consequence of poorly organised land reform in tzarist Russia (this is a point of view of Nicolas Werth, one of the authors of the Black Book).


Regarding African countries, the difference should be made between the regimes that conducted Communist transformations and the regimes that just nominally declared it to obtain Soviet help.

That is not a full list of what should be done, but that seems to be a good starting point for the discussion.

Paul Siebert (talk) 21:30, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Famine and disease

First of all, the article must explain clearly that more than a half of all deaths that occurred under Communists were famine deaths, and majority sources do not describe them as "killings". A hisotrical context of each famine should be explained separately. It was not a standard policy of Communist regimes to organize famines, and majority of them were unintended consequence of regime's policy. A separate section devoted to the Great Leap Forward famine (without this famine, the list of Communist victims would look much less impressive) should explain that it was not the deadliest famine in Chinese history, that devastating famines regularly happened there, and the GLF famine was caused both by mismanagement (destruction of the statistical system) and the fact that the most affected region were traditionally vulnerable to famine. The point of view of O'Grada amd other experts should be duly represented (he is a much better expert than professional anti-Communists), and an explanation should be added that this famine was the last famine in Chinese history, because Communist authorities learned due lessons and took serious measures to avoid it in future.

A description of each famine should contain a discussion of the policy that cause that famine, and the discussion of intentionality. Thus, whereas a considerable part (not majority) of authors consider Holodomor a genocide, others disagree. Noone believes Volga famine or post-WWII Soviet famine were genocides, and majority of authors do not blame authorities in deliberate organising these famines.

Paul Siebert (talk) 21:03, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

The current article treats the issues raised correctly. The concept of a lecture as to what consensus is, does not impress. Sorry but the extended proposals do not have my approval as such, and, I suspect, would not gain WP:CONSENSUS through any RfC. Collect (talk) 22:43, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Can you please provide any logical argument besides WP:JDL? Paul Siebert (talk) 23:53, 7 May 2018 (UTC)
Every single one of those famines were consequences of the policies of the regimes, if they didn't try to implement Communism, they would not happen.
The "Generic Communism" part seems to me to be more of the "it wasn't real Communism" argument, the same atrocities that happens in North Korea and happened in Communist Cambodia happened under every single Communist regime, political repression, food scarcity in the least cases and starvation in the worst cases, etc.
No offense, but it seems to me that your real intention is to minimize and excuse Communist crimes, and the phrase "professional anti-Communists" really gives away your real intentons. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pedro8790 (talk • contribs) 00:47, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
Pedro, it's important that you assume good faith on the part of other editors, especially in such contentious subjects as this. While I wouldn't have chosen to use the words you referenced that Paul used, I have no doubt that he sincerely wants this article to be improved. And while his proposal doesn't have my !vote at this stage, his efforts are to be lauded.
This is the first time in over seven years that this article has been unprotected. I propose that, until and unless the situation here gets ugly, we abide by the standard discretionary sanctions on Eastern European topics. 1RR+talk page discussion remains officially on the books for this specific article, as described here. I have faith that the editors will rise above the old disputes and behave civilly and within our guidelines. schetm (talk) 02:11, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
Thank you very much Pedro for joining Aumann's discussion. Schem, he is doing exactly what I expected from you, guys. Pedro, you've just described my intentions as you see them, thereby putting your vision of my intention into the public knowledge domain. If we all continue acting in this way we inevitably will arrive to consensus.
Let me explain my vision. Imagine, Wiki article about The Holocaust says Hitler killed 12 million Jews, although the sources available to you say only 6 million were killed (which is true, by the way). Do you think I can blame you in whitewashing Nazism if you propose to replace the figure of 12 million with 6 million? Obviously, no.
Pedro, different regimes that claimed they were Communist killed a really big number of people, and I it is not my intention to defend, for example, Stalin. 5 millions or 20 millions - it is a huge number anyway. This regime was criminal, but to avoid such a tragedy in future we have to establish a real mechanism of it.
You write "The "Generic Communism" part seems to me to be more of the "it wasn't real Communism" argument" Firstly, let me point out that it is not my argument, this opinion was taken from a very good quality reliable secondary source. We must respect what it says. Second, it is tempting to blame Communism in all evils that happened in XX century. However, what if it was not the case? I mean, what if that was not the only reason? What if totalitarian dictatorships come to power for some objective reasons, and it is just a coincidence that they accept a Communist doctrine. What if next time some dictator will come, who will declare his open anti-Communism (by the way, that already happened once, remember? A small hint: that happened in mid XX century in one very developed European country, and this event literally decimated European population). Even now I started to notice that attempts to whitewash real Nazi criminals are being made, and the major argument is "yes, they did support Nazism, but they were fighting Communism, so they should be excused". Is it the result we want to achieve? The only way to prevent it is to tell a real truth, even if it is more complex, and requires more reading than just Courtois's introduction to the Black Book.
By the way, do you know that one of the reasons why The Black Book was written was so called "Vichy syndrome" some French intellectuals are still suffering from?
You claim "those famines were consequences of the policies of the regimes, if they didn't try to implement Communism, they would not happen." Pedro, Chinese famines were happening regularly, and some of them were more deadly (in relative numbers). Yes, this particular famine was triggered by Mao's mismanagement, however, nobody can guarantee similar famine would not happen if Kuomintang continued to rule. China was extremely poor (more poor than most African countries).
You say "the same atrocities that happens in North Korea and happened in Communist Cambodia happened under every single Communist regime", and you are absolutely wrong. The NK regime and its atrocities and Cambodian atrocities were totally different. There was no genocide in NK, and this society is a urbanized Confucian estate society; in contrast, Cambodian case is a chemically pure ethnic genocide (one ethnic group was killing another ethnic groups) in an egalitarian rural society. Cambodian type genocide would be absolutely impossible in Korea, and no juhce society could be created in Cambodia.
There were absolutely nothing in common between what happened in Stalin's USSR and PolPot's Cambodia: it the former, the government directed repressions against peasants to create a urban and industrial society, and repressions were not ethnic based, whereas in Cambodia urban population of different ethnicity was being killed by a rural population to perform radical deurbanization. I would say (and many sources say so), Cambodian genocide has more in common with Nazism than Communism. Even Chinese Maoists criticized Pol Pot for his radicalism.
Again, the only common feature all these events share is that the leaders claimed their adherence to one or another form of Communism.
That's enough for today.
By the way, all what I say is not my invention. I read that is very reliable sources, mostly in peer-reviewed articles, not journalist books or papers. All of that is something Wikipedia cannot just ignore.
All the best.
Looking forward to hear more arguments from you. Convince me if I am wrong. Paul Siebert (talk) 04:51, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
  • Paul Siebert, I would strongly suggest that you stick to raising specific points of concern. Not only are your posts too long for most folks to read, they are likely to be construed as an attempt to dismantle the page, even if they are not. Raise a single issue at a time, and support your position with sources, please. I'd suggest beginning with the issue of using Malia in the lead. Vanamonde (talk) 05:39, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
  • Vanamonde. I raised two specific concerns, these are the same concerns many reliable sources raise. First, the very structure of the article gives undue weight to a single point of view (a "generic Communism" concept), which is hardly a mainstream viewpoint. Second, and more specific is that the idea to present a total premature deaths under Communist regimes as "killings" is misleading, and some authors are pushing this idea to support a very specific idea (that Communism was greater evil than Nazism). In particular, only small fraction of famine scholars use the term "killing", "genocide", or similar terms to describe famines under Communists. There are debates over the question, for example, if Soviet famine in 1932-33 was genocide or not, but I am not aware of any dispute of that kind about Chinese famine: the scholars who study it do not use such terminology at all, and the absence of any debates looks like the idea that Chinese famine as a mass killing is being simply ignored by specialists who study specifically this question.
The following example demonstrates my point (it is a very artificial example, but it gives you an idea what I mean). Imagine WP has an article about statistics accident involving red cars, and the article says that red cars killed XXX people. And we also have a lot of publications about Ferrari cars, Toyota cars, etc., and these sources do not discuss a connection between color and accident statistics, and they prefer, for example, to discuss differences in steering mechanism or brake design as a main reason of accidents. What should we do in that case?
Again, before we started to discuss smaller problems, we need to talk about a general structure of this article. That will save a lot of time in future, and probably will help us to avoid many conflicts the editors had in past.
With regard to the length of my posts, the subject this article discusses is very complex, and if you want to edit it you must be capable of reading long texts. If you cannot read my posts, how can you read the original sources this article is based on? They are much, much longer.Paul Siebert (talk) 13:45, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
Paul Siebert You misunderstand, perhaps unsurprisingly. I did not say I would not read your posts; but most editors will not, and thus the lengthy of your posts almost precludes forging consensus for any proposal therein. I also didn't tell you to drop any of your suggestions above; I merely asked you to take them separately, and to make your points in a concise manner. I ask you once again to do this. Since you seem to be focusing on the famine question, maybe we start with that. Begin a new section, in which we may address the specific question "how do we treat famines?" Link your sources, and let's proceed from there. Vanamonde (talk) 13:55, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
I propose to start a serious discussion, and it requires some long introduction. Later, when we come to some preliminary agreement, my posts will become more brief.
I don't think it is correct to start with famines. The very structure of the article should be discussed first. I already created a subsection devoted to this (the previous section). When we finish, a famine issue will be much easier to resolve, because in the article that avoid unjustified generalizations, each famine will be discussed in a historical context. For example, in the "Stalinism" section two major famines will be discussed, and the question if Soviet famine (1932-33) was genocide will be discussed (the post-war famine is not considered mass killing by majority sources). In the "Maoism" section, Great Leap forward famine will be discussed, and the emphasis will be made on the works of famine experts (O'Grada and others), not on political journalism.
Changing the structure of the article will resolve not only famine problem, but most other problems, and no cosmetic changes can resolve anything.
We need to answer the first, major question:
"Since majority of literature discuss Communist regimes either separately (for example, only Stalinism, but not Khmer Rouge), or compare ONE Communist regime with ONE non-Communist regime (for example, Stalinism vs Nazism, or Cambodian genocide vs Indonesian genocide), how can we incorporate all these sources into the article without engaging in original research?"
My answer is simple: by reorganizing the article to avoid unjustified generalizations.
Do you agree, and are you ready to discuss that? Paul Siebert (talk) 15:06, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Regarding the sources, I can quote the David-Fox opinion (taken from the article cited above) where he reiterates the viewpoint made by other authors:
"In the context of the Soviet-Nazi comparison Stephen Wheatcroft insisted before the publication of The Black Book on the relevance of distinguishing between "purposive killing" and "deaths from criminal neglect and irresponsibility." In response to The Black Book, Hiroaki Kuromiya has criticized the results when "'indirect deaths' are indiscriminately lumped together with deliberate political killings." "
Even if we include these sources into the text and leave the structure of the article unchanged, it will look like these authors represent minority viewpoint, and the mainstream viewpoint is the one expressed by Rummel or Valentino. However, that is not the case, because one has to distinguish between political journalism and scholarly sources.
To check if I am right, make a simple experiment:
1. Make a google scholar search using "Great Leap Forward famine" [5]. The first ten results include, among others, articles authored by o'Grada, Sen, Devereux, and others. And these are the sources a neutral Wikipedian should rely upon if they decided to write the article about this subject de novo.
2. Do the same search using "democide" as a key word. You will get this: [6]
3. Now do this (democide + O'Grada) [7] Only TWO (very obscure) sources that mention a domocide concept cite O'Grada, which means this experiment demonstrates two "parallel Universes" exist, and one group of authors simply ignore the works written by others. In that situation, whom you will be trust more? When I have some specific disease, I would prefer to visit a narrow specialist, not a general doctor, right? Why a situation is different in this case?
Again, if we want to write a good article on that subject, we should devote a due attention to what real specialists write about that, and than to add a separate section to explain some authors see a significant commonality between these events (supplemented by criticism of those views).Paul Siebert (talk) 15:57, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
No. And as this has been discussed a few times, I doubt iteration will affect consensus. "Original Research" does not occur when we list nations separately as to deaths without making any connections other than what the sources used state. The article, thus, contains no "OR". Collect (talk) 15:37, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
Yes, currently, the article does not contain significant amount of OR. It has a different problem, NPOW. An undue weight is given to a single viewpoint, and to fix it we either need to do OR (which is unacceptable), or to change the structure.Paul Siebert (talk) 16:00, 8 May 2018 (UTC)


For those who worry about WP:NPOV, I suggest examining Anti-communist mass killings where the types of views being sought to be placed in this article are in full abundance. I fear that adopting the premises of that article here are far off the mark. Collect (talk) 23:24, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

Alas, Collect, I didn't find any source there that should be reflected in the MKuCR article. I don't think the views represented there are too relevant to the subject of our discussion. That Communists were being killed adds nothing to the subject we are discussing (except the fact that Communists killed during civil wars are also included into a "Communist death toll", because it happened under Communist rule).
By the way, Anti-communist mass killings is organized in a simple and straightforward way. It makes no undue generalizations. Indeed, anti-Communism is neither an ideology nor a political movement: both humanistic liberals and Nazi can be anti-Communists. From the point of view of Wikipedia it is pretty acceptable. The subject of that article is also pretty clear: it describes killing (literal killing, not famine, not disease) of those who call themselves "Communists" by those whose intention was to kill Communists. The primary driving force behind those killing was always clear: people who hated Communism killed Communists because they were real or perceived Communists.
In contrast, MKuCR's subject is a totally vague. Why did Khmer Rouge kill Vietnamese or Chinese compatriots? The books devoted to this subject specifically give three totally different reasons, and only one of them was "because Khmers were poor and others were rich". Why did Mao organized famine? Famine scholars conclude that happened because China was so poor that famine was a very common event, and any irresponsible step (especially an economic experiment it the country with destroyed statistical system) might lead to a major famine. Was that a mass killing? Majority of authors disagree. Was that done in purpose? Only few authors believe in that. Do these two events have anything in common? Majority authors doubt in that: Mao tried to accelerate urbanisation of his peasant country, Pol Pot was aggressively trying to de-urbanise Camboda. I am asking again the question formulated by David-Fox: is the fact that Pol Pot was studying Marxism in Paris sufficient to make any generalisations?
One way or the another, your analogy is not working.
-Paul Siebert (talk) 23:49, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
By the way, Collect, I've just realized what have you done. You explained your vision of my point of view, thereby adding a useful information to our common knowledge domain. Now I understand better what do you think about my intentions. Good. One more step towards consensus.
To dispel possible misunderstanding, I do not propose to convert the MKuCR article in something like Anti-communist mass killings. My plans are different: to move all generalizations into a separate section, to put every event in a historical context, to explain the mechanism of the onset of each mass killing, and to remove a combined figures from the lead. Briefly, that is how I see the article.-Paul Siebert (talk) 00:36, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
What you have, indeed, done is to add much verbiage (27K characters in a short period) sans convincing others of the validity of your positions, which you have clearly enunciated often on this talk page. Other than your stated intention in the past to delete the entire article, which you have not iterated now, I know nothing about your "intentions", only what Wikipedia requires by policy. The purpose of WP:CONSENSUS is to find middle ground. Collect (talk) 10:12, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
Collect, since you have mentioned our policy, let me point out that, whereas my posts are made with intention to improve the article, this your post is a comment on the editor. Which is against the policy. Regarding my intention, you misunderstand it. I propose (and was always proposing) not to delete the content, but to reorganize it.
Regarding middle ground, I am not sure you are right (WP:VOTE). Three outcomes are possible: you convince me, I covince you, or we may develop some new idea. So far, I see mostly "I object" from you (with minimal explanations). Have you been more collaborative, there would be probably no need in most of my posts. Paul Siebert (talk) 13:58, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
"remove a combined figures from the lead." That isn't happening. Combined figures have been presented by scholarly sources (not the best scholarly sources, maybe, but still, folks with credentials). Ergo, unless you can provide evidence that those are fringe viewpoints, they need to be mentioned. Of course, those views have also received critique in weighty sources; those are, at the moment, still missing from the lead. But neutrality isn't about eliminating stuff that's been critiqued, it's about presenting all reliable views, duly weighted. Which, once again, means you (Paul Siebert) need to provide sources rather than lengthy explanations; else you're not going to get anywhere. I honestly don't know why I have to keep repeating this. Vanamonde (talk) 11:13, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
I have already provided scholarly sources that explicitly criticise this viewpoint. That is not sufficient to remove combined figures from the article (and that is not my intention, by the way), but is quite sufficient to remove them from the lead and put it into the section specially devoted to that.
If you think the figures should be in the lead (again, I do not say they should be removed from the artcile), per WP:BURDEN you are supposed to prove that they reflect a scholarly consensus. You yourself admitted the source is maybe not the best one, and the sources available to me (according to our formal criteria, they are very good secondary sources) openly say Courtois' introduction from the BB (where the figures were taken from) is "provocative", and the way the figures are presented is very controversial. Some authors believe the attempt Courtois made are the result of Vichy syndrome, and others directly say the goal is to understate the evil nature of Nazism.
Do you really think the source described as provocative can be used in introduction? Interestingly, whereas I presented the sources that criticize the BB (and similar views), nobody presented the sources that criticize theh sources presented by me.
By the way, you may be interested to read this [8]. Snyder is a specialist in XXth century European history, and this article is based on his own research. -Paul Siebert (talk) 13:58, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
Vanamonde, in addition to that, try to think about the following. If you look, for example, at the Holodomor article, you will see that the estimates of the death toll range from 1.8 to 12 million (about 1000% uncertainty !). The question is still a subject of debates between specialists. Do you think Great Leap Famine figures are known better? I don't believe so, taking into account the state of Chinese statistics during those times. Specialists are still working meticulously in archives, but why? Courtois (who is not a specialist in demography or famine) had already made this job in mid 1990s: we know the death toll with astonishingly high precision (from 85 to 100 million, and at least a half of them are Soviet and Chinese famine victims). Don't you find it ridiculous that an obsolete and provocative source (the BB) is presented in the article as a summary of modern views? -- Paul Siebert (talk) 14:43, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
Okay, you really need to take it slow. I haven't said the figures should be in the lead, and I haven't said they are well known. I'm not required to show anything per WP:BURDEN because I haven't yet advocated for a position here. I'm trying to get you to work in a manner that would allow us to build consensus, and in a manner that will not result in the article being locked again. You've consistently missed the point on this. Whether you like it or not, the article isn't going to change substantially without consensus being built here. You need to provide a specific, actionable, proposal, otherwise you're going to get ignored, as you have been already. That's all. Vanamonde (talk) 06:07, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
Vanamonde, to build consensus is exactly what I want, and I already explained how I want to achieve that: I am sincerely explaining what I think, and what sources my thinking is based on, and what I think about your thinking, and you do the same. After several rounds we, per Aumann, inevitably come to consensus. From your last post, I conclude I misunderstood your position, and, frankly, that is partially because you yourself were not absolutely clear. I mention BURDEN, because I thought you were advocating some concrete position, that is good that I was wrong. Do I understand correct you agree that the figures are presented in the lead in a very misleading and provocative way, and they should be moved from the lead to more appropriate place in the article, and placed into a more appropriate context (description of the debates over the BB)?
--Paul Siebert (talk) 14:03, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
Since you ask, I believe we should be looking to present a variety of estimates in the lead, from the best and most nuanced sources we can find. These include many of the chapters within the BBOC, but I believe the introduction does not fall into this category; I've enumerated the problems with this myself, in a previous talk page discussion (maybe two years ago). My point, though, is that if you wish to engage anyone besides Collect and myself, you're going to have to present a specific proposal. My suggestion for such a proposal would be to propose replacing Malia with estimates from several authors, but authors whose works are in depth studies rather than sweeping attempts at summary. Vanamonde (talk) 14:08, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
Before starting to discuss any specific proposal, I need to be sure people are agree to participate in this discussion. From Collect's posts I assume he is not. Besides you, AmateurEditor will participate, but they will join us later (from his talk page, I conclude they are busy now).
As I has already explained, the problem is deeper than you think. If you read the sources I am referring to, their main concern is not that figures are incorrect, but that figures (whatever small or big they are) are misleading: it is fundamentally incorrect to combine all deaths in one category, because the conclusion a reader might draw from that may be totally wrong. MKuCR, in contrast to the Holocaust, were not a single event, and majority historians simply do not believe such a subject exists as a single topic. I already gave an example of gscholar search (look at my post on 15:57, 8 May 2018), and you will see that at least two groups of authors exist: one group is studying, for example, Chinese famine (about 40% of all "MKuCR" victims) as a separate historical event, and these authors do not describe it as a mass killing. These scholars are renown historians and good famine experts, and they totally ignore the writings of another group of authors who are pushing a totally different idea: that all mass mortality events in Communist countries were mass killings, and the primary reason was some "generic Communism". Again, these two groups of authors live in two "parallel universes", they almost ignore each other, and I prefer to trust to the authors from the first group.
Do you know why? Because, if I were a Wikipedian without any previous knowledge of this subject who decided to write this article from scratch, and I wanted to find neutral sources, I wouldn't type "Communist AND mass AND killing" in google, but ""mass mortality" and Communist" in google.SCHOLAR. The first search gives a reference to Rummel, but when you read him[[9]], you will see all sources he use are more than 30 years old. He himself was old, he died in 2014, and it is quite likely his data are obsolete. The second search gives much more modern sources, and, taking into account that google scholars screens out most non-academic sources, you can hope these results are of better quality and more balanced. To understand if Rummel is not outdated (that may be, for example, everybody knows and respects Solzhenitsyn, but no modern scholars trust his figures), you look for reviews on Rummel's works in jstor[[10]]. And the first thing you find are the works that criticize Rummel's methodological flaws.
Which sources would you trust more in that situation?--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:01, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
Regarding "we should be looking to present a variety of estimates in the lead," I can say, there is no dispute about the estimate of number of apples. What actually happens, some authors decided to combine apples and oranges in one category that they call "apples". Other authors prefer to speak about apples and oranges separately, and these authors seem to be much better (according to formal credentials).
There was a long dispute between Rosefielde and Wheatcroft on mass mortality under Stalinist rule, and both authors are knowledgeable in this area. In this dispute, they were putting forward serious arguments, and their opinia should be treated seriously. However, later, Rosefielde decided make generalizations, proposing the idea of Red Holocaust in what is claimed to be ("a comprehensive study of the transcommunist holocaust"). However, Rosefielde is not a specialist in history of other Communist countries, and there are many other authors who study Chinese or Cambodian history, whose views do not fit Rosefielde's paradigm. They do not speak about MKuCR, they would probably disagree with this concept, but they prefer to focus on their own topic (like Wheatcroft) and not discuss the MCuCR concept in general.
--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:21, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Four different levels of data presentation

This article discusses a very complex group of subjects, but it present it in an absolutely superficial and provocative way. To demonstrate that, let me take a deeper look at one aspect of MKuCR, the Great Soviet famine of 1932-33. Four levels of discussion are possible.

  • Level one. A large group of scholars study this famine, and the debates are concentrated on the amount of victims (estimates range from roughly two million to twelve) and on intentionality (was it intentional, was it directed against Ukrainians, was it a genocide? There is still no consensus about that, but the level of argumentation is high, the discussion is very deep.
  • Level two. The scholars who study Stalinism (even not Soviet Communism in general) are working on estimates of the number of victims, and the mechanism of repressions. They prefer to study Stalinism as a separate phenomenon, and they consider Communism just as one factor that potentially explains the deaths. Below is a quote from Timoty Snyder (who compares Hitler and Stalin, not Communism and Nazism, the link has already been provided):
"Beyond the numbers killed remains the question of intent. Most of the Soviet killing took place in times of peace, and was related more or less distantly to an ideologically informed vision of modernization. Germany bears the chief responsibility for the war, and killed civilians almost exclusively in connection with the practice of racial imperialism. "
"All in all, the Germans deliberately killed about 11 million noncombatants, a figure that rises to more than 12 million if foreseeable deaths from deportation, hunger, and sentences in concentration camps are included. For the Soviets during the Stalin period, the analogous figures are approximately six million and nine million. These figures are of course subject to revision, but it is very unlikely that the consensus will change again as radically as it has since the opening of Eastern European archives in the 1990s. Since the Germans killed chiefly in lands that later fell behind the Iron Curtain, access to Eastern European sources has been almost as important to our new understanding of Nazi Germany as it has been to research on the Soviet Union itself. (The Nazi regime killed approximately 165,000 German Jews.)"
  • Level three. The authors who study the USSR in general, summarize the death toll without going into much details. The example is Nicolas Werth, although his works are still of a good quality.
  • Level four. The authors, like Courtois or Rummel, who pushi quite simple and superficial views, take published data and non-critically stockpile all numbers together in the same category. Sometimes, the authors whose data they use directly object to that (there was a conflict between Werth and Courtois about that), sometimes they simply ignore it.

I believe everybody understand this article has been written from the point of view of the authors from the fourth group, the most superficial group. --Paul Siebert (talk) 17:24, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Peer Review Results

If this article needs anything, it's more dispassionate input from uninvolved editors. In that spirit, I put this article up for peer review last month. The result of the review, which garnered one comment, can be found here. The reviewer, Gen. Quon, stated the following, which I present here for our discussion.

In the "Proposed causes" section, I think Rummel's argument is really interesting, but the article jumps from "ideology" to "religion" rather quickly. Is there any way this can bridged a bit better? While I don't necessarily disagree with Rummel, I know that a lot of people would object to calling Marxist-Leninist communism a "religion". Perhaps you can mention what Rummel's understanding of/criteria for religion is? Or perhaps this is beyond the scope of the article?

-schetm (talk) 02:11, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

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