Talk:Jeffrey Ullman

Academic Degrees
This article should add what subject he got his degrees in. 128.174.242.203 02:23, 5 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Done. - Skaraoke 01:42, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Controversy
The section does not seem to be natural. There are too many anonymous edits non-logged-in users continuously revoking the section. The article may need attention from moderators and get temporary locked. 128.100.3.41 (talk) 08:30, 6 January 2011 (UTC)


 * It may not be natural enough; may not have enough references; but this is undoubtedly a controversy, so removing the entire section makes no sense. It can be shortened and references can be added (some of those anonymous edits were by me, so now I have logged in; it is interesting that the previous post, which criticizes this, is by anonymous log-in itself) Arahmim1 (talk) 12:02, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

The controversy may be worth including in the article, but it shouldn't take up such a large fraction of the page. In the context of Prof. Ullman's distinguished career, this one incident is relatively minor. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.144.201.12 (talk) 17:18, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

I also think that the controversy shouldn't take up such a large fraction of the page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Onkarr (talk • contribs) 11:58, 21 January 2011 (UTC)


 * The sourcing is pretty weak, and the subject of this "controversy" has nothing to do with the reasons why Ullman is notable. Therefore, it is not notable. -Skaraoke (talk) 06:10, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I just added the Controversies section again. This guy has went on record spewing anti-Iranian comments. The case is well-documented, with the Iranian-American Council issuing a formal complaint to which Stanford officials have responded formally. It has also been mentioned at Stanford Daily. It is indeed a controversy and the edit-warring and vandalism on it is meaningless. Editing parts of it is one thing, removing it entirely another.Omid.espero (talk) 03:42, 25 July 2014 (UTC)


 * I think you are correct, anti Iranian comments is a significant enough to be inluded as controversy, especially if the case is very well documented, attempts to censure this part should not be tolerated by moderators. 37.170.108.58 (talk) 18:07, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

The characterization "Ullman stated his opposition to assisting Iranians in becoming graduate students at Stanford, because of the anti-Israel position of the Iranian government." does not clearly describe the action of Ullman. Unless there is an objection, I would edit this statement to:
 * In 2010, an Iranian graduate student e-mailed Ullman asking for help in gaining admittance to Stanford. Ullman replied that he was not in a position to influence admissions and, even if he could, he would not help while Iran refuses to acknowledge the right of Israel to exist, writing "if Iranians want the benefits of Stanford and other institutions in the U.S., they have to respect the values we hold in the U.S., including freedom of religion and respect for human rights.”  Briskmad (talk) 16:20, 8 March 2022 (UTC)


 * I vote for something between the two -- the new version contains detail that I'm not sure is relevant to the controversy. How about, "In 2010, in response to an email from an Iranian graduate student, Ullman expressed opposition to assisting Iranians in becoming graduate students at Stanford due to the anti-Israel position of the Iranian government, writing "if Iranians want the benefits of Stanford and other institutions in the U.S., they have to respect the values we hold in the U.S., including freedom of religion and respect for human rights." Possibly should be split in two, a bit of a run-on sentence. Caleb Stanford (talk) 17:36, 8 March 2022 (UTC)


 * No. That makes it looks like he is opposing certain students because of their own personal beliefs. In reality he is opposing certain students as a form of collective punishment for the government of the country they come from. That is expressed clearly in the current version, not expressed at all in your version, and a big part of why his position is so offensive. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:43, 8 March 2022 (UTC)


 * I can't tell if you are responding to Briskmad's version, or my edit. I agree that the current version is clear, but I also think that incorporating a specific quote would be an improvement. Without a quote it's only a summary and leaves a lot of room for imagination about what Ullman actually did/didn't say. Caleb Stanford (talk) 18:22, 8 March 2022 (UTC)

Edit warring in the controversies section
I am guessing the anonymous troll who is starting an edit-warring campaign here is either Ullman himself or a person closely associated with him. Allegation of antisemitism couldn't be more irrelevant here. Ullman's political views and anti-Iranian attitude is published extensively on his website, and he continues to express those views on his social media pages to this day. He is also well-known within the Iranian academic community as someone who holds anti-Iranian views. This particular incident is well-documented and his responses to it, including doubling down on his views are also easily available on his website. National Iranian American Council (NIAC) wrote an official complaint about this to Stanford at the time and it was reported in Stanford Daily as well. Omid.espero (talk) 19:45, 23 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Is the NIAC article the only evidence that Ullman actually wrote the statement attributed to him? The Stanford Daily article is careful to describe the quote as "alleged". Prefacing the excerpt as an "off-topic political rant" is also pretty dang editorial. I tried to clarify this with my edit without erasing what happened, in line with Wikipedia's guidelines for quotations from living figures. Arcticwoolybearmoth (talk) 21:25, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

He justifies and defends his quoted statement against Iranians on his own website here. There is no question that he made that statement and this is a consistent pattern of behaviour spanning several years and far from an isolated incident but as it is well-documented it was specifically mentioned. There are also other anti-Iranian materials on his website and he is very open and vulgar about it (e.g. here) and these were already included in the citations. Also, flat dismissing NIAC as "biased" is strange unless you think any NGO which represents the Iranian-American community in the US should not be taken seriously. I believe your edit was in good faith, but this page has seen a history of edit warring with people trying to whitewash, downplay, or dismiss the controversies section and I would appreciate it if you refrain from making further changes. Omid.espero (talk) 22:19, 2 October 2020 (UTC)


 * He has publicly expressed and defended appallingly racist statements such as "Arabs raping in Darfur" etc. Imagine, saying "Jews raping in Hollywood". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:a62:4d9:8001:b160:4c0c:5483:2517 (talk) 21:24, 20 March 2021 (UTC)

allegedly responded ... went on to write
Does that mean the second quote is authentic, while the status of the first quote is unknown? --84.177.68.136 (talk) 08:51, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Jewish American
He is a proud and fanatic Jewish man. Why not make it in the opening? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:A62:4D9:8001:2D65:EFD8:3F4C:7A6E (talk) 22:53, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Because it is strongly discouraged to mix nationality and ethnicity or religion in the lead sentence, and it has been misused elsewhere. Please stick to nationality only. Sourced mentions of ethnicity or religion, if they are important defining factors in the person's life, can be mentioned in the body of the article.  Acroterion   (talk)   04:05, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
 * what about examples like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidonie_Werner — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:A62:4D9:8001:20AA:A90C:33DE:6E52 (talk) 19:53, 16 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Why not mention that he's Jewish in the early life part? He seems to be pretty supportive of the state of Israel and anti Iran, it is clearly a big part of his politics and his upbringing. 37.170.108.58 (talk) 18:15, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

The controversy section is a mischaracterization in its current form
Ullman has openly expressed his discriminatory opinion about Iranian students, solely based on their location, and Ullman's suspicion to them, on his homepage and on Google plus. See here for a snapshot from his conversation in 2015:


 * I think we need to distinguish between Americans of Iranian descent, who have chosen to cast their lot with the United States, and Iranians who did not leave Iran when the religious fanatics took over, and who may well be sympathetic to Iran's desires to build a nuclear weapon and to Iran's support for terrorists throughout the world. While I'm sure there are some students living in Iran, who would like nothing better than to leave that country for as long as it is run by Islamic fundamentalists, can we afford to take that risk of educating them and then having them turn that education against us?  Especially, can we afford the risk given all the bright students from other countries that share US values who would love to be accepted to a US school?

Also the text of the email he sent to the student on November 2011 is quoted in Stanford Daily here


 * Ullman went on to say that even if he were in a position to help, he would not do so until Iran recognizes Israel’s right to exist, adding that “if Iranians want the benefits of Stanford and other institutions in the U.S., they have to respect the values we hold in the U.S., including freedom of religion and respect for human rights.”

and Ullman never denied it in the same interview with Stanford Daily. He even went on to explain _why_ he said so:


 * “There’s a war going on in this world between Iran and Israel and other countries,” he said. “I don’t believe an Iranian student, however bright they may be, is going to get a true picture of the issue. I was just trying to show him the Israeli side of the story.”

There was never a controversy around Ullman's criticism of Iranian government. It was always about his discriminatory agenda. Now, the controversy section of the wikipedia page is edited to cast the issue as a fight about Iran's government. To start the controversy section by that sentence is a full mischaracterization. The whole controversy is around Ullman's treatment of Iranian students who emailed him asking about admission to Stanford, and Ullman was explicit to say that he will _not_ help Iranians from Iran, solely because they did not leave the country after the revolution as Ullman preferred.

If you want to see why and how the issue is seen as "controversial" see how it is being discussed on twitter, for example here.

My suggestion for a more honest characterization of the issue is to start the paragraph as follows: "Ullman has been a long advocate of not admitting Iranian students to Stanford, or US in general, because of the criticisms that Ullman holds against the Iranian government. His advocacy on his homepage, his emails, and his Google plus activities have been a source of controversy, as many see this as a form of discrimination based on applicant's nationality and source of origin."

CS Diversity (talk) 15:27, 7 April 2021 (UTC)


 * CS Diversity : I think Ullman or one of his associates are maintaining this page. I raised my suspicion to a very top wikipedia editor. He agreed to talk to me only on the condition that we will not use whatsapp (or facebook group products) for fear of eavesdropping. He told me to stay away from this topic indefinitely as there are very very powerful people. So, I decided not to put my nose into Ullman case anymore for the safety of me and my family. You should also think whether pursuing this case further make sense (controversies related to Iran and recent turing award) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:a62:411:2f01:a44c:ac18:9a64:9f46 (talk) 20:30, 12 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Well it is not up to you or him who gets to be educated in American universities, Israel is far bigger threat to peace in that part of the world and uses state terrorism to kill thousands of Arabs, no Arab faculty members are refusing to educate Israeli Americans based on that fact and they shouldn't, eventhough they may have the same reservations as Ullman regarding their ethnic upbringing and relations to middle eatern countries that they may consider as an enemy. 37.170.108.58 (talk) 18:24, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Open petition
Since last revert, I have modified statement on open petition. It is worth noting in the controversy that some notable persons such as Timnit Ghebru had signed such a petition. Now nowhere in the added sentence, there is any misleading hint associating petition to response from ACM — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:a62:411:2f01:436:e627:c2fc:c807 (talk • contribs) 07:21, 8 June 2021 (UTC)
 * WP:BLP is very clear. We can only report on what is described about this story in published, reliable, secondary sources. The petition and its signers are primary. Content from the petition is not appropriate here except to the extent that secondary sources describe it. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:24, 8 June 2021 (UTC)

Picture of Ullman?
Anyone have a picture of Ullman usable in the public domain? Asking for use both here and at Turing Award. Caleb Stanford (talk) 02:17, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

SIG joint statement not being about Ullman?
The "Undid revision 1106000867" reasoning says "you are taking primary sources NOT ABOUT ULLMAN and putting them in a BLP." This claim is clearly false: The referenced statement is titled "Statement Regarding the 2020 ACM Turing Award" and the 2020 ACM Turing Award went to Ullman. Furthermore, the statement specifically and explicitly talks about Ullman: the precise phrase "recent controversy surrounding Turing Award winner Jeffrey Ullman" appears in the text of this statement. Any claim that this statement is NOT about Ullman would therefore be against undeniable facts and wildly unreasonable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 35.3.179.70 (talk) 20:11, 22 August 2022 (UTC)
 * See above section, "Open petition". —David Eppstein (talk) 20:53, 22 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Your response does not validate the given justification for undo, which is that the SIG joint statement is an example of "primary sources NOT ABOUT ULLMAN." This claim is factually false according to the text of the statement. Above all, the threat to block an honest contributor based on a factually false statement does not seem to be acceptable conduct for the Wikipedia community. 35.3.179.70 (talk) 21:59, 22 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Regarding lack of secondary sources, that also seems to be untrue. The SIG statement is discussed in a Stanford Daily article. 35.3.179.70 (talk) 22:11, 22 August 2022 (UTC)