User talk:StAnselm/Domenic Johansson custody case

Untitled

This article is heavily biased. It concerns a boy who was isolated by his parents and had no contact at all with other children, apart from relatives. This is not about home schooling at all, although HSLDA and other organizations want to portray the case in that way.

If you visit the reference pages, you will find that the articles published there are based upon information from only one source, Christer Johansson, even though other people have expressed their opinions about the case.

The Social Services, who is bound to comply with very strong secrecy, has not been able to tell the real reasons for the decision to remove the child from his parents. Therefore, the data appearing on the internet is very biased and only speaks to the parents' (mostly the father's) advantage. In some cases, the publication of details of the boy's care and the parents' suffering because of this, is some of the propaganda for home schooling, especially in the U.S. and New Zealand.

Although this article seems to be objective and reporting the case unreservedly, it is a part of the moulding of public opinion in favor of two persons. Therefore the article should be removed from Wikipedia. Brossan (talk) 07:23, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the input. In response,

1. I don't believe I gave the impression in the article that the case is all about home education. On the contrary it raises some important human rights and parental rights issues.

2. Given that the case has become internationally-known, surely it would be more of a service to Wikipedia readers and the general public, instead of removing the article, to update it with details of the arguments provided by the social agencies in their court documents. Since this case has gone to court, the social services are bound to submit their arguments and reasons for their decisions to the judges, however secret they might be.

For the reasons above I'd argue that the article should remain. Please be patient with me as I locate the relevant documents and/or English translations thereof and add them to the references. This was difficult for me to do today as I am not a Swedish speaker. Miss-standfast (talk) 10:42, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

You can't hardly say that the case is internationally well spread. The Facebook group has less than 10 000 members, and even if i should have 20 000 members, it still would be a minority of the world's population. The support blog has occational posts and people seem to be engaged at first, but when they find out what it really is about, they leave.

This is a case where a father feels sorry for himself. He has tried to find sympathy and support from people around the world and he doesn't realize that he is used by these home schooling organizations. That is the worst thing about this story. Brossan (talk) 13:16, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Removing the links I have added only shows that there is no intention to be unprejudiced and to show different views of this matter. That is another reason for removing this article. For general interest I will add the links here, because I think they will be deleted soon again.

http://homeeducationheretic.blogspot.se/2010/07/dominic-johansson.html http://homeeducationheretic.blogspot.se/2010/07/why-is-dominc-johansson-still-in-foster.html http://homeeducationheretic.blogspot.se/2010/07/final-word-about-johansson-case.html Brossan (talk) 13:27, 25 April 2013 (UTC) Brossan (talk) 13:47, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Please do not edit war. Per WP:SPS and WP:ELNO, such blog links are clearly not appropriate. I have doubts about the "Friends of Domenic" blog as well, but that is essentially the website of an organization. Also, I would counsel you to assume good faith, and not to jump to conclusions about intentional bias. StAnselm (talk) 21:51, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

This article reads more like an advocacy piece than a neutral article. Especially given that it is linked on the front page, it needs massive attention. CarbonCopy (talk) 01:27, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

I would have to agree, this article reads like one-sided advocacy, essentially written by a one-article, one-interest editor. While the topic itself may be noteworthy, the way this is written is nowhere near NPOV. Eastcote (talk) 02:25, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

If the article should exist, it needs to be rewritten completely. Since this isn't a very notable event in Sweden (I was barely aware of it) or elsewhere, it should be nominated for deletion. Meaningful Username (talk) 14:13, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

I find it astonishing that anyone would want to remove this article. The arguments to do so sound very much like a politically motivated agenda to diminish parental rights. If one side chooses not to reveal the reasons for their position, that in no way should mandate that the other side cannot be published, nor should said publication be deemed as biased. Merely publishing available information does not create bias and, perhaps, the published side is 100% correct - who is to say? Furthermore, there is extreme bias in the arguments to remove the article, for example the false assumption that social isolation produces shyness or improprer social skills is no more than an (incorrect) opinion. Which is better - for two adults (the parents) to socialize a child, or for the socially inept (other children) to do so? Through empirical observation I have found children who have been socially isolated in one form or another to have better manners than those whose social skills were shaped by children at large in public settings. Greencamel (talk) 17:22, 25 June 2013 (UTC)greencamel

Hi, Greencamel, please refrain from debating about the article on the talk page. This talk page is not for arguing about whether or not homeschooling is acceptable, but for whether or not this article should be on enwiki, and if it should be, how to best improve it. 68.0.215.230 (talk) 02:27, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

swedish sources

I've been following this case for a while and as pointed out above it's difficult to establish the true facts of the case as we're only getting one side of the story. Miss-standfast, if you have swedish sources I'm able to read them, so if you can post some links I'll see what I can do.

I do have a few Swedish sources linked on the page, including these:

http://www.nkmr.org/gotlandsfallet_sjuaringen_polishamtas_fran_planet.htm

http://www.helagotland.se/nyheter/artikel.aspx?ArticleId=5350456

http://oldsite.alliancedefensefund.org/userdocs/JohanssonOpinion.pdf

johansson.hslda.org/sites/all/files/Johansson_Gotland District Court.pdf

I am working on locating other court documents and translations. As I've mentioned before, anyone who wants to get both sides of the story should not bother so much with the he-said-she-said of newspaper interviews, but read the actual court documents, which are the most reliable documents we have for each side's arguments. For example, if you read the opinion at the last link above you will get summaries of the Social Services' arguments (eg, that Domenic was emotionally abused by not being allowed to socialise with schoolchildren, thus making him shy) as well as the Johanssons' response (eg, that Domenic's shyness was an understandable result of the traumatic abduction) together with the evidence adduced by both sides (totalling 14 witnesses). Miss-standfast (talk) 22:58, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Court documents are WP:PRIMARY sources, and Wikipedia strongly favours secondary sources. It is OK to use primary sources to supplement secondary ones, but not to use them exclusively. That said, it makes a Wikipedia editor's job harder if most of the secondary sources are biased, and especially so if they are all biased in the same direction. It seems from a glance at the article that most of those taking an interest in the case so far are (non-Swedish) homeschooling advocates, but that of itself is not a reason to delete the article. Notability within a community is still notability whether the community is geographical, cultural, or a community of interest. The bias of sources does mean that editors need to work harder to counter WP:SYSTEMIC bias. jnestorius^(talk) 14:36, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Lack of an article in Swedish article

The lack of an article in Swedish, where potentially better informed people might be able to create a less POV article, is very off-putting. If this is just a bug in the bonnet of the homeschooler movement, then I don't think there is any reason for this article. If this is an actual controversy in Sweden, then where are the Swedes? I have no information about this case other than what I've read here, and I don't think the English Wikipedia should be a platform for advocacy. 134.2.129.176 (talk) 07:57, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

There is no mention of "Domenic Johansson" on Swedish Wikipedia. And this article has no citations giving the view of the Swedish authorities. It's very fishy, and this article should never have been selected for the Main page of English Wikipedia. Maproom (talk) 14:28, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

The article on Swedish Wikipedia was created, and deleted, twice on April 24. That is also the only place besides here on enwiki that I've heard about the case... Le Lapin Vert (talk) 18:57, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't see any explanation of why it was deleted. Basically, it is completely irrelevant to us whether there is an article in Swedish wikipedia. They may well use different standards for creating and keeping articles. Or it may be that the deleted articles were unsourced, or gibberish, or whatever. See also WP:OTHERLANGS. StAnselm (talk) 00:41, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Just note that it's almost unheard of in the Swedish news...and no, the newspapers aren't owned by the scary socialistic government of Sweden... Le Lapin Vert (talk) 21:43, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Deletion

Hello,

I have nominated this article for deletion pursuant to reasons for deletion 4, 7, 8. The notability is very questionable, there are virtually no sources that aren't primary sources or opinion sources, and much of the article relies on arguments of a single organization. 68.0.215.230 (talk) 02:35, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

• Since you've requested it, I've finished your AfD request. I don't have any strong inclination one way or the other, although I will see if I can improve the article. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 03:09, 27 June 2013 (UTC)