Talk:Peoples Temple in San Francisco/old merged article talk

Political alliances

I see that as a response to an issue on a non-PT page, a new article has been created to discuss political alliances and Peoples Temple. While I have no fundamental issues with that creation, it certainly would have been proper procedure for the creator to have broached the subject on this page prior to cutting a large amount of this (Talk:Peoples Temple) article for the new page. But then apparently, because some of us aren't involved in the other dispute, our opinions aren't warranted for changes here. This isn't how things are supposed to be done on Wikipedia. Bad form. This message is being left on the old page, Peoples Temple. Wildhartlivie (talk) 04:57, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Let's not scold each other or fork the discussion. I've responded over at Talk:Peoples Temple. Wikidemo (talk) 05:13, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I generally agree with Wildhartlivie here, but the issue of the mere mention of support for Jones and the Temple frankly appears to be so inflammatory that it has caused tremendous repeated attempts to scour at least one page (Harvey Milk) of all such mentions. I'm not talking quotes, but even just the most basic mere mentions of its factual existence.

The proper course likely would have been to begin a discussion over what to do. Bluntly speaking, look what happened were attempts were made to discuss and modify the section in the Milk article (see Talk page). Every single one was simply outright deleted.

Descriptions of supporting the Temple and attacking those attempting to extricate relatives from Jonestown probably should be included in the page of the politician conducting that activity. Unless someone wants to re-add even just tiny summary material daily in some kind "edit war", that likely won't be the case, at least for Milk.

As mentioned, on the Milk page, every single reference to Milk's support of Jones and Milk's attacking the concerned relatives has been scoured from the page. It has been repeatedly deleted in every form. The page is now locked because of that activity.

By saying this, I don't wish to bring the dispute here. Rather, this appears to be the effective reality of attempting to add mentions of the matter. Mosedschurte (talk) 05:21, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Names

This article should be titled Political alliances of Peoples Temple. Per WP:NAME#Lowercase, alliances shouldn't be capitalized, and the organization is Peoples Temple. Wildhartlivie (talk) 05:56, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I noticed the apostrophe error, as well, but I'm not sure how to change it. Mosedschurte (talk) 05:58, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

The article and talk page have to be moved to a new page, then either redirect the current pages or request they be deleted. Wildhartlivie (talk) 09:05, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Milk section

I will only comment here on the Milk section as that is where I spent time researching. This section is quite POV problematic and I'll try to address specific concerns in hopes that regular editors will adjust them as supported by reliable sources and keeping NPOV and Verifiability policies in mind.

• "Former" supervisor, he was a SF Supervisor up until his assassination.
• Section implies Milk was a major endorser or supporter of Jones/PT; he was not. He was a political candidate who received support from Jones through the PT volunteers at the same time the other candidate in the race, Art Agnos did.
• Milk though Jones/PT were weird and dangerous from the beginnings of his dealings with them and instructed his campaign people to always be extra polite to them. This also could account for why Milk made appearances, along with other politicians, at PT events and wrote letters of support of Jones/PT.
• Adding extra material about those who died seemingly tying Milk to these deaths or inferring he was at fault or didn't care in some way is POV
• Extra quotes inferring Milk's glowing support for Jones/PT imply more of a political alliance than existed. Reliable sources about Milk's life do not support these implications. If they did, fine, but they do not.
• The "Letter Addressed to President Jimmy Carter, Dated February 19" might be a reliable source but its use here seems overblown with quotes and no other context. Do we have any proof this was read or had any impact? Do any reliable sources note Milk's letter as being notable, at all, in any way?

I applaud the efforts to bring this material into line with policies and encourage editors to find reliable sourcing for all content presented. Banjeboi 11:01, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I didn't write this article, but I have just spent time checking the statements made in the Milk section against the references given. So the use of the word "Former" should be removed. That's fine. However, there is a reliable source for each and every other statement made in this section. The quotes are directly from checkable sources. The letters written, the statements made, all check with the references. How then can it be POV? I note the comment above that says "This also could account for why Milk made appearances, along with other politicians, at PT events and wrote letters of support of Jones/PT." That would be conjecture that isn't supported by properly sourced materials.

The letter to the President is also cc'd to two representatives and the lieutenant governor. It doesn't matter whether the president read it, believed it or not, or that it had an impact. Milk wrote it in support of Peoples Temple, cc'd it to others. The paragraph makes no further claims other than this. The wording of the letter is strongly supportive of Jones. If Milk were only trying to pay lip service to Jones and the Temple, then the letter need not have been sent to four places nor used wording like "man of the highest character."

As for connections to those who died, Milk appeared to have written the letter to directly address the activities of the Stoens, who did lead Concerned Relatives, and their efforts against Jones. He also directly referenced Timothy Stoen, who in fact did die in Jonestown. The letter is relevant in that it supported Jones and the Temple, and condemned the Stoens. That supporting Jim Jones and Peoples Temple was not a good thing in retrospect, history can't be rewritten. I'm sure Milk regretted his support, as did Jerry Brown. There are likely thousands of people who wished they'd done something more, or different. Then again, how could anyone have predicted how things would turn out?

It isn't good faith to imply that this section is slanted against Milk. It's very straightforward in its presentation. However, just because it isn't politically grand that Milk did support Jones at one time, it doesn't make writing about an attempt to smear Milk, it doesn't imply he didn't care about the deaths or is connected to them, nor is it POV. Do you have a reliable quote somewhere, such as is neutrally presented in the Willie Brown section, that says Milk regrets his support? I'm absolutely sure that such would happily be included in this section. Wildhartlivie (talk) 12:38, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

POV speaks to context. Unless we have a reliable source stating why he wrote the letter we simply don't know, do we have proof it's real? Do we have evidence that it was sent, recieved, rad or had any impact on anything. I don't think we do yet were implying it had some large significance by it's inclusion and breadth covered. here is a quote from the Times of Harvey Milk

“ Make sure you're always nice to the Peoples Temple. If they ask you to do something, do it, and then send them a note thanking them for asking you to do it. They're weird and they're dangerous, and you never want to be on their bad side. -- Harvey Milk ”

This seems to suggest that Milk was wary of them before he was ever involved with them and this quote predates all the strong support we seem to claim. This was pointed out previously but has quite conveniently missed being included. This seems to cast doubt on everything presented in the section. If Milk's words are to be accepted for his glowing endorsements perhaps we should also take into account why he would have done anything in support of them at all. By his own words "They're weird and they're dangerous, and you never want to be on their bad side." Again this is also a POV problem as well as a verifiability issue. I'm not suggesting something can't be included but as presently written it suggests that Milk was an ardent supporter when instead it seems he did nothing but what other politicians were doing. He gained nothing but what others also gained - we also fail to mention Agnos also was getting support from Jones/PT in the same election against Milk. Banjeboi 13:30, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

No, we do not have to have a source to state why Milk wrote a letter to anyone, and to suggest we have to supply motivation is disingenuous. Whether Milk was wary of them or not did not deter him from attending political rallies at the Temple, support the Temple, and write letters to Jones and to others. It's a huge stretch for you to suggest that because he was wary that he wouldn't be involved with them. By your own Milk quote, he endorsed working with them. It does not cast doubt on anything, and it does not present a verifiability issue. However, it would be original research and beyond the scope of an encyclopedic article to try and create a "why he did it." The letter is sourced. The personal notes to Jones are sourced. I would suggest that it is your point of view that the brief paragraphs on Milk say he was an ardent supporter and no, the letter to Carter isn't given undue weight. It has a brief paragraph, covering but a small amount of the content. To me, Milk's statement has an underlying message that it's good to have this group on our side, so we'll use them, and we'll cater to them whether we like them or not. That isn't unlike a politician. I can't speak to why the other politician isn't covered in this article, but perhaps it is because the materials aren't as available, and he isn't as widely known as some of the others. You can't whitewash Milk out of involvement with Peoples Temple. It's covered in more than one place, and in more than one source. The section does not say that Milk continued any support after the events in Guyana, nor would it. Meanwhile, I have sent requests to a couple places seeking further verification of the letter to Carter. Wildhartlivie (talk) 14:47, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with this.

What is stated in the article is not the veracity of the matters asserted or their motivation. Just that they were asserted.

In fact, this is commonplace for the vast majority of statements by article subjects contained in Wikipedia. An investigation into the veracity and/or the writer's state of mind at the time of any statement can be a useful addition to the article in some instances. In most cases, such analyses are not provided.

Interestingly, in this article, one might look to the Moscone section -- in particular the explanation of Moscone's former press secretary Busch -- for some motivation. Busch viewed Jones and the Temple as a powerful political tool. I didn't place mention of this in the Milk section because I'm not sure Busch has any association with Milk (anyone know?) and Milk's political personnel may not have viewed Jones in the same light. I really don't know either way.

Benjiboi's statement that the Life and Times quote "This seems to cast doubt on everything presented in the section" is incredibly odd. It does nothing of the sort unless it casts doubt on whether Milk made the statements in the section, which it does not. Wikipedia is not the place for some political battle over the subject's character. It is merely a recounting of the events. If anything, Milk's Life and Times quotes adds to our knowledge of the events. Mosedschurte (talk) 16:15, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

As a heads up, I deleted the "former" in front of Milk's title and added the Life and Times quote in the article provided by Benjiboi above because I thought it added interesting insight into Milk's possible mindset. Anyone have a date on when Milk stated that? Mosedschurte (talk) 17:15, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Many of these sources are mischaracterized and the end of the section seems to dump responsibility on Milk for the death of the child. This is POV editing not sticking to WP:NPOV policy. To be fair I don't expect these concerns to be addressed as they haven't up to this point and, in fact, have seem rather reluctant to omit what, IMHO, seems scandalistic reporting. As if Milk was somehow responsible for "the over 900 who died" including the "the six year old son of Timothy and Grace Stoen, John Stoen, who was found poisoned in Jim Jones' cabin". Just because something happened does not, in itself, make it notable or worth putting in an encyclopedic article. And showing that a letter was written and then extrapolating that as an attack letter and then leaping into other areas, yikes. Please clean this up. And your source for the Milk quote (New York Times) doesn't contain that quote, it's in "The Life and Times of Harvey Milk", a biography on Milk which generally disputes most of this great support Milk gave to Jones and vice versa. Banjeboi 03:24, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Re "Many of these sources are mischaracterized and the end of the section seems to dump responsibility on Milk for the death of the child."

This is not only incorrect, but rather silly. The last paragraph does not even mention Harvey Milk. It instead states what happened to the relatives of the Concerned Relatives, including John Stoen. This is both factual and neutrally stated.

Re: "IMHO, seems scandalistic reporting. Re: As if Milk was somehow responsible for 'the over 900 who died'"

That you're even making such a charge is quite revealing.

Re: "And showing that a letter was written and then extrapolating that as an attack letter and then leaping into other areas, yikes. "

There is zero "extrapolated" from the letter. However, in response to this comment, I have deleted the word attack, stating instead that Milk made statements about the CR leaders in the topic sentence.

Re: "And your source for the Milk quote (New York Times) doesn't contain that quote, it's in "The Life and Times of Harvey Milk", a biography on Milk which generally disputes most of this great support Milk gave to Jones and vice versa."

I fixed the cite (the publisher and dates were wrong). You stated that this is in the "Times of Harvey Milk" above, which is a documentary. That's what is in the article now. The Life and Times of Harvey Milk is a biographical book. Mosedschurte (talk) 03:43, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

The quote is in the book - The Life and Times of Harvey Milk, I doubt it's in any movie as this was a minor aspect of Milk's political life. You wouldn't know it by reading the section as it is now but at least my requests to address these concerns are also in print. Banjeboi 22:47, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

I share Benjiboi's concerns after reading this article and overhauling Milk's. The political machinations and makeup of San Francisco in the 1970s have been oversimplified to such an extent that the information at least in Milk's section seems a collection of synthesized facts taken out of context. For example, while it's true that Milk received almost 50 sympathy notes about the suicide of his ex-lover, it should be noted that he and his aides were creeped out pretty significantly because all of them were the same word for word.

This article would improve dramatically if background on the politics of San Francisco were included, especially the changing face of the city that ushered out most African Americans and other blue collar middle-class workers, and consolidated most of the rest of them into the Peoples Temple, giving Jones a tremendous voice in city politics. The article begins with the assumed foresight that Jones was well-known by all to be a megalomanical menace to all he knew. However, only by a horrible hindsight can we highlight all the red flags everyone should have seen to put together a picture that was incomprehensible on November 17, 1978.

Technically, the references need to be cleaned up with ref name tags, and split into a Bibliography section and a Citations section. Willie Brown is still a BLP: I would be very careful how this section is sourced and the information used. Due to the lack of thorough background information, the dependence upon a primary book source, and print media easily found by Google, I do not consider these comprehensive or completely reliable as a whole. They tell pockets and snippets of a story, which makes for an article with many holes in it. Information on Jones is pervasive and can top sensationalist. There appear to be Jones enthusiasts (if such a person can exist) at work on this article. To clear up these POV and Synth problems, it will be absolutely imperative for better references to be used to tell the entire story. The article cannot be harmed by many editors checking out books from the library to answer the questions that continue to arise. --Moni3 (talk) 03:18, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Re "it should be noted that he and his aides were creeped out pretty significantly because all of them were the same word for word."

--I agree if that's accurate. That would be an interesting fact to add (and not particularly surprising). If you can find a source for it, adding it would certainly add interesting information to the article.

Re "This article would improve dramatically if background on the politics of San Francisco were included, especially the changing face of the city that ushered out most African Americans and other blue collar middle-class workers, and consolidated most of the rest of them into the Peoples Temple, giving Jones a tremendous voice in city politics."

--That would be interesting, but it's really not true. In fact, it's just flatly false. "Most of the rest of" African Americans in San Francisco were simply not "consolidated into the Peoples Temple." Jones certainly had some draw in the African American community, but he was one of just many San Francisco voices with significant African American support. Jones himself attempted to publicly inflate the size of the Temple beyond it's actual size.

Let's try to keep the article based on verifiable fact and not outlandish assertions.

Re "The article begins with the assumed foresight that Jones was well-known by all to be a megalomanical menace to all he knew."

--It most certainly does not. In fact, I'm not sure how that could even be vaguely implied given the support he received at first.

Re "Due to the lack of thorough background information, the dependence upon a primary book source, and print media easily found by Google, I do not consider these comprehensive or completely reliable as a whole. They tell pockets and snippets of a story, which makes for an article with many holes in it."

--I'm not sure how one can argue there are holes in an article that merely addresses the political alliances of the Peoples Temple and does so fairly comprehensively. Which major political alliances are not addressed? The article does not purport to describe the Temple itself or the politicians involved. Those are discussed in their respective articles.

--In addition, the cites are verifiable and primarily from major newspaper articles (NYT, SF Chronicle, etc.) and widely respected books (Reiterman's Raven, considered the most comprehensive work on the Temple by a San Francisco journalist who had long covered them; Seductive Poison, a book by a surviving inner circle member of the Temple itself, etc.).

Re "There appear to be Jones enthusiasts (if such a person can exist) at work on this article."

--If a "Jones enthusiast" exists in 2008, I've never met him and I'm not sure I'd want to meet him.

--Suggesting that the people who've added references to this article are "Jones enthusiasts" is especially troubling, and probably a violation of Wikipedia standards.

--Let's try to stick to the facts presented in a neutral encyclopedic manner and not attempt to brand others with derisive labels.Mosedschurte (talk) 05:15, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

I just added a brief Peoples Temple background section describing its origins and size, with a link to the Peoples Temple article.Mosedschurte (talk) 06:08, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

I think my points stand. Without a thorough discussion on how Jim Jones rose to political prominence, the article as it reads today states that Jonestown was a horrible tragedy, and the following individuals were tangentially involved with Jones, making it inherently POV and a story with huge holes in it. The article should start telling its story from a vantage before Jones became a head of the Peoples Temple in San Francisco, and how he became politically powerful bit by bit. What were the factors that allowed the church to grow so large? What was it about the Peoples Temple that made politicians go to them for votes? Why did Jones send his parishioners out to work the neighborhood politics in the city? The bulk of the article explaining how this happened is missing.

On my use of "Jones enthusiasts". Fair enough. I will leave it up to you to characterize yourself. These dark places in the human psyche tend to attract the fascinated. I assumed you were in their company and spoke out of turn. --Moni3 (talk) 06:32, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Re: "The article should start telling its story from a vantage before Jones became a head of the Peoples Temple in San Francisco, and how he became politically powerful bit by bit."

No one besides Jones ever headed up the Peoples Temple in San Francisco.

The Temple really didn't become "politically powerful bit-by-bit." In fact, the Temple only moved their operations to San Francisco right before the 1975 election. Jones quickly became a political hit thereafter, likely because of the number of members in his church that he'd built up for about 4 years prior in San Francisco. In terms of drawing members, they first came for a wide variety of reasons, some because of Jones' political message (like Tim Carter, for instance).

The number of members and his appeal likely is the reason locals began communicating with him, including Willie Brown, who put the Temple in contact with Moscone, and things quickly spiraled up from there. That is explained in the Willie Brown and Moscone sections of the article.

In addition, the Temple's backstory is contained in the Peoples Temple article. A brief summary is provided and a link to the main article on that subject is provided, as is standard on Wikipedia.Mosedschurte (talk) 07:04, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Articles should stand on their own without readers having to go to another for a thorough discussion of what belongs in the one they're currently reading. The Temple didn't form in a vacuum. Other factors were involved. What were they? --Moni3 (talk) 07:31, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Re: "Articles should stand on their own without readers having to go to another for a thorough discussion of what belongs in the one they're currently reading."

--It does. The "main" cite is for further information on the Temple should readers desire it. Much like the citation in the "9-11" article to "Planning_of_the_September_11_attacks", preceding only a very brief summary on the subject in the "9-11" article.

--The article rather comprehensively discusses its subject: "Political Alliances of the Peoples Temple."

Re: "The Temple didn't form in a vacuum. Other factors were involved. What were they?"

--No, but a summary of its formation, size and the reason for political desirability are included, while the details of its history are not necessary for an article specifically on the subject of "Political Alliances of the Peoples Temple."Mosedschurte (talk) 08:12, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

I added some more information regarding Milk's support an involvement, including some comments from a friend about Milk's true feelings about the Temple and the formulaic nature of the Jack Lira letters referred to above.Mosedschurte (talk) 01:53, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Conspiracy Theory tag

I object. There is no reason given for it, just to begin with.

Merger?

Rather than just proceeding to tag this page for merger, I'm going to float the proposal here first. Why should there be a separate article on the Peoples Temple's political alliances? Surely the alliances are part of the how the Temple operated? It would be much easier to maintain NPOV if everything relating to the Temple is kept in the main article. Itsmejudith (talk) 16:13, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Topical Reorganization

I took a stab at reorganizing the main body of the article by topic/event rather than by person. The topics are arranged in chronological order, though there is some overlap. I think this will greatly improve the flow of the article, as well as providing a more logical progression for the reader. The only topic heading that breaks out individuals is the "Activities at the Temple" section, largely because it was too lengthy and jumbled as a single section and each persons' visits were usually unrelated to others.Mosedschurte (talk) 08:21, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Milk section still POV

I'm restoring the POV tag. The section still is laden with apparent "evidence" that Milk was a huge fan of the church when reliable sources don't support this and instead all suggest Milk distrusted Jones but like all politicians got volunteer support from him. The information that he found them creepy, for instance, remains at the bottom of the section after all the glowing quotes from thank-you notes. Even if presented chronologically and NPOV, Milk's quote;

"Make sure you're always nice to the Peoples Temple. If they ask you to do something, do it, and then send them a note thanking them for asking you to do it. They're weird and they're dangerous, and you never want to be on their bad side."

From the beginning of his involvement should proceed any glowing notes praising the church and Jones.
The section also omits that Jones supported Milk only after he had already supported his opponent Art Agnos in the same race. -- Banjeboi 19:25, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

• Okay. I just changed the order of the section. It now leads with:

  ---

  After Harvey Milk's initial introduction to the Temple during his 1976 state assembly race, Milk felt that Temple members were odd and dangerous. When a Milk aide became wary of the Temple's large and imposing security force following a delivery of election pamphlets, Milk cautioned the aide "Make sure you're always nice to the Peoples Temple. If they ask you to do something, do it, and then send them a note thanking them for asking you to do it. They're weird and they're dangerous, and you never want to be on their bad side." Jim Rivaldo, a political consultant and associate of Milk's said that, after later meetings at the Temple, he and Milk agreed that "there was something creepy about it."

  ---

  Mosedschurte (talk) 21:24, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

• I also clarified that Jones called up apologizing for earlier backing Agnos and stated that he would send over campaign workers to work for Milk.Mosedschurte (talk) 19:43, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

• In addition, I added this footnote explaining that Milk's statement after his aides became wary of the Temple's odd imposing security force was quite on the money about that force:

  ---

  In a footnote: The statements of Milk would be foreboding. Members of the Temple's security force, which Jones called their "Red Brigade", would later kill four people, including Congressman Leo Ryan and NBC reporter Don Harris, with rifles and shotguns at an airstrip just outside of Jonestown. (Hall, John R. Gone from the Promised Land: Jonestown in American Cultural History. 1989. ISBN 978-0887388019. p. 278). Several others, including future member of Congress Jackie Speier, were also wounded in that attack. (Reiterman, Tim and John Jacobs. Raven: The Untold Story of Rev. Jim Jones and His People. Dutton, 1982. ISBN 0-525-24136-1. p. 525-32).

  ---

  Mosedschurte (talk) 22:18, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

I give up, I don't want to go through any of this anymore and I really don't want to see this article until it's completely rewritten. Good luck. -- Banjeboi 20:55, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

This Talk page is from an old article partially merged into this article.

There is no more Milk section in this new articleMosedschurte (talk) 13:10, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Merge discussion

• Propose merge. The alliances of the Peoples Temple are an intrinsic part of understanding the Temple itself. There is no reason for this to be a separate article, and keeping it separate is an invitation to POV-forking, coat-racking and WP:SYNTH in general. It should be merged back into Peoples Temple so that the Temple's various links can be seen in their historical context. Itsmejudith (talk) 21:56, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

• I definitely disagree at this point. In fact, as background I've actually been working to expand the Peoples Temple and Jim Jones articles, because they really don't include a lot of history prior to the Jonestown in them that's not even political. They used to cover close to no such information back when they weren't heavily sourced articles (and also contained conspiracy theories). That resulted in 20+ years of the most notorious cult in history and one of the most notorious Americans in history being glossed over, though all of the best literature (e.g., Raven, Hall, Moore, etc.) spends hundreds of pages on it. Right now, they just don't match the best literature on the topic. But that will mean expanding them. As an aside, I am also thinking about (haven't decided yet, and will start a discussion later) another article "Tragedy at Jonestown" which covers the final 3 days, so that the already very long Jonestown article can be expanded to focus more upon its history prior to November 15, 1978. The literature covers a lot of very odd and notable goings on then in Jonestown (founded in 1974), but the article really doesn't discuss them at all.

This article is definitely not WP:SYNTH -- these topics are covered at length (hundreds of pages) in the best sources on the topic, such as Raven (book), Hall and Moore, and also covered in lesser detail in Seductive Poison. The Temple was a group that existed in the U.S. and focused extensively on politics in its latter stages, so its domestic political ties were a large part of its existence. It's also certainly not WP:Coatrack, because the article is neither a "nominal" topic nor biased. Note also that there are articles on such historical figures as Hulk Hogan that completely dwarf this article.

These sorts of related articles are common for huge notable events and notorious groups with a long detailed history. Jones and the Temple orchestrated the largest such event involving U.S. civilians prior to 9-11. To take that as an example for related articles:

Osama bin Laden - the bin Laden article itself, Childhood, education and personal life of Osama bin Laden, Beliefs_and_ideology_of_Osama_bin_Laden, Allegations of CIA assistance to Osama bin Laden,Militant activity of Osama bin Laden, Bin_Laden_family, Criticism of Osama bin Laden

9-11 - the 9-11 article itself, Organizers of the September 11 attacks, Responsibility for the September 11 attacks, 9/11 Commission, Timeline_for_the_day_of_the_September_11_attacks, Planning of the September 11 attacks, Collapse of the World Trade Center and probably 10 other articles.Mosedschurte (talk) 23:46, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Outdent:Judith: Note that I've been considering for a while some breakout articles (see below for more elaboration) to develop more history prior to Jonestown. Under the plan I was considering, I think most of this would be merged (in part) into a People Temple in San Francisco article (see below), with the Jonestown/International material either merging into Jonestown or into a "Jonestown before the tragedy" article (history prior to Nov. 15).Mosedschurte (talk) 02:31, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Mosedschurte (talk · contribs) does make a good point in comparing to the series of related articles on Osama bin Laden. Cirt (talk) 03:52, 22 September 2008 (UTC)