Talk:Vampire lifestyle/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

Cleanup

In my opinion, after going through the Wikipedia Manual of Style with respect to this article and removing any PoV and patent nonsense from this article, it has been cleaned up and as such I have removed the cleanup tag. Please discuss any objections here before reinstating it, or it will be removed promptly on the grounds that it is unsubstantiated. Falcon 20:30, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Oh for crying out loud, that's just obnoxious. You hardly cleaned the thing up at all, and there were reasons here on the talk page but you just removed them. I'm putting the tag back as your claim to have cleaned it up is itself unsubstantiated. Please describe in detail how you solved the problems as described on this talk page earlier if you want the tag to be gone. DreamGuy 11:39, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

Removed? Archived, and I put a link on top of the page pointing to this, in order to make the page readable and within the recommended size limit. That notwithstanding, if you would like to see my edit log, I systematically went through the article searching for instances of violation of the style manual, and found a number of errors, all of which have been fixed. If you would like this article to be marked for cleanup, please pinpoint specific instances where the article does not meet standards. Furthermore, this article is not listed in cleanup. Therefore, I will remove the tag based on the fact that there is absolutely no reason whatsoever to keep it there. Falcon 04:14, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

In bad faith? That is absurd. I honestly believe that the article has been cleaned up. If you disagree, please stop calling me a liar and point out parts that need reparation. As an alternative, you could easily list it on Cleanup. Falcon 23:21, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Removing everything on the talk page is NOT archiving. The concept that you think you had to get rid of everything that was here to get it "within the recommended size limit" is absolutely absurd. The article is still written like a 9 year old put it together, it still needs the cleanup tag, and your actions are so clearly bad faith it's not even funny. You're trying to hide all the complaints this article got so you can ignore them and thus pretend there's nothing wrong. This page meets the criteria for cleanup tag, specifically 3 out of four criteria listed on Wikipedia:Cleanup process (it's obviously not a substub). Please stop living in denial and assuming that because you lack the will or the skills to make the article up to the expected level of this encyclopedia that it somehow does not desperately need cleanup. DreamGuy 02:02, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)

What? I archived the comments because the page was too big, and because they were very old. Furthermore, if you would like to take note, the comments are available at their Archive (once again). If you would like to browse them, there is also a link to them at the top of this page. The article is also quite well-written, and I defy you to point out any examples to the contrary. I am not pretending that nothing is wrong, I am stipulating that there is nothing wrong, and I will do so yet again until a third opinion is voiced from a reliable source. As to the comment about a nine-year-old child having written this article, I will not dignify that with a reply. Additionally, I have the skills to make this article comply with the criteria, and I will prove this to you now.

• It is not a substub. We both agree on this.
• It is formatted according to the Wikipedia manual of style, and written in immaculate and easily comprehensible English. I defy you to provide an example to the contrary.
• Why should this article be deleted? I originally wrote it, so there is no copyvio. It has been bitterly disputed whether there is a POV or not, however it is definately not unsalvageable, and could easily be edited. I again defy you to point out an example of POV. Further, it was left on cleanup (kind of, as it was never actually listed there) for a long period, and nobody moved it to VFD (probably not least because we already voted twice, and the consensus on the second was to keep).
• It is not orphaned, is not a definition, and has correct wiki syntax and English grammar.

Therefore, I fail to see what it is you are talking about. If you would like to stop flaming me (which also looks bad on Wikipedia and on you) and pinpoint some specific instances, I would be more than happy to work with you to solve all the problems in this article. Until then, I will continue to revert the cleanup tag as I honestly believe it has no place here. Falcon 03:25, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I have clearly explained my position. The problem here is that, as you admit, you originally wrote this article and are overly protective of it. You ignore clear signs that it is written poorly, clear signs that people wanted it deleted as being horrible (though it failed VfD because people think it could be improved, although it nevcer really was), and clear signs that the grammar and writing is bad. Removing the tag is clearly obstructionistic head-in-the-sand. Further, if you hadn;t deleted ALL OF THE COMMENTS ON THE PAGE, all of this would be clear to anyone reading it. Because you improperly hid these comments, I have now restored them. Removing the tag and removing the comments is clear demonstration of your bad faith attempt to pretend that this article is fine as it is. Now stop acting like just because you originally wrote this horrible article that you can do whatever you want to the article and talk page. DreamGuy 16:53, Jun 9, 2005 (UTC)

Very well, if it is that important to you, I will leave these comments around on this page for another 15 days or so, but the conversations are all inactive and old, and should be archived because they are not useful. Further, moving to an archive is extremely different from deleting. For example, in the archive, they are still there and easily accessible for anyone who cares. Additionally, your disputing the decision of VfD clearly shows that you have a strong bias against this page. The grammar is intact, and I will continue to insist this until you post an example of poor grammar. You are also clearly biased against me personally, for what reason I do not know. This is evidenced by the fact that you have attempted to cite my having originally written it as evidence that it is garbage. It is not in bad faith at all, then, to stipulate that this article is not in need of cleanup. However, in light of the aforesaid, it is clear to me that your insistance on demeaning the article primarily because of its authorship (and one or many grammatical errors you are unable to cite) is in bad faith. Unless you can provide some kind of concrete evidence in the form of quotes, or perhaps attempt your own cleanup, I suggest you cease and desist because this discussion is taking us nowhere, because I cannot find any errors and you refuse to point them out. It is also important to note that Gabrielsimon apparently seems to concur with me on the fact that this page is not actually in need of cleanup. This appearence of a third opinion demands either a citation of actual article content or a withdrawal of charges levied against this article. Falcon 04:19, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

If you can't make sense of what I said, I think that's clear proof that you are incapable of reading English and therefore are not a judge of what needs clean up or not. And, in case you hadn't noticed, Gabrielsimon not only does not write in correct English but also tried to remove the tag back BEFORE the your alleged cleanup happened, so his opinion that it ought to be now removed is obviously not one you can rely on. All you are doing is acting protective of an article you wrote. Please leave your ego at the door. I will eventually clean up this article, but it will take a while because it is so poorly written. Until then the tag stays. And the comments on this talk page that you find so embarassing to your article WILL NOT BE REMOVED any time soon, because they do not at all meet the standard criteria for archiving. You obviously just want to hide them because of all the people saying this needs to be rewritten and/or deleted. You constantly make decisions that are not at all supported by the way things are done here solely because you wrote this article and are invested into it with a fragile ego. Remember that the edit page distinctly says that you lose all control of your edits once they are made and that other editors can change them. You rseriously need to give up emaking edits on this article and move to topics for which you can think rationally and objectively about them. DreamGuy 17:18, Jun 10, 2005 (UTC)

First off, I am not trying to be posessive. I am trying to retain sanity in a controversial article, and I used the fact that I was the original author to establish some kind of credibility, or something like that, I can't even remember. In any case, it makes no difference. I am not being protective, posessive or egotistical. It is you that is doing this, by pretending that you are the cleanup-tag angel while feeling above providing any evidence whatsoever to support your position. There is absolutely no justification according to established criteria to support a cleanup tag on this page, and therefore it must be removed. It is as simple as that. Further, I would redirect your final statement to yourself. It would appear to me that it is in fact you who needs to calm yourself down and stop making edits until you do so, because you clearly are unable to think objectively about the subject or else you would be able to provide a specific explanation. What would be wrong with citing a small pert of the text, or even a line number or something that supports another cleanup? Falcon 04:44, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Obscurity and irrelevance

I haven't followed the full argument above. Certainly this article was atrocious and now is not atrocious; but certainly it's still unclear and needs clearup. Merely from the first two paragraphs, let's take two little examples:

• the subject is considered highly taboo Which subject? (Claiming to be a vampire? Being a vampire? Drinking blood? Having a "vampire lifestyle"? Something else?)
• The belief is very broad Which belief? (That vampires exist? That people consider themselves to be vampires? That people claim to be vampires? That these people have a lifestyle? That this lifestyle involves drinking blood? Something else?

I can't rewrite either, as I really don't know what is meant.

It also strikes me as an absurd mishmash as a whole. For example, "attributes that have been ascribed to this 'species'" include Photosensitivity not related to melanin deficiency in the skin. The claim strikes me as ludicrous, but I'll put its risibility aside to ask: What does this have to do with these people's (or, if you insist, vampires') lifestyle? A similar question could be asked of much else in this article. (Should the article perhaps be retitled?) -- Hoary 05:53, 2005 Jun 11 (UTC)

I agree, this is not the best title. A better choice would be Vampyre or Vampire_(sect). Additionally, thank you for your specific reference. I believe I do in fact know what those mean, and will commence clarification. Falcon 19:16, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The clarification is complete. The final sentence in the first paragraph has been deleted, because it essentially says that most people consider vampirism taboo, which is not only a matter of opinion (generally held or not), but weasel-like and essentially a POV against the believers. Yes, what they are doing is widely held to be dangerous, absurd and morally wrong, but that kind of comment belongs an a section about what people think of them, with a specific quote from somebody qualified to make it (a sociologist or maybe psychologist). Falcon 19:28, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

OK then. I think the article has now improved to the point where it doesn't need a warning/apologetic "cleanup" template at the top. -- Hoary 03:25, 2005 Jun 12 (UTC)

Thank you for your reworking of the head of this page. It's good to get someone else finally making productive changes here. Falcon 07:36, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Addition and removal of comments

An IP number added comments (with "Comment:" and in the first person): see this diff. I've removed the lot. -- Hoary 07:39, 2005 Jun 11 (UTC)

Good job for catching that. I somehow get the idea that we will have to keep watching for people wanting to fill this article up with nonsense and personal beliefs. Falcon 19:29, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Restored cleanup tag and disussion page again

It's really getting tedious having to undo what Falcon keeps doing here unmder the miunderstanding that just because he originaly created the article that he owns it and can remove things that embarass him. Consensus has been reached thorugh multiple editors that the cleanup tag is completely necessary (see the list of people who put it back in page history) so by now he/she should know enough not to push his luck. Oh? And FYI, Falcom and Gabriel.... any comments the two of you have about this article will stay on this discussion page, I don;t need you both putting the exact same nonsense on my talk page. I'll see it here so clogging up my page with petty, incoherent attacks is unnecessary. I'll remove any posts that attempt to bring the argument to my talk page. DreamGuy 20:51, Jun 11, 2005 (UTC)

I do not feel that I own the article (once again). However, it is important to note that you do not either. Therefore, whatever happens to it must be done according to standards. I am re-archiving the comments, because this page takes far too long to load (yes, it does) and edit with them remaining here, not to mention that nobody needs them because they are inactive discussions on resolved disputes (I challenge you to prove otherwise) and, should somebody want to view them or refer to them, they are plainly visible on the archive. If I had wanted to hide them, I would actually have hidden them somewhere or removed them altogether (which I would never do because that is vandalism). I would request that you cease and desist from continuing to revert any changes made according to established policy. The only recommendation that is made toward the subject of archiving pages is that they be archived after going beyond a certain length, which also causes a warning to appear in the edit box, which it did. Therefore, the comments were archived according to policy and the reversal of any change made according to policy is vandalism. In fact, reversion is only appropriate in cases where the edit caused content to be deleted in contravention of established policy or where the change under reversion is an incorrect edit to an article, or a contravention of the manual of style, et cetera. Under no circumstances did you have justification, at any time, to remove the talk page archive from archival. Further, you do not have a right to demand that we refrain from contacting you on your talkpage, and in fact doing so is a recommended component of the dispute resolution process. Further, we are not making petty or incoherent attacks, however we are attempting to call to your attention that certain behaviours which you have exhibited during the period in which you have edited this article are not appropriate or justified. Therefore, you should refrain from continuing to flame me. Additionally, this discussion in addition to that under the heading "cleanup" have both moved beyond the realm of the discussion of this article. I therefore insist that all additional discourse of this manner either be stopped altogether, redirected into some discussion about the article, or carried on within my user talk page. Falcon 22:29, 11 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Verifiabiliy, cites, and infection rates

It would be useful to have verifiable cites confirming that some significant number of people actually do this, rather than simply claiming to do so. It would also, in that case, be very interesting to know what their rate of HIV, hepatitis and other blood-borne infections is. -- The Anome 18:54, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)

Regardless of what we do, any such citation is bound to be inaccurate, on the grounds that we have no means of surveying it other than asking them. This, then, actually arrives at the number of people who claim they do it. It is interesting to note, though, that most want blood tests done on prey. Falcon 23:47, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Really? I would have thought that any kind of actual blood-drinking cult would by now have come to the interest of STD epidemiologists; I would imagine that it would be out there on the medical grapevine along with the tales of the more bizarre autoerotic deaths and rectal foreign objects. Even if they pay attention to the risks of infection, they are unlikely to have a level of discipline similar to that of the porn industry, which still gets outbreaks in spite of a very high level of regular, expensive, short-window testing and associated record-keeping. -- The Anome 09:47, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)

Maybe somebody who's interested can do the needed research. I must confess that the non-issue of the "vampire lifestyle" doesn't interest me at all, so I've no intention of doing any. This looks to me like a bunch of people who are rather dim and thus can't distinguish between (a) reality and (b) the content of Anne Rice's enjoyable novels, mixed up with a few fruitcakes. I can't remember what it was that first somehow drew this article to my attention, but since its style is ghastly and one isn't supposed just to say this and do nothing about it, I'm dutifully plodding through it, trying to cut repetition out of it. Once I've reached the end I expect to "unwatch" it. -- Hoary 10:15, 2005 Jun 13 (UTC)

That's exactly my point: the lack of pockets of blood-borne infections strongly hints that actual blood-drinking is very rare in real life. As you say, "a bunch of people who are rather dim and thus can't distinguish between (a) reality and (b) the content of Anne Rice's enjoyable novels, mixed up with a few fruitcakes" is certainly the impression I get from what I can dig up with a bit of online research. This article, at least in some earlier versions, reports this as a real phenomenon, down to detailed descriptions of "vampire sub-races", and some older versions featured contributions from editors claiming that they, themselves, were actual vampires. I think we need to take a much more sceptical tone here, and just report on the phenomenon of web sites etc. making these claims (the existence of which is not in doubt), and just remove the rather dodgy detailed and conflicting claims made on these websites unless there is third-party verifiable evidence of those claims. -- The Anome 10:49, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)

Oh, and there are lots of other good biological reasons for human-predating human-sized vampires not to be able to coexist with the normal human population for any evolutionarily significant length of time, based on energetic and food chain considerations. Ye cannae cheat the laws of physics. -- The Anome 10:55, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)

OK, I've now done a thorough cut-down and NPOV on this article, putting the word "vampire" in quotes for self-proclaimed vampires, and removing much of the microscopic but unsourced detail. I was particularly amused by the claim that they experience "psychotic Thirst"; I imagine most of the people involved in this would crap themselves if faced with a person undergoing an actual psychotic episode. Note that the claims made in this article are extraordinary claims, and the onus is on their proponents to demonstrate them: can we have proper cites for these claims, please? -- The Anome 12:52, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)

Well done. I've just now removed the boldface shouting about the medical risks . . . though come to think of it the goofballs who might consider this activity might be influenced by boldface. Revert back if you think it might save some lives. -- Hoary 15:52, 2005 Jun 13 (UTC)

POV question and deletion of information vis. 05:31 13JUN2005

I strongly disagree with you, The Anome. Wikipedia is supposed to be NPOV, so taking a skeptic viewpoint is actually counterproductive. What we need to do is report on both the phenomenon and the phenomenon of its popularity. Therefore, we detail both what the sect does (as well as we can, supressing no detail, in the Wikipedia style of thoroughness) and what it looks like, in terms of its various websites and adherents and popularity. Therefore, we sould include both the information you trimmed and any you care to add. Falcon 03:10, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Nope. WP's NPOV policy may extend to saying something about batty ideas such as flat-earthism and creationism, but not to "suppressing no detail" of these. (If it says more about creationism, that's because a significant percentage of north Americans actually believe it.) Actually it doesn't insist on suppressing no detail of anything uncontroversial, either. These are encyclopedia articles, not text dumps. This particular article is about the "lifestyle" of a group of people who, if they even exist in more than token numbers, are of extraordinarily little interest to people other than themselves, which makes them very different from, say, Burakumin, teddy boys, or flappers. Plus there is plenty of evidence that teddy boys did what's attributed to them, but little more than unsubstantiated bulletin-board blather about the bloodstained antics of "vampires". And there's little or no precedent for describing a phenomenon "in terms of its various websites": for one thing, that's the kind of thing that Yahoo does rather well. -- Hoary 04:19, 2005 Jun 14 (UTC)

I didn't mean that not removing detail was NPOV, just that we were not limited in terms of how much we could or should add, except that they should all be relevant to the topic (which they are). Therefore, what I mean is that we should include information on both the prevalence of them and what they do. What kind of article about something only states how prevalent it is? Think of what would happen to the Water page, or something, or better yet, the Roman Catholic Church. Falcon 17:23, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

dont you mean a significant portion of the editors and moderators beeiove in it? Gabrielsimon 04:54, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Citation and verifiability; a way forward

Falcon, one of the core Wikipedia principles is verifiability. In the case of extraordinary claims, the burden of proof lies on the person making the claim. Please provide verifiable third-party cites for your assertions, and you are much more likely to find that they stay in the article. For example, you might want to start with

Miller T.W.; Veltkamp L.J.; Kraus R.F.; Lane T.; Heister T. An Adolescent Vampire Cult in Rural America: Clinical Issues and Case Study. Child Psychiatry and Human Development, 1999, vol. 29, no. 3, pp. 209-219(11)

and this article in Forensic Nurse magazine also looks interesting:

http://www.forensicnursemag.com/articles/351lifedeath.html

There seem to be two phenomena here: role-playing fantasists, and people with an actual psychopathology, with the first group sometimes providing an environment for the pathology of the second group to develop. -- The Anome 08:22, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)

The external links page provides a large number of different websites made by different people which all state the same thing. Therefore, the fact that people believe this is almost unquestionably factual. I also agree with the inclusion of scientific studies, but we are not dealing with a purely scientific article and therefore both the science and the beliefs should be included. Falcon 17:26, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

For my sins, I have actually read through the websites you cited. Once you have eliminated the report of the Kentucky Vampire Clan (which is a real criminal story)and two skeptical sites which are actually about looking for the origins of vampire myths in terms of physical explanations, four sites is not "a large number". The sites cited appear contradict one another, and do not appear to show the existence of a single cult; rather, they show appear to show online role-playing with no coherent set of central beliefs other than those which could be gained by reading Anne Rice and watching Buffy. One of the websites appears to exist for the primary purpose of selling a book to wanabee vampires. As a result, I have chopped a large amount of material which currently appears to be unverifiable out of the article.

Googling for "real vampire" finds about 27,000 sites, as opposed to 214,000 for "furries", so I'm sure that there is some kind of social phenomenon to write about here, but at least from the evidence provided, it appears to be largely confined to fantasists, and a tiny population of seriously disturbed criminals. -- The Anome 18:22, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)

And yet, despite this lack of sanity, the people not only still exist, but the core of their beliefs appear to be formulated on the material you have ridiculed. Therefore, I would like to continue to protest your removal of the information. It is important to realise that we are dealing with an article regarding a group which more or less wishes to remain underground as much as possible and not broadcast their presence to the world. As such, you are not liable to find more than a few cites. Further, because of the absolute implausability that any of this belief is actually true, much of what looks like role-playing is likely in earnest instead. Therefore, I would ask you very strongly to reconsider your actions in removing a large portion of the information on this page which has been verified by, as you have said, four seperate websites. Therefore, the data located in various forums should also be considered as evidence that these websites are actually about an actual topic. In addendum, an additional source and the first one (which appears to have been removed from the external links for reasons unknown) is reapersofblood.org. Scrool down on the leftmost frame and you will find a lengthy list of articles that support my claims yet again. Falcon 21:46, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

check tge archives Anome, this has already been settled. Gabrielsimon 18:24, 14 Jun 2005 (UTC)

So, would you mind giving sources for the various assertions just pasted back to the article? As I say, I actually read the sites given as sources. I'm not denying that this is a real social phenomenon. However, at the moment, most of the latter part of the article is a soup of unsourced material. Remember, if it's controversial, and you can't source it, it's not NPOV, -- The Anome 18:40, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)

OK, I "unsourced"-tagged this article, and it was removed. I've now NPOV-tagged it. What is special about the "vampire group" claims in this article that they, unlike any other controversial claims in any other article, are immune to the need for source citations? -- The Anome 19:00, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)

Nope, the NPOV tag has now been removed. OK, I'll try another tack. -- 19:07, Jun 14, 2005 (UTC)

How and where to argue

I've just received two emails from one recent editor of this article, asking me to revert my revert because of its rudeness, and claiming that the author had "met vampires, the real kind".

I'd like this article to be a good one, or anyway not to be a bad one. If my actions toward this end strike people as rude, that's a pity; but I'm not going to be deterred by the risk of perceived rudeness.

I'm unimpressed by such claims to have met real vampires. I would be interested in such claims made in books from good publishers and in intelligent periodicals. (I discount Weekly World News, etc.)

Moreover, the place for arguing over additions, deletions, and reversions is right here, not in private mail. I shan't bother with any response to any more mail I might receive about this (non-) issue. -- Hoary 04:17, 2005 Jun 15 (UTC)

Initially, for the record and sake of others not involved, I was not involved in sending those emails, and hereby publicly condemn them: who would do such a thing over such a small topic? In any case, I must protest. The sources have been cited in at least four pages (see external links and the discussion above). Due to the underground nature of this sect, it is not likely that we will find very many documentaries on them. That is not to say, however, that the statements are not factual about the belief. Until such a time as consensus can be reached I will not reinsert the information, however I will continue to assert that it has in fact been supported. And, unimpressed as you may be by this, I (like our mystery editor) have known a number of people related to this sect (my ex-girlfriend and a few others) who believe in or affirm the factuality of the data previously presented in this article. For personal reference, however, I would like to request why nobody has pointed out a lack of references on this page until now, well over a year after its creation and numerous edits? Falcon 06:34, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Just a quickie (because I'm connected via modem right now): I'm a little dismayed to see that I'm leading you to condemn attempts to communicate via email. I'm in no way offended by the mail I got; I'm puzzled. The gist of it was "I know, so believe me". If somebody claims to know something that flies in the face of scientific knowledge or is otherwise extraordinary, I want to see the evidence for this claim, and I'm unlikely to be alone. Whether the evidence should be presented in the article or the talk page is a question that consideration of my phone bill won't let me address now, but anyway let's have the evidence. -- Hoary 13:58, 2005 Jun 15 (UTC)

I'm not condemning communication, but harassment. Honestly, if the user in question felt the need to go that far in order to contact you instead of using the talkpage, that's fairly telling. I guess, though, if you don't think it was, I'll not condemn it so severely. However, the latter part of my comments continue to apply. Falcon 17:45, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

No, no, it wasn't harassment. Really, I'm not troubled by the sending of either of these messages or by their content or tone. Like you and The Anome, and perhaps my would-be correspondent as well, I'd like this article to be a good one. My point was and is that arguments for and against changes to its content are best presented right here. -- Hoary 01:50, 2005 Jun 16 (UTC)

Second cleanup

Just a note: although I feel that in its previous state the article was not in need of such a tag, I wholeheartedly agree with its placement there currently. We should continue looking for examples of PoV and poor grammatical structures that always occur at this point in the article's lifecycle. Falcon 17:48, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for keeping the tag. By the way, you deleted my use of "significantly" to describe the increased risk of HIV; I've provided a cite from a public health professional to back up the use of the word. Note that the probability of infection is probably proportional to the amount of blood consumed, which would be hugely more, and far more regular, than a "needlestick" accident. There would also be a significantly increased risk of contracting Hepatitis C, which is roughly 10 times more infective than HIV. [1]

Some more cites from [2]:

"The overall rate of HIV transmission from a single percutaneous exposure to HIV infected blood is of the order of 0.3%."

"The risk of transmission of [Hep C] infection from an infected source to a health care worker is generally estimated to be of the order of 3%, although a recent study in Italy estimated a transmission rate of 0.44%"

So let's do some back-of-envelope, WAG order-of-magnitude calculations. Now imagine the minor gingivitis most people (50-70%) have [3], coming into contact with even a small amount of blood, just enough to wet the bleeding areas. I'd estimate that to be worth about one needlestick accident (maybe more: needlestick accidents don't generally transfer that much fluid). Repeat 50 times, and what are your chances of having Hep C if one of your group has it? You've got to win the Hep C lottery each time, so that's roughly 1 - (1 - 0.03)^50 = 0.78. So, you've got a 78% chance of catching Hep C. The rough probability of catching HIV, by the same reasoning, if you're interested, would "only" be about 13%. -- The Anome 22:51, Jun 15, 2005 (UTC)

Protest. I did not remove the information. In fact, it was me who put the boldface shouting/italic/exclamation point version of the warning a year ago. I hereby condemn the anonymous user who felt the need to do such things as a fool sho not only wishes to increase the legal liability of Wikipedia but also seems to feel that drinking blood is not a significant risk factor for blood-borne pathogens for some unknown reason. My IP is 192.168.1.103 in network 68.146.45.87 (Shaw cable). Falcon 00:32, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

My apologies. I must have confused you with another editor for that edit. Please consider my remarks directed at the person who did make the edit. -- The Anome 00:51, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)

Hello -- you rang? Yes, it was I who de-bolded it. And I could very well have removed "significantly", too. Why? Because of my conviction that in most of the text of encyclopedia articles (although not everywhere in them, let alone elsewhere), the word "significantly" is superfluous. If we talk of an increase of X, then I believe there's a pragmatic implication that the increase is significant, for if it were insignificant we ought not to be referring to it as an increase.

Condemnation and foolishness aside . . . Falcon, are you saying that WP's failure to point out in boldface that certain practices are dangerous increases its legal liability and that we should worry about this? I wouldn't discount the possibility of lawsuits in the nuttily litigious USA, but there is also the phenomenon of dismissal of frivolous lawsuits. But maybe you're right. Perhaps I should add a note to Compact disc: Forcibly inserting shards of broken CDs into any part of the body carries medical risks. -- Hoary 10:44, 2005 Jun 16 (UTC)

No, I do not think so in any way. Boldface or not, it makes no difference to me personally. However, although people reading the CD artcle (even if facinated by the technology, which is unlikely given its absurd pervasiveness) would most likely not be driven to injure themselves using them, and if so inclined probably injure themselves anyway heedless of the risks. However, with respect to this article, we are dealing with a group of people who desperately want to believe that this is real, and therefore may actually be driven to drink blood. Therefore, it should remain, and be in italics (not as emphasis, but as an aside from the article's stream). Falcon 16:48, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

OK, have it your own way. Incidentally, having earlier removed the word "significantly" and defended its removal, I think perhaps I should point out that I am not the IP number responsible for this and other recent edits. -- Hoary 03:54, 2005 Jun 17 (UTC)

dude thats hillarious! Gabrielsimon 10:48, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

removals

Sceptisism doesnt belong in an article based entirely on fact, as the user falcon has said, this is treated as fact, so the changes of removing the sceptisism will return shirtly, thanks.

Gabrielsimon 10:30, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

May I suggest you read the NPOV policy page? When you've read that, read below.

Here are a few POVs which belong in this article, in no particular order:

• Some people believe that there are real-life vampires.
• Some people take part in vampire role-playing
• Some people actually take part in consensual blood play as part of these activities
• Some people believe that they are real-life vampires
• Some mentally ill people hold the latter view
• Some of them have committed serious crimes, including murder
• There does not seem to be any concrete evidence that real-life vampires exist
• There does not seem to be a single "vampire sect", just lots of different groups, many of which appear to only exist in the form of websites
• Many of the participants on these sites appear only to be indulging in fantasy
• Some of these websites seem to be commercial ventures exploiting this fantasy activity
• There is a strong overlap with "goths"
• Many/most of the beliefs associated with these fantasy/role-playing activities appear to be taken from fiction and popular media.
• Blood drinking and other forms of blood play are dangerous, HIV, Hep C, etc. etc.

Note that even where we are saying "people believe X", rather than "X is true", we must still be able to give cites (if challenged) for who these people are, and that they do indeed hold the belief. Idiosyncratic beliefs are generally not covered by NPOV; a view must either be held by some significant number of people, or by a notable or well-qualified person in order to be reportable. Thus, we should not take individual fourm postings or website pages and aggregate them together to create a patchwork view of a unified "vampire cult"s POV; unless, of course, you can demonstrate, that such a unified view exists.

A bit more about cites: you might want to read Wikipedia:Cite sources for a good introduction about cites, what they're good for, when they're needed and why, and when you can get away without them.

-- The Anome 12:30, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)

So long as we continue to cite our sources when we add a PoV, I am in agreement. Likewise, when I add additional information regarding various practices that are generally held (I fully intend to do additional research), that data will be backed up by multiple cites. Also, is there any way we could consider superscripting our cites? They are starting to get cluttery. Falcon 16:43, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I would like to add one thing to my previous comment. When we are saying that "some people say that," I feel that a reliable source for a cite is constituted by someone saying it. Therefore, in those cases, links to forums and other, fairly unreliable (in the factual and dry truth sense) websites constitute reliable sources. The reason for this, naturally, is that because they are saying something, that something is being said (if that makes any sense at all). Falcon 22:28, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)