Talk:Soldiers of Odin

Disputed - Claims regarding group's status

The claims made in this article regarding the group's status are not justified by the sources provided. The statement made in the lede is that it is "international", whereas it appears to be just another group of Finnish nationalists. Even if for example it had connections with other nationalist groups, or had members in other countries, this would not be suffient for it to be termed international. An international group is one that "involves two or more countries", not one that has members or interest in other countries i.e it is one that has two or more contries in its governance structure. Additionally, in my opinion, the statement that ths group is an NGO is true but, while unqualified, is also misleading. A non-governmental organisation is merely a not-for-profit organisation - of any kind. An NGO is not in any manner, shape or form associated with government. And most for-profit organisations (e.g up to 90% of startups) don't make a profit. Most of these go bust, but some just have cunning accountants. Effectively NGO is a meaningless term and therefore subject to abuse. LookingGlass (talk) 08:04, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Well, although the various SOO groups don't probably keep in touch with each other that much, there's clearly active SOO groups utilizing the same symbols and modus operandi in various countries. For example, the members of the SOO Canada (see for example https://news.vice.com/story/soldiers-of-odin-inside-the-extremist-vigilante-group-that-claims-to-be-preserving-canadian-values) aren't just random foreign members of the SOO Finland, they have their own organization which is conceptually based on the Finnish one. You could compare the SOO with outlaw motorcycle clubs (which I guess actually served as an inspiration for the SOO): I don't think that Hells Angels in the United States are that much involved with, say, the Hells Angels in Italy. Of course they might occasionally meet each other as they have the same hobby and the same interests but their organizations are separate and things that happen in Italy won't probably concern the Americans that much, or vice versa. Still, The Hells Angels is described as being "international" or "worldwide" outlaw motorcycle club. JJohannes (talk) 07:12, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

Soldiers of Odin 'type edit'

I reverted an edit earlier today and the originator has questioned my reasoning. I thought I would bring the discussion over here so others can express an opinion. I have no particular interest in this article or far-right groups in general, my only involvement here is as a pending changes reviewer. Please see initial comments at: User talk:Rodney Baggins#Soldiers of Odin 'type edit'.

In response to User:OrlaNiBradaigh: My comment about the limitations of the Type parameter came from looking at the template documentation where the description for Type in the TemplateData table is "e.g. Governmental organization, NGO". There is no other guidance on that but I understood it to mean a very narrow range of possible parameter values. The two "types" that you added were Far-right politics and Hate group which to my mind are too specific and describe the group's political ideology rather than their organisational structure, which I think is what is meant to be conveyed by the Type parameter. If the group cannot be shown to be a registered NGO or any other type of official organisation, but rather just an informal "social group", then maybe "Infobox organization" is the wrong infobox to be using altogether. I'm not sure about the answer to these questions, which is why I brought the discussion here. It might even make a good subject for an RfC.

I would say that if you do remake the edit as you suggested, it would be useful to mention this Talk discussion so the next pending reviewer can see the context. I shall not accept the pending edit as it would be best for you to get a second opinion. The main purpose of pending changes protection is to trap vandalism before it goes live and as you are taking a sensible approach I think I can rule that out. Rodney Baggins (talk) 18:19, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

@OrlaNiBradaigh: It looks like you're autoconfirmed now anyway as you've just gone over the threshold of edits required. So I guess we'll leave it at that and see what happens. Why have you spaced out the lead section like that? Rodney Baggins (talk) 19:04, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

@Rodney Baggins: Ahh I hadn't noticed the spacing, it's all fixed now. Thanks for your help. OrlaNiBradaigh (talk) 19:09, 3 June 2020 (UTC)