Talk:White Helmets (Syrian civil war)/Archive 4

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Biased sentence

"The organisation has been the target of a disinformation campaign by supporters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Russia-sponsored media organisations such as Russia Today (RT), and alt-right personalities, with false claims of close ties with terrorist activities and other conspiracy theories."

Honestly I find it incredible that I even have to point out how much POV there is in this sentence. It's clearly an attempt by the Western media (whose governments are involved in Syria) to link any genuine criticism of and concern about the White Helmets with the Russian government as part of the general anti-Russian hysteria and McCarthyism going on in the West right now. It is blatantly obvious that they are doing that to stifle any criticism of the White Helmets and the Western government's official narrative on the matter. The White Helmets were established and are funded by the Western governments, so it is not hard to see the conflict of interest here from Western news sources. Writing of what they say as if it is an established fact is not accurate.

One would have to ignore the overwhelming recorded evidence (all the sources are linked to here from this one article) of the White Helmets' connections to terrorist groups and shady activities, which have happened again and again, so calling it a "conspiracy theory" is nothing more than a POV smear. The leader of the White Helmets was even denied entry to the US and turned back at the airport because he was a security threat. Also, the part of the sentence that collectively refers to all the various independent journalists and others who have questioned the White Helmets as "alt right" is particularly laughable. When you go to the alt right article it basically defines it as Nazis and white supremacists. Right, because everyone who question the White Helmets' dubious and shady history—including people like John Pilger, Stephen Kinzer, Philip Giraldi—must be white supremacist Nazis. The Guardian article that is referenced here has also been debunked in the source I linked.

So this sentence is definitely going to need to be reworked to make it actually neutral. Romanov loyalist (talk) 01:04, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm not going to repeat the same arguments ad nauseam, but come on, don't use the Corbett Report as a "source." This is the same website which says that 9/11 was a lie, that Obama is using whatever the fuck to create a new world order and, oh look, he's done an IAMA on /r/conspiracy. Clearly a shining beacon of journalism. Stikkyy t/c 04:47, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

"whose governments are involved in Syria": I could say much the same for Russia, no? Stikkyy t/c 04:49, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Indeed, so why are we treating Russia as a biased source, while all the Western aligned countries involved (Britain, US, Qatar-who directly run Al Jazeera, France, etc.) are considered unbiased? - GPRamirez5 (talk) 07:31, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict)corbettreport.com is a crackpot conspiracy theory website. 9/11 conspiracies, eugenics conspiracies, climate conspiracies, depopulation conspiracies, demonetization conspiracies, false-flag conspiracies, NewWorldOrder conspiracies, biometric conspiracies, and more.

Wikipedia summarizes what Reliable Sources say. The lead accurately summarizes what is said by a large number of Reliable Sources. A large number of reliable sources from a multitude of countries across the globe have either used the exact phrase "disinformation campaign", or asserted/supported it in more general terms. The sources cited in the lead, and in the body of the article, are just a small sample of the available sources. Please don't re-write Reliably Sourced content just because you disagree with what Reliable Sources say. Alsee (talk) 05:21, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

If Western sources are clearly not telling the truth and blatantly trying to push an agenda by shutting down criticism by saying "the Russian government has also said xyz, therefore xyz is a disinformation campaign." It is an obvious attempt to shut down genuine criticism that is widespread. As I already stated, I referenced the Corbett Report article because it relies on various other sources that it links throughout the article. One can link the specific mainstream source articles from the US State Department, Newsweek, etc. and other sources that Corbett references to rewrite the sentence for the specific points those bring up.

Also you still haven't explained how people that question the White Helmets are categorized as "alt right", i.e. white supremacist Nazis as they are usually described including here on Wikipedia. Calling anyone who questions the White Helmets Neo Nazis is obviously a smear, and if the so called "reliable sources" are stooping to this tactic than I ask you to explain how exactly they are reliable. Like I said, The Guardian article that is linked the sentence is unreliable at best, a slanderous hit piece more accurately. If you actually read the article all the author does is bring up vague claims of "Russian trolls" (basically anyone who questions the corporate media narrative at this point) and other nonsensical smears.

"Shining beacon of journalism," Stikkyy? And The Guardian and Washington Post are? Don't make me laugh. At this point "reliable source" is essentially if it fits the Western narrative. The Corbett Report article references what you would consider reliable sources anyway. Romanov loyalist (talk) 19:45, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

"...a multitude of countries across the globe..." A multitude of countries have taken the side of the opposition, right down to funding it, including the WH, while another multitude of countries (Iran, China, Russia, Bolivia, Venezuela, Greece, Cuba, South Africa), tend to support the SAR government. We should not be taking sides among the two. -GPRamirez5 (talk) 08:07, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

This article has been kidnapped by a propaganda team.

It's quite clear that WH is funded and controlled by the West, and obviously it operates only in those parts of Syria that are not government-controlled. But any attempt to put those facts in the lede is aggressively reverted by the kidnappers (who appear to me to be operating as meatpuppets). I'm not interested in WP admin contortions, and I don't appreciate completely unjustified accusations of bad faith, so I have given up - maybe someone with patience and power will come along and take this article in hand. But I suspect that will not happen until the MSM (whose reporters never visit Syrian conflict zones) realize they've been suckered. User:GPRamirez5, I suggest you give up. MrDemeanour (talk) 13:01, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Anyway, you completely missed the point. The fact is we have recorded evidence of White Helmets being tied to terrorist groups and the US didn't even let their leader enter the country because of security concerns. And people like John Pilgur and Stephen Kinzer are obviously not white supremacist nazis. So clearly the "reliable sources" are not providing accurate information and are pushing an agenda with their POV. By ignoring this information the editors are trying to select sources deliberately that go with that to push their own POV. Romanov loyalist (talk) 13:47, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

Lie is lie, and disinformation campaign is disinformation campaign. That is what RS tell. The opinions by non-expert celebrities are undue on the page. It does not mean these people are bad. No one but you calls them "white supremacists"; this is possibly a BLP violation. My very best wishes (talk) 20:27, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

No one else equates Alt-Right with White supremacist? Can you hear the nonsense you're spouting? If anyone's guilty of a BLP violation its the person who put the Alt-Right in there.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 21:53, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

Did you read what I wrote? They aren't "reliable sources" when they are clearly not providing reliable information. Sorry but vague claims of "Russian bots" as in The Guardian article are not evidence of any "disinformation campaign." I don't I don't care about celebrities, there are many journalists questioning them, and the evidence of their ties to terrorists is well documented. And yes, that sentence uses "alt right personalities" to describe anyone who questions the white helmets apparently (I tried to change this but it was reverted). Alt right, according to the Wiki article, are white supremacists and Nazis. It's clearly a slur of anyone who questions the official narrative on the White Helmets. Romanov loyalist (talk) 21:40, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

The Corbett Report is very clearly is not what Wikipedia considers a reliable source. If you disagree, feel free to bring it up at WP:RSN. clpo13_(talk) 21:35, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

I know, that's why I said the references are all linked in that one article as it nicely puts together a lot of the evidence in one place, and include ones like the State Department and Newsweek as its sources. We can use those specific sources. Romanov loyalist (talk) 21:40, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm unclear what the specific proposal is in this section. Is it that we stop using the Guardian and Washington Post as reliable sources? If that's the case, it's not for discussion here, but on the RSN. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:43, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Just because a source is reliable doesn't mean its infallible, and guidelines say even RSs should be used "with care" in controversial cases. Western media coverage of Syria must be scrutinized through this light:

Al Jazeera, "How the media covered the Syria strikes: Part of the geopolitical showdown that followed alleged chemical attacks in Douma is being fought over the airwaves."

The narrative in much of the western mainstream media echoed their own governments'...Those demanding evidence that Bashar al-Assad's government was behind the chemical attacks, the sceptics questioning the rush to launch, were given short shrift...The question of waiting for evidence "seems to be missing from much media discussion," points out Tara McCormack, an academic at the University of Leicester. "What we have seen in Syria is footage taken by people on their mobile phones. But there does seem to be a total abandonment of any kind of critical scrutiny. An idea almost that it would be immoral to question these images. I think that's quite a serious failure on the part of a lot of western media."

See also: Max Abrahms, "How Western Media Have Whitewashed the Rebels' Record" Foreign Affairs -GPRamirez5 (talk) 18:22, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

No, the specific proposal is to reword that sentence to be more neutral. For example, point out that the "disinformation campaign" is alleged by Western media, and also mention that the group is accused of having ties to terrorist organizations without using buzzword smears like "alt right" and "conspiracy theories," because clearly the people pointing this out are not all "alt right" and there is a significant amount of evidence that the White Helmets do have ties to terrorists. Romanov loyalist (talk) 15:39, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

One more time. You need a reliable source which says that the disinformation campaign is "alleged" and you need a reliable source which says that this allegation is made by "Western media", wtf that is.Volunteer Marek (talk) 15:46, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Again. If what you regard as "reliable sources" are making allegations that are countered by evidence and challenged by various other sources, then they are clearly not reliable. Alleged is the accurate because these are allegations coming from the Western media. And yes, you know exactly what I mean by Western mainstream media, and I know you have a long history of being disingenuous, Marek, I would prefer that you stop wasting time with that. Western mainstream media includes sources like WaPo and The Guardian. Romanov loyalist (talk) 02:57, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Look. Just read WP:OR and WP:RS. No go. As far as my "long history" goes, do we know each other? I don't recall ever interacting with you before? How do you "know" of this long history? Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:37, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

So, I removed "alt-right personalities" in my last edit [1] per comments by Romanov loyalist. If anyone objects, I do not mind including this back. My very best wishes (talk) 01:11, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Bias of this article is sad

First of all DJT article does not mention the fact he is under "disinformation campaign" by DNC linked CNN, so tone of the article is ridiculous. Secondly it makes it look like all criticism of WH is funded by Russia, while there have been reports by congressman Thomass Massie(https://twitter.com/repthomasmassie/status/986968440979247105?lang=en) that the chemical attack did not happen(according to US intelligence agencies), and ZDF journalist Uli Gack said similar things. Anybody involved in turning this page into propaganda piece should be banned from Wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.217.25.59 (talk) 02:18, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

The source you cited does not say what you claim it says. We call that failed verification. Claims that fail verification are deleted from articles, and ignored or deleted on talk pages.

Wikipedia summarizes what Reliable Sources say. If you don't like what they say, your grievance isn't with Wikipedia, it's with the sources. As for DJT being "under 'disinformation campaign' by DNC linked CNN", Wikipedia will include that text if and when you (or anyone else) present evidence that's what's published in a substantial or predominate proportion of Reliable Sources. Wikipedia summarizes what Reliable Sources say. Alsee (talk) 05:18, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

The U.S. State Department has reportedly frozen funding to the Syrian White Helmets

Should this be included in the article? link link link linkEndercase (talk) 15:33, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, by all means.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 15:49, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

We're not including garbage from the ronpaulinstitute. Other than that, there's already some info about it in the article.Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:02, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Have you read wp:own @Volunteer Marek:? You should be more careful about your wording IMO, not just in this statement but in several on this page. The correct response here IMO would have been to question the reliability of that specific source and referred the user (myself) to RSN for further guidance on this specific use case. As opposed to showing battlefield like behavior and calling a specific source "garbage". Just a suggestion. --Endercase (talk) 18:45, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Hey thanks for the lecture. That source is still garbage.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:01, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Especially since it's simply a republished ZeroHedge blog post. clpo13_(talk) 18:48, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Nicely put, Marek. Drmies (talk) 02:39, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

UK funding for journalism training

This sentence is currently in the "Publicity and recognition" section: A UK government £5.3 million media activists programme included training Syrian independent journalists and activists, including for reporting of "White Helmets" activities across Twitter and Facebook. It is presumably in this section, rather than the "Funding and partnerships" section, because it relates to social media. I think it is a bit problematic though. It cites a primary source, so might be original research. More importantly, it might be a bit of a stretch of what's in the primary source, so maybe SYNTH. Here's the original: More than 300 Syrian journalists and activists have received training in order to help develop an independent Syrian media. Reports and stories on issues including women’s rights, human rights and civic education are reaching an ever-larger audience through radio, the distribution of magazines and regional television stations. UK funded projects are helping to establish a network of independent media outlets across Syria, whose work has included sending out messages about personal safety after the regime’s chemical weapons attack in Ghouta and, more recently, reporting produced by civil society groups and the likes of the “White Helmets” across Twitter and Facebook accounts. The White Helmet element of the funding is not specified; it could be a small portion or a large portion; at best it is one activity among several funded through this fund. I think we should only include this if there are reliable secondary sources which actually show why this is notable in relation to the topic of this WP article. Thoughts? BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:40, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

It's a month and no comments, so I will go ahead and delete this. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:36, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

References

Semi-protected edit request on 27 May 2018

The following sentence makes no sense because it suggests that involvement of Syrian Civil Defense volunteers 'has largely risen' to discredit the organisation for political ends:

Original: "According to The Guardian, the involvement of Syrian Civil Defense volunteers in those isolated incidents has largely risen to political ends in order to discredit the entire organization ..."

I think it is unlikely that the volunteers involved themselves in these incidents in order to discredit the organisation they belong to. Also, 'risen to' is poor English. Hence I suggest this change:

Improved: "According to The Guardian, exposure by activists of the involvement of Syrian Civil Defense volunteers in those isolated incidents has been largely for political ends in order to expose the entire organization ... " Kingarts (talk) 16:47, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

 Partly done: I removed a large chunk of almost-incomprehensibly-written and ungrammatical text, including the text objected-to here, that added nothing to the article. The accusations and rebuttals are already present and sourced better than the removed text. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 22:55, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

1R on UK information funding

Regarding the latest effort to start an edit war, there is no blanket WP:RS rule on using a primary source about something undisputed. If that stands, there will be challenges to using all primary sources on this page , particularly on claims that are disputed. GPRamirez5 (talk) 15:36, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

@GPRamirez5: if you are going to accuse me of trying to start an edit war, at least have the courtesy to WP:Ping me. Just because something is verifiable, doesn’t mean it has to be included. This inclusion was disputed by me and another editor, so get consensus. I have no problem with including this information if consensus says it should be, but at least include the whole quote so the source isn’t misrepresented. Bennv3771 (talk) 17:19, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

Also, what does this have to do with WP:RS? I don’t see anyone claiming the source isn’t reliable. My reason for reverting was 1) whether this content is even worth noting in this article (i.e not trivial) and 2) that cutting off the first half of the quoted sentence gives the wrong impression to the reader. Bennv3771 (talk) 17:29, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

Did someone steal you're identity, Bennv3771, because you appear to have written this: If it is noteworthy then use a reliable secondary source... WP:RS does not say secondary sourcing is the only criteria for notability, but you Bennv3771 raised it as such.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 18:14, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

@GPRamirez5: Again, what does this have to do with reliability? Noteworthiness and reliability are not the same things. As I've said in my edit summary and above, I question whether this content is worth noting on this article (i.e. not trivial). A reliable secondary source (Yes, it does have to be reliable, because all sources cited on Wikipedia should be. I did not include this word that you keep bringing up "reliable secondary source" because I think the primary source is not reliable, but because I do not think a primary source, no matter how reliable, proves noteworthiness.), covering this funding would be sufficient to prove to me that it is noteworthy and not trivial after all. Bennv3771 (talk) 18:21, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

@GPRamirez5: Indeed, "WP:RS does not say secondary sourcing is the only criteria for notability". That's because WP:RS says nothing about the criteria for notability because WP:RS is about reliability not notability. Bennv3771 (talk) 18:45, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

And when I say "disputed" I mean by a RS, because nobody cares about a WP editor's opinion-GPRamirez5 (talk) 18:18, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

And when I say "disputed" I mean by other editors, because WP:Consensus and WP:ONUS exist. Bennv3771 (talk) 18:22, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

The other editors (please have the courtesy to ping them next time) made their case on the basis of reliability actually, and you're original rationale was following their lead and conflating the two.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 22:16, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

@GPRamirez5: My impression of @Bobfrombrockley:'s post was that he questioned the original interpretation of the cited source as possibly being WP:OR or WP:SYNTH (the original content was not quoted straight from the source). If that is not the case, then oops, sorry Bobfrombrockley. And my original rationale is still my current rational and was not following anyone's lead as I did not even see Bobfrombrockley's original talk page post until after I made my revert + edit summary. Bennv3771 (talk) 23:26, 25 May 2018 (UTC)

That’s correct Bennv3771. A month ago, I raised this sentence as problematic and nobody responded so after 4 or 5 weeks I just deleted it. Not sure why GPRamirez didn’t chip in then if s/he thought it was worth keeping. The text in the article seems to stretch what was in the (primary) source and I couldn’t see why it was notable so I suggested it needed a secondary RS mentioning it before we should include it in the article. BobFromBrockley (talk) 18:29, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

WP:SOAP in the lede

"The group has been the target of a disinformation campaign by supporters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Russia-sponsored media organisations such as RT, with false claims of close ties with terrorist activities and other conspiracy theories." This doesn't belong in the lede, if anywhere. It is simply an endorsement, in Wikipedia's voice, of the subject's preferred narrative. At the very least, it should be qualified as the POV of the group's supporters. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.205.81.97 (talk) 16:29, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

It's an interesting point. I'll certainly be happy to support its moving down along the page once we have agreed how to present it - but that's not going to be any time soon from the looks of things. --Coldtrack (talk) 18:06, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

That's not WP:SOAP. It would also be appreciated if you posted with your regular account.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:47, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Agree. SOAP contains a grain of truth. Your current text is pure fantasy. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:17, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

A "pure fantasy"? Actually, almost no one in discussion above tells it was pure fantasy. My very best wishes (talk) 03:13, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm talking about your current text and in particular your tired line of argument. Pretending one bundle is sources is RS and an opposing batch is not. Then using this discrepancy as a disclaimer to state that where they conflict it must mean non-RS is telling lies. It's a classic case of affirming the consequent but since no "support current text" is wise to fallacies, as is visible by the fact that one is committed with every comment they make, you can dismiss their arguments as just pure fantasy. --Coldtrack (talk) 04:20, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Look, you just violated 1RR rule on this page two times and why? Do you really think this is all "fantasy"? My very best wishes (talk) 14:16, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

@Coldtrack: I've nullified one of the reasons you were using to revert. [2] However know that if you were reported and you tried to use this to excuse your WP:1RR violation you'd probably be blocked with extra time added for playing games. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 14:32, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Hi NeilN what's your position on the NPOV tag? It is clear that a dispute exists. GPRamirez5 (talk) 15:10, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

@GPRamirez5: I won't comment directly on the presence of the tag but will point to WP:WTRMT and say that Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard is available. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 15:20, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Non RS tag added to RT reference

I am a bit confused about why a non-RS tag would need to be attached to the reference to an RT article. There is no suggestion that the article referred to is in any way inaccurate. In fact the article actually links to the government announcement to support its report. It seems to suggest that RT itself is considered to be an unreliable source. I have seen that the Daily Mail is considered to be unreliable but haven’t seen anything written about RT in this respect. What is happening here? Burrobert 14:41, 15 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

@Burrobert: Well the RT (TV network) article itself says that it "has been frequently described as a propaganda outlet for the Russian government and its foreign policy. RT has also been accused of spreading disinformation by news reporters, including some former RT reporters. etc" so it should be used with caution. Bennv3771 (talk) 14:55, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Burrobert I replaced the RT ref with a ref directly to the U.S. Department of State. And as Bennv3771 indicates above, yeah, RT has repeatedly and consistently been rejected as non-reliable in discussions at Reliable Source Noticeboard. RT carries some legitimate news, but they don't do it for commercial reasons - RT is almost 100% funded by the Russian government. They also don't carry legitimate news for journalistic reasons either. The Editor-in-chief of RT gave an interview[3]^{(article in Russian)} with another Russian news agency, and stated that RT only runs legitimate news for the purpose of building an audience. RT's Editor-in-chief also explicitly stated that RT was established for the purpose of information warfare. RT's Editor-in-chief explicitly compared the creation of RT to developing "nuclear weapons" for Russia. Whenever the Russian government has an agenda to push, RT shifts from real news to running propaganda, contradictory stories to sow confusion, and insane interviews with any nutjob or conspiracy-theorist willing to say anything that serves the information-warfare agenda. A series of RT staff members have quit, explicitly calling RT a "propaganda" machine. One of their news-anchors quit in the middle of a live broadcast[4] because they couldn't take it anymore. Alsee (talk) 16:25, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Is that an official Wikipedia policy? Are there any policy references that specifically mention RT? I have seen one that deals with the Daily Mail. I would expect that all Wikipedia entries about news entities have a criticism section so am not surprised that the RT article has one. Burrobert 16:02, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Burrobert my post above edit-conflicted, I didn't see this one at the time. There's no explicit policy, but as I note above it's the consistent result at ReliableSourceNoticeboard if you search the archives. In fact I'd say those old discussions are understated. I'm sure a new discussion with new info could easily get RT formally rated as worse than Daily Mail. Daily Mail is junk, RT is malicious. Alsee (talk) 16:31, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

@Alsee I’ll have a look at the noticeboard you linked to. It seems to be quite long so will take a while to investigate. It seems from a quick reading that, for example, the NYT isn’t considered reliable for some things so there may be some surprises in store there. Burrobert 16:39, 15 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

Oops, I keep forgetting to sign my posts. It’s a funny system. The above comment was from me. Burrobert 16:47, 15 June 2018 (UTC) Burrobert 16:47, 15 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

Burrobert, the software automagically converts ~~~~ into a name&timestamp signature. You can check the result by clicking preview. Three ~ generates just you username, four ~ is a standard signature, and five ~ is just a timestamp. We don't use three or five very often. Alsee (talk) 16:56, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Ok Alsee thanks that’s fairly clear. I do everything on an iPad and have a feeling certain features are missing. For example, I can’t see “preview” and the reply button doesn’t seem to work. Burrobert 17:17, 15 June 2018 (UTC) Burrobert 17:17, 15 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

@Burrobert - the reliable source noticeboard (RSN) has a search bar to make it easier. Here's a search for RT: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?search=rt+prefix%3AWikipedia%3AReliable+sources%2FNoticeboard&title=Special:Search&profile=advanced&fulltext=1&ns0=1&ns1=1&searchToken=90h5ofdt7uvp6j5pbx85f776k The consensus (strengthening over time) is that RT is at best a weak source. The RSN also discusses the Daily Mail, and the consensus is to avoid that too.[5] The State Dept original is not ideal either as it is a primary source, but in my view is much better. Better still would be a news report from a reliable source. As well as signing using the four tildas, it's also good to indent your replies using a colon (use one more colon than the text you are replying to). BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:14, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

Use of the word “apparently”

The US government recently announced that it was resuming funding to the While Helmets. This was reported in a number of places. I updated the funding information to reflect this. However my update was amended to add the word “apparently”. The reference I provided actually linked to the offical announcement so I don’t see why there should be any doubt about the announcement. Does anyone have any suggestions? Burrobert 14:53, 15 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

@Burrobert: If it's been "reported in a number of places" + you want to remove the "better source needed" tag and "apparently", why not just replace the RT source with those other (presumably better) sources? Bennv3771 (talk) 15:01, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Another editor has already replaced the RT source. Bennv3771 (talk) 15:05, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

I am still confused. The RT article has been replaced by the actual statement from the State Department but the “apparently” remains. Regarding the fact that the story was reported in a number of places, I used RT because that’s where I first saw the story. I could have added multiple references I suppose but isn’t one reference normally enough? Burrobert 15:49, 15 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

"isn’t one reference normally enough" If that one reference isn't contested by other editors, then sure it's enough. But if it's contested, then why not replace it when better sources exist? As for the "apparently", you'll have to ask the editor who added it. I don't think the sentence is necessary anyway. The State Department press release just states that some funding has been released so that's what's currently stated in the article as well. Bennv3771 (talk) 16:00, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Yes the “apparently” is certainly unnecessary. It is obvious from the Official source that the statement was actually made by the US government. Thanks for removing it. Burrobert 16:14, 15 June 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

I think it was me that added the "apparently". I think I was concerned that we were straying into "synthesis" (see WP:SYN) as we don't (yet) have a reliable source saying the decision was reversed. We now have a primary source saying new funding has been announced, but I'm worried we are putting words in the state dept's mouth in saying a decision has been reversed. Maybe I was too pedantic. The current wording removes the necessity for the apparently, thanks to Beenv3771. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:18, 16 June 2018 (UTC)

RfC: Roger Waters controversy

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Consensus not to include. The main argument against being WP:UNDUE: as the proponents write, Waters is a celebrity who gave an opinion on the group, but is not really an expert on the group or on the Syrian Civil War, and there is no shortage of such celebrities with opinions, as listed by SamHolt6. Or, even more briefly, Volunteer Marek's pithy two word summary. --GRuban (talk) 21:04, 21 June 2018 (UTC)

---

I propose the following text be introduced to the "Controversies" section of the article:

In April 2018, prominent musician and activist Roger Waters declared to a live audience that the White Helmets were a "fake organization" that created propaganda for “jihadists and terrorists". Waters made the statement in response to repeated entreaties by White Helmets-affiliated activists to endorse the organization.

Do you support this? GPRamirez5 (talk) 21:27, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

References

Support

1. Support As the the Haaretz article notes, Waters is "a political personality", and an experienced activist with the "BDS movement as well as Black Lives Matter." The situation is thus notable.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 21:27, 16 May 2018 (UTC)
2. Support Notable, widely covered. Khirurg (talk) 03:30, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

   While "widely covered" is quite an overstatement, there has been a few other reports. Skipping blogs and other non-reliable sources, a Google News search seems to indicate that other WP:RS coverage appears to consistently focus on Roger Waters comments as non-credible, explicitly in the context of fake news and Russian propaganda.[6][7] If we did include coverage of Waters comments, we could and should use those other sources instead or in addition. Alsee (talk) 02:15, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

   Widely-covered refers to it being reported in at least three different Western countries and across the political spectrum (Herald Sun being owned by Rupert Murdoch). User:Alsee, I don't see any of your sources documenting Waters as a Russian agent, so they seem awful speculative. Indeed, the one from the Guardian is just an opinion piece and disqualified by WP:BIASED.WP:BLP may also be a factor if you want to promote innuendos about Waters and Putin.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 16:54, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

   I did not claim or suggest that Waters was a Russian agent. That came entirely from you.

   I did a Google News search for Roger Waters and White Helmets. Fact. I skipped links which were blogs, or which were otherwise not apparently WP:RS news sites. Fact. I checked a few newspaper websites, starting from the top of the Google hits, in a systematic manner. Fact. The newspaper-websites that came up consistently and explicitly discussed Water's comments in the context of fake news and/or Russian propaganda. Fact. I linked theguardian.com and heraldscotland.com as examples/evidence of the results of that systematic scan of top newspaper hits. Fact. You came up with the WP:Original research idea about Waters being a Russian agent, and you made the error of attributing your Original idea to my text. When I read those newspaper hits I came to the conclusion that they were suggesting Waters was an unreliable and innocent victim of fake news / propaganda. However I do not recall the authors explicitly stating that point -- that was my WP:Original research conclusion. I did not include that Original Research conclusion in my comment. Alsee (talk) 03:34, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

3. Support What the likes of Dr. Mies do not understand is the relevance of the event was not because a "random musician" got up on stage in Barcelona and denounced the White Helmets as the assistants of terrorists. It's the fact that the crowd of thousands and thousands of the general public in Barcelona, causing millions, if not billions of fans of one of the most commercially successful and influential groups in popular music history to cheer him when they heard the news. That's what they're really afraid of letting get out in this article. Flashy Gordon (talk) 00:07, 27 May 2018 (UTC) — Flashy Gordon (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
4. Support This wasn't a casual reference by Waters, people had tried to recruit him in favour of the White helmets since back in 2016. After he had looked into it, he came out against them. Please read: Exclusive Emails Show How The White Helmets Tried To Recruit Roger Waters With Saudi Money, Whatever you think of Max Blumenthal: AFAIK no-one has disputed the facts in this story Huldra (talk) 21:06, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
5. Support Notable person remarking on subject of article with just cause concerning his own public affairs (so should also be on his own article). No reason this should be left off the encyclopaedia except on the typical WP:IDONTLIKEIT principles of the "let's pretend the White Helmets are sterile" brigade. --Coldtrack (talk) 21:16, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

Oppose

• Oppose. Trivial; does not enhance readers' understanding of subject. Reliance on Max Blumenthal commentary is unacceptable as well (Ha'artez describes him as an "American far-leftist journalist Max Blumenthal"). Neutrality^talk 22:07, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

(Responses/extended discussion moved to "discussion" section below).

• Oppose In my view the sentence is WP:UNDUE for an article concerning such a broad subject. The subject is notable and the sources cited are verifiable, but statement and indeed the incident itself is trivial when compared to the sheer amount of content that covers the White Helmets. Though this may be me treading on the slippery slope fallacy, but an encyclopedic article about a topic of this magnitude does not need to cover the views of every notable figure that has commented on the White Helmets. This applies to public figures (who tend to pass WP:BIO by default) that have endorsed the group like George Clooney (who is producing a film about the WH), Daniel Craig, Aziz Ansari, or figures that have criticized the group like Alex Jones, Tucker Carlson, and Peter Ford. Again treading on the aforementioned slippery slope, when do we stop once we begin including trivial quotations from notable people?--SamHolt6 (talk) 00:44, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Celebrity chosen and forced onto the article because of he has an opinion and told somebody about said opinion. WP:UNDUE, WP:VALID, etc. Stikkyy t/c 05:09, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose this is totally WP:UNDUE. Also, specifically oppose the logic that being a BDS activist is credentials for inclusion. --Calthinus (talk) 13:10, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. Who cares? Undue.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:40, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose. The personal views of a random musician do not remotely belong in this encyclopedia article. Furthermore it is a WP:CHERRYPICKed fringe view. If we were to include celebrity commentary on the issue, policy WP:NPOV would require us to place primary focus on the overwhelming number of celebrities offering the opposing view. Note: The entire Syrian topic space, including this article, have been subject to incessant efforts to push unreliable and fringe source POV. This effort to cite an utterly random musician illustrates how low you have to dig to find anything that remotely supports the POV-intent here. Alsee (talk) 01:52, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
• I was very much wanting to discredit the source, and it is turning out to be very difficult to verify that the Monthly Review is reliable--I don't put that much stock in Blumenthal. But I certainly can't verify that it's not reliable. However, still oppose because this is such a little thing--that it's mentioned in a bunch of publications ("it" being the comments by Waters, not the emails or whatever led up to it) doesn't make it a big thing. To put it another way, who the hell cares that Waters makes some claim about them? He's hardly an expert on the Middle East, and it's not like he studied them extensively via an internship in Syria: he got a couple emails, that's all, so it's an uninformed opinion as well. Also, "If we were to include celebrity commentary on the issue, NPOV would require...", well, no, because NPOV requires us to look at all of the significant views. In other words, the moment we start including uninformed celebrity commentary we have already violated NPOV. This is a common mistake, that NPOV somehow requires us to "balance it out", when frequently that's asking for a false equivalency. Drmies (talk) 02:37, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

  Drmies I don't think I made the mistake you think I made, grin. I was making an argument in the alternative. Proponents are looking for a vehicle to carry their desired POV into the article, and their proposed vehicle is both insignificant and fringe. If we landed in a bizarre universe where consensus decided celebrity views were significant, NPOV would still require that we summarize the predominant (celebrity) views and that we provide little-or-no coverage of fringe (celebrity) views. My point was that proponents are in a lose-lose situation here, and they should just give up. Alsee (talk) 05:49, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose. I do think this should go on the Roger Waters article (since it was widely covered, and Waters is a political persona as well as a musician - his positions should have space). However - the opinions of Waters carry very little weight in world affairs - so this is basically an opinion of not too influencing musician/activist - so unless this become more than that in relation to the White Helmets - it is UNDUE here.Icewhiz (talk) 21:30, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Hollywood-approved films about the Helmets are mentioned prominently in the "Publicity and recognition" section. Films are produced by artists and corporations like Netflix, neither of whom are political or medical experts. The Oscar and Sundance awards are basically voted on by celebrities. With the established emphasis in this article on cultural producers, a statement by a veteran, best-selling, award-winning artist like Waters is most definitely relevant and not in the least "undue." GPRamirez5 (talk) 17:06, 27 May 2018 (UTC)

• oppose trivial celebrity crap. discuss at the Waters article, not here. See WP:ONEWAY. Jytdog (talk) 01:52, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

People keep evoking this "celebrity" thing, but none of the sources are in the entertainment section, they're in the National or World sections.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 06:42, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

People keep evoking it, because it is celebrity crap. Jytdog (talk) 03:29, 23 May 2018 (UTC)

• Oppose The sourcing is poor, the text misrepresents the balance of content in the majority of sources (which do not report 'repeated entries' by White Helmets - and even the one source that does offers two email invites as evidence - 'do you want to come to a fund-raising dinner?' and 'can I come onstage and make an appeal at your next concert?"), but most of all, since when has Waters become an authority on the White Helmets? As others have said, the content might belong on 'his' article, since it is his actions which are being reported. It would need a much higher level of coverage to even warrant inclusion as a 'controversy' about WH. Pincrete (talk) 23:02, 22 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose Agree that this is undue. Bennv3771 (talk) 18:07, 25 May 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose WP:UNDUE loupgarous (talk) 06:47, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

Discussion

CaradhrasAiguo, I got the sense from your comment above that you actually *support* including the text, is that not right?-GPRamirez5 (talk) 23:31, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

SamHolt6, one distinguishing feature from Alex Jones, or another uninvolved commentator, is that Roger Waters was approached by the White Helmets representatives themselves.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 01:58, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

@GPRamirez5: Exactly. Roger Waters (who is notable) was approached by the White Helmets representatives, and this was reported on by reliable, verifiable sources, but then what? From the information cited we can ascertain that the WH asked for an endorsement from Waters and that he rebuffed and criticized them, but this one instance centered around a single individual does not a trend make. A single event such as this one is comparable to the hundreds of other comments (be they, positive, negative, or neutral) made by notable people in regards to the White Helmets. When compared to the massive subject that topic subject encompasses, any singular event, regardless of what it concerns, is UNDUE and a trivial tangent from the broader subject at hand. Now, if we were to see a trend where in the White Helmets were soliciting notable figures for support, then Waters' comments would be seen as noteworthy and part of a trend. I would also note that (I feel this discussion will head down this path) this RfC concerns the sentence above, and that the debate as to whether or not Waters should be listed as a critic of the WH is another issue.--SamHolt6 (talk) 03:58, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

---

• The only other remotely reliable source that describes Blumenthal as "far left" is the Washington Free Beacon, which itself displays its political illiteracy by describing The Left (Germany) as "far left". Neither should the editorial board of Haaretz, based in hard-right Israel, be treated as having a degree in political science. CaradhrasAiguo (talk) 22:37, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

  Max Blumenthal is, in many ways, far too controversial and "alternative" a character for a mainstream encyclopedia to rely upon. Some evening reading for you:[[8]]. Regarding Haaretz, they are a left-leaning source that is heavily critical of the Israeli government and anyone familiar with Israel can attest to that. Lastly, regarding The Left (Germany) the characterization as a "far left" party is far from uncommon. --Calthinus (talk) 13:20, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

  1. Max Blumenthal may or may not be RS on his own, but published by the Monthly Review, with undisputed emails directly provided by Roger Waters, this most certainly qualifies for the Controversy section.

  2. Why are we discussing the Green Party? They have no relevance to the text.

  3. Again, we have a situation involving White Helmet reps, one of the biggest concert audiences in the world, a very unusual live public repudiation of the WH, and mainstream coverage (including by the pro-Israel Jerusalem Post if that matters).

  Umm the first person to mention the Green Party is ... you. Now regarding our publisher being an "independent socialist magazine", well I do not have a stance on that one but I can assure you that is not a shoe-in either :). Update: well this is interesting, it seems they formerly "offered critical support of the Soviet Union". Not exactly a run-of-the mill newspaper it seems :). --Calthinus (talk) 18:47, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

  Damn Calthinus, I meant the Left Party, not the Green Party. Anyway, the question still stands. What do they have to do with this?

  Re:"critical support of the Soviet Union" Yep, Monthly Review have the same politics as Nelson Mandela, Rosa Luxembourg and Mikhael Gorbachev. But less relevant than their philosophy is their reputation for factual accuracy, which has led them to various university associations.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 20:19, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

  Ramirez, if you read above you may see that Die Linke was brought up by Aiguo, not myself, who claimed that describing Die Linke as "far-left" demonstrated "political illiteracy". Well, that's an interesting thing to claim about "illiteracy", because look at all these sources backing it up. Of course Beacon might not be exactly centrist (they lean to the right) but compared to historically pro-Soviet socialists... ahem. And I'm a lefty, by the way. Not that the characterization of Max Blumenthal as "far left" or indeed "alt left" is limited to Haaretz (left) and Washington Free Beacon (right), it's far more common than Aiguo would have you think [[9]][[10]][[11]] and there is far more. Really, we're dealing with the fringe here. --Calthinus (talk) 20:48, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

So you can produce five RS cites that say Die Linke is far-left; I can produce six that say it's left. Fortunately this isn't a pissing contest; the truth is that Die Linke is a coalition, and it includes Marxist-Leninist groupings and social-democratic groupings, as well as more radical formations (read the article to learn the history). Yeah, sure, in the USA they'd be considered pretty fringe, I guess; in Yurp, not so much. What they have in common is that they're left-wing: they all claim to be socialists (this isn't "left-wing" like e.g. Obama). Note that those M/L groupings are largely a residue of Honneker-style communism; Die Linke is strongest in the states that were originally part of East Germany. Really, that kind of communism can't be called far-left. That's mainstream state-corporate socialism.

Update: it strikes me that my remark could be taken to imply that Die Linke are all Marxist-Leninist state-corporate commies. That is far from what I meant. They are a coalition (like most political parties). MrDemeanour (talk) 21:31, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

Consensus on the RS noticeboard is that Monthly Review is academically associated and not extremist.GPRamirez5 (talk) 22:50, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

And that discussion on RSN is 10 years old. Stikkyy t/c 00:14, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, it's been that long since anyone questioned MR apparently.GPRamirez5 (talk) 01:20, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

And you're completely welcome to start a discussion on WP:RSN regarding that. Anyways, the problem is not with the sourcing. It is whether the clause is worth including, considering the amount of figures which have spoken both for and against the White Helmets, and if said clause is actually helpful to the reader. Stikkyy t/c 04:13, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

Just to say the piece in question is not a journal article in the journal Monthly Review (monthlyreview.org) but an article from Grayzone reblogged on the MR's "MRonline" blog. But agree the sourcing is not the issue as much as UNDUE/cherrypicking is. BobFromBrockley (talk) 17:48, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

What does cherrypicking mean? WP:CHERRYPICK-which is not a policy, or even a guideline-argues that:

"In the context of editing an article, cherrypicking, in a negative sense, means selecting information without including contradictory or significant qualifying information from the same source and consequently misrepresenting what the source says. This applies both to quotations and to paraphrasings."

How have I "misrepresented" the source pray tell? Is the date or the quotation not correct?

We're omitting the Russian theory in the Haaretz article for the same reason we're omitting the Saudi lobbying in the MR post. We are sticking to the concrete facts as an encyclopedia should. (Although it may be unfair to compare those two since there's real documentation that the Saudis fund SCD's PR but no documentation that the Russians fund Roger Waters.) -GPRamirez5 (talk) 18:52, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

I didn't refer to WP:CHERRYPICK when I said it was cherry-picking. I was using it in the common sense meaning described there: "Outside of Wikipedia, cherrypicking often means selecting from the general range of sources on a topic so as to misrepresent a consensus or to misrepresent what has been published... "Cherry-picking" a source is selecting only the information favourable to an editor's point of view for an article, without seeing the true meaning of the source. Likewise, some people will only select red cherries or dark purple cherries from a farm." Roger Waters is one celebrity among many that has commented on the WHs. Picking him, rather than, say, Clooney, is like selecting only red cherries because you happen to like them.BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:02, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

Oh that's good, because the article considers your meaning of "cherrypicking" to be inappropriate for Wiki:

Outside of Wikipedia, in many media, cherrypicking has a wider meaning that is not entirely useful for the editing of Wikipedia...neutrality or due weight may require it, but an individual editor is not required to be neutral, only the article is, and an article's neutrality and balancing of weight are often achieved by adding content, without necessarily deleting other content. Our concern against cherrypicking when editing a Wikipedia article is generally against cherrypicking specifically from within a single source. -GPRamirez5 (talk) 17:52, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I didn't refer to policy WP:CHERRYPICKING in my original comment; I was using "cherry-picking" in ordinary usage, following a previous editor, to describe how one editor cherry-picked a celeb whose view s/he liked. If the response is to indulge that editor's tastes but then add other celebrities for balance, we'll end up with an enormous article full of celeb tittle-tattle. Let's just leave the article in an encyclopedic form, without giving UNDUE weight to celebs. BobFromBrockley (talk) 04:34, 23 May 2018 (UTC)

References

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Israel Evacuates 800 Members of White Helmets Rescue Organization to Jordan

• Kubovich, Yaniv; Khoury, Jack; Landau, Noa (22 July 2018). "Israel Evacuates 800 Members of White Helmets Rescue Organization to Jordan". Haaretz. Sokuya (talk) 09:22, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

Unclear Wording

Not sure if this is the right place for this but "On May 2018, the State Department announced that funding has been frozen for the White Helmets." Should probably be "On May 2018, the US State Department announced that funding has been frozen for the White Helmets." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.54.240.24 (talk) 06:09, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

 Done. This is exactly the right place and thanks for noticing. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 19:18, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

James Le Mesurier red link feeds conspiracy theory

On July 23, 2018, Vanessa Beeley—associate editor of 21st Century Wire, a North American and Europe-based blog—launched a conspiracy theory via Twitter, where she has 39.3K followers, involving Wikipedia. "Has James Le Mesurier," she tweeted, "ex-military, British private security 'expert', founder of #WhiteHelmets been conveniently scrubbed fm #Wikipedia?" This was soon reinforced by Zak Boufont, who attached to his tweet a screenshot purportedly documenting what he called "the disappearance of the link to James Le Measurer" from Wikipedia's White Helmets (Syrian Civil War) page. (It shows no such thing.) Sheila Coombes joined in, tweeting "Wow, case of the disappearing creator of WhiteHelmets from Wikipedia!" And Newsbreak Canada magnified the message by regurgitating Vanessa Beeley's original tweet.

When James Le Mesurier was added as founder to the Infobox on 14 April 2018, his name was red linked—meaning no such page existed. Clicking that link led to a corresponding new article creation page that significantly contained no notice that a page with that title had previously been moved or created.

There is no question that red linking James Le Mesurier was relevant to the context of White Helmets (Syrian Civil War). However, given the confusion and distrust of Wikipedia now being sown by conspiracy mongers, I have temporarily removed double brackets from the founder's name in our Infobox. If other editors disagree, I request that they discuss it here and allow consensus to form before restoring the link. KalHolmann (talk) 20:02, 23 July 2018 (UTC)

• "Newsbreak Canada"? I need an LOL emoji for that, though I'm happy they stand with Russia, a poor country, mischaracterized in the MSM and in dire need of a hug. Kal, you may sleep much better if you stop paying attention to those trolls. I made a redirect for the dude, and I appreciate your note. Drmies (talk) 00:35, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

Contradiction in the article

In section Controversies it is stated that all accusations of While Helmets in stage performance and collaboration with terror organization are false. In next paragraphs in the section are evidences of stage performance and people participating both in White Helmets and militant groups. It seems wikipedia get lost in propaganda war. Lying too much, eh? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.165.173.131 (talk) 17:58, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

• Eh, what evidence, eh? Drmies (talk) 00:36, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

SIS connection

Why is there no mention of James Le Mesurier being an SIS officer? 31.48.111.106 (talk) 19:57, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

• Does it matter? Drmies (talk) 00:36, 24 July 2018 (UTC)
• Widespread embarrasment over NATO interference in the internal affairs of other countries, I would imagine.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 01:14, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

RfC on media controversy

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

A proposal that the following text appear in the lead, as well as the "Controversies" section, of the article. GPRamirez5 (talk) 17:27, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

The White Helmets have been accused of being a propaganda front for foreign governments and an ally of jihadist groups. The authors of this “counter-narrative” include institutions supporting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, including Russia Today (RT), as well as non-state commentators. These claims are denied by supporters of the White Helmets, who consider them Russian "disinformation.

Current lead text:

The organisation has been the target of a disinformation campaign by supporters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Russia-sponsored media organisations such as Russia Today (RT), with false claims of close ties with terrorist activities and other conspiracy theories.

References

Support current text

• Support current text. This page is under discretionary sanctions, and has just come off of full protection due to edit warring. This page has been a magnet for IPs, SPAs, and anti-mainstream-advocacy editwarring. The initial draft of this RFC[12] failed to note that we already have well-sourced text on this topic, and failed to make it clear that the RFC was actually proposing to resolve the editwarring by removing&replacing the current text. I humbly suggest that the current lead has been defended by various long-term non-topic-focused generalist editors.
  
  The sources cited in the current text are a small sample of the of the global sources all saying a disinformation campaign or propaganda campaign exists against the White Helmets. The reason the current lead is the current lead, is because every attempt to dispute it has appealed to non-RS or otherwise poor sources. Any topic facing this level of fake-news and conspiracy theories needs to rely on elevated standards of solid Reliable Sourcing, not reduced standards of sourcing. Under Wikipedia policies and guidelines, the current lead content is effectively undisputed by usable sources. We do-not and cannot re-write articles based on counter-claims citing blogs, tweets, facebook, crackpot conspiracy-theory sites, random rants by a random musicians, selfpublished sources, and other non-RS junk. The closest thing we have to a counter-POV is RussiaTimes(RT)/Sputnik and related government-controlled sources, and those sources have been consistently found unreliable and unusable on ReliableSourceNoticeboard for these kinds of factual claims. When fake-news and conspiracy-theories fail so hard that activists can't dig up any viable RS to lean on, we do not create a false equivalence pushing a non-RS-controversy.

  Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. -- Wikipedia Policy on NPOV, Due and undue weight.

  While it is important to account for all significant viewpoints on any topic, Wikipedia policy does not state or imply that every minority view or extraordinary claim needs to be presented along with commonly accepted mainstream scholarship as if they were of equal validity. [] Conspiracy theories, pseudoscience, speculative history, or plausible but currently unaccepted theories should not be legitimized through comparison to accepted academic scholarship. We do not take a stand on these issues as encyclopedia writers, for or against; we merely omit this information where including it would unduly legitimize it. -- Wikipedia Policy on NPOV, Giving "equal validity" can create a false balance.

  
  The counter argument is that all of the Reliable Sources are pushing a biased narrative because they are all "Western", where "Western" means pretty much anywhere outside of Russia controlled media, from Germany to France to Scotland to US to Japan. (Isn't Japan Eastern?) Alsee (talk) 04:38, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
• Followup comment to the closer: The big problem we're having on this page is unconstructive arguments without any concrete source dispute. One side either fails to cite any specific sources, or they yield that some specific source isn't unusable and unconstrutive generic argument continues. There have been repeated offers to resolve any disputes by taking sources to ReliableSourceNoticeboard, but we can't even get to ReliableSourceNoticeboard without any concrete source.
  If you're willing to take the time to do so, I suggest you read the long academic paper supplied by one of the advocates of the new text. The paper does an excellent job defining the current situation. It documents that "mainstream" sources carry one consistent narrative, and that there is an "alternative" media carrying an alternate narrative. The paper's use of "mainstream" and "alternative" media closely equates to Wikipedia's concept of "Reliable" and "Unreliable" sources. There is (currently) significant minority support for the new text, however even if they were majority, policy requires that articles be based on Reliable Sources. Alsee (talk) 16:23, 20 July 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text. Current text accurately summarizes what reliable sources, and the body of the article, say. The proposed new text places undue weight upon a single source which takes a position that is quite far from what the majority of recognized reliable sources say. Most arguments against current version, as seen elsewhere on this talk page, are based on attempts to de-legitimize recognized reliable sources and the reliable sourcing guidelines in general, which isn't even an argument that should take place here. The issue to deal with here is which version accurately represents what the majority of reliable sources say, and that is the current version. UnequivocalAmbivalence (talk) 05:53, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text. Current text summarises sources well. It also summarises well what the proposed new source - the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence proceedings by Starbird et al - better than the proposed text does. That article is better captured in its abstract (“our work reveals a small set of websites and authors generating content that is spread across diverse sites, drawing audi- ences from distinct communities into a shared narrative. This analysis also reveals the integration of government-funded media and geopolitical think tanks as source content for anti-White Helmets narratives.”) than in the quotation in GPRamirez’s proposed footnote, I think. Starbird et al provide evidence for an active disinformation campaign (they use that very term) involving Russian state media among others: “disinformation campaigns do not need to rely on a single narrative or counter-narrative, but can work by presenting diverse and even contradictory narratives...The Russian government has previously taken issue with— and actively worked to undermine the mission of—NGOs which they see as a threat to its geopolitical interests (Ambrosio 2007)... In this study, we can see an extension of that criticism to a hu- manitarian response organization working—both through its efforts to assist affected people and to garner attention for their cause—against the geopolitical interests of Russia and its ally, the Syrian government.” So I am for the inclusion of the new source, but see no reason to change the text. BobFromBrockley (talk) 22:56, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text. This is not just an ordinary "controversy". The majority of RS tell that WH was a target of the disinformation campaign. We must start from clearly stating the majority view. That is what old version does. New version actually promotes this disinformation by effectively saying that the false accusations could well be true. WP:SOAP. My very best wishes (talk) 19:49, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

This is classic case of WP:GEVAL. The "Russian/Syrian/Iranian" propaganda sources in this specific case are not equal to other actual RS used on this page. My very best wishes (talk) 03:23, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

GEVAL is profoundly disingenuous where you are concerned. Three countries' news outlets and endless independent non-news coverage from several states and in dozens of languages, and commentators spanning even further afield including Roger Waters and George Galloway. I'm sorry to tell you that this shatters your GEVAL argument. GEVAL applies to pseudo-science such as flat earth conspiracies. Although looking at it another way, seeing that your "disinformation" farytale is based on mouthpieces for western governments via their associated media but clearly not accepted outside of this farm, I'd say YOURS is the minority view. --Coldtrack (talk) 04:38, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

• Support current text. Ad infinitum et nauseum. Stop WP:BLUDGEONING the process. Stikkyy t/c 03:43, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

• Support current text - this is an obnoxious WP:POINT stunt by the proposer, based on a gross misrepresentation of sources. The first source just notes that there is indeed an "alternative" Russian and Assadist narrative. Sources 2 through 5, which are falsely presented as if they supported the proposed text, are actually sources which support the current text. This is lying plain and simple, by the proposer (yes, I'm calling it out). On an article under DS sanctions. These kinds of stunts should merit a topic ban.Volunteer Marek (talk) 13:57, 2 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text - current text is fine; proposed version misrepresents sources as VM notes. Neutrality^talk 23:46, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text - there is no reason to describe this is anything other than a disinformation campaign against the White Helmets. Letupwasp (talk) 19:22, 6 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text the only people opposed to it are Russians and Assadists. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 177.128.216.106 (talk) 17:04, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text the preponderance of sources seems to support the current text rather than the new proposed text. The academic paper suggested as a source may be peer-reviewed, but it's written by professors of "human-centered design" and published in a journal about artificial intelligence. They seem to completely ignore the actual facts of the situation in their analysis, focusing instead on the mechanics of how contrasting narratives spread through social media. I don't think this paper is really relevant to this topic in any but the most abstract sense. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 12:42, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text while generally I like to give reasons with my votes, all my reasons and other commentary have already been stated by others, especially Volunteer Marek.-- Calthinus (talk) 21:40, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text -- Found on RfP list. This is a case where it is important to call a disinformation campaign a disinformation campaign, as it is described that way in the RS cited. The new proposed language cites two new sources, neither of which supports downgrading the clarity of "disinformation campaign" to competing narrative. To do that, one would need cite a neutral source saying that perhaps the counter-narrative has some merit. None is offered. The first new source is a computer science paper that does not probe the veracity of the claims. The second new source does not mention Syria. As far as I see, the sources cited (and others) do not treat this as a case of narrative and counter-narrative, they treat it as a case of facts and 'alternative facts.' Chris vLS (talk) 08:45, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
• Strongly Support current text -- Summoned by the bot. A lot of people come to Wikipedia to get the bottom-line on issues that are prone to disinformation and bias. Therefore, it is important to inform the reader, right away in the lede, of the well documented campaign against the White Helmets. Most likely, the reason the reader is here is to get to the bottom of this and therefore it should be explained clearly and straightforwardly. I believe the current text is appropriately worded for this effect. The new proposal, on the other hand is shifts the focus of towards undocumented accusations against the White Helmets. Importantly, the accusation in the first sentence of the new proposal is not supported anywhere, including the Strabird et al. paper. Dryfee (talk) 18:23, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support current text per reliable sources. The proposed new text gives undue weight to unreliable/fringe sources. Bennv3771 (talk) 02:31, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Support new text

• Support new text The peer-reviewed paper cited here takes a thoughtful NPOV view of the controversy, and is a necessary balance to the more sensationalized popular media reports.GPRamirez5 (talk) 17:27, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
• If this is a Proceedings paper then it's not peer reviewed. And you're cherry picking a couple quotes from the source to misrepresent it. THE SOURCE does NOT "accuse (WH) of being a propaganda front for foreign governments and an ally of jihadist groups". It just notes that Russian and Assadist propaganda makes these claims. But we already know that and we already have that in the article.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:25, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  Some proceedings may not be peer-reviewed, but this one most certainly is. Blind review and all: http://www.icwsm.org/2018/submitting/call-for-papers/

  And no, the paper doesn't accuse anyone of anything. That's why it (unlike you User:Volunteer Marek) is NPOV.GPRamirez5 (talk) 21:01, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

• And I just read that one source. It's pretty much all about how the Russian government disinformation online campaign is organized and disseminated. The source in no way supports the text. This is the kind of stunt that should get you immediately topic banned.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:34, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  Volunteer Marek, there's a quote in the endnotes. And who will be bringing that attempted ban? -GPRamirez5 (talk) 21:01, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  A cherry picked and edited quote, which you're using to misrepresent the source, most of which is about how this precise kind of disinformation by Russian and Assadist media takes place.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:31, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  Damn, you should provide a link to the complete paper...Oh wait, there already is one..GPRamirez5 (talk) 21:01, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  Uh, yes, there is, so what exactly is your complaint? Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:32, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

  The paper makes clear that two "contested narratives" are being presented by supporters and critics and there is not enough evidence to speak conclusively about them. There is mention of an atmosphere of disinformation in recent years, but no attribution of who exactly is responsible—and it is acknowledged that the Eastern countries accuse NATO of war propaganda and disinformation. The scholars believe in objective truth and reality (note that nearly the same team openly called out "misinformation" in the case of Boston Marathon truthers), but NPOV leads them to avoid labeling either narrative as misinformation—never mind disinformation.GPRamirez5 (talk) 14:51, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

  "and there is not enough evidence to speak conclusively about them" cough*bullshit*cough* Volunteer Marek (talk) 13:52, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

  As Marek indicates, Ramirez' claim is false. The authors of the paper explicitly did seek to evaluate or discuss the validity of claims. I would like to draw the parallel to proper Wikipedia editing, it was not their task (and it is not our task) to deal with truth of claims. It was their task to provide scientific documentation of the the information environment, and it is our task to summarize reliable sources in that environment. Both tasks deliberately refrain from engaging in the topic-debate itself. Alsee (talk) 01:58, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

  As Marek and Alsee indicate, GPRamirez5's claim that the computer science paper finds "there is not enough evidence to speak conclusively about them" is not supported by the source, or even by the nature of the article. In fact, the paper itself says that it does not weigh in on the weight of the evidence: "In this study, we do not speak directly to this question" of "what and whom to believe." Chris vLS (talk) 09:01, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

  Nonsense Alsee. You also still haven't addressed the fact that nearly the same team did make a validity call on "misinformation" in the case of Boston Marathon truthers. And that paper had near identical objectives re: social media.GPRamirez5 (talk) 02:38, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

  In my universe it is not reasonable to assert 18% similarity as "nearly the same". The Marathon paper is getting also badly offtopic, but it addressed an incident that was effectively completed, it examined unreliabile tweets, it utterly disregarded unreliable "alternative media", and it used the mainstream media and official investigation as a retrospective metric of accuracy of those tweets. The Helmets paper used unreliable tweets as pointers to sources, and it documents the existence of an alternative media without asserting any reliability for it. To the contrary, the paper repeatedly hangs red-flag warnings on the alternative media. We do not write articles based on non-RS sources. Alsee (talk) 17:53, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Actually, the White Helmets paper is throwing up "red flags" around all media, as indicated by the researchers' discussion of Chomsky's Propaganda model.- GPRamirez5 (talk) 18:28, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

What??? Makes sense man! Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:55, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

• Support new text. We have arrived at a stage where some people's idea of "RS" is being used not as a reference but as a disclaimer to discredit the various sources it considers disagreeable. So whatever happens, the word "disinformation" must either be 1) not included, or 2 ) used exclusively to refer to the western sources actually guilty of it. What he have at the moment is "Source 1 spreads disinformation because source 2 says so". That is not the same as producing a finding that confirms the allegation - and when this happens you will know, because the Syrian & Russian sources will not be able to continue in what they aver. Whilst they maintain their positions, it is an impasse (source 1 vs source 2). So the list of fallacies by those wishing to say "Russia spreads disinformation" is as long as a basketball player's torso: begging the question, argument from ignorance, argument from incredulity, affirming the consequent, and several more. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:36, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
• Support new text. Frankly, present text looks as if it could have been written by the CIA, Huldra (talk) 21:12, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

  Could have been, cute. Support is the right call, 2nd'd. 5.100.228.149 (talk) 22:10, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

• Support strongly the newer text. Sources are evidently split and parity needs to be reflected. One bundle of sources accusing a second of disinformation is not proof positive of the former's claim. --Edin Balgarin (talk) 07:59, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

  Sources are NOT "split". All that the provided source shows is that there is indeed an "alternative" disinformation campaign being carried out through online media. None of the sources support the proposed text. This is a WP:IJUSTLIKEIT !vote (same as the others).Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:00, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

  Unsubstantiated claim. Reliable Sources are not split. The only "split" is if we consider blogs, conspiracy-theory-websites, and other sources that fail under Wikipedia RS policies and guidelines. Furthermore Wikipedia does not deal in "proof" or any other original research judgment of truth. Editors are tasked with accurately summarizing what reliable sources say. Any editor who is concerned with "proof" or "truth" of what those sources say need to address those concerns somewhere other than Wikipedia. Alsee (talk) 01:43, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

I repeat, sources are 100% SPLIT. My rationate has not been invalidated in spite of your efforts. Russian, Iranian and Syrian media report the Helmets as terrorist-linked, while mainstream western sources say this is not so. As the mainstream sources have not substantiated their claim, we have conflicting reports. The bloggers are purely additional here, therefore the premise of sources conflicting does not rely on the mass of independent publishers and commentators who have also exposed the Helmets are terrorist-related (and I can assure you there are LOTS of these from many countries). The Russian/Syrian/Iranian sources suffice. As for the jaded "oh but western sources are RS" narrative, well this is pure whimpering. Nobody has demonstrated why their favoured networks are reliable and why the alternative sources are "unreliable". So, unless "disninformation" is actually evidenced, there is no justification to refer to the Russian findings as such. And IF disinformation is ever brought to light, you'll know because the blogs and the Russian media and the like will discontinue with the claim. If the Helmets were suddenly revealed to be as per mainstream description, this would not suddenly disgrace Assad's government, nor would it suddenly boost the popularity of the so-called "moderate fanatics" - these lunatics have reached the zenith of their popularity and their appreciation is restricted SOLELY to western regimes, western media and apologists for western foreign policy. Now if we found commentary from someone who opposes the war but nevertheless claimed no link between terrorists and Helmets, OK it wouldn't prove the disinformation point but it would certainly prove that those accusing the Helmets of being terrorist-linked are confined to a finite number of sources. But that type of writer or reporter or blogger does not exist. So apart from that, not even the entire western population swallows the crap that is dished out by mainstream propaganda. --Edin Balgarin (talk) 15:33, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Correction - reliable source are NOT split. Garbage sources are certainly peddling some bullshit, which is what the text already knows.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:49, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Give it a rest, he told you, sources are split, end of story. The term garbage sources applies only to the sources that tickle your ear. As far as I am concerned we are even divided as to what constitutes reliable. Until you've shown this, it's argument from repetition where you're concerned. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:12, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

The disagreement over what constitutes reliable sources is indeed at the root of this issue, but the fact is that the sources considered reliable by wikipedia are not split. If you want to raise the idea of considering sources like 21stcenturywire to be reliable (as that is, according the the paper cited by GPRamirez, the primary source for the "counter-narrative" you wish to present), the place to do that is at the RSN, not here. As it stands, the sources currently considered reliable are pretty much unanimous on this issue, so that is the way we present it. UnequivocalAmbivalence (talk) 11:30, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

The sources considered *most* reliable by Wikipedia are peer-reviewed ones. According to the peer-reviewed paper here, "The arguments and evidence presented in support of narratives on both sides are often compelling." -GPRamirez5 (talk) 15:47, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Nonsense, that just describes the process through which they gathered their data. You cherry picked one sentence to make it seem like the source supports you. It doesn't.Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:54, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek, for Christ's sake why can't people rebuff you and be left alone? I haven't drawn my opinion along the other section where half a dozen or so editors have acted as one echo chamber on the tired "RS" argument. Your gang says Russian-Syrian sources are unreliable, we say prove it, you repeat yourselves ad nauseam hoping this will dry up, so we reply "ok, we say they ARE reliable" and again you all deploy the ad nauseam "RS RS RS" narrative. So we have no way of breaking out of your strategic loop. --Edin Balgarin (talk) 16:57, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Because one of the requirements of these RfCs is that editors make policy based arguments rather than just WP:IJUSTDONTLIKEIT !votes. Like the two fellahs below.Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:54, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

• Support new text based on all reasons above. SUM1 (talk) 09:02, 6 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support new text I won't reiterate all the above arguments. Robertgombos (talk) 05:19, 11 June 2018 (UTC)
• Support new text per WP:NPOV. Old text is very, very POV. Khirurg (talk) 01:58, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
• Support new text per WP:NPOV. Supporters of the old text fail to convince. This is a clear improvement. Jusdafax (talk) 03:29, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
• Support new text Zellfire999 (talk) 21:52, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

Oppose/other

• WP:POINT is a behavioral guideline and this article is under discretionary sanctions.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:17, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  Oh and I also love how you try to create a fake narrative with sourcing. You have ONE source for the highly POV claim in the first sentence, and four sources debunking that view, but the way you've arranged it on this RfC it looks as if there were five sources supporting this piece of nonsense.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:20, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  Yes that's why I referred to the peer reviewed reliable secondary source, in contrast to those multiple primary media sources. Please familiarize yourself with WP:SCHOLARSHIP and WP:NEWSORG:

  Editorial commentary, analysis and opinion pieces, whether written by the editors of the publication (editorials) or outside authors (op-eds) are reliable primary sources for statements attributed to that editor or author, but are rarely reliable for statements of fact.

  GPRamirez5 (talk) 23:12, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

  I think you might have missed this part right at the start of the section of NEWSORG you quoted: "'News reporting' from well-established news outlets is generally considered to be reliable for statements of fact". The part you quoted refers to editorials and opinion pieces, which is not what these sources are.UnequivocalAmbivalence (talk) 06:02, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

Those sources are analysis pieces. And RS says peer-review analysis takes precedent over commercial news website analysis.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 14:01, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

• "The majority of RS tell that WH was a target of disinformation campaign." RS quantity does not equal RS quality. And you can't believe everything you read.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 00:33, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

But the peer reviewed article doesn't support the point you say it supports. It is a computer science study of information propagation that says "In this study, we do not speak directly to this question" of "what and whom to believe." So you can't cite it to contradict what the many, many RS sources say about what to believe and what not to believe. For that, you need a neutral, RS source that says that the "counter-narrative" just might be true. There is none cited, nor could I find any. Chris vLS (talk) 02:04, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

• OPPOSE the proposed change. That doesn't mean keeping the current text unchanged, however. The current text states disinformation occurred without quoting or paraphrasing WP:RS to say how it occurred. The best way to settle the controversy is to refer to notable mainstream reporting on Syrian/Russian disinformation. That would dispel any appearance of pushing POV in wikivoice. loupgarous (talk) 02:30, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

Discussion

No comment for now on whether it should be added, but I'd suggest removing the scare quotes and possibly combining the first two sentences, like so:

The White Helmets have been accused of being a propaganda front for foreign governments and an ally of jihadist groups by institutions supporting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, including Russia Today (RT), as well as non-state commentators. These claims are denied by supporters of the White Helmets, who consider them Russian disinformation.

clpo13_(talk) 18:15, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

That, to me, sounds like a reasonable and balanced statement, in the light of the limited number of undisputed facts available. Umm - the proposal is that the text appear twice in the article - once in the lede, once in the Controversies section. Firstly Controversies sections are deprecated; and secondly, the lede is supposed to *summarise* the content. I suggest that a leaner sentence be used in the lede. MrDemeanour (talk) 21:12, 30 May 2018 (UTC)

You have a point about the quotation marks clpo13. MrDemeanour, what do you mean by "deprecated" exactly? GPRamirez5 (talk) 16:29, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

@User:GPRamirez5 What I meant was that Criticism sections are not generally approved of. Clearly I mis-spoke; Controversies and Criticisms are different things. I don't think Controversies sections are deprecated. Thank you for drawing my attention to this slip. MrDemeanour (talk) 08:06, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Ping Volunteer Marek, My very best wishes, and Stikkyy: After you posted, I expanded the RFC options/sections to include both versions of the text in this editing dispute. You may (or may not) want to move and/or adjust your RFC-posts to make use of the expanded format. (No need to ping GPRamirez5, they are already explicitly aware.) Alsee (talk) 06:50, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

In the News

An item related to this article was nominated to appear on the main page in the In the news section, but ultimately this article was not included. Alsee (talk) 08:42, 3 August 2018 (UTC)

Sourcing

Rossen4

• Off-Guardian I scroll down, and see the phrase "MI6 Shill" and that Skripal was a conspiracy theory of some sort.
• The Wall Will Fall "The Wall Will Fall: Blog at WordPress.com."
• The Red Elephants Muh censorship by mainstream media
• The Duran Muh realpolitik, muh femi-Nazism, there's a category titled "Red Pill"
• The Mint Press News Probably the most reliable out of all of them, in that it puts on a veneer of neutrality, but has a quite obvious pro-Assad bias, anti-Israel, anti-Saudi.
• Consortium News A little scroll, and I find an article about Assange being persecuted by Obama.

I can't see even a modicum of fact-checking, and there's more than a smattering of pro-Assad bias spread throughout. Stikkyy t/c 04:34, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

Recent Dutch report and Dutch government announcement

The following text was recently added to the White Helmets page in the Funding section:

“The Netherlands announced that it would end its funding of several aid projects in opposition strongholds in Syria, including the White Helmets, by December 2018. This announcement followed a Ministry of Foreign Affairs report according to which the country's supervision over the activity of White Helmets is inadequate and there is a risk that funds meant for the rescue workers would end up in the hands of armed groups instead”.

I would like to propose some changes so that the text is closer to what is in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs report and the article on Volkskrant.

1. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs report is an assessment of all monitoring of the three groups mentioned (AJACS, White Helmets and NLA). Monitoring for the White Helmets is done through Mayday which is nominally an independent body but in practice is closely aligned with the White Helmets as the report states. I therefore think that “country's supervision” should just become “supervision”.

2. The Volkskrant article states that there is a danger that Dutch money intended for the rescue workers may fall into the hands of extremist groups or be used for illegal trade. The MFA report states there is a risk of “diversion of funds by armed groups” (perhaps it means TO armed groups as I don’t think the White Helmets are armed) and that “organisations may indirectly facilitate harmful or illicit trade”. I therefore think that the phrase “would end up in the hands of armed groups instead” be changed to “would end up in the hands of armed groups or be used to facilitate illegal trade”.

In addition, I suggest that the following information from the report could perhaps be incorporated into the Funding section in some way:

“The White Helmets are supported by the governments of the UK, Denmark, the Netherlands, Canada, Germany, New Zealand and the US. Most donors provide support through Mayday, whereas the US provide support through the US contractor Chemonics. According to Mayday, between 2014 and 2018 the programme funds totalled USD 127 mln., of which USD 19 mln. comes from private parties. The Netherlands has contributed almost EUR 10 mln. during this period”. Burrobert 16:07, 16 September 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

@Burrobert: Regarding your first point, I've removed "country's" since I was the one who added it in the first place. Haven't looked into your other two proposed additions so I have no comment on those. Bennv3771 (talk) 16:34, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Thanks @Bennv3771:. I'll see what others think. Burrobert 02:52, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

I think the reason the report says diversion by armed groups rather than to armed groups is clearer when they specify they mean "Appropriation by armed groups", i.e. they are talking about armed groups diverting the money coercively, rather than the WHs deliberately or voluntarily diverting it. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:36, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Yes that would explain the choice of preposition thanks. Burrobert 12:57, 17 September 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Burrobert (talk • contribs)

Thanks for the corrections! Alaexis_¿question? 19:40, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 October 2018

the film is busted directed by Syrian filmmaker Feras Fayyad. Ferasfayyad (talk) 07:47, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. ♪♫Alucard 16♫♪ 13:06, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

Severe POV and Balance Issues

The wording of the article reads like an editorial of Al Jazeera or some similar Gulf petro monarchy mouthpiece. I understand this article has come under systematic campaigning by rabid anti-Russian editors, but its current form is a stain on the image of Wikipedia. The White Helmets have been quite severely discredited by now (the Dutch government has cut funding for them due to links with militants, for example). Wikipedia concluding that they are the poor victims of an evil assadist "disinformation campaign" should be enough of a red flag for us to conclude that editing and consensus building typical of Wikipedia has totally failed in this case. POV activists have taken over the article which now looks thoroughly embarrassing. Blocking this page in its current form is not the right way to go about things - rather I suggest User:Alucard 16 pr other involved admins monitor and encourage debate and consensus building on the talk page. 88.18.162.211 (talk) 12:23, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

There have been four archives worth of debate and at least four RFC consensus processes on this page. There has been no lack of debate or consensus here.

As you might be aware, unsubstantiated personal attacks against editors may result in being blocked from editing or being banned from a topic area, regardless of whether someone is logged in or editing via IP. Alsee (talk) 14:32, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

Quotable source?

Can I quote this blog? It is the only source I could find that features the video of the alleged White Helmet official receiving a reward from al-Nusra that isn't some nutty alt-right website. Furthermore, the blog, except of the overly long and dramatic introduction, focuses mostly on the video itself. LeGabrie (talk) 09:41, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

That's a self-published blog by an anonymous blogger that doesn't appear to be cited by any RSs. The video itself is embedded from another anonymous Twitter account. I don't think it can be cited here. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:30, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Can we maybe also discuss this rather than revert back and forth? There's a lot of stuff in the source quoted here, and I'm not sure how the context can be rendered concisely without giving minor incidents undue weight. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:34, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

Can you elaborate what you mean with "minor incidents" and "undue weight"? Also counts for Marek. LeGabrie (talk) 10:22, 25 October 2018 (UTC) @User:Serial Number 54129 Displaying partiality, posing on a dead body and appearing in an ISIS propaganda video featuring a hostrage is only of "tangential relevance" in a chapter called "Controversies" because...? LeGabrie (talk) 15:16, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Your argument seems reasonable LeGabrie. It has been almost a week since you asked this question. I think you have given enough time for discussion.Burrobert (talk) 05:00, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm not really sure what LeGabrie's argument is. It seems to me that the edits she/he proposed are in danger of cherry-picking a long and detailed 3-part article to find two negative incidents which are then described in the most negative way possible. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:57, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

So you are saying we should just ignore these drastic incidents entirely. Sounds like partiality to me. My stance is the following: The first paragraph concerning the Idlib videos is good as it is, the second paragraph concerning ISIS can be modified to include that the SCD was not the only NGO active in its territory. The part concerning the appearance of the two White Helmets in the ISIS video stays how it is. LeGabrie (talk) 14:20, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

false edit summaries, revenge reverts

User:GPRamirez5, why are you using false edit summaries in your reverts? The fact that you claim you are removing "primary sources" when you are clearly not, suggests that you are "mimicking" my legitimate removal of primary sources in previous edits. That would make your edits a case of revenge reverting and WP:HARASSMENT. This article is under discretionary sanctions and that kind of behavior will get you blocked very quickly. Please self revert.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:51, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

Your edit is also a violation of WP:CONSENSUS as established in this RfC. You've tried to pull these stunts before.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:57, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

The RFC you're referring to makes no reference to issues of sourcing, as anyone can see. I hope you aren't misleading us deliberately, Marek.GPRamirez5 (talk) 18:00, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

It is loud and clear that your text has only 4 sources, while the current text has 6 sources. So there is a clear point regarding to sourcing. The Banner talk 21:15, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

First, show some respect and don't put your words in the editor's mouth. Second, the whole RFC issue is a red herring, as it didn't have any reference to the NPR article at hand.GPRamirez5 (talk) 01:53, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Let us build a Wikipedia based on reliable, in-depth sources and not some passing mentions. The Banner talk 10:53, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

It's actually NOT a red herring and you still haven't explained why you made revenge reverts with false edit summaries.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:10, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

How's this for in depth?

Aron Lund, a Syria expert with the Century Foundation, said after the international community's funding and promoting the White Helmets for years, the evacuation should not be a surprise."

"It seems like simple moral math to me that when the uprising fails, they should try to get their guys out alive, with their families," he told AP in an email. "Had the international community done this much earlier and also offered safe haven to the rebel leaders they've been backing, they could have helped get irreconcilables out of the equation and reduce the amount of killing and destruction. All sides benefit from giving the losing team a safe exit," he said. GPRamirez5 (talk) 14:20, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

What's your point? Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:10, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

The quote from Aron Lund does seem to suggest that he considers the White Helmets part of the "uprising" rather than a neutral actor.Burrobert (talk) 02:59, 11 January 2019 (UTC)

Firstly, figuring out what sources "seem to suggest" is pretty clearly OR. Secondly, even if we were to do that, one could take the exact opposite impression from that quote. It could easily be read as saying that the White Helmets were evacuated, and suggesting that the rebels should have also been evacuated, thus implying that two groups are separate. Thirdly, even if we were to assume that your interpretation is correct, there are other parts of that source, stated in the publication's own voice ("This left the rebels and the White Helmets besieged by the government from one side, the sealed frontier with Israel, and by the group affiliated with the Islamic State group from the south.") that contradict that interpretation which was attributed to a member of a partisan think tank and not stated in the publication's own voice. Finally, none of that has any bearing on whether a passing mention in a (different) article by the AP or AA referring to them a single time as a "pro-opposition group" is enough to state that the entire AP or AA as a whole view them in that way. I personally don't think it is. (And even if it were, the word "nevertheless" clearly violates SYNTH/OR rules since we don't have a secondary source making the claim that the AP or AA view them as pro-opposition despite claims to the contrary) UnequivocalAmbivalence (talk) 07:24, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Intercept article

Hello. Just sharing this material, could be relevant maybe for a criticism section. https://theintercept.com/2019/02/09/douma-chemical-attack-evidence-syria/

Besides, I too think this Wiki article sounds very partisan i.e. asserting "disinformation campaign", "false claims", "conspiracy theories" - we should present the different POVs found in RS not issues rulings on truth, no?

" Formed in 2013, the White Helmets only maintain a presence in rebel-controlled areas, as Douma was on the night of the attack. Like any other aid or reporting outfit in those areas, it operates with the permission of the controlling militias, who are either grateful for the medics’ support or tolerate their presence. Much of the White Helmets’ first-responder work is unobjectionable and utterly necessary — rescuing civilians from buildings that have just been bombed by Russian or Syrian airplanes, for example. All the same, and perhaps because the group carries cameras to document their work and has been the subject of various glorifying documentaries, it is now at the center of a brutish new media war between international supporters of the Syrian revolt, who uphold the White Helmets as unimpeachable heroes, and international defenders of the Syrian government, who have said that they’re first-aiders for Al Qaeda. The Russian government, of course, has every incentive to delegitimize and exaggerate the power of Syrian first-responders, who are sometimes the only sources of information about its bombing campaign. The Syrian government appears to have been directly targeting White Helmets from the air and on the ground for the same reason.

But the Russian allegations about intelligence links and propaganda maneuvers did not come from nowhere. The British-led organization that branded the White Helmets and provided its training and equipment, ARK, was run by a publicity-shy former British diplomat and funded by the U.S. State Department and the British Foreign Office. ARK’s work in Syria started in 2012, when it paid Syrian activists to make propaganda films in favor of the revolt against Assad through a production company called Basma. Operating out of offices in Istanbul and Gaziantep in Turkey, it was soon bidding for civil defense contracts in Northern Syria for the kind of work that would end up being done by the White Helmets. A few of its employees were veterans of the British Army; others included pollsters and policy advisers, a consultant who had previously worked for a “psychological operations” firm, and a development professional with experience in “in-country information-gathering.” According to internal reports and emails provided to me by a Syrian opposition activist in 2014, ARK was also gathering intelligence on Islamist groups in the country, and those reports were being privately forwarded by a British Army liaison officer to U.S. Central Command, with an email recommending additional funding for the organization’s filmmaking arm. “It would be reinforcing success for comparatively modest costs,” noted the liaison officer.

The White Helmets are now supported by another organization, called Mayday Rescue, established by a senior ARK staffer, and no concrete evidence has emerged that ARK or its affiliates are using the White Helmets for intelligence-gathering. What’s certain is that the cameras worn by these civil defence workers see what the controlling militias allow them to see, usually the bombing runs of the Syrian and Russian air force, generating skepticism among some observers about the reliability of their reporting. " 183.89.27.182 (talk) 05:51, 18 February 2019 (UTC)

Severe Bias in the Article

"The group has been the target of a disinformation campaign by supporters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Russia-sponsored media organisations such as RT, with false claims of close ties with terrorist activities and other conspiracy theories.[5][6][7][8][9][10][11] SCD have been viewed by the Bashar al-Assad government and its allies such as Iran and Russia as anti-government propaganda tools and proxies of rebels, funded by the West.[12]"

As part of the opening paragraph to the article this line is probably the worst on the site for suggesting any sort of non-biased standpoint towards this discussion. Firstly, the accusations of the White Helmets and their members being associated with terrorist groups are not in anyway indicative of a disinformation campaign by "Bashar Al-Assad supporters" and "Russia-sponsored media" as different academics and groups from all leanings have pointed to things as evidence for the claims. To simply pass of their accusations as a targeted attack by "the bad guys" is utterly dishonest and goes against the neutral standpoint the argument is supposed to have. Secondly, to simply call the accusations a "disinformation campaign" and "conspiracy theories" completely ignores the whole idea of a neutral standpoint. Ultimately, these people and news-organisations have accused the SCD of having terrorists links, and the other-side has accused them of being pro-Assad supporters, and the article has simply accepted the other point of view as fact with little to no actual sourcing. In fact, the articles cited are in themselves heavily and blatantly biased and yet we are using them as evidence to support the statement when in fact we should be trying to use unbiased ones.

I made an edit to the statement in order to present a more balanced viewpoint and was told to set up a talk page in order to discuss the changes and so here it is:

The group and many members of it have been accused of ties to various terrorist organisations by various media groups and academics,[5][6] a claim that has been rebuffed by various media sources with such articles accusing the organisations and people as being "Pro-Assad" and "Pro-Russian" conspiracy theorists. [7][8][9][10][11] SCD have been viewed by the Bashar al-Assad government and its allies such as Iran and Russia as anti-government propaganda tools and proxies of rebels, funded by the West.[12]

This is find presents a far more balanced a fair viewpoint, it respectfully acknowledges the accusations towards the organisation whilst also mentioning the counter-argument and its stance on the people who've made the claims. Stockwell H. (talk) 19:09, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

It is only three months since we had an extensive RfC on exactly this. I think it is too soon to re-open it, unless something dramatic has changed. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:48, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

I disagree completely, It doesn't matter if the we had an RfC on it yesterday, if there is still severe bias in the article we need to take a look at it until it is up to the standards of impartiality that Wikipedia should have. Stockwell H. (talk) 19:09, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

For those wishing to add "disinformation", there was no consensus. Therefore it should not stay. Basically those favouring it (the pro-west lobby) whimpered repeatedly that the networks and commentators to expose the Helmets as terrorist-associated were not RS but not once did they demonstrate why they were not RS without circular reference to their own preferred sources - which incidentally are also exposed as being inaccurate and bias by the Russian and Syrian sources. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:30, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

This was how the RFC closed:

There is strong disagreement between the two sides regarding which version represents a more neutral point of view and there is no sign of a emerging consensus, not the least because personal geo-political perspectives are evident on both sides. Looking into the arguments, the side preferring to retain the current text has a stronger argument that the proposed new text lends too much strength to one scholarly article. All in all, there is no consensus to adopt the proposed new text.

This was the "current text" at the time of the RFC:

The organisation has been the target of a disinformation campaign by supporters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Russia-sponsored media organisations such as Russia Today (RT), with false claims of close ties with terrorist activities and other conspiracy theories.

"No consensus to adopt the proposed new text" means that the status quo remains by default, plus the closer said the supporters of the status quo had the better arguments. That's not a particularly decisive answer, but the reality is that the current text is supported by the prior RFC. Go ahead and hold a new one if you feel you must, but don't try to argue that the result of the last RFC is the opposite of what it was in reality. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 19:41, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Nice try, but that's not how Wikipedia works. If there is no consensus to use a certain term, it doesn't stay. End of. --Coldtrack (talk) 20:13, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, I think that's exactly how Wikipedia works. Ask the closer, Deryck_Chan. BobFromBrockley (talk) 20:39, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

It is contentious material. Read the policies. --Coldtrack (talk) 21:21, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Coldtrack, this article has a WP:1RR policy (see "Warning: Active Community Sanctions" at the top of this page") and you have reverted 3 times in 8 hours. This puts you in danger of someone reporting you to the edit warring noticeboard. I suggest you might want to avoid that by reverting yourself. Meanwhile, can you point me to the policies that say we should disregard the closing decision when a RfC has been closed? BobFromBrockley (talk) 21:43, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

You're spot on. I was in (and still am despite revert) dire breach. I had my holiday in Ukraine for several weeks and never touched English Wikipedia whilst home. I totally forgot. --Coldtrack (talk) 22:00, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks User:Harry Stockwell for proposing a new version of text and User:Bobfrombrockley for alerting me to this discussion. My closure of the previous RfC does mean that we should prefer the current text over the text proposed at the time. It does not mean there was a lack of decision over that matter.

However, the text proposed here is substantially different from that proposed in the previous discussion, so the outcome of that discussion does not prejudice the outcome of the ongoing discussion about Stockwell's proposal.

Nevertheless, the principle of WP:BRD applies. When there is disagreement, the last stable version stays. That means the text endorsed by the previous RfC ought to stay unless interested editors agree otherwise. Deryck C. 23:06, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

For what it's worth I most definitely favour Harry Stockwell's proposal verbatim. That is to say "rebuff" yes, but not "refute". --Coldtrack (talk) 23:54, 8 November 2018 (UTC)

Actually 'rebuff' means to fend of, reject ungraciously. The word you were searching for was 'rebut'. To rebut is to try to show that your adversary's argument is wrong. To refute is to succeed in that endeavour: your refutation is your proof that he is wrong. A rebuttal can be followed by further argumentation; a refutation is (if your adversary is reasonable) the end of the story. 'Rebuff' has nothing to do with these terms - it's often used, for example, to describe the behaviour of a girl who is not open to my amorous advances ('she rebuffed me'). I am sure you knew that! MrDemeanour (talk) 09:12, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Note that rebutting something necessarily involves presenting an argument (as does refuting something). If you baldly reject your adversary's case, without presenting an argument, you haven't even rebutted it; you've just denied it. MrDemeanour (talk) 09:15, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks User:Deryck Chan. That's really helpful.

I have returned the lede to the RfC stable version. It's really hard to discuss Stockwell's proposal without the sources, but effectively there are two proposals: 1) To put the Assad/Russian allegations first and describe the mainstream response as an attempt to rebuff/rebut/refute/deny them, which seems wrong (with two citations not linked to above); and 2) To add a sentence about Assad/Russia seeing the SCD as proxies for rebels (citing Reuters). Is that right Re (1) this seems to go against the weight of reliable sources. (2) seems unnecessary, but less objectionable on its own, but becomes redundant if we do (1). BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:28, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm aware of the meanings of each word (rebut, refute, rebuff) so I stand by my assertion that "rebuff" is correct, but frankly I shouldn't have brought this up since it was not even on the agenda. I am all right with the multitude of changes because I firmly deprecate "disinformation" since the dozen or so editors who aspired might and main to keep it used fallacious arguing for its defence, mostly SYNTH. They tried to relegate the networks to expose the Helmets as non-RS as though they were blogs or forums, rather than genuine sources offering alternative outlooks. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:23, 10 November 2018 (UTC)

OK. I apologise for underestimating you, and not realising you already knew all about egg-sucking. MrDemeanour (talk) 03:17, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

The crux of my original call for us to change it is not as to whether or not the claims are true or false, but instead for us to present a non-biased standpoint as to the claims that have been made. They are not simply a disinformation campaign and are certainly not being simply espoused by "Pro-Assad and Pro-Russian" sources. The problem is that the article's intro subscribes very heavily to the side that anyone who has claimed potential links is on the "bad side." For starters, non, not a single article that claims that the supporters of the potential links are Pro-Assad or Pro-Russian use any measure of reasonable evidence at all and we simply can not just take what they say as fact, we, as the people who are writing this article need to check their sources and make sure they are reliable and that their arguments are well substantiated instead of simply just accepting their views as fact because "their a reliable source." Secondly, the actual claims that certain members of the White Helmets are terrorists or that some within have links to ISIS, have not been effectively argued against. Once more we can see in the articles claiming such clarification that they simply undertake a campaign of tarnishing people who take that standpoint as being "one of the bad guys" ie. Pro-Assad. Whether or not the claims are actually correct, the point is that we don't know, non of the media sources on the matter have actually countered the argument in a reasonable way and we need to reflect this in the article, it is not simply a case of a disinformation campaign, and to put that is to throw the whole article into one side of the argument and call it a day. Stockwell H. (talk) 15:40, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Agree totally with Stockwell H. I believe we can find a way of demonstrating parity: not making one side more right than the other. And yes, the exposure of the White Helmets as having terrorist links goes far beyond Russian, Syrian and Iranian media. Commentators include persons in the west and some even beyond political backgrounds thereby profoundly remote from being on the Russian media payroll. --Coldtrack (talk) 19:59, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

All of the articles listed as sources for the claim in the lead say that pro-Assad and pro-Russian sources are making false claims about the White Helmets. All but one specifically use the word "disinformation". This statement in the lead is simply complying with what's said in reliable sources. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 20:21, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

You miss my point Red Rock Canyon, I am not saying that these articles do not make such a statement, my point is that these reliable sources are not using reliable information, non of what they say is evidenced or sourced correctly. So do we just simply accept information as correct because the source of the claim is usually reliable? Do we ignore the lack of evidence for their claims? Wikipedia has a duty for impartiality and so we do not simply regurgitate a stated position because the source is called reliable, we look at the source itself and make sure it itself is reliable because whilst it may usually be reliable, it is not a guarantee. Furthermore, if the article is clearly biased, do we simply comply with its stance because it is deemed reliable? Even if we can see that it is biased? I'm not calling for every single source we use to be outlawed due to biases or lack of sourcing, I'm asking that we look at the sources closely to make sure their point is supported by evidence even if they are one of a hundred sources saying the same thing, we need to check their evidence. We don't need to swing to the other side and label the rebuttal as a disinformation campaign itself, we simply need to adhere to the ideals of impartiality and reliability that Wikipedia should have. Stockwell H. (talk) 22:24, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Rock Canyon's point regurgitates the singular trope trumpeted by the dozen or so editors during earlier discussions which claim "source 1 + source 2 say it's disinformation", and "sources 3+4 are claimed by sources 1+2 to be pro-Assad", and "sources 1+2 are 'reliable' and sources 3+4 are 'unreliable'" therefore disinformation. That is WP:SYNTH. What matters is that unlike blogs or forums, alternative media sources being non-RS is purely apocryphal and confined to those whose viewpoints it confounds. What is relevant now is how the points are substantiated and it is not difficult to see how when considering the figures to expose the Helmets are terrorist-linked go well beyond Russian/Iranian media. For example, George Galloway and Roger Waters among others. --Coldtrack (talk) 22:47, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

I am not sure how George Galloway goes "well beyond Russian/Iranian media" when his day job is literally to present TV shows for Russian and Iranian media. Roger Waters is a pop star, not a Syria expert, and we had a discussion on him already 6 months ago and consensus was not to use him. If you want to change Wikipedia's policy on reliable sources or change which sources it considers reliable, this talk page is not the appropriate place. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:38, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Correct Galloway goes well beyond Russian/Iranian media, something that cannot be emphasised heavily enough. He presents his own shows which is totally different from being an anchor who reads from cue cards. His primary role is as an active politician with a portfolio for having been an MP for much of 30 years. As for presenting, he also presents on Talk Radio in the UK and has been a journalist for various websites and magazines. So unless someone can demonstrate how his findings might have been different had he not been given slots with Iranian and Russian media, we can discard the above comment as misguided. As regards Roger Waters, once again people are conveniently missing the point. It was first stated that only Russian/Iranian media have this stand on the Helmets as if to suggest that the entire world outside of these outlets held the opposite opinion. But if anything, not even the entire audience of mainstream media buys every aspect being sold to them. (This rebuttal comes late as I had not spotted the remark until now). --Coldtrack (talk) 20:52, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

User:Harry Stockwell: Re do we just simply accept information as correct because the source of the claim is usually reliable? Do we ignore the lack of evidence for their claims?... Do we ignore the lack of evidence for their claims?... if the article is clearly biased, do we simply comply with its stance because it is deemed reliable? Basically, the answers are Yes, Yes, No and Sort of respectively. Wikipedia has a policy against original research, so it is not our job to sift the evidence; it is our job to go with reliable sources. If you want to argue that the Guardian, Washington Post, France24 and TheConversation are unreliable sources, there is a reliable sources noticeboard where you can do that; until Wikipedia decides that these are unreliable sources, we consider them reliable. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:33, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Sources that are not evidenced at all, are not reliable, its not a case of original research, its literally a case of read the article which if it is to be used in the context of a Wikipedia article I would assume had happened, if it hasn't then it should not be referenced, pure and simple, and if you have read it, you know there is no evidence, so you shouldn't take what it says a fact and base an entire introduction on that article's POV. I've said this before, I am not asking to purge the Guardian, Washington Post or whatever other news source we use from the reliable sources list, I'm asking that we replace an utterly unacceptably biased introduction with one that reflects the non-biased standpoint that Wikipedia claims to have. Stockwell H. (talk) 22:24, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Sources that are not evidenced at all, are not reliable That's not how reliability works. If a reliable source makes a claim, it's not up to us to dig through the evidence they present and second-guess their claims. "No original research" only applies to editors, not to sources. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 22:16, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

By that definition, it is the Russian, Iranian and Syrian sources which are reliable and the denialist mainstream which is unreliable. As we've seen, the whistle-blowers have clearly and prominently exposed the Helmets. The hangers-on have clung to the tassels by claiming the exposing sources are not reliable because the opponent doesn't like them. --Coldtrack (talk) 20:03, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

You clearly don't understand the how we determine if sources are reliable for a given claim. I'm not going to argue with you any further. Red Rock Canyon (talk) 21:00, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

If by "we" you mean the handful of shills to support the current fallacious text then I have a pretty good idea, you determine which source is reliable according to your personal preferences. If you mean "we" the wider community, then lack of understanding lies squarely with you because this thread has nothing to do with RS/non-RS. The topic of RS was discussed months ago and arrived at no consensus over what constitutes "reliable". It is therefore moot. Your lobby claimed the mainstream media is reliable and alternative sources are not, we said "prove it", your lobby parroted the memes (proof by assertion) and likewise failed to demonstrate what was non-RS and so the discussion involving more than a dozen editors dried up and remained moot. It is time to move on. --Coldtrack (talk) 21:11, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Just wanted to drop my input in here and say that the current article is extremely biased and must be changed to more fairly represent the opposite viewpoint. Only Western media outlets that have been shown to post purely pro-Western articles consistently are cited in the offending line. SUM1 (talk) 05:55, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

Like saying it is an "alt-right" misinformation campaign? Why would the alt-right 1. Care what happens in Syria and 2. Care about the white hats? That is the most bizarre thing to include in this article 76.184.220.115 (talk) 23:39, 27 March 2019 (UTC)