Political vandalism

[Poetlister]

Progressive commentator Kyle Kulinski claimed Wednesday that his Wikipedia account was deleted due to the actions of “neoliberal trolls.” “Neoliberal trolls successfully got my Wikipedia page deleted,” he tweeted. “That’s both hilarious and sad. If you’re not part of the club they do everything they can to erase you, quite literally.” According to Kulinski, the entry is now “protected,” meaning another page covering his life can only be created it if it’s approved by the website’s administrators.

www.inquisitr.com

This followed the fourth AfD.

Never mind, Kyle. Your'e still on rationalwiki

[Midsize Jake]

Never mind, Kyle. Your'e still on rationalwiki

To be fair, the AfD effort was spearheaded by User:Snooganssnoogans (T-C-L), and if there's anybody on Wikipedia for whom the term "neoliberal troll" is accurate, it's User:Snooganssnoogans.

That's not to say that every American left-wing guy with a Youtube channel should have a BLP about them, in fact nobody should, but it's impossible to believe that this deletion effort (four tries before they got it!) wasn't politically motivated.

[Poetlister]

To be fair, the AfD effort was spearheaded by User:Snooganssnoogans (T-C-L), and if there's anybody on Wikipedia for whom the term "neoliberal troll" is accurate, it's User:Snooganssnoogans.

That's not to say that every American left-wing guy with a Youtube channel should have a BLP about them, in fact nobody should, but it's impossible to believe that this deletion effort (four tries before they got it!) wasn't politically motivated.

The first three AfDs were inconclusive. If any had been a clear keep, it would have been wrong to continue (though of course such a procedure is scarcely unknown). I doubt that the chap is notable, so there has been politics on both sides, but that's scarcely unknown either.

[Poetlister]

Jyotiraditya Scindia leaving the Congress has left a bad taste in the Grand Old Party’s mouth. Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehot even took to Twitter to say that he had betrayed the trust of the people and the ideology of the party. “Such people prove that they can’t thrive without power. The sooner they leave, the better.”

However, following his resignation, Scindia's Wikipedia Page was distorted with vandals calling him a 'professional traitor'. An earlier version of the article even suggested that he was a 'professional comedian'.

freepressjournal.in

[AndyTheGrump]

Jyotiraditya Scindia (T-H-L)

The vandalism has gone, but the article is clearly in need of a competent copyeditor. Got to like this though:

Citing disgruntlement with the top leadership of Congress, he quit the party on 10 March 2020 to join BJP on following day.

Is 'disgruntlement' in common usage in Indian English? I hope so. I should probably try to use the word myself. It will surely come in useful.

[Poetlister]

It's a perfectly good word, given in both of the dictionaries I have to hand. But are you ever gruntled?

[Zoloft]

It's a perfectly good word, given in both of the dictionaries I have to hand. But are you ever gruntled?

Some of the people here are full gruntal.

[lonza leggiera]

It's a perfectly good word, given in both of the dictionaries I have to hand. But are you ever gruntled?

That, I can't say for sure. I have, however, certainly been gruntled. Indeed, it gives me no small gruntlement to observe that "gruntled" is listed in the Oxford Dictionary of English.

[AndyTheGrump]

It's a perfectly good word, given in both of the dictionaries I have to hand. But are you ever gruntled?

That, I can't say for sure. I have, however, certainly been gruntled. Indeed, it gives me no small gruntlement to observe that "gruntled" is listed in the Oxford Dictionary of English.

'Gruntled' is an interesting word, in that it originally meant the opposite of what it now does. 'Dis-' is prefix with a rare meaning as an intensifier, rather than a negation.
link

[Poetlister]

Yes, the obsolete verb "gruntle" meant to utter little grunts, hence it came to mean expressing annoyance via grunts.

[Poetlister]

People who were apparently frustrated with the Quezon City government's supposed tepid response to the coronavirus outbreak defaced the Wikipedia page of Mayor Joy Belmonte on Friday, March 20. For about two hours on Friday afternoon, a number of anonymous edits were made to Belmonte's Wikipedia page, mostly to insult her for being "incompetent" and to add misogynistic remarks.

rappler.com

[Poetlister]

Wikipedia doesn’t know how many kids he has. When you Google “How many children does Boris Johnson have?” the answer says “5 or 6.” That result sources from Wikipedia, of course. But when you go to his actual Wikipedia page, it says “6 or 7.” For a world leader as prominent and influential as Boris Johnson to befuddle both Google AND Wikipedia regarding his offspring is quite a feat.

brobible.com

Of course, the Google infobox hadn't updated. It now lists four: "Children: Theodore Apollo Johnson, Lara Lettice Johnson, Cassia Peaches Johnson, Milo Arthur Johnson". (How can anyone name a child "Cassia Peaches"?)

[Poetlister]

In yet another incident of anti-Hindu vandalism on Wikipedia, today the Wikipedia page of RSS was edited to brand it as a terrorist organisation

Opindia.com

How appalling to attack the Royal Statistical Society in this way!

[Poetlister]

There was a goof-up in the Wikipedia profile of West Bengal BJP State President and MP Dilip Ghosh. On Thursday, Wikipedia mistakenly identified Dilip Ghosh as the Chief Minister of West Bengal. Since this news came out, it became viral in social media.

When Zee Media contacted the Midnapore MP and Bengal State President Dilip Ghosh regarding the incident, he said that someone might have mischievously edited the Wikipedia page. "I don't know who wrote it and why. Our team has informed Google and Wikipedia may time, but they didn’t change it," Dilip Ghosh

dnaindia.com

[Midsize Jake]

How appalling to attack the Royal Statistical Society in this way!

They'd be doing a lot better if they had meant to attack the Royal Statistical Society — this is actually some of the sloppiest right-wing Wikipedia journalism I've seen in a while, and that's saying a lot.

They literally got the most basic fact of the entire piece wrong:

The words “Hindu Nationalist organisation” was replaced with “Hindu terrorist organisation” to brand the cultural organisation by a Wikipedia editor with the user name Ahmedfalah7711 (T-C-L).

In fact, the word "terrorist" was inserted by a completely different user, User:Schiindler (T-C-L), in this diff. This was after Mr. Schiindler tried "militant" (in the previous edit) and didn't think it was inflammatory enough. That was immediately reverted by User:KAP03 (T-C-L), but Mr. KAP03 wasn't quick enough to revert a second time when Mr. Schiindler did it again. So, Mr. Ahmedfalah7711, who was only trying to point out that the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh party hadn't been banned under British rule (only under the post-independence Indian government), is now being blamed by these idiots because the version left by his first edit still contained the word "terrorist."

The fact is, the RSS was actually a pro-British organization that opposed Indian self-rule because presumably, three guesses, they were worried that Muslims would end up having the same rights as Hindus in a post-British Indian society. Maybe Ahmedfalah7711 just needed a better source for his assertion, but at least Britannica gets it right by not making the counter-assertion at all:

On several occasions it has been banned by the Indian government, led by the Congress Party, for its alleged role in communal violence.

The OpIndia piece is correct about Ahmedfalah7711 being prone to edit-warring, but assuming this confusion over the diffs isn't just a stupid mistake on their part, I'd say the chances that they're trying to pin this on him because he has a Muslim-sounding user name, and "Schiindler" does not, is probably about 100 percent.

I like the fact that OpIndia.com is anti-Wikipedia and all that, but they've got to do a better job than this.

[Instant Noodle]

Didn't an RSS activist assasinate Gandhi?

[Poetlister]

How appalling to attack the Royal Statistical Society in this way!

They'd be doing a lot better if they had meant to attack the Royal Statistical Society — this is actually some of the sloppiest right-wing Wikipedia journalism I've seen in a while, and that's saying a lot.

Sloppy journalism, yes. But is it right-wing in the European sense? There is a tendency to brand things indiscriminately as right-wing when it has nothing to do with the term as used in European politics. Notoriously, Menachem Begin, a firm believer in state-owned companies and other left-wing views, was repeatedly called right-wing until he signed a peace treaty with Egypt, when amazingly he was suddenly popular with the left.

[Lankai]

So, Mr. Ahmedfalah7711, who was only trying to point out that the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh party hadn't been banned under British rule (only under the post-independence Indian government), is now being blamed by these idiots because the version left by his first edit still contained the word "terrorist."

The fact is, the RSS was actually a pro-British organization that opposed Indian self-rule because presumably, three guesses, they were worried that Muslims would end up having the same rights as Hindus in a post-British Indian society. Maybe Ahmedfalah7711 just needed a better source for his assertion, but at least Britannica gets it right by not making the counter-assertion at all:

On several occasions it has been banned by the Indian government, led by the Congress Party, for its alleged role in communal violence.

But why would British ban someone who supports them? According to the Wikipedia article, RSS was known for organizing secret revolutions and secret societies and uniting people against the British rule. This is why I don't see if Ahmedfalah7711 had any way to get his point other than to recklessly censor that part of the article.

Sloppy journalism, yes. But is it right-wing in the European sense? There is a tendency to brand things indiscriminately as right-wing when it has nothing to do with the term as used in European politics. Notoriously, Menachem Begin, a firm believer in state-owned companies and other left-wing views, was repeatedly called right-wing until he signed a peace treaty with Egypt, when amazingly he was suddenly popular with the left.

True. Things like these create more misunderstanding.

[Poetlister]

Attempts to make alterations to the Wikipedia page of Solicitor General Jose Calida (T-H-L) appeared to fail this week, following his successful push to have the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) order media giant ABS-CBN to cease operations. Lawmakers, media, and ordinary citizens alike have called the network's closure unconstitutional and an attack on press freedom.

The Wikipedia edit history for Jose Calida's page points to attempts to add a nickname to his profile there. At least 3 different IP addresses were used to try to make anonymous mobile edits pertaining to Calida's nickname. On May 5, attempts were made to add "Joe" to his name, but these were reverted, also by what appears to be a separate anonymous mobile edit. On May 6 and 7, attempts were then made to call him Jose "Demonyo" (Demon) Calida instead.

rappler.com

[Poetlister]

BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg has been listed as "Chief Press Officer of Her Majesty’s Government" on Wikipedia after appearing to quickly jump to the defence of Dominic Cummings for breaking lockdown rules.

thenational.scot

That was absurd. Can anyone imagine Laura Kuenssberg splitting an infinitive like that?

[Poetlister]

Boris Johnson's most senior aide has been marred in controversy this weekend after the Mirror and Guardian revealed he had driven more than 250 miles up north to visit his parents while infected with Covid-19.

Dominic Cummings has been edited into a list of famous 'visitors' of Barnard Castle (T-H-L) on the town's Wikipedia page. Boris Johnson's top aide is now listed among a painter, poet, author and spy as the Co Durham town's most famous visitors.

Daily Mirror

Quite apart from this edit, having a list of famous visitors to a town is a classic piece of Wikipedia triviality.

[arthur]

Infamous, surely.

[Eric Corbett]

Boris Johnson's most senior aide has been marred in controversy this weekend after the Mirror and Guardian revealed he had driven more than 250 miles up north to visit his parents while infected with Covid-19.

Dominic Cummings has been edited into a list of famous 'visitors' of Barnard Castle (T-H-L) on the town's Wikipedia page. Boris Johnson's top aide is now listed among a painter, poet, author and spy as the Co Durham town's most famous visitors.

Daily Mirror

Quite apart from this edit, having a list of famous visitors to a town is a classic piece of Wikipedia triviality.

The lists of trivia that mar so many otherwise fairly decent Wikipedia articles, usually just a series of uncited one-sentence paragraphs, has been a problem for ever, and it won't be solved until there's some kind of editorial board, as has been mentioned in another thread.

There's a similar problem with the Notable people/residents section in so many settlement articles. Is it notable that the awesomely depressing Morrisey was born in a maternity hospital in Stretford? Isn't that information for his own article, not the one on Stretford?

[Poetlister]

There's a similar problem with the Notable people/residents section in so many settlement articles. Is it notable that the awesomely depressing Morrisey was born in a maternity hospital in Stretford? Isn't that information for his own article, not the one on Stretford?

I suppose that if you were a resident of Stretford and proud of living there (if there are any such people), you'd grasp at any straws you could to make the place seem interesting.

[Eric Corbett]

There's a similar problem with the Notable people/residents section in so many settlement articles. Is it notable that the awesomely depressing Morrisey was born in a maternity hospital in Stretford? Isn't that information for his own article, not the one on Stretford?

I suppose that if you were a resident of Stretford and proud of living there (if there are any such people), you'd grasp at any straws you could to make the place seem interesting.

I am a resident of Stretford, and I still don't see the value of this kind of useless trivia.

[Midsize Jake]

I am a resident of Stretford, and I still don't see the value of this kind of useless trivia.

This is always a tricky issue, though. In this case, the article on Morrissey (T-H-L) says he moved to Stretford in 1970, when he would have been 11 years old, so he wasn't born there, and the Stretford (T-H-L) article just calls him a "notable resident" with no source cited. There's no "Morrissey Museum" or other type of public monument in Stretford, and the house he lived in doesn't have a big sign out in front saying "Morrissey lived here once," so... long story short, I actually agree with you — this bit of information is essentially useless in the Stretford article, though it may be of some value in the Morrissey one.

Now, if people in Stretford were, for some reason, to build some sort of Morrissey museum or monument, maybe even just a statue in a park or something, then I could see it. I don't think they're likely to, though.

Another weird thing about the Stretford article is the last paragraph under the heading "Industrialisation":

Between 1972 and 1975, what is now a closed B&Q store in Great Stone Road was the 3,000-capacity Hardrock Theatre and Village Discothèque, hosting some of that period's major artists in their prime. Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, Bob Marley, Elton John, Hawkwind, Yes, Chaka Khan, Curved Air and Lou Reed were amongst those who appeared. Tangerine Dream was the last band to perform at the Hardrock, on 19 October 1975. In more recent years, Lancashire Cricket Club's Old Trafford ground, next door, has provided a concert venue for bands such as Oasis, Foo Fighters, The Cure, Radiohead, Coldplay, Arctic Monkeys and Pixies.

I mean, what the heck does that have to do with industrialization? Obviously nothing, so why is it there instead of under "Culture and cultural references"? And while I personally would have no objection to this being in the article, do articles about other English towns routinely mention now-closed rock and pop music venues? I'd be a little surprised if that were the case.

[Poetlister]

In this case, the article on Morrissey (T-H-L) says he moved to Stretford in 1970, when he would have been 11 years old, so he wasn't born there

He came from Davyhulme (T-H-L), not a million miles from Stretford. It might be that Davyhulme had no maternity hospital, or there was some obstetric complication requiring specialist treatment, so the birth took place in Stretford. This obviously requires further research.

[Eric Corbett]

In this case, the article on Morrissey (T-H-L) says he moved to Stretford in 1970, when he would have been 11 years old, so he wasn't born there

He came from Davyhulme (T-H-L), not a million miles from Stretford. It might be that Davyhulme had no maternity hospital, or there was some obstetric complication requiring specialist treatment, so the birth took place in Stretford. This obviously requires further research.

Although I said Morrissey, I actually meant Ian Curtis of Joy Division, mea culpa.

[Eric Corbett]

I am a resident of Stretford, and I still don't see the value of this kind of useless trivia.

Another weird thing about the Stretford article is the last paragraph under the heading "Industrialisation":

Between 1972 and 1975, what is now a closed B&Q store in Great Stone Road was the 3,000-capacity Hardrock Theatre and Village Discothèque, hosting some of that period's major artists in their prime. Led Zeppelin, David Bowie, Bob Marley, Elton John, Hawkwind, Yes, Chaka Khan, Curved Air and Lou Reed were amongst those who appeared. Tangerine Dream was the last band to perform at the Hardrock, on 19 October 1975. In more recent years, Lancashire Cricket Club's Old Trafford ground, next door, has provided a concert venue for bands such as Oasis, Foo Fighters, The Cure, Radiohead, Coldplay, Arctic Monkeys and Pixies.

I mean, what the heck does that have to do with industrialization? Obviously nothing, so why is it there instead of under "Culture and cultural references"? And while I personally would have no objection to this being in the article, do articles about other English towns routinely mention now-closed rock and pop music venues? I'd be a little surprised if that were the case.

I agree with you. If you look at the FAC version there was no Industrialisation section.

[Poetlister]

In this case, the article on Morrissey (T-H-L) says he moved to Stretford in 1970, when he would have been 11 years old, so he wasn't born there

He came from Davyhulme (T-H-L), not a million miles from Stretford. It might be that Davyhulme had no maternity hospital, or there was some obstetric complication requiring specialist treatment, so the birth took place in Stretford. This obviously requires further research.

Although I said Morrissey, I actually meant Ian Curtis of Joy Division, mea culpa.

In that case, the article is definitely wrong. The reference it gives for his place of birth in fact says Ian Curtis was born in a hospital in Old Trafford, Manchester.

[Eric Corbett]

In this case, the article on Morrissey (T-H-L) says he moved to Stretford in 1970, when he would have been 11 years old, so he wasn't born there

He came from Davyhulme (T-H-L), not a million miles from Stretford. It might be that Davyhulme had no maternity hospital, or there was some obstetric complication requiring specialist treatment, so the birth took place in Stretford. This obviously requires further research.

Although I said Morrissey, I actually meant Ian Curtis of Joy Division, mea culpa.

In that case, the article is definitely wrong. The reference it gives for his place of birth in fact says Ian Curtis was born in a hospital in Old Trafford, Manchester.

Old Trafford is/was a part of Stretford.

[Poetlister]

Old Trafford is/was a part of Stretford.

My mistake. So the article is right after all.