Talk:Nobuko Yoshiya

Potential violations of neutrality in the description of a person's activities

I remind you that even if the source uses some expression, we do not have to copy it. Firstly, because Wikipedia takes a neutral point of view, while sources, even if they are authoritative, can be non-neutral to a certain extent. Secondly, in order to understand the context, we need a quote from which you took this statement. At the moment, this expression seems to be nonsense, since it is quite obvious that a Japanese military correspondent in the Sino-Japanese War, especially those of patriotic views (which Yoshiya never hid), will describe events in the key desired for his country. Special attention to this can also be a violation of neutrality, as it gives an emotional coloring to controversial events. Solaire the knight (talk) 18:41, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

1. To give just one source, "Kabuki's Forgotten War" by James R. Brandon.

2. Your statements "Potential violations of neutrality", "nonsense", "violation of neutrality" and "emotional coloring to controversial events" are your personal and emotional interpretations and non-WP:POV, contrary to the source given and the statement in the article the sense of which you falsified with your first revert (war correspondents can write endorsingly or critically of the events, while the government's expectation of pen butai members clearly was to write endorsingly). Please don't insinuate your behaviour onto others, and please leave the statement be, as you did with your revert of your revert (which, by the way, resulted in incorrect grammar). Otherwise it could be regarded WP:EW with according results. Many thanks, Robert Kerber (talk) 19:20, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I asked for a quote from which you took this definition, a simple link name is not enough. Do I understand correctly from your answer that you are deliberately ignoring my words and are further set up for confrontation? In that case, I'll just revert my edit and refuse any compromise if you refuse to make one on your end. I still don't got any answer from you as to why we should blindly copy definitions from sources despite their non-neutrality, or in what situations a right-wing war correspondent in an imperialist country at war might write a critical and neutral review of military operations (even your own article you link to describes it as an expectedly pro-government organization). And I also warn you in advance that I will not tolerate references to (or threats of) rules in lieu of argument. Solaire the knight (talk) 19:31, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

The sentence in the article does not appear to be "copying" any "definition", but rather is briefly describing the pen butai. From pages 128-129 in the Routledge ref cited for that sentence (after it lists a bunch of writers involved in setting up the organization):

These novelists were all mostly authors of popular fiction, which, as we have seen above, often told stories of the heroic deeds of Japan's boys at war. These writers now became complicit with the aims and methods of the Japanese war machine due to their deep involvement with it: in the words of Kamiya Tadataka, 'from this point on the military controlled writers'. Tsuzuki Hisayoshi notes that by late 1937, over twenty writers had been sent to China alone to report on the war but that they generally arrived after the fighting was over, and their articles concentrated on the pacified territories. He also observed that in this early stage of the war their writings generally reflected the true state of affairs, which is the reason why, for example, Ishikawa Tatsuzō’s (1905–1985) famous novel on the war Soldiers Alive (Ikiteiru heitai, 1938) was so heavily censored (Tsuzuki 1997: 154–5).

WP:NPOV states that Wikipedia's neutral point-of-view means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic. We don't try to hide or "neutralize" the sources' POVs, but we do try to keep our own personal bias out of our summary. It seems reasonable for the article to summarize pen butai as a government organisation of authors who travelled to the front during the Second Sino-Japanese War to write favourably about Japan's war efforts in China. since their work was censored to achieve the Cabinet Intelligence Office's goals. Schazjmd (talk) 22:32, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

No one suggested to censoring anything. Moreover, I explicitly wrote that I find the biased description of what these authors saw as a fairly obvious consequence. The issue was that the user explicitly stated to me that he moved this into the article because it was supposedly a description of the source. That is why I asked for at least a quote where it was used. But before your comment, I never saw the fulfillment of my request, only the repetition of a link to the source itself and an unambiguous indication that the user perceives a dispute with him as hostility towards him. In that case, if it turns out that this assessment is a conclusion based on the source, and not a direct quote from it (not to mention that the quoted fragment confirms my position that the oppositional opinion would be censored even if the author had the courage), then I suggest replacing it with "pro-government" or something like a more literary version. Favorable suggests they had a choice, and sounds too mild to describe an overtly propaganda government organization. Solaire the knight (talk) 22:48, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't think "favourably" implies a choice. I don't see any problem with the sentence as it is. Schazjmd (talk) 23:00, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

While I see and consider this an unsuccessful wording. Not to mention that the expectation of biased reviews is self-evident in this case. What will we do next? Solaire the knight (talk) 23:05, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I have no idea what you mean by Not to mention that the expectation of biased reviews is self-evident in this case. Schazjmd (talk) 23:08, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Same as what I meant many times before. The biased nature of the government war correspondents of the warring imperialist country is obvious. Especially when we are talking about an author who has never hidden her right-wing views. Therefore, in this case, I consider the word "favorable" as an unnecessary additional emphasis on an already obvious thing. Solaire the knight (talk) 23:22, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

You have objected to "favourably" for being non-neutral, being too obvious, and being too mild. At this point, I don't know why you're objecting so vehemently to that one word, but this discussion is no longer a productive use of my time. Have a good day. Schazjmd (talk) 23:25, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I can ask you and the author of this paragraph a similar question, since defending the presence of this word in an article really becomes an inexplicably personal matter. I did not add this text and I do not undermine any attempts to discuss it. And yes, it is obvious, but at the same time non-neutral, although mild. For example, speaking of this as biased and propaganda, I used harsher words. Solaire the knight (talk) 23:36, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

The word seems to better explain the purpose of pen butai to me. I'm not convinced it's "obvious", various government initiatives at various times have claimed to simply want accurate and fair reporting of whatever the government is doing rather than explicitly favourable coverage. While it's generally disputed if they actually achieved that, it seems this is not such a case and the plan was explicitly for favourable coverage. If you're saying it's obvious that the Japanese government would do that in 1938, that requires way too much specific knowledge to be "obvious". Nil Einne (talk) 23:47, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Thank God. I'm glad that finally someone is trying to discuss this and not accuse me of being hostile because I questioned it or just keep repeating "I don't see this as a problem". I'm fine with this answer, thanks. Solaire the knight (talk) 00:02, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for clarifying that, User:Schazjmd and User:Nil Einne. Just for the records, here is the quote from Brandon's Kabuki's Forgotten War which I mentioned above and directly served as basis for my wording (which the other given sources support): "The army and navy extended rare privileges to Pen Brigade members […] In return they were expected to write favorable reports of their experiences". Robert Kerber (talk) 06:58, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

So, all this time, you really have the necessary quote? Which could have easily extinguished any potential for dispute and ended this dialogue in a few minutes, but you chose not to when I asked you to quote a source and only ended up publishing a quote when the dialogue ended in conflict and several hours of mutual accusations? I have no words. Solaire the knight (talk) 07:48, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I gave the source where you could have looked it up. (And even more by linking to the pen butai article where there are more sources to find.) You had made a nonsensical edit in the first place (clearly explained by other editors above and over at the the administrators' board). You then reverted my revert, and in the wake made one allegiation and manipulation of facts and even threats (on my talk page) after another while at the same time accusing me of behaviour which you showed against me. All this is well documented here and over at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Open mindset for confrontation and threats. Now again you manipulate facts by pretending that I was the one who behaved in a destructive manner.

For these reasons, I refuse talking to you in the future, and anything you have to say regarding my person I will ONLY accept via the administrator's board – everything else I will regard as WP:HARASS. Robert Kerber (talk) 08:16, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

I originally only asked you for a quote because I didn't have a chance to verify the source. And if you hadn’t refused to discuss anything back then, this entire dispute would have been resolved in a couple of minutes and forgotten. And now it's too late to talk about anything. Invaluable time has been lost irretrievably, and even more so I do not want to have any more business with you. Solaire the knight (talk) 08:23, 25 July 2023 (UTC)