Talk:Xwedodah

Persian nationalists seem to be censoring information

It seems someone is blanking the whole article and filling it with unreliable sources that are not verified, where as the new one does cite to historical academic sources Hindoodoo123 (talk) 00:52, 26 April 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [1])

And it seems someone here cannot get over being banned for sock-puppetry, and repeatedly makes new accounts to push his WP:SYNTH nonsense. Reverting sock-puppeteers is standard practice on Wikipedia, you can make a thousand new accounts if you wish but it won't change anything. -- Qahramani44 (talk) 01:55, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Having reviewed the recent editing history of this page, I must confess that I'm concerned that the primary motivation for removal of material is essentially IDONTLIKEIT; the sourcing checks out, and much of it is consonant with the generally accepted stance in Indo-Iranian studies. I'm tempted to reinstate portions of the removed material, rewriting some, but am posting here for clarification on what exactly editors feel is the WP:Synth component of previously included material. Hölderlin2019 (talk) 03:10, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

I suspect this same user is responsible for cooked-up conspiracy theory against me. There is an ongoing sock investigation you can see here. Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/AntiRacistSwede- Manzarene (talk) 20:54, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Disruptive editing

There is clearly an edit-war about to happen here. Could users please avoid blanking the page and disruptive editing (and using what appears to be sock puppets with offensive usernames in other languages). The version of the article I revert to is the least inflammatory and most in line with academic opinion. I have also seen Edit protection has been requested on this page which is wholly supported by me. Manzarene (talk) 13:17, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

That's literally you though. you're going on your phone and turning the hotspot on and off to change your IP. Every single one of those vandalizing edits is from you, this is called subtle vandalism btw, and i cba to bother warning you, regardsLamazeva (talk) 13:44, 27 July 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [2])

Copyright problem removed

Prior content in this article duplicated one or more previously published sources. The material was copied from: https://iranicaonline.org/articles/marriage-next-of-kin. Copied or closely paraphrased material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a compatible license. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.)

For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, and, if allowed under fair use, may copy sentences and phrases, provided they are included in quotation marks and referenced properly. The material may also be rewritten, providing it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Therefore, such paraphrased portions must provide their source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. — Diannaa (talk) 13:55, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

@Diannaa: Someone keeps persistently reinserting copyrighted material, this Qahramani44 is reinserting a word for word copyrighted material from https://iranicaonline.org/articles/marriage-next-of-kin

The following sentence he keeps adding is "The models for these unions were found in the Zoroastrian cosmogony. The meaning and function of the Avestan term is not clear from the contexts.", in the header[3] is just the last two sentences from the first paragraph in the Iranica Online article. [4] Sincerely Lamazeva (talk) 10:23, 28 July 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [5])

== Vandalism, Censorship and Plagiarism by Manzarene ==

The last revision [6] by admin Diannaa is sourced to dozens of reliable sources from various academic journals. Yet user Manzarene keeps reverting the page to a version which is plagiarized from Iranica Online [7] and trying to reintroduce improperly cited content; see here: [8], and not only that has been engaging in subtle vandalism

NOTE: He seems to have deleted his Userpage after the admin had reverted his bad faith, disruptive and vandalizing edits. And for some reason moved some of his content to his UserTalk page [9] I of course had already archived it since I was going to report him for sock-puppetry, I've archived it here on archive.org however [10] I will request a WP:REFUND to undelete it, soon.

His userpage says 2 things of importance to this issue:

1. he himself identifies as a Zoroastrian and is ethnically Parsi, in the Iranian ethnic group , hence he is editing this page out of a bias and to censor information about Zorostarianism, such as xwedodah which is brother-sister incest in Zorostarianism. You can see why he'd wanna censor this information WP:IDONTLIKEIT
2. it states he is from London, there blatant vandalism by random IPs from London and one fake account, which are most likely his socks. He attempted to make it look like someone was blanking his own content as to get an admin to revert back to his reversion. Which of course in the end did not work to his expectation.

(keep these contextual clues in mind, they are important and decisive information for next sections)

Evidence of Vandalism by User:Manzarene

Subtle Vandalism is defined by wikipedia as:

• Vandalism that is harder to spot, or that otherwise circumvents detection, including adding plausible misinformation to articles (such as minor alteration of facts or additions of plausible-sounding hoaxes), hiding vandalism (such as by making two bad edits and reverting only one), simultaneously using multiple accounts or IP addresses to vandalize, abuse of maintenance and deletion templates, or reverting legitimate edits with the intent of hindering the improvement of pages. Impersonating other users by signing an edit with a different username or IP address also constitutes sneaky vandalism, but take care not to confuse this with appropriately correcting an unsigned edit made by another user. Some vandals even follow their vandalism with an edit that states "Rv vandalism" in the edit summary in order to give the appearance the vandalism was reverted.[11]

On July 26, he made the following 4 edits, where he reverts a clean page to an older unsourced, plagiarized and improperly cited revision. [12][13][14][15]

In these edits he edits in copy pasted stuff from who knows what website, publishes it. And then edits it again to remove "weasel words/ensure neutrality". This falls under wikipedia's definition of hiding vandalism.

• "hiding vandalism (such as by making two bad edits and reverting only one),"

Now we can assume good faith if this was a single isolated event, many inexperienced users edit pages like this, but this shows he is copy pasting things word4word from Iranica Online and just slightly paraphrasing it(still a copy right violation), instead of actually summarizing it for an encyclopedia. For example here [16] all he does is copy paste something, and then when he sees he also copy pasted a link, he just turns it into a wiki-formatted citation. Many of the links he cites are broken, not properly cited, and no reliable source, I will elaborate in the next section.

The same day the following edit by the newly created user TheNewWordBo here: [17], which he keeps reverting to is just copy pasted word for word from Iranica Online's page on xwedodah. For example just highlight and google search the 1st paragraph of the Religious Interpretation section [18] and you'll notice it's word for word from Iranica online, no effort to even properly put the citations in wiki format. UPDATE: While I was typing all this out, an admin already dealt with the copy right issue. But this should show he is not editing to build an encyclopedia, nor is anybody who ignored this copyright claim and kept reverting to it.

On July 27 He on 5 separate occasions reverted back to this plagiarized revision by TheNewWordBo despite being told it was plagiarized from Iranica Online. [19][20][21][22][23]

He claimed "as pointed out by User:WikiDan61 there is no evidence of plagiarism." which is just negligence, and either shows willful ignorance, or an inexperience with academia, as well as the fact he is editing a page where he has NOT fully read any of the sources he is citing, nor is removing.

His last edit shows this, see here [24]. He clearly does not preview his posts, nor review his changes after publishing it. To get around the admin's reversion to a clean version, he took part of the code for the header from a unclean version, and switched it out with the header for the clean version. Resulting in a duplication of "{{pp-sock|small=yes}} {{Zoroastrianism}}"m as well as orphaning several reliable sources, which the bot here [25] restored. I have not edited this article since, and he has yet still to fix it, showing all he does is try to censor information he does not like and then leave the article instead of reviewing it and double checking it, nor does he use the "Preview" feature before publishing.

Evidence Sock Puppetry to game the system

On July 27, after being told he was posting copyrighted material twice, these edits suddenly started appearing, 8 in total, all posting the exact same vandalizing edits. [26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33]

They came from the following IPs & 1 recently created user, their GEOLOCATE IP Lookups are linked next to em.

1. 2a03:1b20:7:f011::a12e [34]
2. 185.195.232.145 [35]
3. 148.252.133.180 [36]
4. 148.252.128.59 [37]
5. Literalcrapposter (has just been indefinitely blocked)

They all originate from London (like his userpage admitted before he deleted it, weirdly deleting it when I told him that those IPs were suspiciously from London, the same place he states he is from).

The first two 2a03:1b20:7:f011::a12e AND 185.195.232.145 have the ISP "31173 Services AB" Which here at ScamAlytics [38] is shown to primarily run VPNs and TOR nodes, although not all. Now VPNs/Proxies are mostly blocked on Wikipedia, however there are Private VPNS as well as non-listed public VPNs which are not know to Wikipedia. Or for example VPNs made on Amazon Web Services servers (obtained through free trials) do work on wikipedia. For speed they are placed close to the user's home city. This of course is just a theory from what ScamAlytics say, it is possible this is also his normal ISP and not a VPN. This isn't very strong evidence, but in the technical context it should be noted as elaborate vandalism attempt.

The second 2 148.252.133.180 & 148.252.128.59 have the ISP Vodafone are more incriminating and helps support the above theory, that regardless if it's a VPN or not, this user is in London. It's a British phone service provider, and on phones you have a hotspot feature where if you turn it on, the hotspot itself is a separate internet gateway (separate from the phone's 4G IP), and when you turn this hotspot on and off, you get assigned a new IP. One can change their IP in seconds via this method. But of course they all originate from the same city your in, and show it's by the same ISP and IP range.

From this evidence we can say with 100% certainty all those 8 edits came from the same person. And considering the timing of these vandalism, his admitted location, and his previous attempts at subtle vandalism to promote his narrative, we can say Manzarne and the person who made those 8 IP+throw away account edits are in fact the same person.

Motivation

Why would he vandalize his own posts? Well he admits it here [39] , he's trying to game the system WP:GAME. By intentionally using his sock accounts to vandalize the page, he hopes an admin will revert it to his revision from the vandalized revision and perhaps the page will get locked to his revision. As he states:

• "The version of the article I revert to is the least inflammatory and most in line with academic opinion."

Now remember those thing I said to keep in mind for context. i.e he is Zoroastrian and is Parsi. Well he incriminates himself here and trying to fabricate false evidence & plant it. He states:

• "(and using what appears to be sock puppets with offensive usernames in other languages)"

Some more context here, Zoroastrians/Persians have a civilizational rivalry with Muslims/Arabs. Same way how the Chinese Japanese hate each other, and Indians to the British. Because one civilization conquered the other

On his sock account he vandalizes the page with statements like "Infidel Kaffir Majoosi", these are things Arab Muslims call Persian Zoroastrians. The word "Majoosi" which comes from the the Persian word Magus(i.e a Zoroastrian priest), is what Arabs call Zoroastrians in their Arabic language. (this is actually literally in this article in the 1st sentence of the Non-Persian Sources section) Over time it has come to be used as a derogatory slur, especially in the 21st century.

All Zoroastrians/Persians etc... know what these words mean and what they are used for and who uses it. Yet he types "it appears to be" as if he doesn't know. Why would he do this? Again sneaky vandalism and false flags. He wants the admin to come to this conclusion themselves, to gaslight them, so he isn't suspected for knowing too much. And thus the admin will be tricked into doing what he want (aka lock the page to his revision)

Improper Sources

And lastly he keeps adding improper sources. His last edit [40] adds in false claims and improperly attributes them to sources that he hasn't read. He cites books he does not have access to and we see this when he does not cite their page numbers, claiming these books back up his statements, when half his citations contradict his attributions to them.

Lets just look at what he reintroduced. He writes

1-

• "There is a divergence of views regarding this form of union amongst scholars, whether it is to marry simply within the Zoroastrian community, or to familial incest."

And sources it to just "Dubeansky, Jennifer (2013). Gifts to a Magus: Indo-Iranian Studies Honoring Firoze Kotwal. P. Lang. ISBN 978-1-4331-2051-0." no page number, nothing. What page is this claim on?

2-

• "Amongst modern Zoroastrian communities, it is thought to refer to cousin marriage, this view is supported by most scholars from Anquetil Duperron and James Darmester to even the modern archeologist Alireza Shapour Shahbazi."

He sources this to "Zend-Avesta, ouvrage de Zoroastre: contenant les idées théologiques, physiques & morales de ce législateur .... Qui comprend l'introduction au Zend-Avesta .... 1,1 (in French). Tilliard. 1771." by Abraham Hyacinthe Anquetil-Duperron a 18th century Orientalist. The citation is obviously wrong. The proper citation in Harvard Format is "Anquetil-Duperron, A.H., 1771. Zend-Avesta, ouvrage de Zoroastre. (Vol. 1). Tilliard." The page number again is not cited. And for this source we'd need a french speaker to verify.

And the other source is Hjerrild, Bodil (2003). Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law: A Comparative Analysis. Museum Tusculanum Press. ISBN 978-87-7289-807-0. and as usual, no page number cited. He claims it's supported by most scholars, but according to the Iranica Online source he seems to be plagiarizing off, it states this is what Duperron was told by the locals. James Darmesteter was however one of the minority scholars who held this view. However the Iranica Encylopedia is just filled with majority scholars being against this view. Also since he's plagiarizing he didn't notice he misspelled DarmestETer's name, and clearly is not very educated in this topic since eh does not have the prerequisite knowledge to be making such big edits to this page.

3-

• "Darab Dastur Peshotan Sanjana and Sheriarji Dadabhai Bharucha, argue the term refers to “marriage among relations [cousins],” rather than to next-of-kin marriages, a “vile and unfounded charge". This was on the basis that xᵛaētu does not refer to close kin which taoxma in Avestan bur rather to members of a larger family. Therfore if such unions with close family had been intended the correct term would be *taoxma-vadaθa which is never used. To support their argument, they have found multiple passages in the Avesta in which Xwedodah is taken to mean ‘divine communion’ between man and God."

His first source it to "Dārāb Peshotan Sanjānā (1895). The Dînâ î Maînû î khrat, or The religious decisions of the spirit of wisdom: The Pahlavi text prescribed for the intermediate examination of the Bombay University. Printed at the Duftur Ashkara and the Education Society's Steam Press." and the Iranica Online encyclopedia ( https://iranicaonline.org/articles/marriage-next-of-kin ) the Iranica online article already contradicts him, as well as it is just cherry picking.

The whole source is about a 19th century Zoroastrian priest "Dārāb dastur Peshotan Sanjānā" See: https://iranicaonline.org/articles/sanjana-darab and it contradicts his claim that this is what "most scholars support"

The Iranica encylopedia states "In 1887, Darab Dastur Peshotan Sanjana gave his response to West in a speech to the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, in which he criticized West’s description and interpretation of xwēdōdah. " i.e the consensus among Western scholars was that xwedodah was between a brother & sister. He also refers to "Sheriarji Dadabhai Bharucha" See: https://iranicaonline.org/articles/bharucha-sheriarji-dadabhai-parsi-scholar-born-at-broach-in-1843 ; and this article states "His independent and radical views on the Zoroastrian religion and his propagating of reformist ideas caused increasing controversy," in other words his sources do not match what he is falsely attributing to them.

4-

• "Muslim, Jewish and Christian sources have often interpreted Xwedodah as direct familial incest marriage, but this view is very contentious as the meaning and function of the Avestan term is not opaque and many interpretations are possible."

Sourced to the Iranica Online encyclopedia article ( https://iranicaonline.org/articles/marriage-next-of-kin), but no such statement is found in this article, and this seems to be his own WP:NOR

In other words this is not an academic claim, it's just apologetic religious preaching that does not match any of the evidence of what we know about Xwedodah in modern academia.

5-

• "Generally the accepted modern scholarly consensus, is that the term related to relationships, especially that of marriage, but also marriage within one’s own, rather than an alien, community. Yasna 12.9 refers to peaceful coexistence and the religion’s preference for married rather than unmarried life, while Videvdad 8.13 refers to cattle and not incest as had been assumed."

Sourced to "Jamshed Cawasji Katrak (1960). Iranian and Oriental Papers.", again no pages, and it's not a reliable source. It's by a Jamshed Cawasji Katrak, but who is he? A historian? Looks like random pamphlets. It is digitized by the University of Michigan tho [41] but that does not make a source reliable, unless we know who this author is.

And of course it's not an "accepted modern scholarly consensus" the Iranica online article disagrees, as does all the more modern reliable sources the he removed from the header, which on the other hand are all properly sourced, by known scholars, published by academic journals and have their page numbers cited.

TL:DR

Wikipedia is WP:NOTCENSORED and continuously deleting sourced academic information WP:IDONTLIKEIT and replacing them with unreliable and vague fringe sources is not acceptable, esspecially when you use sneaky vandalism to promote your nonacademic narrative. Regards... Lamazeva (talk) 18:27, 27 July 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [42])

Accusations raised against me by Lamazeva

I don’t know if this the proper place to say this but I would like to address the accusations against me. You are the subject of such an investigation presently, which has been conducted by a user other than myself and has support from a number of different users! Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/AntiRacistSwede. Your post is full of speculation and strawman. You should read WP:POV railroad. Please control your tone, you might be accused of a borderline PA too. I do not use sock accounts and edit history clearly reveals more purported sock accounts that are on your side than mine (Orpheusxd, QawmLutGotMerked, Layafai94, Histoire des religieuses etc.). You have created a wide and vague conspiracy theory that is far easier explained by sheer coincidence than some manipulation of Amazon VPN software. (As you should know from having archived my old userpage- Hanlon's razor should apply when). I need to defend my reputation and clarify that when I was taking about offensive usernames I was referring to ‘Qawm Lut got merked’, which is an offensive Arabic term for the homosexual community. Just as an aside, Parsis are not an Iranian group (other than ethnically), the insult of Majoosi would not hold any weight with Parsis who do not speak either Persian or Arabic. Again I find it incredulous of you to say Brits hates Indians and Arabs hate Persians. This is total whatobouttery? When you think from this sort of perspective it is an easy trap to hate other people but I can only speak for myself but I would like to assure you I don’t think most Persians or Zoroastrians hate Arabs or Muslims. I also apologise for misspelling, I have dyslexia and I often make mistakes especially in English which isn’t my first language (this isn’t an excuse and I need to be more careful with this). I used the phrase ‘it appears to be’ because as I wasn’t sure of the meaning of all the words used. Again I am also sorry I mis-cited something too. I do have a vested interest in ensuring a Modern Zoroastrian interpretation is reflected in this article. You or these other new accounts obsessed with this article, keep deleting this, whenever I or any other person has tried to reflect this. Also please note I didn’t add anything 'word4word’. None of your sources include any Zoroastrian authors and many of the claims are deeply offensive and couched in impolite language. I can address each ‘improper source’ one-by-one but I think we should both get a third opinion, maybe consulting those active in WikiProject:Zoroastrianism. I have read everything concerned and I do have a post-graduate qualification in Zoroastrianism (not that I am trying to be a credentials). You clearly have a passionate interest in Xwedodah so let us work together on a consensus for the page rather than stoop to personal attacks as you have done. This article is full of false statements and exaggerations and I think maybe we can reach a consensus on this. Let us try and work on a neutral way to achieve a balanced and fair article in the true spirit of Wikipedia. Manzarene (talk) 20:38, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

If it's not you, you don't need to say anything. But the timing of the vandalize and you asking for page protection(for your specific revision) is suspicious. Ignoring that, which is just for the admin to read. You've reinserted disputed claims without addressing the issues, I won't bother to undo em right now, and will leave that up to. To focus on 1 just for now, your first sentence which I highlight in Issue #1, you do not cite any pages. Are you even reading these books?

Not to mention this (modern apologetics) does not belong in a header, if you want you want to make a "Zorostarian Apologetic" section you can do that. Your blanking of actual reliable sources is WP:IDONTLIKEIT What's your explanation for reintroducing improperly cited material? And falsely attributing things to them? Regards -Lamazeva (talk) 10:54, 28 July 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [43])

A lot of sources here have been cherry picked by you and your purported sock Zoroastrian primary sources/zoroastrian translations have been ignored in order to push a narrative. I have read all the sources I included and these are not modern apologetics but perhaps better understood in a context of decolonisation rather than revisionism. I fully agree with you that plagiarism is not to be tolerated on this encyclopaedia, and I mistakenly reverted to a version with plagiarism (not done by me). I think I pretty much agree that it was practised among the nobility and the sources that the you cited are based on observations strictly in context with the nobility. (Though as shown by my edits the very meaning of the phrase is highly contentious in Avestan). Since the Persians had the concept of a "God king" these ideas were jotted down into some political texts that were later copted and taken as religious texts. The parallels can be found amongst the Hapsburgs, who practiced incest with more severe consequences than Sassanids or their predecessors ever had to deal with and also controlled a great deal of the church and the catholic world. Only difference their "incest" didn't make it to or was mistaken to be put into the religious texts. You have been eager to let the nuances slip into oblivion. The Enclyopedia Iranica article presents this largely correctly even though there are some mistakes there too. Instead of being so aggressive, why not work together to create a fair page?- Manzarene (talk) 12:23, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

Thats original research WP:OR. You need to cite peer reviewed academic sources on what you say is true. Here is one question, just answer it. What page number on your source "Dubeansky, Jennifer (2013). Gifts to a Magus: Indo-Iranian Studies Honoring Firoze Kotwal. P. Lang. ISBN 978-1-4331-2051-0." does it say there is a divergence of views among scholars? I'll double check at the university library which has a copy of this book. Cause the Iranica online article states that the entirety of Western academia does not disagree with this. Regards...Lamazeva (talk) 13:56, 28 July 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [44])

Yes I welcome you to read this book and observe for yourself. Anyone with basic flair for logical analysis can observe and conclude that the views of western scholars differ greatly and there is too much room for nuance which you are ignoring with or without citation. Please see the edit you reverted by @xhepablo. It was incredibly well evidenced. Manzarene (talk) 13:45, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

== Misattribution of legitimate sources ==

Qahramani44 is deleting the following:

• "Nuclear family incest was more than a mere religious ideal or rare ritual. Unlike incest in Egypt, or Rome, or Medieval European royalty, this form of nuclear family incest was not relegated to just royalty but was widely popular among all facets of society from slaves, to free men, to the middle class, aristocrats and royalty. Nuclear family incest resulting in progeny was a far cry from an exclusively or even predominantly royal custom."

Which is sourced to "Scheidel, W. (1996). Brother-sister and parent-child marriage outside royal families in ancient Egypt and Iran: a challenge to the sociobiological view of incest avoidance?. Ethology and Sociobiology, 17(5), 319-340."

He claims:

• "(reverting back to this edit, already gave an explanation as to why a speculative source that contradicts two other sources isn't valid.)" 19:14, 27 July 2020‎ - [45]

• "(Speculative source which contradicts the Iranica and Mitterauer sources in the article, which state the extent outside the nobility and clergy was unknown.)" - 05:13, 14 July 2020‎ ; no revision link as an admin deleted it dueto copyright violation

The Iranica Online article however states:

• "On the evidence for next-of-kin marriages in documents from Dura Europos dated 344 Seleucid era = 32-33 C.E. (Cumont) and from Roman Egypt, see Hopkins, and Scheidel, 1966, and 2005 (further refs., p. 106 nn. 4, 11)."[46]

As you can see the Iranica article also sources to this very same paper. Screenshot: [47]. Yet he claims "it contradicts two other sources" and "isn't valid". This is clearly either lying about what a source says, or clearly he has not read this source and most likely just read the first two paragraphs or the IranicaOnline article.

His other source is "Mitterauer", which is not an actual source. He most likely means the citation he saw in the first paragraph of the IranicaOnline article, which says "(see, e.g., Mitterauer, pp. 235-36)."

This source in the IranicaOnline article is "Michael Mitterauer, “The Customs of the Magians: The Problem of Incest in Historical Societies,” in Roy Porter and Mikuláš Teich, eds., Sexual Knowledge, Sexual Science: The History of Attitudes to Sexuality, Cambridge, UK, and New York, 1994, pp. 231-50. ". It's a chapter from the book "Sexual Knowledge, Sexual Science (1994) by Roy Porter"

The two pages cited are 235-236. Here is a screenshot of 235 and 236, as you can see I highlighted the relevant info. Further context is explained on 239 that when they mean "incest is banned" they refer to father-daughter or mother-son incest, not brother-sister incest. There are 3 types of xwedodah.

On page 237 it also states:

• "In Iran , marriage among near kindred is attested over a much longer period . 23 Criticism of the incestuous practices of the Persians begins in Greek sources as early as the fifth century BC, and carries through to the Nestorian authors "

• "in a weaver ' s household in AD 189 : of twenty - six persons , four were married to siblings."

• "Alongside the normative sources for incestous marriage as practised in the Persian empire there is a number of individual instances, though they are neither as frequent nor as detailed as the Egyptian censuses . "

• "In connection with the theories discussed above it is interesting to note that contemporaries did observe the genetic consequences of Zoroastrian inbreeding. The Nestorian patriarch Jesubocht describes ' the judgement of God , which often manifests itself in the children of such filthy unions , in that there is something abnormal about them : their limbs , eyes , hands and feet and other limbs show some weakness , and their skin is of various colours ' . [25] The connection between incestuous marriage and degeneration due to inbreeding is clearly made . "

Second (Scheidel, 1996) states the following

• "The first hypothesis that institutional nuclear family incest is never embraced on a regular basis outside royal families is clearly proven wrong by the census returns from Roman Egypt. The Zoroastrian sources provide additional though less unequivocal corroborative evidence. At the same time, the apparent uniqueness of these two scenarios underlines their exceptional character." [48]

• "The evidence from Zoroastrian Iran, which in spite of any problems of interpretation at the very least provides a second example of nonroyal incest over a very considerable amount of time, contains some indications of aversion against this mating practice. Not only hostile outsiders but the Zoroastrian sources themselves betray uneasiness about brother-sister and parent-child marriage. It also remains uncertain to what extent incest became popular among common people of Iran"[49]

The next is too much to copy paste, I don't want to violate any copyright policies so here is a screenshot of the paragraph [50]

Where it states:

• "However, the zeal of the Zoroastrian priests to promote xwedodah in larger parts of the population apparently increased under the Sasanian dynasty from the third century A.D."

In short there is no "speculative sources", there are no "contradictions", even if there was we already know on many academic topics there are differences of opinion and fields are contested, both views are then provided, one is not deleted for another. He is not actually reading what he's citing, and removing information cited to reliable sources on mere wishful thinking. Lamazeva (talk) 17:11, 28 July 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [51])

It's quite funny that you went to the lengths to post such an argument when it completely undermines the revision that you were trying to push. The original paragraph you were trying to push in was the following:

>>Nuclear family incest was more than a mere religious ideal or rare ritual. Unlike incest in Egypt, or Rome, or Medieval European royalty, this form of nuclear family incest was not relegated to just royalty but was widely popular among all facets of society from slaves, to free men, to the middle class, aristocrats and royalty. Walter Scheidel states: "At the very least, we can be sure that nuclear family incest resulting in progeny was a far cry from an exclusively or even predominantly royal custom.

Yet, the pages of the source you've just linked do not at all state that the practice was widely popular amongst all facets of society nor that it was more popular than in Egypt, in fact quite the opposite, that it wasn't nearly as frequent (4 out of 26 people in a household is "widely popular" to you?), as well as explicitly saying that it was less frequent than in the Egyptian censuses. The fact that you're attempting to erase any of the sources and paragraphs from the article prior to the sockmaster's re-writing as well, is quite telling. Qahramani44 (talk) 22:55, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

::You've misread the sources. "4 out of 26" is an example from 1 household, of a weaver. Scheidel states:

• "Zoroastrian sources provide additional though less unequivocal corroborative evidence"

And Mitterauer concurs that there is just less census data from Persia than in Egypt. You seemed to have confused that for "did not happen" or "was less then" but both sources agree that nuclear family incest happened, whether it was brother-sister, father-daughter, or mother-son (remember these are all 3 different types of nuclear family incest, as all sources state)

Scheidel also states

• "However, the zeal of the Zoroastrian priests to promote xwedodah in larger parts of the population apparently increased under the Sasanian dynasty from the third century A.D."

You clearly are not reading these sources. Although it's correct that the part on Egypt was wrong, Persia and Egypt was equivalent. Scheidel only states that Rome and Medieval European had it for royalty. Regards...Lamazeva (talk) 10:44, 29 July 2020 (UTC)<--- blocked sock of User:AntiRacistSwede (see also; [52])

Avesta.org as a Legitimate Source and the WP:IDONTLIKEIT Argument

Hello,

I saw the chaos that was happening here and decided to step in. It's very clear that there are two competing agendas at play here, so I did my best to develop the most accurate and neutral re-write I could of the article considering the near-endless issues the last version had. I'm amazed to see Lamazeva state that Avesta.org is not a legitimate source under WP:IDONTLIKEIT which makes very little sense considering I used it only for statements relating to religious documents that required attribution. Avesta.org is just a collection of translated Zoroastrian religious texts, many of which are available in the open domain and are also used by academics since many of these translations have been around for decades and, in some cases, about a century or more now. I am a bit concerned that Lamazeva is using the WP:IDONTLIKEIT argument for sources they don't seem to like despite their applicability in the article. Also, can we all please stop with the endless back and forth revisions? Thanks.Xhepablo (talk) 18:37, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

As it turns out (unsurprisingly, and as I'd suspected from the get-go) Lamazeva is a confirmed [53] sockpuppet of AntiRacistSwede and/or his friends [54] who've been obsessed with this article since April. I'd say your revision is the best one so far and I'd support maintaining it from now on and going from there. Cheers and thanks everyone for your efforts at improving this article. -- Qahramani44 (talk) 23:58, 29 July 2020 (UTC)