Talk:International Oversight Advisory

Fan Criticism
I think I may remove the entire "Fan Criticism" section. It has no references and incorrect. I'm nowhere near a hardcore SG1 fan, and I know it's wrong. I saw one of those season opening specials on SciFi regarding the production of the show, and the creators of the show credited their major creative tool as being having the protagonists (the Stargate team of the US military) unintentionally causing the major problems that spark a galaxy wide danger, and throughout the show they try to fix mistakes they've made. That would be the exact opposite of the US being a "Mary Sue" in the show.


 * Oh come on, the US military is certainly portrayed as being perfect. OK, perhaps not off-world, but that's not what the smaller paragraph was talking about (the paragraph about fan criticism was reffering to it's role in Earth politics). The US military is portrayed as the only honourable organisation on the planet (certainly compared to how the Russian military is presented, not to mention the underlying message of Stargate SG-1 that civilian oversight over military projects is just wrong), anyone who claims otherwise just doesn't know Stargate. The cliché-like nature of the IOA (the cowardly French, manipulative Chinese, and pompous English representatives) also deserves to be mentioned. As far as I'm concerned, the paragraph stays. If anyone feels different, please leave a message. Maartentje 21:47, 13 September 2006 (UTC) (however, do sign your posts, unlike our mysterious editing guy here)

Can you provide a source of this critism? If the critism is your own, then it is Orginal research, which goes aginst Wikipedia Policy WP:NOR. Besides, what matters here is verfiability, not facts WP:NOT. --Eldarone 22:08, 13 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It's not original research. The cowardness of the French representative, the pompousness of the British and the manipulation of the Chinese and representative is very clear in "The Scourge", the perfect nature of the US military can be seen in "Full Alert", the notion of civilian oversight on military projects being bad is very clear in "Politics". These are only examples off course, the criticism is based on elements from many many episodes, that's what makes it so hard to point to specific episodes. Also, the research isn't mine, I didn't wrote the text, I just agreed with it... Maartentje 22:53, 13 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It is still orginal research if you interpret it yourself or whoever started it. It dosn't matter how the IOA is portrayed, what matters is that the ciritism comes from a verfiable and relevant source.  --Eldarone 23:13, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

So it's original research to state that French delegates are portrayed cowardly and stereotypically when they're affraid of everything in a single episode? It's also original research to call a diplomat pompous when he keeps whining for 45 minutes? The paragraph is NOT original research, it's simply a collection of obsevations under a banner called "fan criticism". This is exactly the same as the sentence about the Ori being gods or not at the head of the Ori (Stargate) article. Maartentje 23:33, 13 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, if that's how the characters are portrayed, then that's how they're portrayed. But interpreting their portrayal is not observation, that's nonverifable.  You can mention that their behavior is protrayed as such, but no intepretation is allowed.  --Eldarone 01:16, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Just some explanation about the references in the "fan criticism" section: - "Shades of Grey": a rogue section of the NID steals advanced technology from allied civilisations, however, the US Military defends its strategy of "better being honest and dead then a thief and alive". Jack O'Neill also valiantly risks his carrier and life to take out the thieves. - "Disclosure": After telling the other four nations and future members of the IOA about the Stargate Program, all delegates, except off course the American representative (General Hammond) prefer to acquire advanced technology at all cost, including theft. In the same episode, the democraticaly elected senator Kinsey tries to covertly take over the Stargate Program through the NID, however, the Asgard (Stargate) intervene in Earth politics and influence the representatives to make a decision in the US Military's favour. - "Crusade": Even the Russians, the longest supporter of the US military's control over the Stargate, eventually manipulate the poor US Air Force to give up one of their Daedalus class battlecruisers.
 * stereotypical: "The Scourge", the cowardly French, manipulative Chinese and pompous English delegates mentioned above.
 * icompetent and fools: also "The Scourge", and "Flesh and Blood", where Hank Landry points out the mistakes in the strategic plans made by the IOA, said they were "waisting their breath" and later calls them "idiot blowhard politicians".
 * Mary Sue:
 * Greasyness: in "The Scourge", the Chinese delegate is constantly manipulating, Woolsey is reminded of his corruption in the past.
 * Criticism on civilian oversight: in "Politics", the "bad" senator Kinsey tries to shut down the Stargate Program, almost causing the complete destruction of Earth by the Goa'uld in the process. Only after SG-1 disobeyed their orders, the danger could be avoided. Not to mention the NID (Stargate), a civilian agency assigned to watch the secret Stargate Program, being increasingly corrupt. (if you want references for the NID, go and look at the NID's article). Maartentje 17:35, 14 September 2006 (UTC)


 * According to wikipedia Policy, WP:OR: "Original research is a term used in Wikipedia to refer to material placed in articles by Wikipedia users that has not been previously published by a reliable source. It includes unpublished material, for example, arguments, concepts, data, ideas, statements, or theories, or any new analysis or synthesis of published material that appears to advance a position — or, in the words of Wikipedia's co-founder Jimbo Wales, that would amount to a "novel narrative or historical interpretation."  Fan Critism section is filled with analysis and ideas that have not been published in a reliable source.  It gets removed per policy.  --Eldarone 19:06, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

All I wrote HAD all ready been previously published/shown on television, didn't you read my last post? If you're the specialist on original research, how would you state the stereotypical nature of the representatives and the fact that the IOA is the third time civilian oversight was interfering in the safety of Earth? The entire paragraph was nothing but a synthesis of ten seasons of Stargate SG-1 and the involvement of civilian oversight in the Stargate Program. I (again) placed the paragraph on the article, and (again) rewrote it slightly. I also changed the title of the paragraph to avoid 'advancing a position'. Feel free to read it this time...

I do have another question. What makes "George W. Bush" acceptable and the latest version of what I wrote original research? Is the mere mentioning of often heard criticism original research? Or maybe I should just add links to one of the many forums criticizing the portrayal of the IOA? Maartentje 19:22, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Maartentje, please refrain from repeatedly adding your opinions into this article. They are how you perceive this television program, and completely unaccredited. In addition, it appears that your views are in direct opposition to those of the actual creators, writters, and producers of this program. Any further additions or reversions may be viewed as vandalism, and will be dealt with accordingly.


 * More specifically, citing the bases of your opinions does not constitute a factual basis; nor does a list of people who share your outlook (which seems to be in the minority)152.163.101.6 04:40, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh come on, we finally reached a consensus about the article (even Eldarone agreed it was no original research). And it's not how I perceive the program, the eventual edit was just a series of facts. The IOA IS the 3rd civilian agency interfering in the the SGC's business, and the first two results WERE disastrous. Doesn't that deserve to be mentioned? And again, I stated before that I didn't write the paragraph, I just defended it. So apparently, my opinions are shared by some... Also, you make criticism that is different from writers' intentions sound almost inferior. The criticism on Mein Kampf was also different from the writer's view, that doesn't make an opinion any less valuable... I completely agree that Wikipedia shouldn't be used to spread opinions, but if you were really a Stargate fan, you would be aware of the countless blogs and internet forums addressing the matter. Maybe the (factual, see the references and explanation above) part about the SGC acting on morals obviously not shared by the NID, French, British and Chinese delegates and the Russian army shouldn't be mentioned here, I grant you that, but the paragraph has been edited so many times it has become a little complicated.

And BTW, please stop threatening me with messages about how I 'vandalise' pages (also on my talk page, especially with your nameless IP address). During this friendly discussion with Eldarone here, even I managed to be polite, please do the same. Maartentje 15:27, 17 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It is not worth mentioning the SGC's involvement with other civilian agencies, being they were completely different organizations. If you think the "evil writers" of Stargate are akin to the Nazis (Hitler in particular, as you've implied), you should start an article about that problem. This is an encyclopedia, not a forum for you to bash the writers of a scifi show, and vent your hostilities towards a show about the American military; which despite the clear biases that you alone perceive, is shot in Canada, with the strong presence of Canadian actors. In addition, wikipedia does not base it's entries on "internet forums," as you've referenced as the source of your opinions.152.163.101.6 09:18, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

You implied my opinion was incorrect and even inferior because it didn't agree with the writer's intentions, that was what the hitler comment was meant to address... And the IOA, the Senate's Appropriations Committee and NID were in fact very similar organisations, all three were watching and controling the SGC. Even the NID was headed by an elected official (via the US Senate's Intelligence Oversight, at one point run by Senator Kinsey). Differences such as "the IOA's members are not all from the same country, the SAC's were" hardly make them completely different agencies. In the end, all three organisations are branches of the civilian executive of legeslative power trying to control the Stargate Program.

And I'm not hostile toward SG-1, I bought al the DVD's and I'm a big fan, so don't you call me ignorant. Your latest edit also scrambled all the references, couldn't that be called vandalism? And just for the record, because a show is shot in another country and used Canadian actors doesn't make the story lines any less American...

Also, one of the things you removed in your edit labeled as 'removing Maartentje's vandalism was the sentence "In addition, General Hank Landry has defended Dr. Elizabeth Weir and her (international, Tau'ri) team from the IOA's criticism.", which you yourself added earlier, so that can't be what you meant with 'vandalism'. That does however makes me ask myself what is wrong with the other sentence you removed, being "It should also be noted that the IOA is, after the Senate's Appropriations Committee and the NID, the third civilian agency that tried to interfere in the Stargate Program. The first two civilian interventions had near-catastrophic results."? The "catastrophic results" were after all, confirmed and referenced facts (just read my earlier post on this page explaining the references I made)... Maybe another experienced user could give his opinion on this? Maartentje 13:12, 18 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It doesn't seem to me like they're questioning your knowledge on show, but your comprehension of what wikipedia is about. Whether your interpretations are right or wrong is irrelevant, they are not verifiable, they're not concrete, they're not facts. These contributions that you stuck in the article appear to meet strong opposition from everyone participating in this discussion (now, myself included), except for you. These statements don't belong in an encyclopedia. If you make it necessary for an admin to come in and put it to a vote it's clear that you'll be outvoted. So could you contribute to wikipedia by fixing those erroneous scrambled references that you noted.Wikipedian 29 14:04, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Sourcing Quote
The article states that General Hank Landry calls the IOA "idiot blowhard politicians." The reference numbers seem to have shifted, however none of the noted links direct to a page that verifies the said quote

Since a direct quote obviously needs to be referenced I will remove it if a source isn't added within the next 24-hours. Wikipedian 29 14:17, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Fine, I have no problem acknowledging when I'm wrong, and as a fact, I do know what wikipedia is about. If you were to check all the edits I made to the tiny paragraph you'd see that I just provided my imput in making an at first biased paragraph I hadn't written more and more neutral. However, I just resisted simply deleting it as some had suggested. But calling it vandalism both here and on my talk page like mr anonymous did just seemed like a personal attack to me... Maartentje 14:24, 18 September 2006 (UTC) PS: about the quote, is a link to a transcript of the episode confirmation enough?

Content Dispute
I was called here by User:152.163.100.130 because he thought I was an admin. I'll state right off the bat that I'm not, so don't afford my words any more weight than you would any other wikipedian. I appologize if I've given the impression that I am in other articles, and I really hold no authority. I'm replying here, because the IP that contacted me is flagged as an AOL IP, and I have no guarantee that whoever it was will get my message if I leave it on that talkpage.

What I was contacted regarding is a content dispute on this article. I'd just like to advise so we're clear here that since this is a content dispute and nobody's even broken WP:3RR yet, there's not much the real admins can do about this either. Barring disruptive or outright vandalistic edits by either of the parties, it will not get addressed on WP:AN/I or any other administrative action.

If consensus cannot be achieved, or if even a single editor is edit-warring but not breaking 3RR per se, the editors on an article need to follow WP:DR to try to work it out. You might see more success petitioning the Mediation Cabal or starting a Request for Comment.

If this fails to achieve consensus on what is to be done with the article, there is always arbitration, but bear in mind this is a last resort and the ArbCom really prefer you try other methods first and look dimly upon matters that are escalated straight to arbitration.

Hope this helps. I'm not blaming anyone here, and without more background on the dispute I won't be getting involved. I just wanted to emphasize that I'm not an admin, and the admins themselves can't intervene unless something serious happens.--Rosicrucian 14:38, 18 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It seems to have worked itself out, thanks anyway Rosicrucian.

Yeah, I'll surely refrain from making any more edits for the time being to the article, however, I would like to know why stating that the IOA is the third civilian agency interfering with the Stargate Program isn't accepted here... Fine, I admit that mentioning the first two attempts were disastrous could be seen as not very neutral, but I still think User:152.163.100.130 was a little overzealous in deleting content he considered biased... Maartentje 14:59, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Degeneration af this article
I went back and reviewed June '06 versions of this article, and they were considerably better than its current state. I am going to discuss a complete rewrite with an admin, because as-is, this article seems to get worse on a daily basis. IOA is currently just a compilation of highly biased remarks and revisions to reduce the biased statements, and all these ridiculous edits have robbed it of any quality.205.188.116.71 05:36, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

If you really had compared the two versions, you would have noticed the current version is twice as long as the June version, this one is referenced, etc etc... And except for the "criticism" paragraph, most of the content hasn't been edited. Also, you claim most statements here are biased, but after all these "rediculous edits" even the words being used are just quotations from episodes (i.e. "watchdog" => The Ties That Bind (Stargate SG-1)). Maartentje 09:15, 22 September 2006 (UTC) PS: One more thing, as I noted on Talk:Ancient Control Chair, the outpost in Antarctica is called the Atlantus outpost, the city in the Pegasus Galaxy Atlantis. Just check the transcript of Lost City.


 * It's Atlantis. "Terra Atlantus" was the Ancient translation. In the follow sentence Daniel translates it into (Earth) Atlantis in English. And after they realize that only the outpost was there, everyone called it the Ancient Outpost in Antartica. 205.188.116.71 17:44, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Maartentje
On a personal note, Maartentje, you're ridiculous. You sit and fight with everyone, and you seem to be quite an angry person in general. Almost all of your 30 some odd additions to this article have turned out to be unusable, and the half-dozen+ participants in here have all come out against your poor & biased wording of paragraphs.

I don't know if it's the television show Stargate, or the general policies of Wikipedia, but something in this equation is way over your head. Well, let me rephrase, it's either ignorance or deliberate portrayal of misinformation; but if that's the case then I don't know where your (seemingly) 4th grade spelling and grammatical skills would fall into place. Find a hobby or something. I'm really tired of watching you use this article to sully the integrity of Wikipedia.205.188.116.71 17:44, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Now that's what I call a personal attack... Apparently I'm not the only one ignorant about the finer details of Wikipedia's policy. Also, there's a difference between a friendly discussion and a fight, the only angry person I see here is you. And perhaps you hadn't noticed, but not every human being on Earth is a native speaker of English, so it's real low to point out the odd spelling mistake. And on a final note: we eventually reached a consensus about the article until you showed op complaining about the "degeneration of the article"... There were also only three people here who disagreed with me, not "half a dozen+", of which eventually only two became rude. And if the "degeneration of the article" bothers you so much, why did you only fix some tiny typo's? Maartentje 18:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Personal attacks are not allowed, 205.188.116.71. And Maartentje is right, you are the one acting aggressively. I'm not into Stargate, but according to me, the article looks fine, at least for the moment. Maybe Maartentje's unusable additions have yielded some result after all 81.245.169.7 21:26, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Croatia??
Way is Croatia highlighted on "Nations confirmed to participate in the Atlantis Project" map?? Croatia is not part of Atlantis expedition! --Vladar86 —Preceding comment was added at 12:16, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Ark of Truth
Hey there is a new IOA guy in the Ark of Truth movie someone should add him up on here 68.221.91.130 (talk) 04:53, 2 January 2008 (UTC)