User talk:Fowler&fowler/Archive 23

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Free India flag

Dont have a specific cite in my head that says "this was the flag". But the square orange-white-green flag with a tiger is only used by the German Indian Legion. I know for a fact (and have previously read it explicitly written) that Bose adopted the INC flag as the national flag. All instances of the Government or Army of "Free India" doing something is with the INC flag (sometimes seen without the charkha if its a simple "field made" flag while the army is out in the bush etc)
It was used in the Greater East Asia Conference for example. Here are some videos showing its use at other places as well:
https://streamable.com/mfj2w at 4:18 it can be see in the East-Asia Conference
https://streamable.com/s9au4 at 0:30 Its the Rani of Jhansi Regiment raising the national flag and singing.
https://streamable.com/jucwq at 0:29 INA review and the national flag flying.
https://streamable.com/dgby7 at 3:13 INA Parade and Bose speaking with huge Japanese and Free Indian flag hanging from the building.
Here are also some pictures:
https://i.imgur.com/OZfWQaa.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/45/51/bd/4551bd3a663658393672d1aab317a973.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/c3UtSIs.jpg (on the Andaman and Nicobar islands)
https://museumofworldwarii.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/EAST-ASIA-WAR-POSTER.jpg
The "tiger flag" is literally never used by the INA or Government, only by the German unit. Hopefully this is enough evidence without me having to dig up a real citation for this fact, hehe. --Havsjö (talk) 19:10, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

@Havsjö: I didn't say anything about the Tiger flag. But like the British Raj page, pictures or videos are not enough. We have a virtual puppet government; the question is whether it can even have a flag, and if so, what flag did it have. Could this theoretical republic have arbitrarily and unilaterally picked for its flag the flag of the Indian National Congress, which opposed its existence? Who had recognized that flag, and even if a few Asis nations did, was that enough for a mention or inclusion in the infobox? We would need a scholarly source for that, in my view. Pinging @RegentsPark:. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 20:31, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

This is crazy. Yes, the government was an unrecognized (by most) puppet government. But it officially adopted that flag as its national flag, and which is why its used by them in alla contexts as their national flag. This like saying the Wang Jingwei regime cant have that flag because China is already using it. A puppet regime cant have an official flag because it is a puppet regime? Unlike with the British Raj (where the official civil ensign was used as an unofficial "flag of India" in many contexts internationally), this is officially adopted by the government and both de-jure and de-facto the flag of this "country", and accepted as such by the few countries who recognized it too.

PS. I mentioned the Tiger flag since you had originally put this flag with the flagicon template in the INA article, before I changed it to the correct flag. --Havsjö (talk) 20:38, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Peter Fay's The Forgotten Army: India’s Armed Struggle for Independence, 1942–1945 is a source for the adoption of the INC flag by Azad Hind. It is thereafter referred to as "their (INA/Azad Hind's) flag" or "his (Bose's) flag" or "Free Indias flag". This was also the flag they ceremoniously raised in the "liberated areas" of India in the 1944 offensive. So there you have a source confirming this too. Ridiculous semantics and overly hung up on details! Should Wang Jingwei China page be purged of their official flag too? Because the real KMT-China didnt recognize it and opposed it?? --Havsjö (talk) 20:47, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Haven't had a chance to look at this in detail. But we do need a reliable source that unequivocally associates a flag with an entity. Images of the flag in use are, by themselves, not enough. --regentspark (comment) 22:03, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

@Havsjö: @RegentsPark: What page of Peter Ward Fay? I must have missed it. In my copy, I see only, "On the 9th of December 1943 a special committee on national integration (Lakshmi was a member) brought to a full meeting of Bose's cabinet its recommendations—common messing, romanized Hindustani, Jai Hind and Chalo Delhi, the new anthem, the springing tiger, the tricolor without the charkha—and all these recommendations were accepted." (bottom of page 235). Please clarify. Best regards, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 03:19, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

@RegentsPark:@Fowler&fowler: On p.226 it is mentioned they now marched under the "national flag" of orange-white-green flag which had been raised above congress years before. On page p.229 they specifically talk about how the chakra on the flag and how the flag signified Ghandi and the INC and how it was a point of contention between Muslims and Sikhs. This seemed to have begun used even before Bose arrived. The "empty" tricolour was used, as it was mentioned to be used to help "integration" and can be seen carried the army in footage too, but this flag doesn't rule out the other (both are even seen in the same footage in the documented footage, such sa the INC flag flying on the pole or hanging of the building while "empty" ones are carried by INA units marching before it). The INC flag was kept in use and the flag is referred to in the book as "his (Bose's) flag", "their (INA/Azad Hind's) Flag", or "Free Indias flag" when they for example raise it in "liberated India" in 1944 and so on. How can we know this is the INC flag? Because this is the flag seen in all printed/photographed/recorded footage (even on military awards) of INA/Free India using it in the described events of the book when they are described as using "Free Indias/Bose's/INA's flag! Even after December 1943 (when the empty flag was "accepted"), for example the video of the flag raising and singing on national anthem is dated April 1944. This video (3:13) is also from 1944. As is the images when they "liberate India" (described as using the free india flag etc). In "The Springing Tiger: A Study of a Revolutionary" by Hugh Toye he also writes on p.98 that Bose chose that the Congress tricolour should be the national flag. It also quotes from Boses speeches in 1944 during the offensive into India how they should "gather wholeheartedly under your Tricolour Flag of Independence hoisted by the Provisional Government of Azad Hind" and how "There can be no rest and no pause for us, until our tricolour national flag is hoisted over India’s metropolis." etc. So which tricolor flag did the INA fly and rally under etc in these 1944 events when liberating areas of India etc? Luckily they documented this:

I would like to also go on a little tangent here and make a note: That even if there would have been no written source about this, and only the countless photographed, printed and recorded evidence, I should very much have been included. A historical group/movement which existed over 70 years ago has very much ample documented physical evidence of liberal use of this flag in both marches, flag raising ceremonies, their own propaganda material etc. And because "uuuhm, but who allowed them to use this flag?" "hmmm, this movement was not recognized though" this plain historical fact/information should be possibly even scrubbed from Wikipedia? If a terrorist group from 25 years ago could always be seen with one symbol which they use in all their material and painted in the areas they controlled, should no mention of this symbol be included on their wiki article as simply "the symbol of Group-X"/"Group X used this (as their) symbol" or whatever. Because... the group was not recognized and opposed? Not "allowed" to use that symbol? Didnt have UN-approved documentation about the official adoption of this symbol as their official symbol? It would still just be a clear-as-day historical FACT that this historical movement always used this symbol and to scrub a mention of their use of this symbol from Wikipedia on such grounds would be utterly nuts! Especially here, when there are tons and tons of mentions of "the tricolour was used" by authors and "our national flag" by Bose himself and all the groups own photo/print/video evidence of this flag (even in the same specific events as mentioned by aforementioned people) is the INC tricolor flag. Bose is even seen on numerous official/ceremonial events standing before this flag, holding speeches or saluting it flying etc (even after the empty flag "acceptance" of Dec. '43). It just becomes ignoring actual, factual, easily confirmed history in favor of "legalities" on paper that obviously contradict the groups own "words". And a line regarding the "acceptance" of an alternative empty flag does not warrant ignoring all proof and a purge of the INC flag --Havsjö (talk) 09:09, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

@Havsjö: @RegentsPark: I'm afraid there is no agreement in the sources. The page 226 mention in Fay is to Mohan Singh's INA, i.e. the first INA. He says clearly:

Under Mohan Singh some things had changed. There was a national flag to march beneath, the green, white, and saffron tricolor (green for Muslims, saffron for Hindus, white for everyone else) that had been raised for the first time at the Lahore Congress sessions fourteen years before."

But the first INA was dissolved in December 1942. Bose arrived in Singapore in early July 1943 and the decision to adopt the tricolor but without the charkha was made in December 1943. Fay is pretty clear about that.

Joyce Lebra, in Women Against the Raj (page 57), on the other hand, says:

"For the INA song Netaji turned away from Bande Mataram, the song that had so galvanized Bengali revolutionaries because of its emphasis on the Mother. Mother worship has no place in Muslim and Sikh traditions. Instead he chose Tagore’s composition, Jana Gana Mana, which is Indian’s national anthem today. Meals in the INA were taken together, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs and Christians in a common mess. Beef and pork were never served, mutton occasionally. Religious ceremonies were celebrated mutually, but Netaji was convinced that religion should be kept out of politics and out of the INA. Another symbol of national unity was the flag. Bose felt the Indian tricolour with the emblem of the spinning wheel, which was essentially Gandhian, might offend Muslim sensibilities. He chose instead a springing tiger, the tiger being associated with a Muslim hero of eighteenth century battles against the British. ‘Jai Hind! was the universal greeting of the INA and the three watchwords were unity, faith, and sacrifice."

Sugata Bose does seem to think Bose had adopted the Congress flag in southeast Asia. He is talking here about the Free India Center in Berlin, opened during Bose's days in Germany:

"The Free India Center was formally inaugurated on November 2, 1941, at Liechtenstein Alee 2, in the Tiergarten area of Berlin. The green, saffron, and white tricolor of the Indian National Congress was adopted as the national flag. The image of a springing tiger, reminiscent of the eighteenth-century anti-British warrior Tipu Sultan of Mysore, replaced the charkha ("spinning wheel") in the middle, though Bose would revert to the Gandhian symbol in Southeast Asia. (Sugata Bose. His Majesty’s Opponent (Kindle Locations 2830-2832). Kindle Edition.)"

Leonard Gordon talks about Berlin as well in Brothers Against the Raj (page 460):

"He tested this out with the soldiers, with more educated colleagues in Berlin, and with Bose, and finally it was agreed to and used. Similarly, a flag, the Congress tricolor with a springing tiger on it, became the flag, and an adaptation of Tagore’s song as the anthem ‘Jana Gana Mana.’ "(p 460)"

He does say that Bose raised the Congress's flag in the Andamans, but says nothing explicit about what flag had been adopted by the INA in its Bose incarnation or by the FIPG. So, as far as I am concerned, of the four historians one, Peter Ward Fay, says explicitly that the tricolor but with no charkha was adopted as the flag of the FIPG. Another, Joyce Lebra, says that it was the Congress Flag, but with a springing tiger replacing the charkha, yet another, Sugata Bose says it was the Congress flag, but somewhat offhandedly, and the fourth, Leonard Gordon, says merely that the Congress flag was raised by Bose in the Andamans (which is neither here no there when it comes to the flag of the FIPG. Bose may have raised the Congress flag because it was considered the Indian National flag). This is the usual kind of problem with flags, emblems, and the other bells and whistles of nations, armies, or organizations. Historians typically do not pay too much attention to them. In other words, there is no consensus among historians about what constituted the FIPG flag or the INA flag. I'm done with the discussion. I've looked at the major sources. The pictures and videos don't count. They might show either Bose or the INA raising a flag, but it does not mean they had adopted that flag for the FIPG. Best, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 13:07, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

The orange-white-green tricolour (congress flag) but with a tiger instead of a chakra was indeed adopted by his movement when it was in Europe, it was then used by the Free India Legion in Germany there. But in Asia the chakra was the symbol used, as you even have some historians there correctly saying, not mixing up the tiger tricolour with the later used chakra tricolour (both based on the INC flag). I seriously dont understand how you can be so dissmissive of the physical evidence though. With the British Raj situation I can get it, even if I dont fully agree. But here you have historians saying how "the tricolour" is used for this and that and is the flag of the FIPG and then you see the INC flag in all these contexts. Historians saying how the FIPG tricolour/national flag was raised in liberated India, as well as grand speeches from Bose's own mouth about how they raise the national flag of Free India in the liberated India followed by the actual photos from the described event show the INC flag! Its denying the actual people in the actual movement own words in favour of obvious mixups (such as with the tiger flag, which some historians even "point out") You have tons of actual footage of:

Joint Japanese-Indian ceremonies with the Japanese flag and INC tricolour for the FIPG, including in contexts were they nationalistically show the (often new) national flags of all the East-Asia Sphere members.
Only Indian ceremonies with the INC tricolour for the FIPG, including being saluted or raised as national anthem is sung
Indian-made propaganda showing the INC tricolour for the FIPG
Indian allies-made propaganda showing INC tricolour for the FIPG
INA troops carrying large, properly made INC tricolour flags and raising it in the liberated areas of India (as mentioned)
INA's own military decorations/medals depicting this flag

and also

lower quality "empty" tricolours flewn on sticks by INA soldiers on the march in the field

I assumed these were just simplified flags before, omitting the complicated symbol, as is often done in such contexts. But it seems this may have had official context.
The tiger flag is relegated to only the European pre-FIPG units and not once seen in any of the above mentioned contexts.
To ignore this evidence, from the various forms of media from the FIPG/INA people themselves, or by not putting 2 and 2 together, such as with "the national flag" being proclaimed to be raised and the INC flag then being the one raised is to ignore real, actual history. You are denying what you literally, in-front of you with your own eyes see actually took place in real life in the world. If you took a time-machine to that time, this is what you would see i.e. this is what historically IRL happened and was used at these times! Did Bose just play several pranks when talking about the national flag and let his men raise another? Did he trick his followers and always used another flag than the one they followed? Did he proclaim the use of one flag, and then never use it in favor a different unrelated one? It is just plain denial of reality. --Havsjö (talk) 15:30, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

I've given extracts from the four most reliable sources on Bose. They don't seem to agree on the flag during the period 1943 to 1945. As for why that may be, it is certainly undeniable that Bose's life was unusually buffeted by events, giving it greater unpredictability than the average Indian nationalist of that era. His seemingly random cooperation with the Nazis and Imperial Japan are examples. Both seem a world apart from his previously voiced positions. Why there was that inconsistency, I cannot say. As for the flag, it could be that the Congress flag was more easily available in Japanese Singapore or -Burma, and they went about choosing their flag in an ad hoc fashion, driven by the exigencies of budgets, principles, organization, and availability. I've read pretty much everything there is on Bose. You can see the evidence in Death of Subhas Chandra Bose which I wrote around the same time as the lead of Subhas Chandra Bose. I've also forgotten much, but I'm pretty sure now that there was no well-defined flag of the FIPG, or the INA. For those reasons, I feel we cannot have a flag on either of those pages. Thanks for your input. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:47, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

It cant be removed!! Because even if its """cannot be pinned down""" what the official flag was, if some person goes to wikipedia to look for info about these things, its our duty to inform him that "this is, in fact, the flag which these men carried back then". Why should this plain fact be scrubbed from history by us and hidden from people? Because its """not possible""" to pin down an official proclamation of its use? It was still evidently commonly used and its documented widespread use should in-turn be documented here. Borderline censorship if information about its proven use is removed for of such as reason. --Havsjö (talk) 18:29, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

Havsjö, if we start looking at images and drawing conclusions from them, we're making up history not reporting it. The reason we look for reliable peer reviewed academic sources is because we can be confident that a reliable researcher has concluded that a flag, or other object in an image, is representative, official or has a particular meaning ascribed to it. Lacking these sources, we cannot, and should not, make that judgement. --regentspark (comment) 19:33, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

Just a further small note, but I guess this discussion is over. I just found this image from when Bose is proclaiming the formation of the FIPG on 21 Oct. 1943 in Singapore which id thought id share --Havsjö (talk) 20:10, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

Hold up. How is the explicitly named national flag raised on Andaman & Nicobar islands, referred to as such by both FIPG at the time and by all historians today, as well as the meomorial plaque on the islands, and which is also both described (by historians) and photographically proven to be the INC flag with the chakra, not definitive proof on this matter? (and then add all the other photo/video/written/spoken/etc proof too...) (this is even after the "acceptance" of the chakra-less flag) --Havsjö (talk) 20:40, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

@Havsjö:, You are offering the kind of evidence that is inappropriate on Wikipedia whose principles on citations are clear. This is my position: There cannot be any flag in the infobox. However, there can certainly be a section in the article about the flags. All flags for which we have textual citations, which in our case are: the Congress flag, the Springing Tiger flag, and the simple tricolor flag (with no emblem in the middle) can be included in the section, along with a small description, a paraphrase of the various quotes I have given above. Let me point out a further problem. Examine the Indian National Congress page. The flag it has is its infobox is its current flag, which is no more than ten, fifteen, or twenty years old. The Congress flag (of yore) is nowhere to be found. It appears only in a section, Flag of India#History of the Flag of India page. Putting the Congress flag upfront and center on the INA and FIPG pages, when it appears nowhere in the INC page, will create in the case of someone such as Bose—who fought very publicly with the INC, who was expelled from the INC, who went on to collaborate with Nazism and Fascism, not to mention employ and celebrate violence as a means of achieving anti-colonial ends, in stark contrast to the principles of the INC, especially during a time when the major Congress leaders were imprisoned and unavailable for expressing an opinion—a visual version of WP:UNDUE. As for your last two pictures, if they are reliable ones (and many such pictures are not), the first is from 21 October 1943, but Bose's and his cabinet's decision not to have an emblem or badge in the center of the tricolor dates to December 1943. As for the second, we don't need it, we already have a citation from Leonard Graham about Bose raising the "National tricolor" in the Andamans. The problem for us is that there are also equally reliable contrasting citations. Also pinging @RegentsPark: Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:07, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

Merry Christmas!!

Christmas tree worm, (Spirobranchus gigantic)CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 23:14, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
	Time To Spread A Little Happy Holiday Cheer!!
	I decorated a special kind of Christmas tree in the spirit of the season. What's especially nice about this digitized version: it doesn't need water won't catch fire *and batteries aren't required.
	Have a very Merry Christmas - Happy Hanukkah‼️ and a prosperous New Year!! 🍸🎁 🎉

Happy holidays

Hi Fowler&fowler, thank you very much for the card, and I hope this note finds you well. Wishing you and yours all the best for the holidays, SarahSV ^(talk) 07:17, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Wishing

you a merry Christmas, a happy New Year and pleasant holidays! And, here's hoping to see more of your excellent craftsmanship over our articles .... ∯WBG^converse 15:53, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Io Saturnalia!

		Io, Saturnalia!
		Wishing you and yours a Happy Holiday Season, from the horse and bishop person. May the year ahead be productive and distraction-free. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:58, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year

Thanks for the card f&f. Happy holidays and best wishes for the, hopefully roaring, 20's!--regentspark (comment) 17:40, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Season's Greetings!

Faithful friends who are dear to us

... gather near to us once more.

May your heart be light

and your troubles out of sight,

now and in the New Year.

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:51, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much @SandyGeorgia:. This is a beautiful card, as are its thoughts. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 04:07, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Season's Greetings

FWiW Bzuk (talk) 00:59, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much @Bzuk:! Fowler&fowler «Talk» 04:11, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Assuming that the questions answered herein aren't covered by the 24 wait you've asked for...

Regarding Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Coropuna/archive1#Comments by Fowler&fowler as far as I know there are no special conventions from the Wikiprojects in question. Regarding "wikilinks instead of descriptors" it's a tough question - wikilinks require one to leave the page, but descriptors often shake the flow of the sentence. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 21:33, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

OK, Thanks very much @Jo-Jo Eumerus: Fowler&fowler «Talk» 04:12, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy Holidays

Hello Fowler&fowler: Enjoy the holiday season, and thanks for your work to maintain, improve and expand Wikipedia. Cheers, DBigXrayᗙ Happy Holidays! 15:16, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Spread the WikiLove; use {{subst:Season's Greetings1}} to send this message

And to you too, @DBigXray:. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 15:40, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Coropuna FAC

		The One-third Barnstar
		Awarded to User:Jo-Jo Eumerus, User:Fowler&fowler and User:ComplexRational – for having the fortitude, diligence, resilience and "sound moral principle" to show the rest of us the best way to approach a featured article candidacy. Here's to you all three of you! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:48, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Thank you @SandyGeorgia: I like this barnstar. I had no idea that such precision existed in rewarding! Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:01, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Someone gave it to me once ... I can always peruse my sub-page to find a Barnstar for any situation, even though sensible editors have said that barnstars belong on barns (along with Coca-Cola signs :) Best regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:10, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

:) I like cookie salad. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:20, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Seasonal Archiepiscopal article?

Greetings, both seasonal and normal. Back in the dawn of time (nine years ago nearly, aargh!) I took part in the peer review of your rewrite of Mandell Creighton. The Rt Rev has had a cameo role in the article on Randall Davidson on which I have been working during the past month. I now have RD up for peer review, and if you were minded to look in and let me have your thoughts it would be esteemed a favour. Perfectly understand if you aren't disposed, naturally. I have clocked the history of the Creighton FAC, including the intervention of the achingly missed Brianboulton, and will be v. happy indeed to help if I can in having another pop at that, too, at some point – yours to command. Best wishes, Tim riley talk 17:19, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Hello. @Tim riley: Season's greetings to you as well. I'd be happy to look at RD, once the Christmas madness is over.

It's funny I was thinking about Brianboulton the other day myself, about his generosity, and about Creighton. As you know I withdrew the article from FAC2 with the intention of reading the sources he had suggested. I never did read those sources but did manage to buy WG Fallows's older biography, Mandell Creighton and the English Church (ca 1964). No sooner had the book arrived than, as they say on WP, real life intervened, and I managed to lose Fallows in the recesses of our home. Anyway, it was found, definitively, and I've been reading it. I've only read the introduction which is a pithy biography of MC, and a joy to read. (It reminded me of an early-1960s (?), interview with Bertrand Russell, during which he said he owed his style to Milton (for the passion) and Baedekers' Guidebooks (for the brevity). I don't know if Fallow's Chapter 1 has passion, but it certainly has an attractive brevity.) The rest of the book is written in a more relaxed style. ... There are a couple of other books that have appeared since, which might be useful. The one I remember is, Historians and the Church of England: Religion and Historical Scholarship, 1870-1920 by James Kirby, OUP, 2016. Then there is always Lytton Strachey's character assassination in Eminent Victorians (probably worth rereading). Anyway, if you can give me a month, say until the end of January, I'd be able to give you a better assessment of where Creighton "is at." If you want to help write it, it would be an honor. I'm glad you wrote here. I need some prodding for refocusing. Meanwhile, I'll stop by RD. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:13, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

PS Another article which is half written, whose completion would be a worthwhile memorial to Brianb, is V. S. Naipaul. He had given me much needed encouragement on the article's talk page. Anyway, I don't remember the sequence of events, but I left the article in this state in 2014, and haven't gone back since. Naipaul, though, needs a lot more work. Some of his books will have to be read, or reread, their articles on WP written or rewritten, and so forth. But maybe if Creighton can be completed, I will feel more encouraged to take on Naipaul again. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:18, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Excellent! No rush at all for comments on Davidson, and as to Creighton, as lead editor it's for you decide when and what you want me to do. I can't make a similar offer for the Naipaul article as serious 20th century fiction is not my strong suit, but I'd be glad to offer suggestions at PR etc in due course. Meanwhile, Merry Christmas and a Rollicking New Year. Tim riley talk 21:30, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Actually there is another article that we need help with.....

Many moons ago we buffed Betelgeuse...and then a few of us thought it'd be good to buff Rigel. All the folks who've worked on it have been people familiar with astronomy, but after your thoughts on Horologium and a peer review that attracted zero interest, I thought I'd ask and see if you could see how its prose could be more engaging....I'd like to take it to FAC one day....and it should be more coherent than a constellation. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:01, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

@Casliber: Well, it's early. I hope I haven't scared the others away. :( Are you sure there is nothing more in the literature (for Horologium)?

The two above seem to have more meat. It may take me time, as I'm swamped right now. The general problem, as I'm sure you know, is WP-wide and plagues articles on all sorts of technical topics, medicine, drugs, all branches of science, mathematics, ... The main question is: can a WP article be written more or less at the level of a survey of the subject and its literature in a journal or subject-companion? There are exceptions, of course, I remember your own excellent article on depression. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 15:48, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

There is no time limit on Rigel at all...we've been a tad stalled for months...I will look for more on Horologium...pretty hard as all we have are astronomy guidebooks (generally bland) and scientifc articles, which treat constellations as addresses for patches of sky and nothing more really Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 21:22, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Problem with psychiatry article is that they are like...well, work. Still am trying to clean up schizophrenia (again!) and will one day get to bipolar disorder and some others...Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 21:25, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/James Humphreys (pornographer)/archive1

I am ashamed of you. Graham Beards (talk) 14:28, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

If you seriously think that a man, James Humphreys (pornographer), who has spent 7 1/2 of the previous ten years in jail, a small-time crook, jailed for minor villainy (in the nominator's own sources) who has opened a sex club, can be described as changing directions professionally (with all the errors and ambiguities of usage, not to mention WP:DUE), that the nominator's making his last stand on it and withdrawing, but not before heaping abuse on me, is just all right, then I'm ashamed of you as well, whoever you are. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 15:09, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

A pathetic reason for disrupting a FAC. Graham Beards (talk) 15:29, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

It was no more rigorous than at the Cactus Wren, Coropuna, or Horologium (constellation) FACs. But the nominators there are not reacting as intemperately (several instances of WP rules violations), and I haven't even got to comprehensiveness, to the absence of a survey of the literature much of which is not reliable. There are books written by policemen that offer a different perspective, that are not even mentioned in the page. Harold Challenor, with significant WW2 achievement, whose obituary appeared here in the Guardian, here in the Telegraph, who was treated for paranoid schizophrenia, which very likely was in its incipient stages according to the Telegraph obituary, is being described as making it so that Humphreys "had to" bribe him, with no other nuance, no mention of whether or not sex-clubs were legal in England at that time. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:13, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

This is a very busy time for me, but as and when I find time, I will be continuing the critique at Talk:James_Humphreys_(pornographer)#Other_issues_of_Fowler&fowler I have already opened a thread. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 19:15, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Don't be surprised if no one engages with you. Graham Beards (talk) 19:22, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

You think I've made that for others? Fowler&fowler «Talk» 19:25, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

@Graham Beards: Oh, Gee. I completely forgot. This was a pornographer. He was exploiting women. Again: He was exploiting women. Did it not occur to any referee, all boys, to ask why no mention is made anywhere in the article of sexual exploitation? You want to challenge me that it is not there in the sources? Not a peep did the boys make. And you wonder why women run away from Wikipedia. A silly mutual admiration society is worked up because I gave one of their own a fair shake. I should be ashamed? Fowler&fowler «Talk» 05:52, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Notes on James Humphreys

References:

Bleakley, Paul (2019), "Cleaning up the Dirty Squad: Using the Obscene Publications Act as a Weapon of Social Control", State Crime Journal, 8 (1): 19–38
McMullen, R.J. (1987), "Youth prostitution; a balance of power", Journal of Adolescence, 10 (1): 35–43
Mort, Frank (2007). "Striptease: the erotic female body and live sexual entertainment in mid-twentieth-century London ∗". Social History. 32 (1): 27–53. doi:10.1080/03071020601081256. ISSN 0307-1022.
Edelstein, Arnon (2015). "Rethinking Conceptual Definitions of the Criminal Career and Serial Criminality". Trauma, Violence, & Abuse. 17 (1): 62–71. doi:10.1177/1524838014566694. ISSN 1524-8380.)
Carter, Oliver (26 July 2018). "Original Climax Films: historicizing the British hardcore pornography film business" (PDF). Porn Studies. 5 (4): 411–425. doi:10.1080/23268743.2018.1489301. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
Mort, Frank (2010), Capital Affairs: London and the Making of the Permissive Society, Yale University Press, ISBN 978-0-300-11879-7 {{citation}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |laydate=, |laysummary=, and |authormask= (help)
Tyler, Melissa (2019), Soho at Work, Cambridge University Press, pp. 65–, ISBN 978-1-107-18273-8 {{citation}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |laydate=, |laysummary=, and |authormask= (help)

More information Extended content ...

Extended content

Article: James Humphreys (pornographer)
Sentence 1: On his release from Dartmoor Humphreys changed direction professionally and opened a strip club in Old Compton Street, Soho, which was frequented by fellow criminals.
- There is clear ambiguity. The primary meaning of "professionally" is:(OED) "In a professional manner; by, or as if by, a professional. 1901 Daily Chron. 21 Dec. 3/2 For German officers, the best professionally trained officers in the world, no preliminary specialisation is required. 1941 J. Agee & W. Evans Let us now praise Famous Men 436 Her dark blond hair is newly washed and professionally done up in puffs at the ears. 2000 Which? Oct. 18/1 Cavity wall insulation... Get it professionally done." Webster's Unabridged in a professional manner <a professionally equipped stage — Key Reporter> <the first professionally trained and experienced librarian to fill this position — Current Biography>
- Humpherys was not a professional, not even a professional criminal, before he opened his strip club. See for example: Edelstein, Arnon (2015). "Rethinking Conceptual Definitions of the Criminal Career and Serial Criminality". Trauma, Violence, & Abuse. 17 (1): 62–71. doi:10.1177/1524838014566694. ISSN 1524-8380.) (From Edelstein's table, p. 63 A professional criminal is someone who is not moonlighting, who has a full-time job in crime; who has a specialization in specific crimes; whose monetary gain is high and stable, and not low or cut off by imprisonment. According to Duncan Campbell (much cited in the article): "Humphreys, a crook but not a major one, was amongst the first to profit from the sixties’ boom in pornography." and elsewhere, "Jimmy Humphreys was a south Londoner from Old Kent Road who had spent time for minor villainy in approved schools, Borstals, and prisons, ..."
Sentence 2:Soho was the area of London described by the cultural theorist Oliver Carter as "the central location for London's sexual economy, with pornography and sex work being its defining feature". (cited to page 6 of a journal article of Oliver Carter: Carter, Oliver (26 July 2018). "Original Climax Films: historicizing the British hardcore pornography film business" (PDF). Porn Studies. 5 (4): 411–425. doi:10.1080/23268743.2018.1489301. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
- Carter, however, says, on page 6: ". According to Mort (2010) Soho was the central location for London’s sexual economy, with pornography and sex work being its defining feature. This economy was able to operate through an alliance between local entrepreneurs and the Metropolitan Police."
- Mort (2010) is, page 222 of Mort, Frank (2010), Capital Affairs: London and the Making of the Permissive Society, Yale University Press, ISBN 978-0-300-11879-7 {{citation}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |laydate=, |laysummary=, and |authormask= (help)
- That this is indeed the case, is mentioned by Tyler, Melissa (2019), Soho at Work, Cambridge University Press, pp. 65–, ISBN 978-1-107-18273-8 {{citation}}: Cite has empty unknown parameters: |laydate=, |laysummary=, and |authormask= (help) on page 65:
  "As Frank Mort has summarized it in Capital Affairs, Soho’s location is fundamental to understanding its significance as ‘London’s exotic foreign quarter and long-standing centre of the capital’s sexual economy’”
- Frank Mort works in Cultural History at Manchester. Oliver Carter, in Culture Theory at Birmingham City University. Both are well-recognized in their fields. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 19:11, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
  - Nothing here negates anything in the article. As with much of the dross posted at your second rate FAC review, you are insisting on minute changes based on little more than a desire to be disruptive. Time to trip trap off somewhere else. - SchroCat (talk) 19:17, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
Sentence 2 (continued). After inaccurately quoting Oliver Carter, no attempt is made anywhere to explain how this "sexual economy" worked, or where it stood with respect to British law. Oliver Carter himself describes it:
Under British law, distributing hardcore pornography was restricted by the Obscene Publications Act. This was introduced to “strengthen the law concerning pornography” (Robertson 1979, 20). The vague and problematic law was enforced by the Obscene Publications Squad (OPS), an arm of the Metropolitan Police known as the Dirty Squad. According to Geoffrey Robertson (1979, 5) OPS officers “maintained an unofficial licensing system in Soho, permitting the surreptitious sale of hardcore material”. OPS officers found that they could make large sums of money from those involved in Soho’s sexual economy as well as controlling what could or could not be sold in the bookstores. Martin Tomkinson (1980, 53-54) states that the “going rate” for a licence would be “£100 - £200 for a single shop”; larger players like Jimmy Humphreys would pay £1000 a month.
The expression "licensing fee" occurs nowhere in the article. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 20:31, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
Sentence 3: Humphreys rekindled a relationship with a former girlfriend, June Gaynor, nicknamed Rusty, after the colour of her hair; she had previously worked as a barmaid and model, but was employed as a stripper by the time she and Humphreys resumed their relationship. The couple married in May 1963." (Cited to two sources, the second of which is Duncan Campbell (journalist, born 1944), longtime Guardian journalist.)
- I can't access the first source; Campbell, however, says,
  At the same time, one June Packard who had renamed herself Rusty Gaynor - Rusty after the colour of her hair and Gaynor after the film star Mitzi - was becoming the Queen of the Soho strippers. From the family of a respectable Kent master-builder, she had been encouraged to learn tap-dancing and singing by a mother who dreamed of another Shirley Temple. Rusty had started as a chorus girl but, when music hall faded from fashion, found herself working as a Soho stripper. She decided to make herself one of the best, choosing her own musical arrangements, hiring Shirley Bassey’s choreographer of the time, flying to Paris to see what they were doing at the Crazy Horse and the Folies Bergére, and stripping to torch songs and ‘Rhapsody in Blue’.
- June Packard, took the name Rusty Gaynor (Rusty after her hair, and Gaynor after Mitzi Gaynor. She was a chorus girl. She wasn't just employed as a stripper but was actively pursuing that career. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 19:57, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
Sentence 4: "To keep the club free of harassment from the police, Humphreys had to pay protection money to Detective Sergeant Harold "Tanky" Challenor."
- "protection money" pipes to Protection racket, which says, "A protection racket is a scheme whereby a group provides protection to businesses or other groups through violence outside the sanction of the law. In other words, it is a racket that sells security, traditionally physical security but now also computer security. Through the credible threat of violence, the racketeers deter people from swindling, robbing, injuring, sabotaging or otherwise harming their clients. Protection rackets tend to appear in markets in which the police and judiciary cannot be counted on to provide legal protection, because of incompetence (as in weak or failed states) or illegality (black markets)."
- This is seen elsewhere in the article, links that mislead are presented to the reader. No responsibility is taken; rather, it is left to the reader to make judicious assessments after clicking out from the page and wasting much time. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:02, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Close

Aksai Chin

Let me know what you are seeing wrong with the Aksai Chin page and I will work to make it more in line with the standards for WT:INDIA. Geographyinitiative (talk) 15:34, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

I believe your question has been answered on the article's talk page. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:47, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy New Year, Fowler&fowler!

Happy New Year!

Fowler&fowler,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia.
Happy Holidays! ᗙ DBigXrayᗙ 21:00, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks}} to user talk pages.

Thank you and the same to you and yours. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 03:54, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Happy New Year, Fowler&fowler!

Happy New Year!

Fowler&fowler,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia.
Fylindfotberserk (talk) 10:29, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

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Jammu Map

Hi could you please add the discussed map which is present on all Kashmir articles to the Jammu article? As I do not want to ruin the page by editing the map incorecctly thanks. 2A02:C7F:3614:CA00:428:F043:792:AB4A (talk) 13:15, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Edit-warring on Hindustani

I reverted your BOLD rewrite of the article. Please don't edit-war, but take it to talk. This article is about the language variously called 'Hindustani', 'Hindi-Urdu', etc. You changed it into an article about the word 'Hindustani', which besides being a violation of WP.DICT leaves us with no article about the national language of India and Pakistan. If your objection is the name, the proper procedure is a move discussion, not the deletion of the language. — kwami (talk) 23:39, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

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India Education Section

Hello Fowler&fowler, please forgive me for adding in the "Education" section into the India article without prior discussion. I also understand your comment about a sole IIT Bombay image being inappropriate for such a section. I would like to know if adding in this section once again, with the appropriate edits, can now be discussed. I believe it is a very important section that is available in numerous other country pages and, thus, should be put into consideration.

Thank you Doc2129 (talk) 11:11, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

You rang?

"One of the people, I mentioned above needs to say something here" ... I don't know who you mean ... anyone in particular? - Dank (push to talk) 21:12, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm tired, nodding off, I should have said, "One of the computer scientists I pinged above." Of course, you yourself, might be one, and your comments too would be useful. I was wondering if it is possible to have aa robust automated system which would randomly select six featured articles (out of the 5,000) for each day, give them a four-hour prime spot and use your pre-made blurbs. The entire process would be automated. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:31, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Ah, oops, I'm the wrong guy for that. - Dank (push to talk) 22:27, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose's death history

Have you any appropriate sorce of Netaji's death history??? Subrata Ghanty (talk) 09:25, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Edit war on Lab Pe Aati Hai Dua

I have warned TheEshanKumar with respect to the repeated changes on Lab Pe Aati Hai Dua. Likewise, you should be careful to remember that it takes two to edit war. Hopefully this can be sorted out on the article's talk, or otherwise through an appropriate forum. Dl2000 (talk) 00:11, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

@Dl2000: Thank you for the kind warning. It is always good to be reminded of the rules and guidelines under which we operate. Best regards, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 01:40, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Vindictive

Fowler what was the point of this ? It was perfectly clear that the nominator had requested the FAC to be withdrawn. It is none of your business as to when the coordinators find the time to archive it. And, I for one am way past caring what you think. Graham Beards (talk) 11:33, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Research of Hindustani

When I searched about Hindustani language, i find this page on Encyclopaedia Britticana, I read it, but it is not Hindustani, it's Hindawi, written, in Encyclopaedia Britticana. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fogstar (talk • contribs) 19:25, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Fisher cat in New England

Does anyone who watches this page know if the Fisher cat has made it to New England from Canada? About ten minutes ago, I caught a glimpse of something in the woods that at first appeared to be a cat. In fact, I did a double-take because it looked like one of ours. But its pointier snout, longer tail, and shorter legs, was certainly no cat's. It wasn't a weasel, opossum, or woodchuck, so I lean toward the Fisher. Beautiful black coat. No wonder it was hunted down for its pelt. A little later the ravens in one of the tall trees began to caw like no tomorrow. Probably from just the sight of him; I doubt he can climb that high. I didn't take a picture because wouldn't you know, I left my phone at home. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 12:48, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

According to Fisher (animal), yes - in fact it was always part of their natural range. Johnbod (talk) 13:51, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks John. In the meantime, I asked some oldtimers here who said he said he is a rare sight. ... Now I have the camera handy but no Fisher. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:35, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

My wife meanwhile heard from Fish and Wildlife. They said fishers are around, but not commonly seen. They apparently eat squirrels ... We feed the squirrels. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:53, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:09, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

We have them in eastern Massachusetts. David notMD (talk) 10:10, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks @David notMD:. We have our eyes peeled for him (and his kin) now! Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:26, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Notification about a FAC renomination

Greetings,

since you did comment on this later withdrawn FAC I wanted to notify you that I've renominated it at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Coropuna/archive2. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 20:15, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

OK Great! Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:08, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Sorry for bothering you, but...

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Hindustani

Some of what you added on the talk page for Hindustani language was interesting and a lot has references to support it, you should add it to the actual article. If you haven't already? The distinction as obsolete, the British civil service exam, etc. Irtapil (talk) 14:16, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

@Irtapil: I tried once but was buried in an avalanche of reverts. I am in the process of finding more sources and understanding the considered replies of some linguists (Kwami, Austronesier, and SMcCandlish). I liked your post on the Hindustani talk page. The problem is that there is a whole خاندان of Hindustani pages full of POV. I just noticed one Hindustani kinship terms. Which Urdu speaker (at least in India) calls their father's younger brother chaachaa instead of چچا? Little things like this irritate me, but I'm trying to stay calm and soldier on. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:40, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

What got reverted? why would they delete appropriately referenced content? Or do you mean they revert places you've changed Hindustani to something else?

I'm not the most knowledgeable, I've started learning Urdu and Hindi recently and when I can't find the answer on wiki, I find it elsewhere, then I bring it back here for the next person to find more easily than I did.

Does خاندان mean family? You mean just an interconnected collection of pages?

Hindustani isn't even the most used and accessible term in modern English? It is not something known by people not already knowledgeable on the topic, and surely the people who would be looking it up on Wikipedia are not experienced linguists? So a more commonly used and recognisable term would be better for page titles?

The fluent Urdu speakers i know are Pakistani, Indian Urdu is quite a mystery to me. If you know much about the languages overlapping both countries there's some dubious translations of "republic" on the names of India in local languages page that I'm not having much luck verifying. Writing Urdu / Sindi / Punjabi / Kashmiri in a different script shouldn't change the word? I suspect English speakers are copying the word used for Pakistan because it's the same in English? But I might be wrong (e.g. I once corrected हिंदी to हिन्दी before realising both were ok and reverting it myself).

I'm not sure what you are getting at with chacha. To me that looks like both say cha-cha? is the longer second A in the Persian one the difference you mean? Or just that the second is written in Persian? I think two alifs might be the more common spelling? One of my closest friends speaks Urdu and a lot of Urdu speakers writing blogs and such in English will use the Urdu terms for relatives since they want to distinguish which grandma or which uncle they mean. So kinship terms are one of the things know a few of (even though I can barely count to ten yet, i know "one" and I can only spell it in Hindi). The terms they use are recognisable, but rarely match the formal transliterations. The only source i know of for cha-cha is one I'm not sure is a good idea too add, somewhat controversial to the point that the author published it in first name only, A picture book called "My Cha-cha is Gay". Irtapil (talk) 00:22, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Updated above to fix a few typos etc. Irtapil (talk) 00:39, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

North East Delhi riots

Thanks for appreciating.

Wolf

Regarding the recent discussion about The Times of India at WP:RSN

Many people, including El C, seem to be fully convinced by your argument. I partially disagree.

While it is true that TOI has been - since time immemorial - a pro-government newspaper, it has recently begun to show independence. Nowadays, I see a lot of op-eds in TOI (and Sunday Times) which bash the Indian government for the CAA-NRC duplet.

Press freedom is directly proportional to the gross domestic product per capita (GDP per capita) in democracies. Please wait and watch for a few years; you will see a gradual shift towards liberalism in Indian media.

And TOI is quite a visible newspaper; any false claims published in it will be instantly rebutted.— Vaibhavafro ^💬 12:53, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Well GDP has some correlation, but it probably has to be hard-earned; look at some of the middle eastern countries Saudi Arabia, Qatar, ... I don't disagree with your other assertions, but the problem for WP is that a large number of people who will be attempting to use a TOI article as a source might not have knowledge of these changing dynamics. The decision about reliability is made with respect to a generic global WP editor. I'm sure TOI will get there again, but right now in my view, it is not there. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 13:30, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Who said I was convinced by Fowler&fowler's argument? Please don't put words in my mouth. I merely interpreted the arguments and agreements in that discussion. My closing was not a supervote and should not be viewed as such. I did not express my own view, but here it is: your view that in "a few years" there will be "a gradual shift towards liberalism in Indian media" is nothing but prophecy, which I put very little stock in. El_C 14:28, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

@El C: I apologise for my mistake. I thought you were convinced by Fowler&fowler’s case because you praised his “substantive argument (and breadth of knowledge in this area)”. If you have time, please checkout this analysis by M. Huitsing published by Media Bias/Fact Check.— Vaibhavafro ^💬 04:16, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Let’s consider an example. The Hindu is widely respected as a reliable source. However, even it is considered to have a slight-to-moderate pro-China and pro-Communist bias (which is not surprising because The Hindu’s stronghold is South India).

This bias can be brilliantly illustrated by the following excerpt from the book The Accidental Prime Minister: The Making and Unmaking of Manmohan Singh by Sanjaya Baru. The page number is 204 and the chapter name is Ending Nuclear Apartheid.

“Many in the audience, including The Hindu’s chief editor N. Ram, walked up to Dr Singh and complimented him for his ‘visionary’ speech. However, a misreading of his speech by the London-based Times of India reporter, who was not even present in Oxford, resulted in a front-page story accusing Dr Singh of ‘genuflecting before the Empire’. Both the BJP and the communists instantly attacked him. Since Ram had praised the PM, I urged him to write an editorial explaining why he thought the PM’s speech was ‘visionary’ and he agreed to do so. However, the next day he called to say that Irfan Habib, the Marxist historian, and Prabhat Patnaik, the Marxist economist, had penned a strong attack against the PM and it would be difficult for him to editorially defend him. Ram, like Irfan and Prabhat, was a member of the CPI(M).”-Sanjaya Baru

In spite of this bias, The Hindu is still considered to be a reliable source. Why is not The Times of India analogically considered a reliable source, even if it has an apparent ‘pro-government bias’?— Vaibhavafro ^💬 09:25, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Unbecoming conduct

Reminder

British Indian provinces coat of arms

1RR violation at 2020 Delhi riots

Disambiguation link notification for March 25

2020 Delhi riots

Thanks for the note, but yes, I do mind, a lot. Not just because of the quotes--I don't understand your argument at all, and they're already "in the record" already. "the lead is being carefully finalized" sounds like there's some committee writing it, some committee that I and others didn't get invited to. Perhaps you can ask the committee why it saw fit to revert my edits to the rather horrible prose; who on earth writes tripe like "Muslims were described as having been targeted by the rioters" (as if Muslims weren't targeted in reality, just in someone's mind--was this article written by someone who was afraid of saying it like it is?) or "Fifty-three people were killed, most of whom were Muslims who were shot...". Shit, I can't even restore a decent topic sentence ("Muslims, muslim-owned properties, and mosques were specifically targeted by the rioters") because of the 1R restriction. No, I mind a lot. Drmies (talk) 13:18, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

This is a toxic topic. It took a long time for it to calm down, and it wouldn't have happened without some general agreement among the editors (e.g. using only third-party international media with correspondents based in Delhi; in other words, not using Indian media, other South Asian media, etc.). In the absence of that, do you know how many newspapers there are available for use and misuse in the echo chamber of the Indian media? Enough that for every claim that Muslims were targeted, there are two that the Pakistanis choreographed the violence to embarrass Modi during Trump's visit. And I'm talking about the well-known newspapers that have the imprimatur of WP's tastemakers. Such is the pressure the Indian government has been bringing to bear on India's press. As for quotes, if you don't add the extended ones, i.e. only the citation, others will add polar opposite claims with the same citation, and then you'll be sidetracked in time-consuming disputes. Besides replacing the sentence, "Muslims were targeted, according to witnesses," (or paraphrase thereof) with "Muslims, Muslim-owned properties, and mosques were specifically targeted by the rioters," makes for less than coherent prose, when the very next sentence says, "In some instances, witnesses accused policemen of joining the rioters. In other instances ... Muslims were brutalised." Why? Because the police did not join in property destruction, only in beating up Muslim men. So the first sentence does need to be about Muslims, not property. Your sentence is also redundant when two sentences later we are saying, "The properties destroyed were disproportionately Muslim-owned and included four mosques, which were set ablaze by rioters." So, again: people write, "Muslims were described (by witnesses) as being targeted ..." because if they don't there will be edit wars (and they've been plenty) disputing the paraphrasing; precise paraphrasing of the source can sometimes be clunky but is a good temporary expedient. Best regards, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:23, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't agree with your grammatical and rhetorical analysis, and that POV commentators will disagree with statements of facts doesn't mean we need to avoid stating the facts. Drmies (talk) 15:03, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm afraid you'll have to tell me why you disagree. Best regards, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 17:17, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't know, Fowler&Fowler--if you produce prose like this, "Muslims have been interpreted as having been marked out as targets for meting out violence" (I don't know how you managed to make it worse, but you did), using two weasel phrases and a passive construction to say "rioters singled out Muslims", I'm not sure there is anything I can explain to you. If "pressure" is making you write like that, maybe you should step away from the article. Drmies (talk) 13:21, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

:) @Drmies: The problem is that we don't know that rioters singled out Muslims. Some people, by no means all, have made that interpretation. In some neighborhoods that is more the case than some others. Moreover, we don't know who has made that interpretation (the much-needed subject of active voice is absent in the sources; the source says, "The violence is described ... targeted," or "appears to be targeted." "Target (v)," moreover is chiefly an American English construction, and that a relatively recent one. The article is presumably written in some variant of Commonwealth English) What options do we have? An interpretation was made, by whom we don't know. Moreover, such interpretations are presumably still being made. We have no choice but to use the past perfect. I'm happy to listen to other formulations. Please suggest something else. But you will appreciate that constraints loom large. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:02, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

I've undone my last effort at forbiddingly scrupulous NPOV. Thanks for your post. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:23, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Civility

Indenting

Your ownership of 2020 Delhi riots

@Fowler&fowler: Yesterday you removed 2020 Delhi riots from your list of self-appointed Current responsibilities, which I thought might signal you were done editing that page. Today, however, you returned. I therefore ask you to read my recent contribution to Talk:2020 Delhi riots that administrator El C removed after just two minutes, meaning you may not have had a chance to see it. I sought to comply with Wikipedia's Ownership of Content by posting it, as the policy directs, on the article talk page before proceeding to mediation. El C, though, disapproved, asserting in his edit summary, "this is not the place to make such a report!" For that reason, I am engaging you here on this matter, just to be on record as having attempted to solve the problem directly with you. NedFausa (talk) 01:03, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

El_C, RegentsPark I understand that it is not the job of admins to intervene in content disputes, but at the same time, there is a limit to which people can nip at the heels of reasonably well-written edits, relentlessly. Please examine this history of death by a thousand cuts:

In other instances, Muslim males—who unlike Hindu males are commonly circumcised—were forced to show their genitals for ascertaining their religion before they were brutalised. (diff (some version of my original edit; I didn't have the m-dashes
Some Muslim males—who unlike Hindu males are commonly circumcised—were forced to show their genitals for ascertaining their religion before they were brutalised. (diff (edit by NedFausa, which introduces the ambiguity that only some Muslim males are circumcised.
Muslim males—who unlike Hindu males are commonly circumcised—were sometimes forced to show their genitals for ascertaining their religion before they were brutalised. (Corrected by Kautilya3 diff)
For ascertaining their religion, Muslim males, who unlike Hindu males are commonly circumcised, were at times forced to show their genitals before being brutalised. (I changed it to this version, as it came after, "Victims of the violence were targeted for being Muslim." "Muslim" was appearing back to back. (diff)
For ascertaining their religion, Muslim males, who unlike Hindu males are commonly circumcised, were at times forced to remove their lower garments before being brutalised. (I changed it because a new sentence, "Among the injuries recorded in one hospital were lacerated genitals." had been added, and now "genitals" was being repeated in two consecutive sentences. (diff)
Earlier today, NedFauser changed the sentence to "Muslim males, who unlike Hindus are commonly circumcised, were at times forced to remove their lower garments so that Hindus could ascertain their religion before brutalising them." with edit summary, "reword to clarify that Muslim males were not ascertaining their own religion. Please note: this is not a substantial change to the lead's status quo"
Dear El_C and RegentsPark, Each time these editors edit, they introduce errors which have to be set right, even when they claim in long edit summaries that they are not changing the status quo. Please examine my last three edits. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 01:15, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Arbitration enforcement notification

Disambiguation link notification for April 6

Maurya Empire

Hi, I noticed you reverted my edits to Maurya Empire for being too large of a one-time edit. Would you prefer if I divided it into multiple edits? Is this a Wikipedia policy I should be aware of?

I'm actually planning on making a number of edits to the article. As it stands, Maurya Empire is a bit of a mess: it is often haphazard and repetitive, contains a lot of unsourced content, and makes the mistake of presenting the narratives of specific poetic sources as fact, even when it contradicts other primary sources. There are also POV and OR issues regarding its appraisal of Ashoka's commanding abilities as a prince.

The main changes I want to make (the ones I made were 1, 2, 3, and some things under 5) are:

Addition of comments on the prescriptions of the Arthashastra for context on early Mauryan economic policy
Addition of references for the comments on internal trade in the Maurya Empire
Addition of a subsection on personal freedoms under the Maurya Empire, as per the Arthashastra and during Ashoka's reign
Addition of a subsection on the symbols of the Maurya Empire.
A section on the scientific and technological advancements and economic institutions created in India during the Maurya Empire
A subsection for Hinduism under the "Religion" section, as the Hindu synthesis occurred during the Mauryan period, and Buddhist influence on Hinduism (and vice versa) is also seen in this period.
Removal of unsourced content (which have been citation needed since 2016):
1. attribution of waterways and canal construction to Ashoka
2. attribution of expanded trade with Indo-Greeks to Ashoka
3. claim of Ashoka being the first ruler in history to advocate wildlife conservation
4. claim of private corporations existing prior to the Maurya Empire
5. claim of Bindusara himself being an Ajivika seems to be OR (we know that the Ajivika sect peaked under his reign and that his wife and advisor were Ajivikas, but there are no sources that suggest he himself adopted a sramana religion).
A rewrite of the "History" section in accordance with the uncertainty regarding the chronology and details of the various described events. E.g.
1. The Mudrarakshasa should not be presented as an uncontroversial description of the founding of the empire, as it contradicts heavily with Buddhist and Jain sources, and is considered a fictionalized account
2. The account of the North-Western conquests are haphazard and repeated in multiple places.
3. It is not clear that Bindusara himself carried out the Deccan conquests: Greco-Roman sources suggest that Chandragupta Maurya himself already controlled peninsular India, as does the Jain legend of Maurya retiring to South India.
4. Whether Ashoka's conversion to Buddhism occurred as a result of the Kalinga war is controversial, as many historians believe it contradicts Sri Lankan legend. In any case, the section on Ashoka should be written in a more encyclopedic tone.
5. Expansion of the Decline section, which currently does not mention the two-capital theory (that a breakaway capital may have formed at Ujjain during the reign of Dasharatha).
Some reorganization of the content about the contact with the Hellenistic world -- I find it rather unnatural to have an entire section devoted to Mauryan trade with Greece, when the Mauryans also traded with Central Asia and even built significant infrastructure for this purpose. I would find it more natural to have a section on foreign relationships including subsections on Hellenistic influence and the transmission of Buddhism to Central Asia.
Addition of a section listing primary sources of information regarding the Maurya Empire. This could be an expansion of the "Literature" section which is currently sorely lacking.

Also, you referred to the references I added as old sources. This is odd, considering that I have mostly used sources from the 21st century -- you may have confused my edits with the references that were already present in the article. The only references I've added from before 1990 are:

Craddock, P.T. et al., Zinc production in medieval India, World Archaeology, vol.15, no.2, Industrial Archaeology, 1983
Joseph Spengler (1971), Indian Economic Thought, Duke University Press, ISBN 978-0822302452, pages 72-73
Benjamin Walker, p. 69, Hindu World: An Encyclopedic Survey of Hinduism. In Two Volumes. Volume II M-Z
K. M. Sarkar (1927). The Grand Trunk Road in the Punjab: 1849-1886. Atlantic Publishers & Distri. pp. 2–. GGKEY:GQWKH1K79D6.
Arthashastra R Shamasastry (Translator), Book IV.

Of which Shamasastry is still the standard translation of the Arthashastra are Sarkar and Walker are just cited for the fact that the Mauryans built the Grand Trunk Road.

Do tell me how you'd prefer to have me make my edits -- I'll be happy to make them separately if it makes for easier documentation.

Chan-Paton factor (talk) 13:44, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Please take this to the article talk page, and gain consensus for your edits. Consensus will take time. This is a high-level article with many watchers. Not everyone will respond right away. I would say at least a couple of weeks. This is a difficult time for everyone, and yours seems to be a big edit. Thanks and best regards, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 13:47, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

PS pinging @Chan-Paton factor, Kautilya3, पाटलिपुत्र, and Johnbod: Fowler&fowler «Talk» 13:51, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough, thanks. I've created a section in talk for discussion. Chan-Paton factor (talk) 14:08, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

2020 Delhi riots edit objection

F&f, can you clarify a point regarding this post? Are you objecting to:

this edit in which the editor removed a citation that they said did not support the claim that the riots ended on March 1, and replaced it with {{cn}} tag? From your statement that "I have no idea how long the violence lasted, precisely. it appears that you agree that the March 1 end-date claim needs to be examined and the previously cited HT article is not sufficient to support it.
Or, are you objecting to this edit in which the editor removed the sub-section related to March 1 events? If so, you can yourself revert the deletion (it will be within 1RR) and following WP:BRD, the issue can continue to be discussed on the talkpage till proper consensus is reached (I agree that editors should not be in a rush to declare consensus on any contentious issue and should wait at least a day or so; not a hard-and-fast rule but a common sense recommendation).

Posting this here since it deals mainly with a process issue and not article content itself, and thus may be a distraction if discussed on the article talkpage. Let me know if I am missing something. Abecedare (talk) 00:48, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi @Abecedare: Thanks for posting here. There are all sorts of dates and time frames given for the riots. We, for example, say that mobs of Hindu were going around Muslim neighborhoods attempting to scare Muslims out of house and home in the days leading up to Holi (celebrated March 9). We mention that in the lead. So, what do we mean by putting even the date of March 1 as the last date for the riots? I mean, do we mean, killing? Do we mean intimidation by mobs with threats of death? If the former, what date do we assign to the decomposed bodies found in the fetid canals for days afterward; if the latter, then even March 1 is too soon. I guess what I'm saying is that various editors, who shall remain unnamed, are, at least from my point of view, taking advantage of your good nature, by constantly bickering about inconsequentials on the talk page and wasting time, holding up progress being achieved by other editors such as SerChevalerie. I'm frustrated. I've added dates from the reliable foreign sources on the talk page. I'm sure I can find sources for the March 1 date. I can't recall off the top of my head, but I've seen them. Hold on. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:36, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

PS It didn't even take that long. See this piece in the Diplomat, which says, "Within hours, the worst Hindu-Muslim violence in more than three decades exploded. Between February 23 and March 1, mobs of Hindus and Muslims clashed, resulting in dozens of casualties, while vehicles, shops, and houses were razed to the ground. In all, 53 people were killed, mostly Muslims." and again later, "Even after March 1, when clashes had dissipated, hard-line elements of the BJP, including Mishra, continued to stir animosity by propagating a narrative that the violence was provoked by anti-nationals, aiming to undermine India, including during celebrations of the Hindu festival of Holi on March 9." This is an analysis piece, not an opinion piece. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:41, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

PPS I'm not hung up on any date. One could finesse it. We could write: The week of 23 February 2020, and leave the enumeration vague. Or several days following 23 February 2020. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 03:09, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

I agree with your position that it will be hard/impossible to nail down any single date as the definitive end-date for the riots. That is the reason I believe that you too would agree that given the current choice between

(a) 23 February 2020 – 1 March 2020 (7 days)^[1], which states the March 1 end-date as a fact, and

(b) 23 February 2020 – 1 March 2020 (7 days)^{[citation needed]}, which at least indicates to the reader that the dates are not unimpeachable.

option (b) would be preferable. Right?

Of course, (b) can only be a temporary solution while the discussion on what the final arrangement should be takes place. That final choice could be between excluding dates altogether from the infobox; keeping it really vague "around end-Feb 2020"; slightly vague "Feb 23 to approx March 1"; reflecting the range of dates offered by sources, eg, "3-10 days starting Feb 23"; providing the most common end-date in the infobox and detailing the complexity in a footnote etc. You and I, both have dealt with such ambiguities in numerous history articles and are well familiar with the commonly used templates in such scenarios. And also too familiar with the discussion required to be waded through to reach a consensus; although, as you state, this need not be the highest priority for discussion for now and (b) may be a decent placeholder that may be acceptable to all the current discussants.

Hope you and fam. are doing well and protecting yourself from the pandemic (a sentence I couldn't have imagined writing just a few months back!) Cheers.. Abecedare (talk) 03:13, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, and I too could not have imagined thanking you (in earnest, that is; I would have thought, "what pandemic?") for the good wishes a few months back! I hope you and your family are protecting yourself, as well, in these surreal, yet scary, times.

In case (b) above, can I remove the citation needed tag, by citing the claim to the Diplomat article? It is analysis, not hard news, but as long as we will be discussing the date anyway, what harm is there in letting the March 1 date remain, properly cited? Fowler&fowler «Talk» 04:16, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Good morning, @Abecedare:. Sorry, I meant, citing it to the Diplomat article and adding {{Better source}}, which would indicate that the source is not unimpeachable, as you eloquently put it. Best regards, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 12:58, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

PS The Diplomat article is: Singh, Jasminder (3 April 2020), "The 2020 Delhi Riots: Implications for Southeast Asia", Diplomat, retrieved 12 April 2020, Between February 23 and March 1, mobs of Hindus and Muslims clashed, resulting in dozens of casualties, while vehicles, shops, and houses were razed to the ground. In all, 53 people were killed, mostly Muslims. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:23, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Good find. Best to discuss it on the article talkpage but be prepared to spark discussion on what the ideal content for the infobox field would be. That discussion does need to happen at some point; just a matter of when you and others would prefer to deal with it. Abecedare (talk) 14:35, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

References

[1]
"Panic grips Delhi after fresh violence rumours, police say situation normal". Hindustan Times. 2020-03-01. Retrieved 2020-03-09. No riot-related deaths were reported on Saturday but a shop was set on fire in the Welcome area, said police.

Romila

Urdu

"Sorry you cannot revert someone else's talk page post"

Please stop deleting my contributions

Mughul empire

question

Precious anniversary

Precious

Three years!

Note

Sorry if I came across as a bit cranky on FAC talk the other day, I think might have misunderstood what you were suggesting; not in hindsight that you were implying or anything, but have a reactive dislike of being guilt tripped over my chose article subject matter. Anyways, hope you and yours are keeping safe. Ceoil (talk) 18:51, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi there. No, not at all. No offense was taken because none was given by you. Free choice is the strength of Wikipedia and I would never meddle with it. (I should add, in that discussion, I was simultaneously ramping up on the statistics (in particular the existence of 700+ warfare related FAs) and trying to remember what it was like 10 years ago, so my POV was evolving. I might have said different things at different times. ) Still, something seems to have happened. I just made a little graph for the Transport FAs in User:Fowler&fowler/FA Diversity Transport. It is pretty stark—the landscape of diversity there, that is. How and why that has happened is what I'm trying to understand. Wikipedia's principles are all sound. Was it a case of Lord of the Flies? That is the mystery. I've sounded out some folk who were involved in the last great rewrite of Britannica. They are getting on in years, and won't want to get involved in details, but are still full of wisdom. It will take time to unravel this mystery. Months at the very least.

As for this surreal life we are all leading, who would have thunk? This is the time to read Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year or Camus's Plague ... My wife and I are baking a lot, making yogurt, ... I'm cleaning the cat litter twice a day, which I did only in theory earlier. We had thought about growing veggies, but the survivalists beat us to it. The seeds were all gone, just as the toilet paper was in the supermarkets, as Americans rose to new heights, or should I say expanded to new volumes, of hoarding. All stores are price gouging. Sort of like famine in the old days, so I should add Ackroyd's Conquest of Famine to the reading list. Maybe I'll make a Desert Island List. I've taken to adding pictures of our surroundings, all except the tandoor, on my user page.. I hope you and Liz and the family are safe. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 01:19, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Fowler, all is well here, Liz made it out of IRL as restrictions were coming to look after parents in NE. So I now have sole resp for the cats, ulp...they are running circles around and playing me big time...yes am a sucker ha ha. Restrictions beginning to lift in a very controlled and cautious way, which gives people hope. Ceoil (talk) 20:01, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

That is a very nice thing Liz is doing for her parents. I'm sure they appreciate this. Yes, cats know how to play humans. I think the arrangement is programmed into both species. Cute picture. Here too, they are lifting a bit, amid grim prognostications, of course. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:41, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

Yadav

Hi, do you have access to the MSA Rao source used in the Yadav article? Way back in 2017 you did a fair amount of work on it but in the section on Post-independence there was and remains a citation needed tag for statements attributed in-text to Rao. The style of writing reads as if it might have been your work. I suspect we would need to qualify things if it was from Rao's 1979 study (just to put his stats in context) but first I think it needs an actual cite, unless I have missed something among all the usual pov edits and incompetence that affects the article. - Sitush (talk) 12:01, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Hello Sitush, Long time no see. So, welcome back!

I've reviewed the history. I apparently made my last substantive edit in 2011. The lead in that edit is the same as what is currently in place! But the Post-independence section doesn't ring a bell. Not saying it wasn't me, but I'll have to do some rummaging to figure out the Rao bit. I don't remember that author. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 12:45, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, I am on mobile & saw your edit in 2017 & didn't check further. I don't have access to Rao here so am stumped. Might be simpler just to delete the info because the stats will be outdated anyway. - Sitush (talk) 13:05, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

He seems to be well-known in his sub-field of sociology, but most of his books are on snippet view, which means he was active quite some time ago. Yeah, you could delete it; I'm sure we can find modern sources. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:12, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I have one of his books here but not the one cited. I will delete as outdated/tagged for years. Thanks. Hope you are keeping well. - Sitush (talk) 14:28, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

And I hope you are too Sitush in these strange times. The other day I took one of our cats to the vet. No longer are humans allowed in. Ceoil, who too is a caretaker of felines will appreciate the protocol. Upon arriving in the parking lot, call the receptionist on your cell phone. Upon seeing a technician in mask and gloves, crack open your car windows, unbuckle the cat carrier, put on your mask, and exit your car. They didn't say with both hands raised, but it wouldn't hurt. Maintain a safe distance while the technician extracts the honored patient. Wait for 15 minutes, 30 minutes, or as long as it takes, until the vet calls you with a diagnosis, a prognosis, and other essential details. As a rule, money is not an essential detail. A similar protocol exists for receiving the honored patient after a cure has been effected. The honored patient seemed pleased with this arrangement. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:34, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Ha! Of course, there was a 50/50 chance of the patient being pleased - cats veer between a desire for extreme distancing and being the centre of attention. I am not supposed to step outside my house as I am "clinically extremely vulnerable". As luck would have it, my neighbour is a vet and so my dog has had more walks than me & next Monday is being taken in for some dentistry. Thus far, it is the first time he has enjoyed being with a vet; I doubt that will apply after Monday. - Sitush (talk) 03:40, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

I'm sorry to hear but glad that you're taking good care of yourself, and your neighbor is helping out. Unlike us, dogs and cats receive general anesthesia for dental work. So he won't feel a thing during the visit. The apportionment of blame will begin after returning home. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 03:58, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Australasian Antarctic Expedition

RfC

File:Joppen1907India1805a.jpg

June 2020

Orphaned non-free image File:CharanSinghRedFortDelhi15August1979.JPG

Regarding the "History of India" page

Deletion of Yadav Article's Heading image of Ahirs in Delhi

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Featured_article_candidates#Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/Dimple_Kapadia/archive1

FAC...

F&F - I'm going be be blunt here. I did archive the Dimple FAC, but it was not so much because of your oppose but in spite of it. Your methods of reviewing are starting to cause much disruption at FAC. I think you often have some good points, but they are buried under a wall of prose that is often hard to penetrate as well as being obscured by points that are not really relevant or actionable at FAC. I strongly suggest that if you want your reviews to continue to have any influence, that you take on board the suggestions of folks and try to cut down the verbiage, as well as basing your points firmly on sources, not on your feelings that something just has to be so. As an example, your point about which version of a film the subject of the article saw in the 1960s turned out to be incorrect - partly because you assumed that something must be so because of your own experience rather than reading the source closely. And when you conveyed your point, you buried it in a blizzard of words that made it very difficult for folks to understand your point. Please also try to assume good faith of the nominators and refrain from discussing their motivations for things - it helps to keep the temperature at reviews down if the review doesn't get into discussing the editors, but sticks to the article content.

FAC needs good reviewers that engage with the nominators in a congenial manner. While I'm not going to say that the recent reviews you've had clashes on were all your fault, it would be best if things changed. I'm dropping this note here in hopes that we can call work to improve the situation, and hoping that you'll see the above not as a bash at you but as an attempt from someone outside the clashes to help you avoid furture ones. I'm going to drop any of my own FACs that I had planned on trying to work on for the near future in order to be more hands-on at FAC, but it also needs help from others to clean up the process. --Ealdgyth (talk) 16:24, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

True. ... I didn't arrive there as a commenter; it evolved somewhat randomly, and I should have been aware. I should have done a straightforward source- and paraphrase review at that point, rather than getting involved with religion. Maybe that is what I will do in the future: a source and paraphrase review, ..., concisely that is. Those are the issues in pretty much all my opposes. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:37, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

But it was fun in the sense that I ferreted out info about this actress I knew nothing about, a lot, both plausible and implausible, and the article stands changed. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:39, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

The verbiage part will be harder. Its an aspect of my always trying to ensure I've left nothing out. My family knows this well. I'll try. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:44, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

The other funny thing is that I don't have an awareness of clashes. People remind of bygone clashes, and I have no memory. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 16:54, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Can I add a +1 to the request for concision please? I don't doubt your good intentions, but you have a habit of posting an essay where a sentence will do, burying the wheat the with the chaff. They say brevity is the soul of whit. Best, HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:25, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes, the soul of wit it surely is. I'll make an effort, find the time to be brief. Thanks. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:52, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

@Ealdgyth and HJ Mitchell: As I have your attention, I wanted to run something by you about verbosity, verbiage, walls of text, and other expressions I see commonly used.

(a) There is obvious verbiage: "in other words," "for that matter," ... to which I plead guilty.

(b) There is also comprehensive or complex prose: I just posted something on Talk:India (end of section 7; please note one correction); it is long, but essential for communicating nuance to knowledgeable editors.

(c) Then there is prose that while similar to (b) is inappropriate in detail for the context, causing miscommunication. An example is: User:Fowler&fowler/Sources_in_Dimple_Kapadia#Section_2.1_(cont). Here I am attempting to communicate a few things: the sentence in the article quotes a source and seems to imply something, (i) the source, a scholarly book (where scholarly=published by a university press) which has been quoted, has no such implication, (ii) a second cited source (an online magazine) makes some general claims (iii) a third source, a scholarly book, which I have added, contradicts the claim, and (iv) and a fourth source, another scholarly book, also contradicts that claim.

The problem for me is that example (c) above would not be considered verbose on Talk:India; in fact, they would compliment me for enriching the discussion. But sometimes on FAC, not always, it is cast as walls of text. But I am making a valid point. Ignoring it creates an implausible sentence, at least one that would be considered implausible on Talk:India.

What should I do? Details come naturally to me. When I was in graduate school, a professor from one department came to speak in another. At one point, he said, "... but these are details we will sweep under the rug." Immediately, someone in the audience said, "We live under the rug." Fowler&fowler «Talk» 21:28, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Peer review/Dimple Kapadia/archive2

Pings

Gandhi

Thanks

Princely estates vs kingdoms

Hi Fowler. Apologies, I know you're away. But, if you see this, could you clarify the difference between a "Princely Estate" and a "Princely State" as it pertains to the Raj. The article is Kingdom of Jeypore. This Jeypore appears to have been ruled by kings but a source says "the British had taken over the direct administration of Jeypore in 1863". Doesn't that mean that it was no longer a nominally independent Princely State but was directly under the British (perhaps in the Madras or Bengal presidencies)? In which case, I would assume, the kingdom came to an abrupt end. @Sitush: because he's cleaning up the mess that is that article. --regentspark (comment) 00:10, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Yup, I have been wondering about that, too. I am also wondering whether we need an article on the "little kingdoms" historiographical model, first proposed by Bernard Cohn & subsequently taken up enthusiastically by the likes of Nicholas Dirks. Many of the tiny states/estates in India seem more than a little ridiculous, with a house having a front door opening into one & a back door opening into another. - Sitush (talk) 01:02, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

What, like on the ROI/Northern Ireland border? Johnbod (talk) 01:04, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Well, yeah, there are examples like that in most countries (and that golf course that straddles Wales/England, causing recent issues re lockdown restrictions) but we're talking "princely states" with an area of a couple of acres and having five houses or so. Talk about "lord of all he surveys".- Sitush (talk) 01:38, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

If the Raj era sources at Jeypore are right, the thing became a zamindari in 18th century. - Sitush (talk) 02:09, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I'm nodding off into such deep states of slumber as I write this that I have to go take a nap very soon. Today is a busy day anyway, so I will answer in a day or two. Yes, Estate is some kind of large land ownership for the purpose of collecting taxes (land settlement). In the Punjab and UP (minus Awadh), there were no large landowners. In aWadh, there were the talukdars. Zamindari was a feature of Bengal and Bihar. I'm not sure about thie portion of Orissa that this estate fell in: whether it was a part of Bengal (with zamindar) or Madras (with ryotwari). Hermann Kulke and his associates have done work on the Little Kingdoms of Kalinga (Orissa) one is Shared sovereignty ... the other is more specifically about Kalinga. My brain is shutting down, so ... Fowler&fowler «Talk» 15:02, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

@RegentsPark, Sitush, and Johnbod: I don't believe the British ever used the expression "Princely Estate" for their various holdings of direct and indirect administration. But "estate" for "zamindari" they did.

From left to right: (a) The Jeypore zamindari, a U-shaped region included the tahsils of Nowrangpur, Jeypore, Koratpur, Malkangiri, Bissamcuttack, and Raygada, (b) Kalahandi princely state formed the southwestern tip of the Bengal presidency. It abutted the U-shaped Jeypore zamindari. (c) the tahsil headquarters of Jeypore estate are marked in red. From Malkangiri to Bissamcuttack is approx 130 miles. So the estate could have spread over thousands of square miles.

As far as I can glean, the Jeypore estate was a zamindari in the Madras Presidency. It consisted of a U-shaped swath of land wrapping itself around (the southeast, south, and southwest borders of) Kalahandi princely state in the Bengal presidency. It you visualize the upper end of the Madras Presidency(top map) to be a mitten, then the Jeypore zamindari formed a broad arc between the thumb and the fingers. I couldn't find the higher-res IGI maps I had uploaded. Maybe I didn't upload them; or maybe the graphics people replaced these maps with their rudimentary pastels. Anyway, I have uploaded new ones which are attached here. A portion of the zamindari lay above (i.e. to the west) of the Eastern Ghats (the coastal range), but the rest lay among them. You could certainly link "estate" to "zamindari" in the infobox. Fascinating geography. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:15, 27 June 2020 (UTC) As for the anthropology: there are some German sources—Sitush has probably already seen them—more anthropology than history (like Dirks and Cohn), but I'm not sure about their value for RP's question I have collapsed these:

More information Anthropological historians on Little Kingdoms and Jeypore ...

Anthropological historians on Little Kingdoms and Jeypore

Burkhard Schnepel , “ The Nandapur Suryavamsas Origin and Consolidation of a South Orissan Kingdom ” , in The Orissa Historical Research Journal , Vol . XXXVIII , nos . 1 - 4 , 1994 , pp . 170 - 199 . (That kingdom I believe is what became Jeypore)
There is also the German: Little Kingdoms of Kalinga with discussions of rituals and ideology in snippet view. There is also the edited volume:
page 211 of this edited volume of the anthropology of India whose continuation into page 212 can be read in page 254 of the digital version :). It mentions Jeypore; it mentions anthropology and history, but does it help us? I'm not sure.
There is this source which defines a little kingdom to be something between a feudal estate and a princely state. And from the Germans we know that Jeypore was a little kingdom ...

Close

Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:18, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

PS I've added a third map, a relevant composite of the first two. This wasn't exactly a little kingdom geographically. I'm done. Good night. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:51, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

PPS >>> "I'm nodding off into such deep states of slumber as I write this that I have to go take a nap very soon." I just noticed this. My first post above was not a comment about the previous discussion, just my state of extreme tiredness. :) Fowler&fowler «Talk» 03:08, 27 June 2020 (UTC)

ANI discussion about WP:OWNBEHAVIOR

Deletion of the Kingdom of Jeypore page

About An Article

Yamnaya map

Per your request on my talk

And now I am going to run out of time today, as I am off to the cabin tomorrow, and need to shop and pack. So I'll keep it brief.

You are not doing yourself any favors in terms of how you present your concerns. At FAC, things might (unsure) have a chance of working themselves out (in terms of faulty reviews and reviewers) if we let the facts speak for themselves. The data tells the story; no need to point fingers. When your advice and concerns and reviews are ignored (and you are by no means the only one who feels that), you should simply state your case, and leave that review, rather than continuing to pursue something that others will not see or hear. Outside of Wikipedia, that star means nothing to anyone, so let more of it roll off your back. FAC has been slowly dying for a long time now, and any attempt to "pound some sense" into those who will not hear simply is not working. By bringing up concerns others are unwilling to hear, you are only garnering attacks, so time to let certain things go. I don't always agree with your points either, but I can at least appreciate your desire to improve that which has fallen into serious disrepair at FAC over recent years ... but again, those facts and the data speak for themselves, and by continuing to point out specific articles and specific people, we aren't making progress. Structural change at FAC is needed, and even if that is accomplished (which is a big if), I am not sure it will not be "too little, too late". But turning things around will require a lot of conscious collaboration, honey over vinegar, to try to get others to see that their star has no meaning when there are no standards, and reviewers are chased out. I just wish you would take an approach that is more likely to yield results, and we can see that the approach you have taken so far is not doing that. There are many people who would like to see FAC turn around, but have quite simply given up; additional confrontation only encourages them to stay away in droves, and leaves you speaking in isolation. Hope this explains my POV ... there are many on that page who are chronic personalizers and attackers. Don't be one of those people. Don't name people, or articles, and when you encounter pushback on a review, walk away and let the Coords decide. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:57, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

No disagreements with you there. The problems lately (from my perspective) are: I and my edits at FAC review have become the target. when I apply "oppose early and oppose often," they come out in droves and support even if they have never walked on that terrain. I've often said jokingly if a nominator wants their FAC promoted, they should simply ask me to oppose it. I persist because there is the counterpoise: submissions such as Horologium (constellation), Coropuna, Rigel and Leech that were enjoyable and drama free. Anyway, thanks for posting. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 19:12, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I completely agree that you have turned into a target. But this is Wikipedia, and life sucks. You are completely right. But we can't change that, so don't draw any more ire. We got Coropuna turned around, and Jo-Jo has become a wonderful example of how better guidance about the standards produces better editors and better articles. And an example of how to collaborate pre-FAC, as I continue to work on Jo-Jo's articles pre-FAC. Model the good, ignore the bad (and kudos on Jo-Jo for the "drama-free" part). I understand there is plenty of bad, and it has been targeted at you, but don't make yourself such an easy target! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:17, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

"Model the good, ignore the bad." Hear hear. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 19:20, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

And most importantly, remember, your wife/life is far more important than any of this! If you promised her three months, turn off this darn thing :) Be well, best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:23, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) SandyGeorgia, I've been watching the discussion at WT:FAC with some distaste, and I wanted to thank you for being a voice of reason. I would do so there, but I suspect that would be inflammatory, given the personalities involved (I am among the few that TRM gets upset by even more than by F&F). And you, Fowler, for raising important concerns that seem to have been dismissed based on the tone of your posts and your own activity, the latter of which isn't especially relevant. Vanamonde (Talk) 19:28, 1 July 2020 (UTC)
Vanamonde93 not at all. I get most upset when my motives and capabilities as an editor and reviewer are ridiculed. You, as far as I recall, have never done that. I barely even remember interacting with you these days. The Rambling Man (Stay indoors, stay safe!!!!) 19:41, 1 July 2020 (UTC)
@The Rambling Man: Glad to hear it. I haven't ever questioned your motivations, that I recall, only your methods. Vanamonde (Talk) 20:25, 1 July 2020 (UTC)
Yes, that's what I said. My methods now revolve around creating GAs, creating FAs, reviewing GANs, FLCs and FACs. It's going well. Apart from this minor bump in the road but at least we have a summer of tranquility ahead. The Rambling Man (Stay indoors, stay safe!!!!) 20:28, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Mr Esque agrees with you TRM. All the best to you. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 20:57, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Enjoy your summer; unwatching now (I hate squirrels, for reasons best not mentioned :) Please ping me if further feedback from me might be helpful. Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:02, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Lab pe aati hai dua

Apologies for interrupting your vacation, but I had a question re your recent edit on Lab Pe Aati Hai Dua, where you removed Mayo, Doon and Welham's with the summary "Please do not distort the social and religious history of the song by citing it to assembly songs of privileged private schools in India". I do not understand how it distorts the social and religious history of the song; if anything, it adds to it by charting its adaptation in distant contexts. I was the one who added the schools, admittedly with the intention of counterbalancing the 'Islamic tilt' of the article. Why? Because school principals in India get suspended or beaten up for making their students sing this, and I introduced the secular "private schools" so that the narrative is not hijacked by Hindu nationalists, who would be all too happy to learn that the poem is only used in Pakistan or Urdu-medium schools in India -- which is what the article erroneously says now. I did not revert because I would like to understand where you're coming from. Please reply (or reintroduce it) in light of my stated intentions. Best regards, PublicusTacitus (talk) 12:16, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

As the last version was not neutral and not wholly correct, I have restored the private schools bit with the original references. If you must present yourself as someone safeguarding the social and religious history of the song, you must then safeguard it fully by going the whole hog, without suppressing information that clashes with your vision of what you want that history to look like. I have explained why the secular schools, too, have as much claim to be included in the song's performing history as the Urdu-medium schools. And whyever not? One didn't censor Schubertian/Beethovenian/Wagnerian history when the Nazis went, "That's a nice tune!" (I admit the analogy doesn't quite work, as in this case the net result is positive, where a song has travelled far for good...) If my re-insertion is seen as opportunistic given your absence, I invite anyone reading this, who is sympathetic to Fowler's stance, to undo my edits. Because I will not be bothering with it again. But if you do so, you must also then end the charade and forever relinquish your pretence to neutrality. Best regards, PublicusTacitus (talk) 11:44, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

The du'a has been interpreted ecumenically for nearly a century, sung in government and private schools for nearly as long. I will make a post at the article's talk page and then rewrite the lead. Best regards, Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:25, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Your time and effort in finding sources and rewriting the lead are much appreciated. I would just point out that the Doon reference you've included is on page 104, not 103. I'm not sure why including "it makes no mention of Islam" is necessary, or if it even makes sense. The Srivastava source itself says (I have the text) that the assembly uses a mix of Christian hymns and prayers, Kabir's poetry, Guru Nanak's bhajans. Given the syncretic nature of the ritual, obviously there can be no specific, or overt, mentions of any religion, let alone Islam. The YouTube link you've shared is not entirely representative of the usage either, because in that particular context it is being sung as a nostalgic ode by alumni with drinks in hand, not as a dua. This is closer to the original context: Song No. 3 - Doon School Choir and Orchestra or this another Iqbal poem, Chishti ne jis zameen mein paigham-e-haq sunaya; Nanak ne jis chaman mein vahdat ka git gaya or "The land where Chishti declared the message of truth; The blooming garden where Nanak sang the song of Oneness...". So the need for inclusion of a rider that the assembly makes no mention of Islam is not immediately apparent. Thanks, PublicusTacitus (talk) 09:44, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

	The Barnstar of Diligence
	Thank you so much for your attention on Indian National Congress. Back in time I worked hard to improve the article, asked for editors for copy edit but later article became matter of disputes. I had to give up eventually. I will start working on it again as I can see a ray of hope. I will also make sure it achieves GA status. Thanks again mate. 25 CENTS VICTORIOUS ^☣ 16:10, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

		The Barnstar of Awesomeness
		(suddenly dropping out of the sky) I just went through your userpage, and found it quite depressing, as I completely disagree to the number of Barnstars and other shiny objects you have. I am ashamed of our collective editor conduct in failing to shower you with appreciation in a volume and frequency that is more mind numbing than a Who performance. Therefore, I humbly present you with my little token: a Barnstar for your allround, wholesome and... simply awesome existence. Proud to have breathed the same air as you. Aditya^{(talk • contribs)} 18:54, 25 August 2020 (UTC)

Notes on James Humphreys

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