Arbitration case on WWII topics

[Kumioko]

It looks like there is a new Arbcom case on the horizon to review topics relating to WWII content here:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... uests/Case, specifically those around Nazi Germany related articles. At the center of this case is of course K.e.coffman (T-C-L) who has been on a personal mission to erase every Nazi related article from Wikipedia, the military history project and the general editing environment around WWII articles.

So far, claims have been made about sockpuppetry, inappropriate conflict of interest editing, favoring Nazi ideals, etc. What really strikes me is that the arbs who are voting to accept the case are voting to accept different cases, with no evident agreement on what they case is, or isn't about.

This looks to be another very contentious case with the usual incompetence and misrepresentation of facts by the Arbcom. No matter how the case ends we can be sure of one thing, the Arbcom are going to determine an outcome that negatively impacts everyone so they don't have to take a side and be blamed for actually making a decision.

It's also worth mentioning that the Military history project has largely been drama free with a positive reputation and fairly strong group of editors. That group of editors has been decreasing steadily though and a big contentious case like this could seriously damage the projects credibility and make it less interesting to participate in for its members.

[Poetlister]

Are they going to try to disprove Godwin's law (T-H-L)?

[MadManz]

One of many projects suffering wikiproject rot, plain and simple. The wikiproject is losing editors, gaining drama, etc as it goes on like many others. There are multiple Wikipedia editors who are likely neo-Nazis too which adds COI into the mix.

[Kumioko]

One of many projects suffering wikiproject rot, plain and simple. The wikiproject is losing editors, gaining drama, etc as it goes on like many others. There are multiple Wikipedia editors who are likely neo-Nazis too which adds COI into the mix.

Oh yeah no doubt. Wikipedia is a big place and although it is losing editors there are certainly pro[insert affiliation here] for any topic. Just try editing an article on Witchcraft and see how fast the conservative Christian and Catholic editors revert your edits, no matter how well referenced. Try inserting an image of Mohammed on the Mohammed article and face retaliation by offended Muslim editors, then there are the Infobox wars, etc., etc.

[AndyTheGrump]

...
It's also worth mentioning that the Military history project has largely been drama free with a positive reputation and fairly strong group of editors. That group of editors has been decreasing steadily though and a big contentious case like this could seriously damage the projects credibility and make it less interesting to participate in for its members.

If there is any truth whatsoever in what K.e.coffman claims in the article he had published in The Bugle and in the Society for Military History (T-H-L)'s Headquarters Gazette, there are more serious credibility issues than just that of the military history project.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... view_essay

[JCM]

...
It's also worth mentioning that the Military history project has largely been drama free with a positive reputation and fairly strong group of editors. That group of editors has been decreasing steadily though and a big contentious case like this could seriously damage the projects credibility and make it less interesting to participate in for its members.

If there is any truth whatsoever in what K.e.coffman claims in the article he had published in The Bugle and in the Society for Military History (T-H-L)'s Headquarters Gazette, there are more serious credibility issues than just that of the military history project.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... view_essay

I have no real doubt myself that his claims as presented are accurate. And I myself have encountered much the same thing in religious content, particularly religious biography. At least some of the major existing sources on some of the major early Christian popular saints cast them in really unrealistic ways even taking into account the major changes in the social and cultural norms since their times. Many of the early Christian hagiographies give images of people too good to be true who did things even God might have trouble pulling off. Saint Patrick exiling all the snakes from Ireland for example. Of course, there never were any snakes in Ireland, so his alleged results at least are hard to argue.

Particularly problematic might be comparatively minor figures in both Nazi history and religious history who seem to be almost if not actually discussed only by well received but not necessarily neutral writers who might present a rather biased result. If there don't exist any accessible contemporary substantive documents which present a more realistic portrait, sometimes even with the best of intentions and great effort you may still find the best summary of a minor biography an encyclopedia can put forward isn't as believable as one might like.

[Kumioko]

I agree that some of K.e. coffmans claims are true but I also think he has been somewhat hyperbolic about them and eventhough he has cherry picked some good cases to prove his point, and as I mentioned, it seems to be much more of a personal mission to downgreade as much Nazi articles as possible.

From that aspect, and with this new arbitration case, K.e. coffman is today's "Hasten the Day hero".

[Midsize Jake]

I agree that some of K.e. coffmans claims are true but I also think he has been somewhat hyperbolic about them and eventhough he has cherry picked some good cases to prove his point, and as I mentioned, it seems to be much more of a personal mission to downgreade as much Nazi articles as possible.

With all due respect yada yada, the list of examples on his user page is waaay too long to be regarded as "cherry picking." What I think we're really seeing there is an ongoing attempt to counter the natural (though, perhaps, unfortunate) human tendency to want to portray the subjects of personal research in a more positive light than may be warranted, given that those subjects may be extremely bad people such as Nazi war criminals. This will always be an uphill struggle on Wikipedia, because Wikipedians are not professional historians and researchers; therefore most of them have not been trained to resist this tendency on their own.

It's actually a serious problem that we haven't covered much, if at all, mostly (IMO) because our focus has always been on living biographical subjects and the potential harm that can be done to them by people who want to use WP as a revenge platform. In other words, in the past we've essentially encouraged the tendency to treat one's "pet subjects" more positively than they might deserve, because that (by extension) encourages them to defend BLPs against revenge-minded people and (presumably) reduces the overall potential for harm. But when those pet subjects are WW2 Nazis, all of whom are dead, it's better to discourage that tendency - otherwise, Wikipedians may very well be (unwittingly?) contributing to a gradual whitewashing of Nazi history, perhaps without realizing the extent of the threat to culture, society, freedom and even security that this could represent.

[Kumioko]

Certainly no one here, especially not me, is trying to white wash what the Nazis did, I'm just saying that I think ke coffman has other reasons for it other than the betterment of Wikipedia.

I also think that he makes a lot of unsubstantiated claims of contacting real life historians and although he might be telling the truth, it has been my experience historians, particularly military ones, don't have the time or desire to fix anything in Wikipedia. When I was editing, most I contacted don't hold Wikipedia in very high regard and wouldn't spend the time to discuss it no matter how passionate they were about the subjects. I also think it might constitute a conflict of interest or perhaps in some cases fall into original research. I think it's also fair to say that regardless of the branch of service or nationality, when submitting someone for an award, there is a tendency and often a requirement to word in such a way to make it sound more dramatic or positive than it really was and certainly the Nazis are no different.

I just don't think erasing a couple thousand articles, some of which were pretty well written, from Wikipedia, is a very good way of documenting human knowledge.

[Poetlister]

the conservative Christian and Catholic editors

Catholics are Christians too!

[AndyTheGrump]

I also think that he makes a lot of unsubstantiated claims of contacting real life historians ...

Are you seriously suggesting that K.e.coffman invented the quotes from Melson, Lipstadt, Kühne, Westemeier and MacKenzie?

[Kumioko]

I also think that he makes a lot of unsubstantiated claims of contacting real life historians ...

Are you seriously suggesting that K.e.coffman invented the quotes from Melson, Lipstadt, Kühne, Westemeier and MacKenzie?

Oh no, absolutely not. I'm sure those were accurate, but the same types of quotes are also prevalent on other articles including those of Medal of Honor recipients, Navy Cross, Victoria cross recipients, etc. I could also pick examples from those groups were the accolades were embellished or exaggerated in order to meet the qualifications of the medal.

In fact, I'm surprised someone hasn't made the decision to delete or redirect all, or most of the American Civil War medal of honor recipient articles. Most have very limited references and the medal was awarded for things worded simply as "Captured the enemy flag" or the like. Which sounds easy, but in reality was extremely difficult, but most people wouldn't recognize that by the wording.

Many of the ones presented for the Indian Wars especially have wording relating to killing natives or Indians that in current times would be generally considered inappropriate or even as a war crime in some cases.

All I am saying is that Wikipedia should be documenting the information in as unbiased fashion as possible, regardless of whether they won or lost or how we personally feel about their actions or beliefs. It should be relaying information to readers, not rewriting it, hiding it or making excuses for it.

Having said that, as someone who's been thrust into the Hasten the day crowd, every article deleted from Wikipedia is a win for us and K.e. Coffman is currently one of the best players on our team....so Hoozah!

[AndyTheGrump]

No, "the same type of quotes" can't be found in Wikipedia articles. Or at least, I hope not, since the material K.e.coffman quoted in the Bugle was from email correspondence with academic historians concerning possible bias in Wikipedia military history content.

[Kumioko]

No, "the same type of quotes" can't be found in Wikipedia articles. Or at least, I hope not, since the material K.e.coffman quoted in the Bugle was from email correspondence with academic historians concerning possible bias in Wikipedia military history content.

Ok so first off, I think we are confusing two different things here.

What I was saying was that when the articles include the award write-up or a description of the action the medals were received for, they tend to be written with some dramatic hook such as "intrepid skill", "unwavering leadership", "steadfast commitment to duty", etc. and I completely agree that many need to be rewritten and copyedited to reduce this...but we need editors editing and improving articles to do that, not talkers talking about what's wrong with them and maybe slapping a generic "Needs copyedit" template on it.

What it sounds like you are saying is we are trusting that these emails with quotes from "historians" actually exist or has someone validated that? I also think, regardless of the topic, you can find someone in a profession to argue either way on a topic. In other words, if I were a supporter of a certain bias, I could find sources or people who favor that way or if I were an opposer of a certain ideal I could also find sources and experts to support that. There's no way for us to know who or how many historians he contacted, what his email said or how the "non selected" quotes read. They could very well have said he was a complete loon, we have no idea.

Without actually seeing these supposed emails and having something documented in print, even a blog or a news clip about these academics claiming widespread bias, other than one editor who supposedly spoke to them that we cannot even verify, then as far as I am concerned it's just rumor and original research, neither of which is allowed by policy on Wikipedia.

It's astonishing to me how many sheep are willing to just jump on the band wagon of one editor with a personal mission just because he is targeting the very unpopular topic (to most of us at least) of Nazis.

[AndyTheGrump]

"Original research"? You really have swallowed the Wikilawyer's bible whole, haven't you? This is supposed to be a discussion of whether Wikipedia coverage of WW2 military history shows bias, and asking reputed historians for their opinion on the matter is a perfectly legitimate thing for anyone, Wikipedia contributor or not, to do. At least, it is if you consider the aims of the project to be to produce an encyclopaedia, rather than to act as a collective vanity publisher for Nazi apologists and for 'military history buffs' who know fuck all about any recent historiography of the subjects they are supposedly experts in. This is a damned sight more important than pettyfogging Wikipedia rules, or for the members of any Wikipedia project.

And yes, I 'trust' the emails that K.e. coffman published in the Bugle, and in the Society for Military History's Gazette, because anyone who doubted them would only need to contact the original authors' to confirm them. If you want to peddle ridiculous conspiracy theories about things you don't like, feel free. Just don't expect anyone to take you seriously. I certainly won't because this ridiculous Wikilawyers whitewashing exercise of yours has finally convinced me that the only place I want to see you any more is on my ignore list.

If anyone else wishes to discuss the actual supposed topic of this thread: the question of bias in regard to Wikipedia WW2 military history subjects, I'd be glad to do so. I am not however interested in vacuous discussions about whether Wikipedias' contradictory 'policies' and 'guidelines' have been broken by someone who evidently cares more about honest reporting in articles concerning a sensitive topic than nit-picking about said policies. Then again, maybe I'm hopelessly naive in thinking that readers getting what they are due is more important than adherence to the rules of a 'community' that makes up whatever shit suits their obsessions best. It was my previous experience with events leading to the ArbCom 'gun control' case that demonstrated to me just how willing some contributors were to fabricate history (concerning the Holocaust, of all things) in order to spin articles their way, and this latest case (which seems to confirm something I'd already suspected, though hadn't previously investigated in any depth) only reinforces this. If there is one topic any credible 'criticism of Wikipedia' website should be taking seriously, it is this one, and it needs a darned sight better analysis than Kumioko's idiotic stream of excuses for a 'military history' project.

[Kumioko]

You know Andy, your username really fits perfectly but I should make clear that I do not care whatsoever how you feel about me or my views because it's likely that my views of your attitude and demeanor are not very good either.

I know what this discussion was about, I started the topic, and I don't recall being very specific about the direction of it regardless of how you interpreted it. Certainly the bias aspect is part of it, but to me, so is the complete lack of reliable evidence by K.e. Coffmans "evidence", the willingness of so many people to blindly accept that evidence without validation it or requiring some proof and the fact that the arbcom took the case without it's members even agreeing to what case they were taking (several different arbs seem to have differing opinions about what needs to be addressed).

One thing is obvious though, this is going to be a contentious topic, both here and on Wikipedia it seems.

[Midsize Jake]

Just to be clear, I didn't mean to accuse you of supporting the whitewashing of Nazi history on WP or anywhere else. What I meant was that that could be the cumulative effect of many individual cases (not necessarily any of yours) where that natural human tendency to want to indulge one's research subjects isn't restrained by years of professional training to inhibit one's doing so.

It's similar to the problem many inexperienced fiction-writers have, whereby they'll fixate on a particular character (and not necessarily a hero or anti-hero), use that character as the representation of (or mouthpiece for) the author's personal ideas and opinions, and then overindulge that character with special talents/powers and/or an unusual degree of charm or sexual attractiveness. (It's what the phrase "kill your darlings" refers to.)

Just as an aside... let's just for a moment throw out the hyperbole and exaggeration and ask realistically: How many Nazi-related articles, really, do you think would actually be deleted if Mr. Coffman had his way? I'm assuming he doesn't want to delete all of them, or even half of them, but how many is it really? Percentage or actual number, either one.

Finally, people who jump on what they perceive to be an "anti-Nazi bandwagon" are not "sheep." It's a simple moral choice. You really risk messing up your own credibility when you use that word in that context.

[Ming]

Most interesting to Ming response from Assayer (T-C-L), who is a German-speaker:

I contribute mainly to the German Wikipedia. For years I refrained from contributing to the English Wikipedia, because I found the field of Nazi German history including the German war effort to be misrepresented. A bulk of articles, many of them peer reviewed for excellence, struck me as a "gallery of heroes", based mainly on fringe militaria literature, memoirs, extremist and revisionist publications or even on outright Nazi propaganda (e.g. the Wehrmachtbericht). Each and every "ace's" victory was recorded in the most minute detail. "Skilled leadership" and "extreme battlefield bravery" were emphasized. When I did start contributing I found some editors connected with the MilHist project not very receptive to criticism. Instead accusations of campaigning and tag-teaming with K.e.Coffman came quickly. But to be clear: This is not about content but about representation, imagery and POV. As David Stahel has pointed out in his book on Operation Barbarossa (Cambridge UP 2009), it is well known that, in contrast to German historiography, Anglo-American military histories tend to portray the German generals of WWII as mere professionals. By separating military performance from political and ideological actions, Stahel argues, too many favourable judgements were passed. (p. 443, emphasis added) Such judgements (POV) are also characteristic, maybe inadvertently, maybe intentional, for the English Wikipedia. Thereby no Nazi sympathies are expressed and no crimes are denied. On the contrary, that POV is essentially anti-Nazi, but it is also biased when it comes to describe who the Nazis actually were.

As to LR in particular, their work first came to my notice when they expressed their "shock" about the "very existence" of the article at (Talk:Rommel myth#This article is a classic case of synthesizing and content forking a coat rack. Suggest immediate redirect.). I commented on their article (Talk:Helmuth Groscurth) when it was nominated for GA. While as of today [48] they did not correct wrong citations and missing page numbers, they found time to remove material for allegedly missing page numbers elsewhere(diff). This strikes me as double standard. If I randomly pick another edit, e.g. (diff) I find them reinserting information sourced to Heinz Guderian's memoirs, mainly reiterating the story that the Wehrmacht was constantly hindered by orders from Hitler with whom they disagreed. As military historian Russell Hart points out in his Guderian: Panzer Pioneer or Mythmaker? (2006), p. 96-7, despite of what Guderian wrote in his memoirs, his disagreements with Hitler were episodic and temporary and gradually increased only over time. Historical research has firmly established that the military elite of Nazi Germany constructed a deliberately biased account of the Battle of Moscow by arguing that the German offensive only failed because of Hitler, the winter (weather) and Soviet reinforcements from Siberia. LR apparently thinks that such arguments make an article more informative. LR is right in that they inserted material demonstrating how certain senior Army officers encouraged murder, e.g. underlining the extent of Walther Reichenau's participation in the Holocaust (diff) But with the very same edit they diminish the responsibility of units under Reichenau's command for the massacre at Babi Yar. Historical research demonstrated that Reichenau "and some of his men had been actively involved. Infantry divisions of the sixth army had helped arrest and confine Jews, and Reichenau had participated in a series of meetings where it seems the action was planned." (Doris L. Bergen, War and Genocide, 3rd. ed. 2016, p.201) In other words, Reichenau was not simply in charge of the area in which SS, Einsatzgruppen, and Ukrainian auxiliaries operated.

(bold is Ming's emphasis)

[Kumioko]

Fair enough and to clarify I wasn't referring to those jumping on and "anti-Nazi" bandwagon as sheep, I was referring to those who would blindly accept the K.e. Coffman's unverified emails with historians must be true. I find it very odd that generally people question these kinds of statements and want some proof, but in this case, a lot of people seem to be ignoring the fact that he could just be making this shit up as he goes along. It certainly wouldn't be the first time Wikipedia was the victim of a hoax. Now before I get beat up, I am not calling him a lyer, I'm just saying that he hasn't really proven anything, he just said so and so sent me this and that and no one questions it. I find it surprising no one else besides me finds this unconvincing.

To answer your other question about how many articles are affected, its hundreds to a couple thousand.

Here are a couple examples, not all of which relate directly to Nazi articles, but many do: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:K.e.coffman/PROD_log; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:K.e.coffman/CSD_log; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... r_Articles

Again though, I'm really not trying to support inclusion. As I have said before, every article deleted from Wikipedia is a victory for the hasten the day crowd and if K.e. Coffman deletes thousands upon thousands of articles, for whatever reason, then great, all the better for us HTDers.

[Auggie]

I know I sound like a broken record on this, but the WWII articles have been overrun by Nazi sympathizers.

Even the main article, World War II, is heavily distorted in favor of battlefield minutia at the expense of explaining what the war was actually about.

There is nothing about the gestapo. Nothing about Mein Kampf. Nothing about eugenics. Only two very passing references to racism. Nothing about the Holocaust other than that it happened. The word "antisemitism" does not appear. Neither do "ensatzgruppen" or "death camp".

A young person reading this article would come away with the impression that this was just another routine conflict between European nation-states. Bigger than usual, but other than that nothing special. Hitler was just another politician. Exactly the way Nazis have been spinning it since forever.

[Poetlister]

Good thing we have Encyc.org. But wait! The article there does not mention eugenics or death camp either.

[Anroth]

Meh, its really nothing to do with political views of the editors. The main problem is that the various military articles are filled with military geek editors who care more about statistics, tactics and military cruft than political and ethical issues involved in being part of a war machine of a totalitarian genocidal government.

So 'filled with nazi sympathizers' is not really correct.

Of course there is the other issue, in that some editors want to make absolutely clear on every page related to WWII that the nazis were bad mmkay. At length and in detail. Ultimately a lot of people who are looking at the Wehrmacht are probably more interested in the military organisation than the political views of its officers.

Either way, the outcome of the arbcom case should be fucking hilarious.

[Kumioko]

I think part of the problem is there is so much information om this subject, it's really hard to make an article about it without leaving out some important aspect. There is a valid need for articles on multiple aspects of the war, each of which could have multiple related subarticles articles. IN several cases, there are multiple articles just about one person who participated in the War. Douglas MacArthur (T-H-L), Audie Murphy (T-H-L) and Dwight D. Eisenhower (T-H-L) for example each have multiple articles relating to them.

[Volunteer Marek]

Most interesting to Ming response from Assayer (T-C-L), who is a German-speaker:

(snip) it is well known that, in contrast to German historiography, Anglo-American military histories tend to portray the German generals of WWII as mere professionals. (snip)

(bold is Ming's emphasis)

For anyone who even half-seriously delves into the history and historiography of WW2 this (the bolded part) isn't news. It really is the British and American pseudo-historians who have some Wehrmacht fetish of the "the Wehrmacht was so awezome a fighting force so they couldn't have anything to do with the Holocaust and anti-semitism!" sort. The same kind of crap exists in Germany but it is (or at least was, haven't checked in a while and the world's been getting crazy) mostly confided to the far-right fringe.

I'm not familiar with this particular aspect of the dispute but K.e.coffman has done an excellent job on these articles. Not surprised he's pissed off some assholes.

[Poetlister]

Obviously, even if the generals didn't believe in Nazism, they were complicit in the regime except for those involved in the plot to assassinate Hitler. "I was only obeying orders" doesn't wash, especially at such a high level.

[Randy from Boise]

Good thing we have Encyc.org. But wait! The article there does not mention eugenics or death camp either.

World War II wasn't about eugenics or death camps. It was about the military invasion of sovereign nations and the reaction thereto.

I rather doubt there is much coverage of Soviet mass murder in the World War II article either... Damned if I'm gonna read it to find out, big topics like that are a perfect example of What Wikipedia Is Not.

RfB

[AndyTheGrump]

Good thing we have Encyc.org. But wait! The article there does not mention eugenics or death camp either.

World War II wasn't about eugenics or death camps. It was about the military invasion of sovereign nations and the reaction thereto.

I rather doubt there is much coverage of Soviet mass murder in the World War II article either... Damned if I'm gonna read it to find out, big topics like that are a perfect example of What Wikipedia Is Not.

RfB

The 'military invasion of sovereign nations' was driven by ideology, which shaped the objectives of warfare, and led to specific strategic decisions about the way the war would be fought. Any purely 'military' history of WW2 is a fiction.

[JCM]

Determining the amount of space to give this topic in various articles which may not particularly relate strongly to it will likely be a never ending dispute. It will also almost certainly be a long standing source of friction in the main articles on the war, given the number of thepretical first level spinout articles which might be seen as being required. I remember doing a peer review of the Jesus article and not even trying to address any weight issues knowing the same issues exist there.

[Poetlister]

Good thing we have Encyc.org. But wait! The article there does not mention eugenics or death camp either.

World War II wasn't about eugenics or death camps. It was about the military invasion of sovereign nations and the reaction thereto.

I rather doubt there is much coverage of Soviet mass murder in the World War II article either... Damned if I'm gonna read it to find out, big topics like that are a perfect example of What Wikipedia Is Not.

RfB

The 'military invasion of sovereign nations' was driven by ideology, which shaped the objectives of warfare, and led to specific strategic decisions about the way the war would be fought. Any purely 'military' history of WW2 is a fiction.

This is exactly the "it was just another war; Hitler was just another politician" line that the neo-Nazi apologists try to push.

[Beeblebrox]

I think it’s a bit of both. Military history geeks love to write about the order of battle and strategy. Why the fighting took place is secondary at best to them. Unfortunately, this plays straight into the nazi apologist/holocaust denier agenda.

The cure, I think, is people more concerned with the political and social issues surrounding the war need to edit these articles. How to make that happen, I don’t know. Maybe all the attention on it right now will help at least a little.

[Auggie]

Good thing we have Encyc.org. But wait! The article there does not mention eugenics or death camp either.

I think I was going for a retro vibe so I used the term "concentration camp" instead of the more specific (and accurate) "death camp". I should probably change that. But at least Encyc talks about camps. Wikipedia just tosses out a lame dismissive paragraph on "holocaust" and rattles off a bunch of types of people killed.

As for eugenics, it's kind of a technical-sounding word and that's probably why it was avoided. Encyc does describe what the Nazis were doing though. Is there room for improvement? Of course, but that's why it's a wiki.

[Auggie]

Meh, its really nothing to do with political views of the editors. The main problem is that the various military articles are filled with military geek editors who care more about statistics, tactics and military cruft than political and ethical issues involved in being part of a war machine of a totalitarian genocidal government.

So 'filled with nazi sympathizers' is not really correct.

Of course there is the other issue, in that some editors want to make absolutely clear on every page related to WWII that the nazis were bad mmkay. At length and in detail. Ultimately a lot of people who are looking at the Wehrmacht are probably more interested in the military organisation than the political views of its officers.

Either way, the outcome of the arbcom case should be fucking hilarious.

No. It's tempting to think it's just geeks being into their cruft, but if you try to broaden the scope of an article, they will say exactly what you're saying. Pretend that you're trying to make every page "Nazis were bad mmkay". Like Hitler's social views have no place in the history of World War II except as a side note. I'm sure that's not what you mean but that's where that attitude leads.

[JCM]

Google shows the existence of an Encyclopedia of World War II edited by Spencer Tucker, with others by Alan Axelrod and John Keegan, a Complete Encyclopedia of World War II, a Historical Encyclopedia of World War II, an Oxford Companion to World War II, all rather quickly. I think it should be possible for someone to consult them and the others that no doubt exist, look at the reviews for comparatice purposes, and be able to come up with some sort of less than official essay or guideline which might be able to provide a broad view of relative importance of Nazi atrocities and weirdness dor wikipedia articles in general and maybe a few indicators as to what circumstances might prompt maybe a separate pargraph or section on unpopular or negative aspects of the regime.

[Randy from Boise]

Good thing we have Encyc.org. But wait! The article there does not mention eugenics or death camp either.

World War II wasn't about eugenics or death camps. It was about the military invasion of sovereign nations and the reaction thereto.

I rather doubt there is much coverage of Soviet mass murder in the World War II article either... Damned if I'm gonna read it to find out, big topics like that are a perfect example of What Wikipedia Is Not.

RfB

The 'military invasion of sovereign nations' was driven by ideology, which shaped the objectives of warfare, and led to specific strategic decisions about the way the war would be fought. Any purely 'military' history of WW2 is a fiction.

Well, that depends on how narrowly or broadly one defines "World War II." For military historians, it is a series of battles, starting with an invasion and ending with an invasion. Obviously, the military aspect is just that — an aspect.

I really don't have a problem with the military historians doing their thing with the war as a set of military campaigns as long as there are other, linked, correct histories of other aspects of the conflict, including (but not limited to) Nazi ideology and the fascist genocide.

RfB

[Ming]

The obvious flaw in the current article to Ming's eye is the failure to address German war aims coherently, especially as an expression of Nazi ideology: once they get around to Barbarossa, there is mention of lebensraum, but that needs to be addressed in the lead, or at least in the opening sections. And the whole thing lacks much organization beyond the strictly chronological, and that only in terms of battles. That is perhaps the other reason why there's a lot wanting it terms of context. When you read articles on the individual commanders you can see that all the wholesale slaughter of the populace in eastern Europe was part of the program and not just something that happened as an afterthought after the army had passed further east; the main article almost gets there, but not quite.

The other big hole is hidden in the sentence that states that the USA produced 2/3s of allied material. There's a whole school out there that essentially ignores the details of the war in favor of concentrating on the demographics and economics. Ming thinks that's oversold: there are at least two key points (the Japanese failures in Hawaii, and the failure of the Germans to take out British radar during the battle of Britain) where individual command decisions and pure luck were pivotal for the course of the war. But in the end the engagement of the US and its material supply could be said to be what prevailed.

[Kumioko]

The World War II topic is a good example of why Wikipedia isn't trustworthy and is inadequate for many subjects. It's relatively good at holding simple things, but with this kind of topic where the pool of information is massive and the sources contradict each other, Wikipedia will never be able to adequately explain it without the article itself exceeding critical mass. Volumes of books have been written on every conceivable aspect of the war, far to much to cram into a couple thousand characters on a website.

[Auggie]

Google shows the existence of an Encyclopedia of World War II edited by Spencer Tucker, with others by Alan Axelrod and John Keegan, a Complete Encyclopedia of World War II, a Historical Encyclopedia of World War II, an Oxford Companion to World War II, all rather quickly. I think it should be possible for someone to consult them and the others that no doubt exist, look at the reviews for comparatice purposes, and be able to come up with some sort of less than official essay or guideline which might be able to provide a broad view of relative importance of Nazi atrocities and weirdness dor wikipedia articles in general and maybe a few indicators as to what circumstances might prompt maybe a separate pargraph or section on unpopular or negative aspects of the regime.

haha whoever the sucker is who does all this scut work will quickly find out that their opinion is still not welcome. A dozen guys with unlimited time on their hands will nitpick and argue the issue to death.

The obvious flaw in the current article to Ming's eye is the failure to address German war aims coherently, especially as an expression of Nazi ideology: once they get around to Barbarossa, there is mention of lebensraum, but that needs to be addressed in the lead, or at least in the opening sections. And the whole thing lacks much organization beyond the strictly chronological, and that only in terms of battles. That is perhaps the other reason why there's a lot wanting it terms of context. When you read articles on the individual commanders you can see that all the wholesale slaughter of the populace in eastern Europe was part of the program and not just something that happened as an afterthought after the army had passed further east; the main article almost gets there, but not quite.The other big hole is hidden in the sentence that states that the USA produced 2/3s of allied material. There's a whole school out there that essentially ignores the details of the war in favor of concentrating on the demographics and economics. Ming thinks that's oversold: there are at least two key points (the Japanese failures in Hawaii, and the failure of the Germans to take out British radar during the battle of Britain) where individual command decisions and pure luck were pivotal for the course of the war. But in the end the engagement of the US and its material supply could be said to be what prevailed.

Bingo re: German war aims. How did Hitler take over one of the most advanced democracies in the world and convince all its people to start another world war twenty years after the last one, when they all should have known better? This is more interesting and relevant material than battle trivia.

Regarding material, there are a bunch of little turning points but Churchill himself said that when the US entered the war he knew the Allies would win. Yes the Allies got breaks, but then again the Germans should not have been able to overrun France in six weeks.

[Cla68]

So, if I understand correctly, this guy Coffman wants to reduce the amount of operational/military minutiae in articles about WWII Germany and replace it with more detail on how it all relates to war crimes, the Holocaust, and other barbarity? Why not have both? Leave all the military minutiae and add in paragraph after paragraph about how so-and-so Wermacht general helped further the progress of the Final Solution. Then, everybody's happy, although every article will be 20 pages long.

By the way, on a couple of occasions I asked professional military historians look over articles I had written. They gave me some compliments and went on their way. Thinking back on it now, if I were them Wikipedia would make me nervous, because how is a book writer going to sell any books if people can read about it on Wikipedia?

[Kumioko]

So, if I understand correctly, this guy Coffman wants to reduce the amount of operational/military minutiae in articles about WWII Germany and replace it with more detail on how it all relates to war crimes, the Holocaust, and other barbarity? Why not have both? Leave all the military minutiae and add in paragraph after paragraph about how so-and-so Wermacht general helped further the progress of the Final Solution. Then, everybody's happy, although every article will be 20 pages long.

By the way, on a couple of occasions I had professional military historians look over articles I had written. They gave me some compliments and went on their way. Thinking back on it now, if I were them Wikipedia would make me nervous, because how is a book writer going to sell any books if people can read about it on Wikipedia?

No actually, he wants to erase the presence of German Nazi related articles completely and tilt everything in the direction of the victors of the conflict writing the history against their enemy.

As I have stated before, I favor the US side obviously and have no desire to see naziism promoted or elevated on Wikipedia. But erasing history, as we see in the United States with Civil War statues and memorials does not allow us to learn from the past. It erases it so that future generations are unable to learn from those mistakes. It's also worth mentioning, again, that coffmen hasn't even proven he was actually in correspondence with the historians, he just says he is and as far as I can tell no one has bothered to verify any of the information. It could all just be another in a long string of crafted hoaxes by an editor with a POV.

[Cla68]

So, if I understand correctly, this guy Coffman wants to reduce the amount of operational/military minutiae in articles about WWII Germany and replace it with more detail on how it all relates to war crimes, the Holocaust, and other barbarity? Why not have both? Leave all the military minutiae and add in paragraph after paragraph about how so-and-so Wermacht general helped further the progress of the Final Solution. Then, everybody's happy, although every article will be 20 pages long.

By the way, on a couple of occasions I had professional military historians look over articles I had written. They gave me some compliments and went on their way. Thinking back on it now, if I were them Wikipedia would make me nervous, because how is a book writer going to sell any books if people can read about it on Wikipedia?

No actually, he wants to erase the presence of German Nazi related articles completely and tilt everything in the direction of the victors of the conflict writing the history against their enemy.

As I have stated before, I favor the US side obviously and have no desire to see naziism promoted or elevated on Wikipedia. But erasing history, as we see in the United States with Civil War statues and memorials does not allow us to learn from the past. It erases it so that future generations are unable to learn from those mistakes. It's also worth mentioning, again, that coffmen hasn't even proven he was actually in correspondence with the historians, he just says he is and as far as I can tell no one has bothered to verify any of the information. It could all just be another in a long string of crafted hoaxes by an editor with a POV.

Well then, I'd say let him have at it. Let him erase all the articles on German Luftwaffe aces. People trying to read about the war will be wondering, "Were there any German fighter pilot aces? Wikipedia doesn't say. I wonder why? I guess I need to go to the library."

[Kumioko]

Well as a hasten the dayer I fully support anyone deleting large groups of content from Wikipedia. Guys like Ke Coffman and Fram are doing more on a daily basis to HTD to the end of Wikipedia than we critics. The best players on our team.

We need to create a new award. Hasten the Day hero of the day!

[Midsize Jake]

Why not have both? Leave all the military minutiae and add in paragraph after paragraph about how so-and-so Wermacht general helped further the progress of the Final Solution. Then, everybody's happy, although every article will be 20 pages long.

No actually, he wants to erase the presence of German Nazi related articles completely and tilt everything in the direction of the victors of the conflict writing the history against their enemy.

Both of you are exaggerating. It's clear that Mr. Coffman wants to substantially raise the notability threshold for Nazi biographies, and he also wants to add verbiage to the existing articles relating to whatever role each subject had in advancing the overall Nazi agenda, even if it amounts to mere failure to object. But just as clearly, he doesn't want to delete all that many articles, and in the vast majority of cases (i.e., the failed-to-object-but-otherwise-didn't-participate guys) it looks like he'd be happy with a sentence or two. Though, admittedly, he wants those sentences in the lead section of each article.

Over time, people like this will always become at least superficially obnoxious - when you know you're right about something and nobody is listening, it just gets really exasperating. It's one of the reasons Wikipedians don't like Wikipediocracy or various sites related to it - over time, exasperation leads to what the WP folks call "tendentious behavior."

I'd still be interested in a realistic estimate of the number of actual articles that would be deleted if Coffman had his druthers - I might look into it more closely next week (I'm a little busy with real life at the moment). These articles are definitely not categorized in such a way as to make it easy to get an overall count, and I suspect there's a reason for that which has a lot to do with defending them against people like Mr. Coffman, if not Coffman specifically. But my (preliminary) guess is that the number of Nazi military-personnel biographies is well into the thousands, and the number that would be deleted is in the 500-700 range, so that a "realistic" goal would be about half that number.

[Kumioko]

Well so far there are something around 2000 that have been redirected to the various Iron Cross lists, for example:
*https://dispenser.info.tm/~dispenser/cg ... 2%80%93Hm)
*https://dispenser.info.tm/~dispenser/cg ... 80%93Schr)

He also tried to get a lot deleted, but the results were to keep some of them fro various reasons.

[Auggie]

Why not have both? Leave all the military minutiae and add in paragraph after paragraph about how so-and-so Wermacht general helped further the progress of the Final Solution. Then, everybody's happy, although every article will be 20 pages long.

No actually, he wants to erase the presence of German Nazi related articles completely and tilt everything in the direction of the victors of the conflict writing the history against their enemy.

Both of you are exaggerating. It's clear that Mr. Coffman wants to substantially raise the notability threshold for Nazi biographies, and he also wants to add verbiage to the existing articles relating to whatever role each subject had in advancing the overall Nazi agenda, even if it amounts to mere failure to object. But just as clearly, he doesn't want to delete all that many articles, and in the vast majority of cases (i.e., the failed-to-object-but-otherwise-didn't-participate guys) it looks like he'd be happy with a sentence or two. Though, admittedly, he wants those sentences in the lead section of each article.

Over time, people like this will always become at least superficially obnoxious - when you know you're right about something and nobody is listening, it just gets really exasperating. It's one of the reasons Wikipedians don't like Wikipediocracy or various sites related to it - over time, exasperation leads to what the WP folks call "tendentious behavior."

I'd still be interested in a realistic estimate of the number of actual articles that would be deleted if Coffman had his druthers - I might look into it more closely next week (I'm a little busy with real life at the moment). These articles are definitely not categorized in such a way as to make it easy to get an overall count, and I suspect there's a reason for that which has a lot to do with defending them against people like Mr. Coffman, if not Coffman specifically. But my (preliminary) guess is that the number of Nazi military-personnel biographies is well into the thousands, and the number that would be deleted is in the 500-700 range, so that a "realistic" goal would be about half that number.

Wikipedia's order of biographical importance
1) Sports
2) Entertainment
3) Military (add extra points if participated in genocidal war machine)
4) Businesspeople/doctors/inventors/all the rest

[Textnyymi]

Wikipedia's order of biographical importance
1) Sports
2) Entertainment
3) Military (add extra points if participated in genocidal war machine)
4) Businesspeople/doctors/inventors/all the rest

But what do average people care about, while doing stuff on the Internet?

What do they think of the concept of biographical importance?

[Cla68]

Well so far there are something around 2000 that have been redirected to the various Iron Cross lists, for example:
*https://dispenser.info.tm/~dispenser/cg ... 2%80%93Hm)
*https://dispenser.info.tm/~dispenser/cg ... 80%93Schr)

He also tried to get a lot deleted, but the results were to keep some of them fro various reasons.

Do the articles he tries to get deleted happen to be the ones in which the historical record on them, perhaps because their ranks or roles were too low, doesn't say what their stance on the Holocaust or military aggression was? If so, then he's definitely pushing a POV narrative, in that the only articles on Nazi German people or entities that he thinks should be allowed or ones in which he can add text that shows that they contributed to atrocities, whether by commission or omission, i.e., if there is no source which upon which aspersions can be added showing that the carnage was at least partially their fault, then away with it.

I can understand that POV if you're trying to emphasize that Nazi Germany and everything it did was "evil." However, the problem with it is that you will have some junior German military or civilian people who have a credible claim of not being involved in atrocities or genocide. And, that doesn't mean that they're not notable enough for a WP article, at least according to WP's standards.

That's a slippery slope, because Nazi Germany is not the only tribe that has ever waged a war of aggression or an ideological campaign against perceived enemies in history. Especially when it comes to an ideology of placing "group identity" as paramount above the individual, Nazi Germany isn't the only entity to do that, as it also includes Mao, Lenin/Stalin, Pol Pot, and the post-Modernists/cultural Marxists of the current times.

[Midsize Jake]

...Especially when it comes to an ideology of placing "group identity" as paramount above the individual, Nazi Germany isn't the only entity to do that, as it also includes Mao, Lenin/Stalin, Pol Pot, and the post-Modernists/cultural Marxists of the current times.

No, it doesn't include "post-Modernists/cultural Marxists of the current times," who mostly exist only in your head anyway. You do that again and I'll just edit it out - this site is not going to be a lie factory.

[Poetlister]

In the case of Pol Pot, it is only a handful of very senior people who could be regarded as notable. It is likely that they were all in close sympathy with him. That is not the case with the Nazis or Stalin.

[Auggie]

haha Somey mad. Since when is taking cheap shots at leftists against the rules?

That's a slippery slope, because Nazi Germany is not the only tribe that has ever waged a war of aggression or an ideological campaign against perceived enemies in history. Especially when it comes to an ideology of placing "group identity" as paramount above the individual, Nazi Germany isn't the only entity to do that, as it also includes Mao, Lenin/Stalin, Pol Pot, and the post-Modernists/cultural Marxists of the current times.

Quit distracting. It is flat wrong that the WWII articles are as shitty as they are. The Nazis on Wikipedia have a bunch of crap arguments about why this can't be fixed. "You're going to make the articles run too long, you'll unfairly single out Germans, war articles should be only about battles, it's too judgemental, it's repetitive, blah blah blah." All of these arguments are patent nonsense. If you're not a Nazi yourself, you need to wake up and stop enabling them.

[Bezdomni]

I've just stumbled across a category (French Jews, with nearly 1000 members), just as new privacy laws go into effect.

The French nationality law itself, strongly secular, forbids any statistics or lists based on ethnic or religious membership.

source

There are less than 100 people tagged as French Muslims. Many of these people are alive and quite possibly did not consent any more than those included in the previously mentioned listing from the Wikidex. As far as I've seen, there are no people categorized as French Arabs or as French Palestinians, nothing related to the French Maghreb. There is, on the other hand, a category of "French Arabists" with over 40 members.

Even Dreyfus -- for whom there's a link to the culture juive et judaïsme portal -- is not categorized into some adhoc list of Jewish people on fr.wp ...


Why, exactly, is en.wp so very strange?

ps: the quote above is supported by a reference to an old decision of the Conseil Constitutional which is 1) a primary source and 2) incomprehensible to anyone who doesn't read French. Much more relevant is the CNIL: https://www.cnil.fr/fr/les-sanctions-penales

Le fait, hors les cas prévus par la loi, de mettre ou de conserver en mémoire informatisée, sans le consentement exprès de l’intéressé, des données à caractère personnel qui, directement ou indirectement, font apparaître les origines raciales ou ethniques, les opinions politiques, philosophiques ou religieuses, ou les appartenances syndicales des personnes, ou qui sont relatives à la santé ou à l’orientation ou à l'identité sexuelle de celles-ci, est puni de cinq ans d’emprisonnement et de 300 000 € d’amende.

Est puni des mêmes peines le fait, hors les cas prévus par la loi, de mettre ou de conserver en mémoire informatisée des données à caractère personnel concernant des infractions, des condamnations ou des mesures de sûreté.