Talk:Secular Islam Summit/Archive 1

Reply to comment by Adjwilley

Oh, I tried to integrate the criticism into the article. That was reverted too, because for Kwamikagami it's never been about avoiding a criticism ghetto, but rather about hiding criticism from the reader. I agree that more of the article could be about other than criticism of the summit, but that's an argument for adding material, not removing the best-sourced section in the article. Don't you agree? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 20:22, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps. There's also NPOV to think about though. Ideally you shouldn't have one user adding "negative" material, insisting that others should add "positive" material to balance it. In my opinion, negative material should always be given WP:DUE weight in comparison to the positive, and vice versa (with Due weight being defined by the sources).

As a side note, I read the "Criticism" section, and I'm having a hard time understanding precisely what the criticism is and who's doing it. Also, if the criticisms are no more than "mutual mudslinging," shouldn't they be classified as WP:FRINGE and given their due weight (i.e. the briefest mention possible)? ~Adjwilley (talk) 20:57, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't think "mudslinging" implies "fringe" that would require removal, since a. the U.S. News article indicates that some or all of CAIR's criticisms were on target (eg. the conference was organized by non-Muslims and did include people who were hostile to Islam) and b. according to that view, neutrality would also require us to remove content on the conference and its speakers, since the source also characterized it as "mudslinging," and that would be detrimental to the article as a whole. Re your comment about balance: in theory, of course, it's correct. But as I said, the criticism section is more than adequately sourced, and if Kwamikagami hadn't reverted my integration of the material into the article body then it would seem a lot less overwhelming. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:10, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Mudslinging implies non-NPOV which would require removal.

Your integration made it far more overwhelming, because it made the entire article a criticism piece. Entirely inappropriate for any article that is not specifically about criticism. — kwami (talk) 01:00, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

No, that isn't how NPOV works. NPOV is about how Wikipedia describes views, not about whether those views are themselves neutral. If we were only allowed to describe views that were neutral, it would be impossible to cover any election. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 01:12, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Would it be possible to condense the criticism into a simple sentence or two? For example,

"Members of the Islamist Council on American-Islamic Relations have criticized the summit for being organized by a non-religious organization and for including non-Muslims among its speakers, saying that some of the speakers were hostile to Islam."

or something along those lines... Something like that could be slipped into the article text without the specific "mudslinging" quotes from speakers or the "mudslinging" responses to the quotes. It would certainly make for a much cleaner read. Would something like that sentence be a reasonable compromise for both parties? ~Adjwilley (talk) 23:46, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, we obviously couldn't use a wording that described CAIR as Islamist. I think your removal of the Abdo op-ed in the WaPo is a good way to go if we're to cut anything. However, I think we should be able to give a little more detail on what it was about the speakers that wa sobjectionable - do you think that my paraphrase of the bit about Sultan, from the revision history, works? And what about the Haddad quote (or a paraphrase thereof)? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:52, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Oops, I have no idea who CAIR is, but was going off the statement, "which speakers had characterized as an Islamist organization". As for Sultan and Haddad, from my perspective, we should dumb it down as much as possible, avoiding the direct quotes. For someone (like me) who doesn't know a lot about the subject, it can be pretty dense. For instance, I don't understand what "right-wing" or "neocon" mean in the context of Islam, and even "moderate Islam" is a tad cloudy. Perhaps something like, "...saying that some of the speakers held extreme views and were hostile to Islam." Perhaps some of the detailed quotes could be left in the footnotes? ~Adjwilley (talk) 00:25, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Oops again. It looks like "right-wing" and "neocon" were being used in reference to the American media. ~Adjwilley (talk) 00:27, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I think your idea to generalize Sultan's hostile views in-text and to include the quote in a footnote is an excellent one. Haddad is unaffiliated with CAIR so if we're to include her (which I believe we should - she's an expert) we need to name her separately. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 00:45, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

My two problems were presenting mudslinging as fact, and, as you said, having a criticism section longer than the article. I think your quoted proposal is good, apart from the Islamist characterization, though I'd change "non-Muslim" to the more precise "ex-Muslim". But we should have *something* on what the summit was about and what it hoped to accomplish, or any criticism section would be undue weight. To develop the article enough to justify a criticism section, we need to develop the article. — kwami (talk) 00:58, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

"Ex-Muslim" and "non-Muslim" are both accurate descriptions of the speakers, but only one is accurate in its description of what CAIR objected to. We can't give the impression that self-styled reformers of Islam who were, say, Christians from an early age would have been perfectly acceptable. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 01:12, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

We can't repeat what CAIR objected to, because it's slanderous and we have BLP concerns. The way so much of this was worded, at first it sounded like Glenn Beck was putting it on. We need some precision here. — kwami (talk) 07:12, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Again, I am not responsible for your own personal interpretation of words that have actual meanings. "Non-Muslim" is what CAIR objected to. I'll play that card right back at you: it's a BLP concern to deliberately misrepresent Ahmed's opinion because you personally think it has connotations which are not present. This is not Kwamikagamipedia. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I've made an edit, adding the stuff we've talked about to a 3rd paragraph in the Lead. It seemed appropriate there, immediately after being described as "a landmark" but feel free to move it if you think there's a better place. I've dropped the "Islamist" but left "non-Muslim" (the preceding paragraph notes the "ex-believers"). Anyway, I think the paragraph can be moved and edited, but I think it should stay short, limited perhaps to two simple sentences with any extra detail going into the footnotes. It could probably be expanded later on as the article develops, but for now I share kwami's concern for NPOV. ~Adjwilley (talk) 01:59, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Removed a factual error: they didn't say that some of the speakers were hostile to Islam, they said that the summit drew neocon voices that were hostile to Islam.

Oh, and the quote in the footnote. It's probably not a good idea to put such things in a footnote if they're not appropriate for the article. (In this case I suspect you put it there because there was so little on the summit in that source that it was difficult to find?) I thought at first that it would be a good quote for the article if we ever expand it, but on second thought, I wonder about the characterization: it was a blanket statement, when it would appear some of the speakers were not out to damn Islam, but only radical Islam. — kwami (talk) 07:09, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

No, try reading the source again: "[the neocons] touted as role models of 'reform' those who are deep in their hostility to Islam." Don't whine about the footnote, please, it was Adjwilley's idea and I think it's an excellent compromise. Why do you have so much trouble accepting anyone's contributions other than your own? This is not how we work here. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

But that's not what you he said, is it? Why do you have such difficulty accepting your own sources? — kwami (talk) 01:16, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I wrote "speaker Wafa Sultan had denied that moderate Islam existed at all but was being held up as a voice for reform in Islam." What is it about this sentence that you believe inaccurately conveys the idea, from the source, of someone being held up as a role model for reform who was hostile to Islam (the para in the source includes the Sultan quote to substantiate CAIR's criticism). Please suggest an alternate paraphrase rather than blanking. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 02:42, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, 'he', not 'you'. I had removed a factual error from what Adjwilley had written. — kwami (talk) 04:22, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

What error do you believe you removed? I see only your removal of CAIR's criticism of the speakers' views on Islam, which (far from being factually inaccurate) is almost a direct quote from the source, and your change of "non-Muslims" to "ex-Muslims," which introduced a factual error into the text because that's not why Ahmed criticized the conference. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 18:56, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to tweak it a bit - let me know what you think. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 02:18, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Completely inappropriate. You're not listening. — kwami (talk) 07:09, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I still think the best solution is to keep CAIR's objections out (see above). If the consensus disagrees here on that point, we'd better include Susan Jacoby's response [which can be found here} to the reactions of CAIR on the summit. Otherwise, the article would suggest that CAIR's words are the leading mainstream opinion on the summit, which is not the case. Maybe we can include other opinions on the summit, but that's for later.Jeff5102 (talk) 07:59, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

What is the leading mainstream opinion on the summit, and where can that be found? That would be a very useful thing to have in the article. ~Adjwilley (talk) 14:01, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

Re fringe, Jeff, WP:FRINGE is about not giving undue weight to fringe views in articles on mainstream views. But the same article where you're getting your justification for excluding CAIR's comments also refers to the remarks of conference speakers like Wafa Sultan as "mudslinging," making them just as fringe as you're claiming CAIR is. That means that, according to WP:FRINGE, we need to provide the actual facts to contextualize the fringe views. Do you think the article would look better or worse if we spent some space explaining that the speakers' positions were rubbish and that there are many moderate and progressive Muslims? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

To summarize my point: I think we have two good options: A) we can include the relevant facts on the summit, without the "mudslinging" by CAIR and the "mudslinging" against CAIR. After all, the article is about a summit, and not about relations between CAIR on one side, and secular muslems and the Center for Inquiry o the other. B)We include all facts about the summit, CAIR's reaction on it, and the response on that. That would prevent WP:COAT. However, I prefer the first option. After all, this is an encyclopedia, not a collection of in-depth-background-stories.Jeff5102 (talk) 14:17, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

What was referred to as "mudslinging" was not the conference's comments on CAIR, but their comments on Islam. In my opinion, their views on Islam are a rather integral part of the article, despite the fact that they're obviously nonsense. I don't think the fact that either side's comments were called "mudslinging" prevents their being included in the article, particularly since, as I've said, the US News article largely substantiates CAIR's comments (not necessarily the neocons part, but certainly the being organized by atheists, the lack of interest in moderate Islam displayed by speakers, etc.) –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 18:56, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

If you're going to read between the lines, you could argue that CAIR's mudslinging was against reform, not the summit.

I agree with Jeff: The article should be about the summit, not relationships between the two groups. Unless criticism of the summit is somehow notable, it doesn't deserve more than a passing mention. Roscelese, you think I'm trying to censor the article. The solution is simple: produce RS's that demonstrate that the criticism is notable and relevant.

I tagged the section about CAIR criticising the summit for being organized by a non-rel org. I'm not finding that in the ref we give.

I find it a bit ironic that one of CAIR's own speakers was a non-Muslim. — kwami (talk) 23:27, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

We've been working with the notable and relevant RS from the very beginning. I'm sure you're very busy and you have a lot on your mind, but surely you remember that the US News article contains the criticism of the summit, demonstrating (according to Wikipedia policy, rather than imaginary policies in your mind) exactly the qualities you ask for, and that RSN moreover agreed that it was reliable. How would you like to rephrase CAIR's comment about the conference being made up of atheists, if not in the way already done? Enjoy your irony, but don't let it cloud even further your very low commitment to maintaining WP policy in this article. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:31, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

It is only a side-note, but the complete text of the Wall Street Journal-article can be found here. It tells us more about the viewpoints of the attendees, and the funding, altough I think the last issue was already settled.

And on the mudslinging-issue, the US News article says: Repeatedly, speakers in St. Petersburg denounced CAIR as typifying fellow-traveling Islamism. Absorbed with grievance-group politics and hypersensitive to any criticism of Muslims, it receives, various speakers noted, generous funding from Saudi Arabia and other Arab states. More disturbingly, as many in St. Petersburg pointed out, some CAIR officials have refused to denounce Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist organizations, while others have been too quick to declare who is, or who is not, a true Muslim. Unlike Roscelese says, the 'mudslinging'-comments were targeted on CAIR, not on Islam. Jeff5102 (talk) 15:16, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

LOL, the fact that they made comments about CAIR that could be described as mudslinging doesn't change the fact that they also made comments about Islam that the source described as mudslinging. From page 2: "the frequent intemperance of the secularists' remarks, including the claim by the Syrian-American psychiatrist Wafa Sultan that there is no difference between 'radical Islam and regular Islam,' played almost perfectly into the hands of CAIR. As its board chairman, Parvez Ahmed, noted, 'The [Secular Islam Summit] drew an amalgam of extreme right-wing and neocon voices who touted as role models of 'reform' those who are deep in their hostility to Islam.' Such mutual mudslinging..." –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:28, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I do not agree that the remarks about islam by secularists could be described as mudslinging by the source. My interpretation of the source is, that Wafa Sultan's remarks were just triggers for Parvez Ahmed's statements about 'extreme right-wing and neocon voices.' But that is just my way of reading it.Jeff5102 (talk) 12:09, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

The source uses the word "mudslinging" to describe the secularists' remarks. It's not a question of "interpretation." I even provided you with the quote. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 13:29, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I see. So the term "mutual mudslinging" is a description of remarks done by one party, according to you. Strange.Jeff5102 (talk) 21:07, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

No. As is inherent in the word "mutual," it is a description both of some of CAIR's comments and of the speakers' comments. This little side-conversation about whether the source really used the word "mudslinging" is bizarre to me, since we have access to the source and we can see that it did. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 16:28, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Roscelese, given that your understanding of "agreement" differs so radically from other people's, perhaps you should let one of the people who agrees with you post your version? — kwami (talk) 01:49, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

"My" version is the one Adjwilley suggested. I don't see a single user who has disagreed with it other than yourself. You need to learn when it's time to give up and recognize that the consensus is in disagreement with you; you do not own this article. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 02:12, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

As usual, what you claim other people have said turns out to be what you said. If Adjwilley thinks this is a good idea, have him post it. — kwami (talk) 02:20, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I know my ideas aren't always the best, but for an article of this size, I'd prefer to lump the quotes in the same footnotes with the citations. I know it's not the cleanest thing ever, but I've seen it work in articles far more controversial than this. I've made an edit that I think does that. (Sorry about the edit summary–I accidentally hit enter before I was done.) ~Adjwilley (talk) 04:01, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, I'll see what you make of it tomorrow. But I have a few concerns: (1) we have a paragraph criticizing the summit, but we have nothing about the content of the summit. How, in a balanced article, can you cover condemnation of a thing, without first saying what the thing is? All we have is a criticism piece, which is not normally considered appropriate for a WP article unless it is specifically a criticism article (which are discouraged). (2) The first quote is made to sound like it was made at the summit, but it wasn't. It was made by one of the speakers at another place some time after the summit. That's quite misleading. Since we never say what the summit was about, people would naturally assume this quote is representative of what it was about. We don't have criticism of anything that anyone actually said or did at the summit. (3) I have BLP concerns with "it's everyone known for damning Islam". That makes it sound like the speakers damn Islam. But among the speakers—and organizers—were devout Muslims. The summit brought together people with different views, many of whom disagreed, but we paint them with the same brush. It's rather like CAIR's "bunch of atheists" comment.

Anyway, for encyclopedic balance, I think the criticism needs to be proportional to the description of what is being criticized. — kwami (talk) 05:08, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

The article as currently written is good. If more reliably sourced information emerges, include it. Otherwise this is getting close to beating a dead horse. There has been a 3rd Opinion and a Request for Comment. Tempers have raised. Let's not raise them any further. There is disagreement about the content of this article. If someone can contribute reliably sourced, new information then it should be included. Otherwise, if disagreement continues some options are the Dispute Resolution Noticeboard and Wikiquette Assistance. I would recommend taking this to Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal at this stage. Factseducado (talk) 18:48, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The problem isn't that previous DR methods have led to continued stalemate - the problem is that one individual user, Kwamikagami, refuses to accept that consensus does not favor the removal of this information. This is not a problem that will be solved by more intensive DR methods. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:44, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Several editors have objected to your bias, Roscelese. Your opinion isn't consensus no matter how many times you say it is. — kwami (talk) 19:52, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

If that's what it takes to address the BLP concerns, imbalance, and false implications, so be it. — kwami (talk) 18:53, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't know that we are at the point of needing formal mediation just yet. I've seen much worse than this. I'm sure whatever problems there are can be resolved with a little good faith and some work. If the concern is BLP, that is easily remedied. If it is a balanced article, we can add a bit more to the goals section. If there are deeper concerns at the root of this, they should be brought out to the open.

On a completely different note, while I was reading some of the source articles, I had the thought that part of why the Summit is notable is because it was criticized. Lots of the news articles spend time documenting the criticism, so we should probably follow their lead there. That said, we should be careful not to give the criticism undue weight. I think with the current length of the article, we should keep the size of the criticism section limited to about where it is now. Does this make sense? ~Adjwilley (talk) 19:42, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Makes sense to me. I still have a problem with the CAIR quotes, though. Though we're quoting them, the way we present them is misleading. For example, when we say, CAIR criticized "the frequent intemperance of the secularists' remarks, I think most people would think that the speakers made intemperate remarks at the summit. However, that's not the case. (Or at least we have no source for it.) When we say, "The [Summit] drew an amalgam of extreme right-wing and neocon voices, one might reasonably assume that these right-wingers attended the summit. That's not the case either. When we say, The speakers are extreme in their views. Basically, it's everyone known for damning Islam, we imply that the speakers are extreme in their views and damn Islam. But that's not true. (It's true for some, but not for "the speakers".) This is troubling, and that's why I have BLP concerns with the article as currently written. Roscelese has argued that we shouldn't consider what the reader will understand by our words, as long as they're literally true, but of course that's how propaganda is written, not an encyclopedia.

With the goals section, at least it's now more balanced: the body is currently 72% criticism (146/204 words), down from 100%. I agree the criticism is newsworthy, but I think that's a bit of a WEIGHT problem. — kwami (talk) 20:19, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Adjwilley completely. Assuming good faith is a great way forward. Also, concerns about BLP are things the community knows how to address. I bet Adjwilley knows a lot and I am sure others would be happy to clarify the policy as it relates to the living people in this article and suggest any needed changes. I also agree with Adjwilley that the summit was received with controversy and that has been reported on by a few reliable sources. I think the current criticism content in the article is sufficient without going overboard. I'd like any other concerns to be addressed openly so everyone can communicate to resolve unhappiness. Adjwilley has good ideas here. Factseducado (talk) 19:51, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I wasn't objecting to Adjwilley. I've agreed with almost all of what everyone has said here, apart from the one editor who's causing all the fuss. The problem is claims like we need to say devout Muslims are a bunch of atheists because we have a reliable source that someone who didn't like them said that. (At least that one appears to have been dropped, though we've replaced it with devout Muslims damning Islam.) I'm not assuming bad faith, I'm sure she's sincere, but she's coming from a very biased POV, and seems to have no idea how to balance the POVs in an article. Everyone else has been fine; my only disagreements have been matters of degree, with things like weight, which Adj seems to agree with in principle. — kwami (talk) 20:01, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I appreciate the vote of confidence by Factseducado. Just a note about "biased" POV's... My opinion is that we all have one, whether we realize it or not, and the best thing we can do is try to accpept that, and then try to understand the opponent's POV and work toward a compromise that suits both parties. Let me see if I can't hammer out some of the concerns kwami raised above. ~Adjwilley (talk) 21:28, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

The BLP violations were still there today, so I deleted them. — kwami (talk) 04:31, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

I also removed the Haddad quote. I planned to just delete the parts she didn't actually say, but there was nothing left. — kwami (talk) 04:57, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

By which you mean you removed the quote on nonsense BLP grounds, and then you removed the paraphrase on BLP grounds because you were pretending it wasn't supported by anything in the source. Truly a stellar example of good editing there. Tell me, how would you like to paraphrase "Experts on Islam question the summit's nonpartisan status. 'Legitimate scholars are horrified by the lineup. The speakers are extreme in their views. Basically, it's everyone known for damning Islam.'"? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:11, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't see anything in WP:BLP that says "one user can unilaterally call BLP and revert against consensus." The material is excellently sourced and contextually appropriate. You need to gain consensus to remove this material - BLP will not protect you from sanction for edit-warring, especially when the call is such patent nonsense. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 04:43, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Try reading the lead: "Contentious material about living persons [which is] poorly sourced ... should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion". I did wait for discussion—may bad—but this went unanswered, so I followed BLP. — kwami (talk) 04:59, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Luckily, it's excellently sourced. Do we need to return to RSN so you can have it confirmed for you, again, that these sources are top-quality? It was rather embarrassing for you last time. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:11, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

It's not just the quality of the source, but the quality of use of the source. A RS saying someone said something is not the same as a RS for that thing, as has been pointed out to you by another editor. — kwami (talk) 05:22, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Luckily, no one is trying to use CAIR's comments in US News as a source for the claim that Wafa Sultan is an atheist. We have perfectly fine sources from Sultan which say that. Instead, we are trying to use them to support the claim that CAIR said these things. Next! –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:23, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Just a note: It seems like there's a pretty good tug-of-war going on here, and I'm trying hard to find a middle road. I think we need to move away from the the little personal jabs that keep cropping up in comments and edit summaries, take our focus off the editors themselves, and focus on the content and the sources. We should probably also get away from making wholesale reverts as well (not that this has happened recently, but when someone makes a string of edits like this that mixes controversial edits with non-controversial edits, it can be tempting to just revert them all). ~Adjwilley (talk) 19:45, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Could you explain why you again restored "ex-Muslims" and removed the comment about the organizers being non-Muslims? It's not important to me to single out the organizers specifically; I just want to make sure that we avoid implying that CAIR's problem was that the summit included apostates, which is certainly implied by the misleading and inaccurate use of "ex-Muslims," when its problem, as stated in the source, was that these people claiming to want to reform Islam were simply not Muslim. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:06, 18 May 2012 (UTC)

Non-Muslim implies outside the Muslim community, and these are people from within the Muslim community. In Yugoslavia, for example, there are Muslim atheists, and it would be problematic to call them "non-Muslims": they are part of the Muslim community even if they do not practice Islam. "Non-Muslim" is also extremely vague: most people are non-Muslims, so that doesn't do much to tell our readers who these people are. — kwami (talk) 04:26, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Then propose language that acknowledges the people involved who were never Muslim and the fact that CAIR objects to their not being Muslim rather than to any apostasy. I tried, and you repeatedly reverted to something inaccurate. Wikipedia is not an autocracy; you will not revert and revert and revert until you get a version that is exactly what you want. You need to learn to work with other users and to adhere to the sources. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 04:40, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Who are the people who were never Muslim? — kwami (talk) 05:00, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Center for Inquiry. You're not even trying, are you? Like I said: I would love it if you came up with language that reflected CAIR's actual criticism while also accommodating your concerns. But you keep reverting to an inaccurate version, which is why I am forced to restore the version supported by sources. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:07, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Who from the Center spoke at the summit? — kwami (talk) 05:16, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Where does the source say that the comment was in reference only to the speakers and not to the organizers? And again, how do you propose to avoid misrepresenting CAIR's concern as one of apostasy rather than outsiderhood? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:19, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

"criticized the summit for featuring ex-Muslims among its speakers". — kwami (talk) 05:25, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

Common ground

I've created a table below that contains several statements that I see as being important. Please indicate your agreement with the following statements by replacing the hyphen (-) with "Agree" or "Disagree". The purpose of this "vote" is to see if we can't find some common ground, and then to find and discuss the points on which you disagree.

It looks like we have a good deal of common ground here, with just a few points with disagreement. One point that I think most of us were previously unaware of is that there was at least one non-Muslim who spoke at the summit (although he did not sign the declaration).

Points upon which there is significant disagreement are:

• Putting sharper criticisms and longer quotes in footnotes, to solve the weight problem
• Substituting "ex-Muslims" or "former Muslims" or something like that, for "non-Muslims"

I think the idea in the first point was mine, and I still kind of like it; we should discuss solutions/alternatives below. For the second point, perhaps we could find a compromise where we use "non-Muslims" when reporting CAIR's criticism, but make it clear elsewhere in the article that the vast majority of the speakers were Muslims or former Muslims.

One point I was happy we all agreed on was that the criticism should not get undue weight. Since we're all on the same page there, all we have to do is decide what DUE weight is from the sources, and then agree on a rough guideline for the article. There was obviously more criticism than "praise" in the coverage of the summit, likely because "secular Muslims" represent only a tiny minority of Muslims. I think, therefore, that the "criticism" paragraph under the "Reception" heading should be significantly bigger than the other paragraph calling it a "landmark". (perhaps roughly a 4:1 ratio?) I also think that the "criticism" paragraph should be significantly smaller than the rest of the article (excluding the Lead, which is supposed to summarize the article), with perhaps a 1:3 or 1:4 ratio. Does something like this sound reasonable? ~Adjwilley (talk) 20:27, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Re phrasing, I tried to use the "ex-Muslims" phrasing in the part of the article that talked about speakers, but was reverted. Nonetheless, let's talk about it: do y'all think it would be a good idea to say that speakers were "mostly ex-Muslims and Muslims" (this seems safe, even accounting for Phares and for others I wasn't able to verify who may be Arab Christians) and that CAIR criticized the summit for featuring/being the product of/(we can talk about the verb some more) "non-Muslims"?

As for weight, it's difficult for me to think about it in terms of numbers as opposed to terms of actual content. I would find it easier if we broke down the criticism into points on which the summit was criticized (non-Muslims, right-wing agenda, non-inclusive of people of faith, anti-Muslim, unscholarly) then decided which ones should be included and how much detail to include (eg. quote or paraphrase in article body). –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:02, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

@Adjwilley, changing the previous 3:1 ration to 1:4 would work fine for me, at least in the abstract. But one of the problems we've been having is reporting criticism of things outside the summit as if it were criticism of the summit. I don't think I've seen any criticism of anything said or done at the summit itself, except ironically from one of the speakers, who wouldn't sign the declaration. The only external criticisms I've seen have been ad hominems.

@Roscelese, if it was me, I wasn't reverting you for saying "ex-Muslim", but for the stuff that went along with it. As for "mostly", I don't know. I don't think we have a source on what the ratios were. What we could do is say ABC are ex-Muslims, DE are devout, F is an Arab Christian, etc. — kwami (talk) 21:45, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

• I've implemented what seems to be the running consensus here. We still have a few points of contention: shall quotes be included in footnotes? What constitutes due weight? Given these considerations, I've omitted quotes from footnotes in the version I just made, but otherwise restored the criticism that was previously present. Editors arguing that the content is undue must present specific issues and explain why they should not be included so that we actually have something to discuss, rather than blanking the entirety of well-sourced content (eg. the views of a scholar of Christian and Muslim history, published in a reliable newspaper). –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 05:01, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Some of that was an improvement, but I reverted other parts. There is the WEIGHT issue (you once again have the majority of the article devoted to criticism), repetition (ex-Muslim = former believer), poor flow in the lead, and misquotation (Haddad did not say she shares CAIR's concerns, she did not say it was nonpartisan [not sure what that means it this case anyway], and did not criticize anything said or done at the summit: she merely objected to the lineup, so her interview presumably either took place before the summit, or she was unaware of what happened at the summit, or she had no (reported) objection to anything said or done at the summit).

All it says about Haddad is the following:

"Legitimate scholars are horrified by the lineup. The speakers are extreme in their views. Basically, it's everyone known for damning Islam," said Yvonne Hadad [sic], a Georgetown University professor who teaches "the history of Christians and Muslims."

What she's saying is that their views are extreme, and implies that other scholars see the lineup as unbalanced. She did not "agree that the speakers promoted unscholarly anti-Islam views" and she did not "question the summit's claim to nonpartisanship", though we might argue she implied those things. But we imply that she's criticizing the (speakers at the summit) [as in the things they said], when in fact she's criticizing the summit's choice of speakers. Also, although Manji did say that "one need not renounce Islam in order to be a secular Muslim", we need to be careful in how we use that, or we imply that the summit said so.

When we report CAIR's criticism, what do we make of the context in the article where that was reported, that they were "playing to type"? That is, "absorbed with grievance-group politics and hypersensitive to any criticism" and "too quick to declare who is, or who is not, a true Muslim".

What I find so odd about all of this is that, apart from Manji, there is no criticism of anything the summit actually did or said. We have a bunch of reaction in anticipation of the summit, but no reaction *to* the summit!

We barely note the opinions written after the fact: the WSJ (full text reposted here) and Washington Post, which were largely positive, but make an effort to extract as much criticism as possible from people without any direct knowledge of the summit. It sounds as though the only journalist among our sources who was actually there was the one who wrote the WSJ article.

— kwami (talk) 17:59, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

1. Oh, you're trying the "poor flow in the lead" argument now? Absolutely pathetic. The Center for Inquiry needs to go first because sources name it as the primary entity involved in the summit. You are welcome to edit the sentence in a way that makes it "flow" better without misrepresenting our sources to pretend this was primarily some grassroots or Muslim-organized thing. ("Ex-Muslims" was added because of your strenuous insistence on it, to the point of repeatedly misrepresenting the source, but if I've managed to provide a compromise in the other section such that you don't care anymore, that works for me.)

2. Should I just repeat my comment earlier? You cannot deal with the WEIGHT issue by blanking excellently sourced material in order to reach some arbitrary numerical standard. You must find specific material that is objectionable so that we can then discuss it, and/or find neutral material to add, because Wikipedia's purpose is not to serve as a puff piece and not to be the personal encyclopedia of one editor who likes to revert a lot without explaining why.

3. Are you suggesting (in your incorrect comment that the criticism was all pre-summit) that the speakers' lineup was an unimportant fact about the summit, and thus that comments about it are irrelevant? If the speakers were unimportant, can you please explain what you believe happened at this conference?

4. Try reading the source next time: "Experts on Islam question the summit's nonpartisan status." I have no problem removing the bit in the Haddad line about CAIR - it was meant as a transition to avoid sounding repetitive (eg. "CAIR said speakers were anti-Islam. Haddad also said speakers were anti-Islam") but we can definitely remove it. If you believe that Haddad was inaccurately paraphrased, please suggest what you believe would be a better paraphrase or provide her quote instead. You've opposed both, which is not making your claim that this is about due weight and accuracy, rather than removing criticism from scholars, very convincing.

5. Manji did indeed say that one need not renounce Islam in order to be secular (and that the summit alienated Muslims), and we attribute the saying of it to her. That's what we do. The fact that, in your mind, it still implies that the summit said one must renounce, etc., is unfortunate, but again, Wikipedia belongs to everyone, not you, and we are not bound to remove the substance of her comment because of personal associations that it has for you. I'm going out on a limb here, but you could possibly also stand to learn the difference between "subjective" and "false."

6. Just as I said earlier, speakers' comments on CAIR are relevant to the article insofar as they describe what happened at the conference. They are not necessary context for CAIR's comments. The conference was presumably more than a back-and-forth with CAIR.

7. Please suggest material that you would like to add from the WSJ and WaPo. Again, the way to deal with the WEIGHT issue is not to mass-revert anything vaguely critical; it's to find specific negative material that you believe is overweighted, and to find well-sourced neutral material that you feel can be added. No one can read your mind, and reverting any edit that diverges from your Platonic ideal without providing any explanation of what you feel could be better verges on disruptive.

–Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 18:53, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Lovely: ranting, personal attacks, and assuming bad faith. I didn't bother to read the rest. Come back when you can address the actual issues in a rational manner. — kwami (talk) 19:51, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

The continued and continuing refusal to discuss the article with other users, while nonetheless repeatedly reverting, is exactly why the assumption of bad faith is warranted. I hope you'll reconsider and decide to respond to the discussion, so that we can create a version of the article that accommodates your concerns rather than being forced to override a tendentious editor. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:03, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Not "other users", just you, because you are not engaging in rational debate. I object to you misrepresenting or misquoting people to push your POV, and when called on it, insisting on selectively quoting them to push the same POV, while demanding that we not provide the context that would show your POV is not supported. I don't mind a balanced portrayal, even if that means reporting universal agreement that the summit was an abomination. (I don't know. I wasn't there. I wasn't involved. I don't know anyone who was.) But I do object to you pushing your own opinion as if it were external to you.

Later today I will try to do what you suggest, including the CAIR criticism in its context, and reporting what other sources have said. — kwami (talk) 23:11, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

PS. I like how the speakers at CAIR included non-Muslims. — kwami (talk) 07:18, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, restored Roscelese's preferred word order to the lead, as the suggested relative importance is supported by the WSJ and Post articles. Restored an account of Haddad, trimmed down to the length we alot the entire WSJ article (which is too much per WEIGHT, but I agree that that should be addressed by having more from the WSJ article). Noted that the summit and CAIR were set opposite each other, with an example of each one's criticism of the other, and characterized CAIR with the wording of our sources. Noted Al-Jazeera coverage. This is a bit more balanced; the difficulty in improving it further is the lack of coverage in the content of the summit, rather than the personalities involved; some of the things attributed to them may have been from the summit, but it's impossible to tell. — kwami (talk) 08:06, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

I looked over today's string of edits (I'll admit I didn't look at yesterday's very closely) and I think we're getting a lot closer to a compromise. I'm sorry I haven't had the time to participate as much as I'd like, but at the same time you two know what the issues are much better than I do. Thanks. ~Adjwilley (talk) 17:25, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

I think it mostly looks good as well, though I've made a few tweaks (attempting to keep the weight the same) and would still prefer including the actual quotes in a few places to avoid ambiguity. I also plan to add some more material from Stephens's piece about what was said at the conference and/or by conference speakers. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:34, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Largely okay, except that I still have a problem with the quote "that one need not renounce Islam in order to be a secular Muslim". You seem to think that if we can document that s.o. said s.t., that is sufficient to include it. But this is like asking a man if he's stopped beating his wife: it suggests that the declaration requires you to denounce Islam in order to be a secular Muslim. And elsewhere again the issue with a RS that s.o. said s.t. not being the same as a RS for the thing (you even commented "per source").

Also, Bret Stephens did not say the things you say he did. (See? There's a line from you that makes the summit look good. I don't object to it from POV, but because it's false.) But I'll let you reword that one. — kwami (talk) 16:38, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Firstly, "denounce" is not the same thing as "renounce," but secondly and more importantly...again, we neither state nor imply that the declaration says this. We actually have the declaration in our article, so there can be no mistake. This is about criticism of the summit (a supposed lack of which you criticized!) by a participant (not CAIR!) based on the substance of things said at the summit. It's an opinion, meaning that it is subjective. The way we accurately report these things is by fully attributing them and framing them as opinion, which is exactly what we did. Should we also remove the declaration from our article because it suggests that non-"secular" Muslims believe in imposing repressive religious-based policies? (And Manji did "refuse"...it wasn't like she forgot or something. The source specifically says "refused," so I don't know how you can possibly claim that "per source" was false.)

Can you explain what you believe to be inaccurate about the paraphrase of Stephens? Obviously I didn't think it was inaccurate when I added it, so just saying "it's inaccurate" without explanation is unlikely to lead me to make any changes since I don't know what's wrong with it.

As far as your other changes go: I object to the removal of Haddad's qualifications. She's not just some random person in the street, she's an expert scholar on the material that the conference was about. (If it's about the number of words for weight, we could remove the Georgetown bit and say "a scholar of Christian and Muslim history," or something.) We also can't say that she didn't comment on anything said at the summit, because the source doesn't say so; drawing conclusions from what a source does not say is original research. (And that reduces weight! whee.) I also object to the removal of "and anti-Muslim"; it seems a deliberate attempt to suppress the substance of her criticism. Extreme in what way? Are they far-right neocons? Are they total religious disestablishmentarians? Etc. etc. (We could phrase it another way, such as "extreme in their negative views towards Islam," etc., but "extreme" alone is not sufficient.)

You've again removed the comment from CAIR about the speakers' views. I don't know why it's so important to you to pretend that the extreme political positions of these people were not a major focus of criticism from multiple parties. Please restore it. If the problem is simply weight, you need to find something to balance it and/or explain, for us all here in talk, why you feel it needs to be suppressed in preference to other criticism (like the religious identification of the speakers).

Re Manji and the amendment, what you wrote isn't an improvement in accuracy, it's just changing the subject: the source states both that changes were proposed and ignored, and that the provided text was suggested for a future version. It seems to me that, since this article is on the 2007 summit and its declaration and not on hypothetical future declarations and/or summits, the first is more relevant. What do you think? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:36, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

My "have you stopped beating your wife yet" concern stands. Such things are not appropriate even if not actually false. This, again, is how propaganda works, and we do not accept that as appropriate.

The American Prospect saying "reports circulated that she had refused to sign" is not the same as the American Prospect saying she had refused to sign. A RS that s.o. said s.t. is not a RS that the s.t. actually happened. So no, it is not "per source".

Stephens: I'm not sure Al-Jazeera is here, suggesting that the real Arab mainstream better appreciates the broad interest the conference's speakers attract in the Muslim world necessarily translates to "would be appreciated by the Arab world's mainstream", though I don't object enough to delete it. I don't see what he said that would translate to "if not fully by the American public".

Haddad: "at Georgetown" is the kind of description we normally give; we don't need three times as much as anyone else, and we have a link to her bio, so people can look her up! In my mind, her university affiliation is far more important than "a scholar of X", since anyone can claim to be a scholar and that therefore means almost nothing.

Yes, perhaps another wording would better reflect their description of her views. But I do think it's important to note that she did not evaluate the summit. She only criticized the lineup. Perhaps what they said justified her fears, but she never said so. Quite possibly they interviewed her before the summit, or if after, before she received any info about it. She was not a witness to the summit, and appears to have had no info from anyone who was. Since when do we quote criticism from people who are not familiar with the topic they're criticizing? I'm not sure her inclusion is justified at all. CAIR may or may not have known what actually happened at the summit, but they're relevant because of the media coverage. The only on-hand coverage we have would appear to be the WSJ article. It would seem they are therefore the only ones who would actually know what they're talking about.

CAIR: drew an amalgam of extreme right-wing and neocon voices who touted as role models of 'reform' those who are deep in their hostility to Islam does not mean describing the speakers as hostile to Islam. Again, you're painting with an overly broad brush. Was the chair of CAIR really claiming that Manji and Mahmud were hostile to Islam? Perhaps he was, but the source does not support such a claim.

The details of what Manji proposed and how are trivial and beyond what we're covering in this article. In any case, I doubt they'd pass RS: a letter is a RS for the opinions of the writer, but not necessarily about the people she's writing about. My main objections are the triviality of it, and the empty implications of trying to read meaning into a few words when we don't have a source for what happened. (Was there a debate at a roundtable where they refused to acknowledge her presence? Did she stick a note in a suggestion box that was never opened?)

— kwami (talk) 00:36, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Is there a way of including this criticism from Manji which, in your view, doesn't suggest that the summit promoted renouncing Islam? Perhaps we could include the quote in the article text, to make it (even!) more clear that it is her opinion of the declaration: "In our view, the summit Declaration fails to meet this challenge [of ensuring that the summit stands with the secular faithful, or however you'd like to bracket]. It should clarify that secular Muslims are not necessarily atheists or people who have renounced the faith..."

Out of context, "reports circulated" sounds dubious, but in context - when a) it's used to mean that "word got out," leading to support for Manji and b) when we have a separate source from Manji which explains her decision not to sign! - it's clear that the term is appropriate.

I'll try to rephrase the Stephens part sometime.

You're right that "scholar" is vague - "professor" of, etc.? I just want to make sure that it's clear in the article (rather than just on a click-through) that this is expert criticism, not the views of an uninformed activist or amateur who happens to be a professor in possibly an entirely different subject (like a certain individual I could name in this topic area).

Again, I'm not sure the lineup is as irrelevant as you seem to think it is. Talks by these speakers were the central feature of the summit, they were chosen for their views and previous related activities, and post-summit coverage (like Stephens) bears out that they didn't exactly diverge from their usual themes which Haddad criticized. (Incidentally, the Stephens article also says that the Sultan quote about radical Islam and regular Islam comes from the summit. She presumably said it more than once.)

"role models of 'reform'...who are deep in their hostility to Islam" - is there a better way you can see of paraphrasing this? I'm also not sure why you seem to be arguing that the criticism must apply to every speaker. Neither the source itself, nor the individual quoted in the source, say this, so the argument that we have to suppress it in order to avoid smearing Manji and Mahmud is weak.

It's not especially important to me to mention that they proposed amending the declaration, but if we discuss it, we should represent it relevantly and accurately, ie. wrt the 2007 conference.

One more note: I appreciate the material you've been adding, but you need to stop including unattributed copying. I can't keep cleaning up after potential plagiarism - please use your own words to convey the content in the source, or include it in quotation marks to clearly indicate that it comes from the source. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 04:03, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

We seem to have a fundamental disagreement on what a generic noun means. When you write "the speakers", I take that to mean, well, the speakers. You apparently mean some unspecified speakers. If someone were to drop in here and say, "the editors on this page are a bunch of idiots", you or I might take offense. I doubt we'd think, "oh, that's all right, he probably meant some other editors." "The editors" would mean the editors in general, by implication all of us. CAIR did not describe "the speakers" as hostile to Islam in the sense that I take English definite generic nouns to mean. Although it's not exactly clear what they did mean, I'm guessing that they meant that there were speakers who were held up as models of reform, and that these speakers were hostile to Islam. That might have something to do with why other devout invitees did not attend, but it cannot be equated with the speakers in general.

We also seem to disagree on what plagiarism is. Often the things we refer to are so basic that there isn't much difference between a paraphrase and a quotation. Repeating common English constructions from a cited source is not plagiarism, as long as you cite where the info/ideas came from. I've seen people twist themselves in knots trying to avoid repeating s.t. when there really isn't any other good way to put it, and AFAIK it isn't necessary. If it's the kind of wording you might use yourself if you were to try to express the same thing, it isn't plagiarism. In many of these cases I would have used the same words, and with the citation I not claiming it's my idea. Probably 90% of what we say are trite variations of common constructions, so we repeat what others have said before us almost every time we speak.

"In our view, the summit Declaration fails to meet this challenge", or some wording similar to that, would be fine. That's her opinion, and it doesn't imply anything other than her opinion. We currently say basically the same thing in the footnote.

"Refused": I still have a problem with that. Did they all come together with the declaration, and she said, "not until you address my concerns"? That would be a refusal. Did they leave it on the table for anyone who wanted to sign it, and she thought to herself, "no, I'm not comfortable signing this"? That's rather different, and we don't know which it was. What we do know is that in the end she didn't sign it.

"Scholar": if she weren't in a relevant field, we wouldn't be quoting her at all, so that seemed obvious to me. We don't go into the detailed qualifications of the other people we quote, or of the speakers, so it seems out of place to do that for Haddad.

Lineup: I didn't say the lineup was not relevant, but criticizing the lineup is different from criticizing the summit. Now, if we had a source that said, "see, I thought this was going to be a farce from the lineup, and they said the same nonsense they always do," then we would have a criticism of the summit itself.

Also, if the lineup reflects the intent of the summit, remember that there were other devout invitees who didn't attend. Some reports give their reasons, and perhaps it was because of the rest of the lineup. But criticizing the summit for not having religious speakers when religious speakers were invited and didn't show up, well, that doesn't seem like a fair criticism of their intent. (Though if we have RSs, it might be worth mentioning why some of those religious invitees chose not to attend.) — kwami (talk) 05:25, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Oh, is the problem how it's phrased in the article? That's easy enough to solve. I trust that when I rephrase it in the article to avoid what you see as a problem with the phrase "the speakers," you will stop trying to remove this sourced and properly weighted criticism.

I very much doubt that WP's copyright experts will be sympathetic to the idea that you totally came up with the same phrasing independently. It's very easy to avoid plagiarizing someone else's words - when you include an idea from a source, use your own words or use quotation marks to properly attribute.

Well, "this challenge" is impossibly vague without brackets, but I assume you endorse what I suggested above.

We don't know how it actually went down. All we have is a reliable secondary source that says she refused, and a primary source that explains in greater detail why. It's not our place to decide that she didn't refuse hard enough.

We actually do discuss the background of the speakers and of the other critics. Haddad would be the only person that we don't describe.

This is an issue that could possibly be mitigated with some reorganization - the bit about people deciding not to attend really belongs in "People" - but it remains true that criticism of the speakers' lineup is criticism of the summit, because the speakers' lineup was not only a part of the summit but an integral part of the summit. (It was also a large part of the summit's own press release, so it's not just critics who have decided it's important.) –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:13, 3 June 2012 (UTC)