Talk:Jung Myung-seok/Archive 4

Untitled
REGARDING EDITS OF 17FEB08

After reviewing the BLP policy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons) I have removed all content that was either a) unsourced, b) poorly sourced (note: message boards and non-professional media are not regarded by Wikipedia policy as proper sources) or c) conjecture.

Editors will notice that a large portion of the article has been deleted. However, I'm certain that after reviewing the BLP policy yourself, you will see that the content was deleted legitimately.

Specifically I draw your attention to BLP policy stating:

"We must get the article right.[1] Be very firm about the use of high quality references. Unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material — whether negative, positive, or just questionable — about living persons should be removed immediately and without discussion from Wikipedia articles,[2] talk pages, user pages, and project space."

AND

"Material about living persons available solely in questionable sources or sources of dubious value should not be used, either as a source or as an external link (see above). Self-published books, zines, websites, and blogs should never be used as a source for material about a living person, unless written or published by the subject of the article (see below). Editors should avoid repeating gossip. Ask yourself whether the source is reliable; whether the material is being presented as true; and whether, even if true, it is relevant to an encyclopedia article about the subject."

AND

"Editors should remove any contentious material about living persons that is unsourced, relies upon sources that do not meet standards specified in Wikipedia:Verifiability, or is a conjectural interpretation of a source (see Wikipedia:No original research)."

Editors: please do consider BLP policy in regards to this article. This is not the first time I have removed these edits.

Uptional (talk) 16:24, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

DISPUTED: Reliable Sources for Biography of Living Persons
Editors are in disagreement as to what constitutes reliable sources —Preceding unsigned comment added by RB972 (talk • contribs) 11:56, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

This subject/headline has been created to provide a space for discussing reliable sources. According to Wikipedia policy concerning BLPs these sources are not credible and have therefore been removed (immediately, as the policy states) from the article. If you would like to reinstate them, please discuss it here beforehand as outlined in Wikipedia policy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Uptional (talk • contribs) 10:10, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Are you serious? The first source is from the Korean Police's English homepage! The ones following from reliable news sources. The Australian newspaper and various others. You're really clutching at straws here Uptional. And what exactly do you think is wrong about the information? You don't seriously think he's not in jail, do you? Hilarious! ````Peter Daley —Preceding unsigned comment added by CaptPorridge (talk • contribs) 11:00, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Peter, thanks for your input, but I'm not sure what your comment about him being in jail has to do with us editing this article. In any case, I have made edits with your comments in mind. As such, here are the sources that should be left out of the article because they are not considered reliable by Wikipedia policy:

all www.religionnewsblog.com content (this is a user generated blog site); 7 days news documentary (this is not a proper citation); http://nuri.donga.com/nurinews/view.php?k_id=200801110239&m=2 (this site is not in english, nor is an english translation provided) ; all www.jungmyungseok.com/falsemessiah.proboards23.com material ( this is a blog/message board site); all www.rickross.com content (this is also a user-generated blog site according to this link http://www.rickross.com/aboutus.html); http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200608190106.html (this site not in english, nor is an english translation provided)

To any editors that would like to include these sources, please give explanation here before reposting them, as this is the BLP policy.

Thanks, Uptional (talk) 11:09, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I would, it it wasn't that for the last year all you've done on Wikipedia is try to find reasons - any reasons - to delete information about Jung. I'm tired of it. I've seen whatever has been cited with RNB or rickross before it was there, and the news articles that are cited (no, not blog posts) are the same as the ones originally published. It doesn't matter if the source is not English. The falsemessiah ones are sourced to the 30 lessons, not the message board, just you can access a copy of it there. And I'm pretty sure at some time someone gave you a link to the 7 news documentary even with an English translation. I've explained all this to you many times before. RB972 11:21, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I try to find reasons to keep this article conservative, neutral and factual. The rule of thumb is to do no harm, instead of sourcing dubious websites.  I campaign against edits that betray the BLP policy.  Please do read the policy before making further edits.
 * Uptional (talk) 11:41, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Editors, in an effort to resolve this amicably, I have initiated a RFC. Let's encourage Wikipedians to review the citations and sources themselves, as it appears we are at an impasse.  Because this is a Biography of Living Persons article, I trust that you will respect Wikipedia policy and refrain from re-posting the sources and citations in question until this process has been completed.  After all this is a living person and our goal is to provide a clear and accurate article presenting reliably sourced facts.


 * As well, because this article involves religion, which can arouse passions in us, let's refrain from directing comments to individuals. I think from the way we write it will be understandable what one's opinion is.  Let's stick to the article and not start picking fights with each other in a he said/she said sort of way. Agreed?


 * Best regards, Uptional (talk) 11:50, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * First RfC response: Sources do not have to be in English. They are of course preferable, but  there are not required.  See WP:CITE.  If this article were about Britney Spears, then we should be using english sources. However, this is about Jung Myung Seok.  Obviously there are going to be a ton of useful resources (probably better ones) that aren't in English.  The uiser blogs have to go.      The non-English ones can stay.--Esprit15d • talk • contribs 12:55, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * A note: there's no blogs. The cites are to news articles reproduced by rickross.com and religiousnewsblog.com. They're just not on the original publisher's website anymore. RB972 12:59, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Oh, unless you mean providencetrial and providencecultwatch. RB972 14:08, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Here's a source for you http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/02/20/asia/AS-GEN-SKorea-Cult-Leader.php

I'm starting to wonder if the watering down of this article is related to the above news? ````Peter Daley www.jmscult.com  —Preceding unsigned comment added by CaptPorridge (talk • contribs) 13:49, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I added it. I've found these as well, . It's an AP article so they'll probably be more articles soon. RB972 14:08, 20 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Dear Editors, please note that the dispute over the sources in this article have not been resolved. Currently the article contains blog sites, which violates the BLP policy. To that end, leave the stamp in place. Uptional (talk) 17:58, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

As the owner of www.jungmyungseok.com/falsemessiah.proboards23.com, I personally stand by everything posted there, and you have yet to explain which sources and materials you believe inacurate. And the material referenced was material produced by Jeong's "religion" specifically photocopies of his 30 lesson Bible course which announces Jung as the messiah, so I can't comprehend how that could in any way be inacurate. And I'd be interested to know why you removed the material referenced by the Korean Police and several newspapers.

The goal of wiki is to provide information, you are here to remove information. Here's a rule I like. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ignore_all_rules CaptPorridge (talk) 22:08, 20 February 2008 (UTC)Peter Daley


 * Ironically if the jungmyungseok.com sources are removed, the article is just going to echo the sensationalism of journalism even more than it does now. Why Uptional wants this is beyond me. Maybe the hyperlinks should be removed and it just cited as an offline source. Or maybe someone can watch the "I want to know about it" Korean documentary again and see what it says. RB972 23:09, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

No need really to provide links if they are in contention. Just give the full cite to the actual original news source itself, without an external link. You could even use one of the cite templates from WP:CIT. And as an aid to other editors active in the article, just give a "convenience link", either after the cite, or on the talk page. Cirt (talk) 04:50, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment


 * Good idea. I'll do that for all the Rick Ross and Religion News Blog articles. Since I saw all of them on the original publishers as far as I can remember, this is appropriate. Re:Esprit15d on blogs, I've also removed providencetrial and providencecultwatch as sources (although they were only being used as sources for their own opinion). I really only had them because I wanted Providence's main argument included (that the allegations were by or paid for by bitter former members) and the new AP article has it (more or less) so that can be used instead. RB972 09:27, 21 February 2008 (UTC)


 * OK, I removed all primary sources as well. The article is now entirely sourced by reliable secondary sources, except for his birthday and that he was born in WMD. Not that I think the article is better like this, I've just got better things to do than play wikicop. The article is an accurate representation of reliable sources so if it's negative, it's not my fault. I invite all editors to comment on the article and if they think it's perfectly sourced now or not. I also expect Uptional to promptly remove the tag and leave the article alone from now on. RB972 11:32, 21 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for cooperating editors, I find the article improved because now the information being presented is at least verifiable and reliable. I do share your opinion that the journalism upon which the article is sourced is overly sensational, unfortunately so.   Thanks to those editors who made themselves available to us for help.  Note: citation 16 is a dead-link and needs to be repaired.  The Disputed tag will remain until the dispute is resolved, when the remaining sources are discussed, specifically those termed "Rick Ross" and "Religion News Blog". Uptional (talk) 16:32, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

So as it currently stands, what is still disputed? Cirt (talk) 17:55, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Query


 * It no longer cites Rick Ross and Religious News Blog and that was Uptional's concern. And since Uptional's contribs show all he's ever done on Wikipedia is try to delete or discredit this article, I removed the tag for him. RB972 02:28, 22 February 2008 (UTC)


 * By the way Uptional, if you really do have real concerns over bits in the article, don't label the entire article as disputed. That would be akin to when you labelled the article POV and posted a long opinionated defence of Jung on the talk page, without actually giving a reason why the article was POV - and when a third party investigated, he did not share your concern . I'm tired of such games. RB972 04:43, 22 February 2008 (UTC)


 * The dispute is not resolved. Sources 1, 11, 12, 20, 24, 27 and 31 are not citations at all, but merely links to... nothing--literally in some cases.  Imagine writing a research paper and sourcing articles and books that cannot be located...this is wrong, especially so because this is a biography of someone living, who is also the focus of the media.  Consider Wikipedia policy of Verifiability: "Material challenged or likely to be challenged, and all quotations, must be attributed to a reliable, published source."  Is this material likely to be challenged? Yes, not only in Wikipedia, but also in a court of law.  Is the material published? Perhaps, but we have no way of knowing because there is no link to it. The information Wikipedia provides must be verifiable.


 * Again, the Wikipedia policy: "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. "Verifiable" in this context means that readers should be able to check that material added to Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source. Editors should provide a reliable source for quotations and for any material that is challenged or is likely to be challenged, or it may be removed." So, if a reader cannot verify a source, there is no use in citing that source.


 * Finally another bit of policy which applies directly to this context: "Exceptional claims in Wikipedia require high-quality reliable sources; if such sources are not available, the material should not be included. Also be sure to adhere to other policies, such as the policy for biographies of living persons and the undue weight provision of WP:NPOV." Editors of this article must not use the article as a tool of manipulation.  As such, since they SHOULD be working with that which is verifiable, the prompt removal of these sources is also in their best interest.  Please remove those sources immediately.     Uptional (talk) 09:18, 22 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Your concerns about lack of verifiable sources in this article appear to be invalid. Is this quote, "Is this material likely to be challenged? Yes, not only in Wikipedia, but also in a court of law." supposed to scare people who may disagree with your point-of-view regarding the subject of this article? There is also no evidence that this article's editors are using the article "as a tool of manipulation" I would advise you to be more concise with specific concerns; your current responses indicate that you disagree with the neutral use of information in the article and could paint you as a POV warrior. Bumm13 (talk) 10:46, 22 February 2008 (UTC)


 * The above comment is unhelpful. Please re-read my post, which concerns invalid sources (there are no sources if there are no links!). That's the issue being disputed--the sources--that's what needs comment on.  Follow the links and see... can you verify them? If not, then should unverifiable sources be included? According to BLP policy, the answer is No.


 * My quotation was mis-read because you are unfamiliar with the subject matter: "court of law" regards the legal on-goings of the subject matter, with which the sources speak of. No, it was not a scare-tactic. It is pointing to the fact that this article serves as a public record of an on-going investigation and therefore the sources should all be verifiable.  That's nothing to speak of Wikipedia policy.


 * There is evidence of manipulation. Go back and look at the history.  For the past year this article contained sources from one article editor's blog-site on which contained copyrighted material.  That is not only against Wikipedia policy, but also illegal.  Yet, despite the other editors being aware of this, I remain the only editor at the moment who is challenging it. Uptional (talk) 14:49, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Here's another link to a summary of source No1, http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-30801576_ITM You need to register, but I can't be bothered. Anyway I RB andI already saved that on our forums here: http://jmscult.com/forum/index.php?topic=246.15 The above link is at least evidence the article existed.

11 is on my old site, and I'll say again I stand by that completely: http://www.jungmyungseok.com/falsemessiah.proboards23.com/index127f.html?board=japan&action=display&thread=1154863682

No 12, I remember reading it and I was the one who submitted it to Rick Ross, but I may have neglected to keep a copy on my old site. Anyway it is online at Rick Ross's site.

20, 24, and 27 are also on my site, I can't be bothered with individual links. http://www.jungmyungseok.com/falsemessiah.proboards23.com/index49f9.html?board=japan

At least you can read them if you were curious.

It's a pity you weren't so critical when Jeong was telling you he read the Bible 4 thouand times and meet Jesus in a cave.

Uhm Evidence of manipulation? Not on my site there isn't. I've collected factual information about a man who was at the time a wanted fugitive, and in case you have forgotten, he was a fugitive you aided. And speaking of manipulation, have you also forgotten that you erased numerous sourced material? Ande what a laugh it is your cult complaining about copyrights, you don't blink an eyelid at the rapes, the suicide of former members, and Jeong's fugitive status, but I post some of your "secret" materials Jeong stole from the Moonies, and suddenly you start caring about "laws." And if those sermons are really the word of God, why is my site the only place where they are freely available? Why aren't you posting all those speeches and Bible study lessons?

````CaptPorridge / Peter Daley —Preceding unsigned comment added by CaptPorridge (talk • contribs) 14:59, 22 February 2008 (UTC)  ````CaptPorridge

And I would argue that I haven't infringed the cult's copyright. No court has deemded that I have, and my sites are all still online.So your beef with my site as a reference in that respect is baseless. Your allegation is just that. If you want to prove it, go ahead and sue me. If not, then I object to your statement just as you would if I wrote in the article that Jeong is a crazed serial raping pedophile. I'm sure if I wrote that you would say, "wait for the trial" and fair enough too. So let's treat your copyright allegations the same way. ````Peter Daley —Preceding unsigned comment added by CaptPorridge (talk • contribs) 16:08, 22 February 2008 (UTC) You don't have to have online links visible on the Internet in order to satisfy Verifiability for this project. Just enough information in the citation to verify it so that others could go and check it from news archives, and to make sure that it satisfies WP:RS. In my opinion, Sources 1, 11, 12, 20, 24, 27 and 31 appear to satisfy WP:V to that regard, and the sources themselves seem to satisfy WP:RS. Not sure what the problem is here... Cirt (talk) 17:22, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment
 * I will repeat what Cirt said - there is absolutely NO requirement that a source be online in order to be used. Some of the best information available is found in books. And thousands of Wikipedia articles cite newspaper articles that were at one time online but now can only be found in a library. And many magazines articles aren't online either, not even in paid form.
 * Also, I disagree with removing a link to a blog or other site that would be (in and of itself) considered unreliable IF the link is simply to content that is in fact from a reliable source. I realize that it's possible to put up a fraudulent copy of an article on a website, but if the website is reputable in and of itself, there seems - to me - to be no reason to keep information from readers by not providing the online link. Of course, when you do so, you should not mention the website. Here's an example:


 * Tom Beyerlein, "Questions raised about branding contract for U.S. Rep. Mike Turner's wife", Dayton Daily News, February 10, 2008


 * The link isn't to the Daily News website, but to a copy of the newspaper article on the citizensforethics.org website. That website isn't mentioned in the citation because it's irrelvant - the source is the newspaper. And, of course, the source is perfectly good even if there was no link.


 * I will note that this approach isn't universally accepted, partly because of copyright concerns and partly because of concerns that what is being shown isn't accurate; that's why it's ideal if you can find a copy of a page at archive.org. But if no one objects to a link to a site with a copy of source material on it - and hopefully objections are limited to cases where someone believes that the website owners are in fact not reputable - then (again) it's a service to readers to show them where an on-line copy of a source does in fact exist. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 22:29, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Disagree with removals by Hux
3 sources were removed by Hux as being unreliable or not stating what the quote said. As the author of the Keimyung article, I would obviously disagree. And as someone who has researched this group for 5 years and who hosts the major critical sites in English, I think I have established my credentials as someone who knows this cult well. The sources I checked all said exactly what the quote stated, so the stated reason for the deletion is misleading

Another article deleted was a copy of a printed article hosted at rickross.com I submitted most of the article to Rick. I'm not sure what the problem is there. The quote was directly from a published news source.

The testimony from www.freedomofmind.com. I again fail to see how the testimony of a former member is unreliable, especially when it is consistant with all the articles and the Korean court's rulings, which all came much later. And the specific quote concerning when members' are eligible to be married is also exactly what I heard from other former and current members.

````CaptPorridge / Peter Daley


 * Hi. Just to make clear at the outset: I know next to nothing about the subject of this article - I'm not "for" or "against" him or whatever he stands for. My edits are solely from the perspective of making the article more encyclopedic, in accordance with the policy at WP:BLP. If I come across as fairly rigid in my views then that's because the BLP policy is a very serious one: articles that don't conform to it open Wikipedia up to serious legal liability - it only takes one hefty libel case from a plaintiff with deep pockets to bring this whole project down. I don't think any of us wants that.
 * So, that said, this is an issue of using sources to back up claims made in the article and some of those sources just don't hold up to scrutiny. For example, self-published sources should never be used in BLP articles (unless written by the subject of the article to back up what that person has said, obviously). They're just not reliable enough to hold up to scrutiny. This applies to an apparent reprint of a news article on some random site (e.g. the rickross stuff): we don't know whether it really is a word-for-word reprint or whether the publisher is passing off a fake and banking on "originally posted in [major news outlet]" to convince people it's real. But whether fake or real, it's effectively a non-issue: if a site claims to be republishing a news stories from a major outlet then we can simply go and find the original source and link to that. If that's not possible then we'll just have to do without it. This won't be a major disaster. This is the internet: if something is significant enough we will be able to reliably source it somewhere, if not now then eventually.
 * Re testimony from former members: again, where is that testimony published? If it's in a major news outlet or a serious, peer-reviewed journal then great, put it in there. If it's from a self-published web site or a little known advocacy group then sorry but that just doesn't meet the standard of reliability that we need to shield Wikipedia from legal action.
 * Re the "Keimyung" article that you said you wrote, Peter, I'll refer to you to WP:NOR. Sorry but we can't use original research here. You should also take a look at WP:COI, since you're obviously heavily invested in a particular viewpoint on this subject. This is not to say you can't make edits here, obviously, you just need to be very careful and, in particular, you shouldn't in general be citing yourself to back up something in the article.
 * Hopefully people can now see where I'm coming from. This has the potential to be a decent article, but it needs a lot more work, especially in the reliability area. -- Hux (talk) 21:14, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Hux for your responces. And yes, I'm definately not as up to speed on wikiguidelines as I'd like to be.. busy busy busy! But I just read them, albeit briefly and I still feel the references are valid.

A few comments, first the Keimyung article is a published article. Keimyung University is a large university with 30,000 students and three campuses. They produce a Korean newspaper and the above English Gazette in which my article was published. The article was published both online and in the Gazette's printed edition. I have scans and copies of that edition, if that'd help, but the article online at the kmu website should suffice. Here's the university's homepage in Korean: www.kmu.ac.kr

RickRoss's site. There's just no reason to doubt those links. Some of those article are no longer online where they were originally published, but I personally saw them and Rick did as well, as he does all the articles on his site. This did come up last week and another editor felt those articles met the standards.

The testimnony is from Steven Hassan's site and he's recognised as one of the world's leading experts on cults. If a testimony is on his website, then again I can't see any reason to doubt it. I understand the need for verifiable sources, but again, I fail to see why those sites are in any doubt. We are hardly talking obscure advocacy groups here. Especially since the contents are completely consistant with the articles referenced and the Korean court's ruling. If they contradicted everything else published about Jeong Myeong-seok, then yes I could understand scepticism, but they don't.

I understand your edits were designed to improve the article, so apologies for sounding otherwise.

Thanks, CaptPorridge (talk) 23:35, 29 February 2008 (UTC)CaptPorridge


 * Hux, thanks for discussing and helping with the article, but I really feel that you've just disregarded all the discussion above in the RFC. The articles are not sourced to rickross (besides the point that rickross is not some random site, he testifies in court as a cult expert and he'd get sued in a millisecond if a word of his articles were wrong - there's a lot of people who don't like him). Have a look at this diff . I absolutely cannot agree that sources should be removed just because they are removed from the original publishers, and it was previously established that the article doesn't need to be online to be cited. Yeah the article looks pretty much the same with them, but it sets an absurd precedent. Are we to remove the Korea Times articles when they get removed? It's not impossible to find the articles now removed in other ways. RB972 23:58, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I think I'm going to be WP:BOLD and add the offline cites back. It's been established they don't need to be online to be cited, and both myself and CaptPorridge have seen and/or have the original articles. If you're curious what they look like, they look the same as the ones on the Internet. Most of the cites were originally cited to the original publishers, so WP:DEADREF applies. Note that, for example, the "2,000 Japanese join cult led by suspected sex offender on the run from Interpol" is hosted identically by 6 independent sites that all get their articles directly from the media:       . And that's only the English ones. Also note that most of these articles are Japanese from late July to early August 2006 - a time where Jung Myung Seok was the 3rd most aired story on Japanese TV. So if CaptPorridge and I are lying, we're picking a pretty bloody stupid thing to lie about, and a pretty implausible lie too. WP:AGF. RB972 02:58, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Please note that at no point did I ever imply that you or CaptPorridge were lying or attempting to mislead anyone. Otherwise, I strongly disagree with both of you about relying on sites that reprint news articles. Why can we not simply locate the original source? If it doesn't exist then surely we can find a separate, more reliable source to back up the specific claim, can't we? -- Hux (talk) 09:36, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks to those who have helped to keep this article "clean". I noticed someone replaced text with an expletive--and not a very nice one--a few days ago. Kudos to the editor for noticing it and reverting... Uptional (talk) 16:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I deleted the sentence about Jung being 'unrepentant' and claiming that the rape was for religious ritual because A) it's not factual and B) the source for it was unavailable to the reader. Uptional (talk) 12:28, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * A is WP:OR and B is false. That you don't subscribe to Korea Herald is not reason to delete the ref. Anyway, you can see the article here:

http://www.asianewsnet.net/news.php?id=784&sec=1 RB972 00:59, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for working so hard to keep this article accurate. I don't see any major issues with this article in light of Wikipedia trying to keep everything well sourced and Encyclopedic. So even though some facts about Jung were removed that were probably true and even verifiable through research (in that I agree with them having seen it from multiple sources myself), it would be unfair to a third party visitor if they themselves cannot independently verify this through a source that meets Wiki standards. So while I might have seen something reported on the news, if I cannot provide a reference it would basically be my word on the internet that I saw it. Cached articles by a reliable source are probably a necessity here as articles tend to evaporate. The nature of Wiki means that the article will evolve over time through peer review. Thanks again! -bdiego

Segments of Jung Myung Seoks's sermons give more accurate or more up to date contents of his teachings. Newfound References
I found some references/quotes taken directly from Jung Myung Seok's sermons. Based on these references I updated the "teachings" section. I also removed the part about his teachings on resurrection because I didn't see anything about resurrection in the cited reference. Based on the teachings in his sermon, "Only God and Jesus is(are) the Lord(s) and can be the Lord(s)." all parts that refer to him as a self-proclaimed messiah need to be removed. This obviously contradicts his own quotes. Macauthor (talk) 13:30, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure we should take the unreferenced word of a convicted rapist who was fugitive for 8 years as "gospel" and use it to delete material that was sourced from numerous news articles. Here is one: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/asian-cult-leader-arrested/story-e6frg6so-1111113538594 PeterDaley72 (talk) 22:31, 5 December 2011 (UTC)PeterDaley72

Please make changes that improve and make the article more accurately represent the sources referenced.
I'm not sure why these recent changes were made. They are only adding vagueness and confusion that does not match the sources of information about the subject. He does not claim to be the "physical embodiment" of Jesus, and has made it clear in numerously online posted sermons that the Lord is a divine being and that JMS himself is simply being used by the Lord who has no body much like the Lord used all the heroes of the bible. I don't think you'll find "physical embodiment" in the biographies of Martin Luther or any patriarchs of the bible, so that kind of language should not be used here - just as it wasn't used in the cited source. Also, please do not paste the entire long url in the summary. A simple reference to the links section or cited references will suffice. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Macauthor (talk • contribs) 13:53, 6 June 2012 (UTC) Macauthor (talk) 20:58, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

Inadequte citations in Jung Myung Seok article
I am new to Wikipedia but seek to make sure the information is correct. According to BLP rules any information that is unsourced or of a dubious source is to be removed. In the article Jung Myong Seok I take issue with citations 11, 12, and 13. 11 Is attributed to a French sociologist Ms Nathalie Luca. Problem is the citiation page does not support the claim that JMS was a member of the Unification Church. Additionally there is an out of place British flag on the top of the citation page which does not fit CNRS country of orgin--- France. Therefore, I do not only doubt the authenticity of the citation but it does nothing to support the claim made in the body of the article. 12-- Citation leads to a link titled Radio Australia with 5 poorly written sentences that describe a supposed historical timeline. The article has no reference to primary sources AND does not even have a listed author. It gives me the impression that someone robbed a page from Radio Australia and wrote whatever suited their needs. Furthermore, the information contradicts what was written in paragraph 3 of the JMS article. Mr Jung was not fleeing justice but was carrying out missionary trips. The sentence associated with this citation clearly portrays Mr Jung as a criminal on the run. This is a shameful act of intellectual dishonesty and it is travesty to leave this libelous information posted with an inadequate citation. 13 The citation link is no longer available and can not be used to verify the statement in the body of the article. What accusations reached other countries and why was he investigated by Taiwanese authorities? The answer is not stated in the wikipedia article but the implication is that he committed sexual assault or some similar crime in other countries. These 3 sentences( associated with citation 12 and 13) flow with the clear intent to slander Mr. Jung without 1 single properly referenced source.

All three citations should be thrown out with their associated text!!!! MrTownCar (talk) 03:42, 9 October 2012 (UTC)

I also take issue with three additional citations.

Citation 17 is a dead link.

Citation 18 not verifiable and can not be used to support the text.

Citation 19 is very dubious as it quotes an unnamed source and a spokeswoman for Providence but doesn't include her name. Additionally, the article is poorly written and full of typographical errors including missed punctuation. I doubt the existence of a person by the sir name of Jewsbury. The citation also quotes the article as being written in 2001 but the article has a heading date of 2007. Given the poor writing quality of this article and inconsistent dating, it is very dubious and should be removed (with its text) as a reliable source.

The associated text should be removed according to BLP guidelines.MrTownCar (talk) 16:21, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

FICTITIOUS ARTICLES QUOTED IN CITATIONS
A number of the citations for this article have been dubious at best but as I go through the ciatations one by one they are actually fraudulent. Citations 3 and 5 are essentailly the same article with a cut and paste effect with no author listed in either article. Citation 4 does not even open the link and I can not verify it. The fact that a number of these citations (beyond 3-5) have the same retrieval date is also very suspicious. Considering that one article is written in the China Press and the other by Fox News it is highly unlikely that the content would be exactly the same. Clearly they were written with the agenda to slander Mr. Jung. Additionally the fact that someone highjacked bona fide media outlets to post their propaganda is illegal let alone unethical. In the spirit of seeking truth, I ask that the editors remove citations 3,4,5 from the footnotes at the end of the article.MrTownCar (talk) 16:52, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

That is completely and utterly ridiculous. 114.203.184.10 (talk) 06:54, 9 February 2013 (UTC)Peter Daley

Please do not vandalize this page
How could Shii remove so much biographical information, links, and add such derogatory information to a living person's biography without even so much as an edit description or a mention on the talk page?

He should be familiar with the rules he's breaking because he's been called out on it before for other articles he edited just as JoshuSasori warned him on (talk) 12:28, 16 September 2012 (UTC), "do not add unsourced derogatory information to biographies of living people, and then expect people to clean up your mess. The rules for biographies of living people appear at the top of every page whenever you edit it. If you add any more I will remove it again, the same way."

Just as JoshuSasori said I too will immediately undo such undocumented vandalism. Macauthor (talk) 17:47, 29 December 2012 (UTC)
 * The facts have no bias. Shii (tock) 15:19, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm trying to find balance in this article.

Macauthor, all of the specifics of his theology is unsourced and does not belong in the lede. It looks to be copied from somewhere else. You can't use the site http://providencetrial.com, gospelofprovidence.com, http://gospelofprovidence.com or any other related site as a resource, since it is WP:Primary. It can be used only as an opinion of itself. We need WP:Secondary WP:Reliable sources.

Also, 98.14.50.144 and Macauthor, it looks like you two got into an WP:Editwar. Please avoid that. Build WP:Consensus and go to the talk page.

Everyone, please read WP:BLP. Specifically WP:BLPCRIME.

Shii, the first sentence in the lede should not mention he's a rapist. That's not an appropriate tone. There is a paragraph dealing with that in the lede. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 18:45, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

I’m a little new to the difference between primary and secondary/tertiary sources, but I’m pretty sure the article referenced on ProvidenceTrial.com is a secondary source since it is a direct translation of an article published in a Korean investigative journalism magazine. ProvidenceTrial.com has some articles written based on member experiences, but that’s different from the magazine article written by a journalist listing out the problems with Jung Myung Seok’s trial. It just so happens to be available for online viewing at providencetrial.com which is why I provided the link. I originally cited it as an online resource but we could just as easily cite the magazine it was originally published in called Civil Government. http://providencetrial.com/2010/01/jms-in-the-news-full-report-reveals-all/

The source of the theology additions were all from Jung Myung Seok’s publicly available sermon summaries on GospelofProvidence.com. It is an official site by the organization he founded and contains no opinions other than the ones Jung Myung Seok has publicly made himself through his sermons. The site is nothing more than a publication of summaries of Jung Myung Seok’s own sermons by the organization he founded which are broadcasted all over the world each week. I don’t know which category of sources it would fall under, but I think we can agree that Jung Myung Seok’s own publications would be the best source of information about Jung Myung Seok in the context of religion. I would like to restore the section about his teachings. I can reference which sermon each statement comes from if needed, especially the statements that conflict with the wrong and out date presumptions about them currently posted. More specifically the idea that he is a self-proclaimed Messiah. He has sermons directly addressing this misunderstanding that are publicly available. Can I update the wikipedia article based on his own sermon? http://gospelofprovidence.com/2008/12/sun-msg-only-god-and-jesus-is-the-lord-and-can-be-the-lord/ http://gospelofprovidence.com/2008/12/there-is-only-one-god-one-holy-spirit-and-one-lord/ Macauthor (talk) 22:12, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * How do we know GospelofProvidence.com is a real Providence website and not a spinoff group? This is why WP:V was invented. Shii (tock) 06:51, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

It is obvious that Shii has an agenda to smear and discredit Jung Myung Seok. As pointed out by another user the tone is not appropriate in the lead. In the spirit of Wikipedia I will do my best to keep this article honest and factual with appropriate citations when possible.MrTownCar (talk) 01:46, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * If you're actually going to do what you say, that sounds perfectly good to me. I don't live in Korea and have never met a member of Providence. Shii (tock) 06:51, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * RE:ProvidenceTrial.com. The site is a Providence run website. I don't know if their translation is accurate. I don't know anything about the magazine Civil Government. I don't know if it is a WP:RS. There's too many questions and issues with that source.
 * The Providence sources probably could be used for citing their theology, but with some caution.
 * MrTownCar, you can't remove multiple reliable sources like what you did. Please read WP:BLPCRIME. He has been convicted of rape, it is not slanderous to mention that. In fact, we have to mention that and can't downplay it. It is also not uncommon to mention a conviction in the lede, since that is rather noteworthy. Look at the page for Kent Hovind for instance. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 07:16, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Harizotoh he was convicted of rape WITHOUT physical or DNA evidence. This is an important point.MrTownCar (talk) 14:32, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thank you Harizotoh9 for helping with the article. I agree, we need to be safe and find balance with this article. Not just for the sake of wikipedia, but it’s only right that the article have some representation of the opposing side if it’s going to declare the subject controversial.


 * Due to the controversial nature of this article I would like to remove some, but not all, of the links that MrTowncar found contentious. I know that the rules say that you can use sources that are not available online as long as they retrievable from an archive but wikipedia's rules also say that any material that is contentious should be removed immediately. So many of the current references are just links to the front page of the newspaper organization, to their 4o4 page, or even just dead links altogether. There seem to be plenty that are viewable online so can we agree to stick to those?Macauthor (talk) 18:50, 12 January 2013 (UTC)


 * ProvidenceTrial.com is the undisputed representation of the religious organization’s point of view. They even have a Taiwanese branch of the site in Chinese http://tw.providecetrial.com.
 * GospelofProvidence.com has produced 2 summaries every week for several years. This time next week I’m pretty sure there will be two more. I’m not quite sure what you would find to be convincing evidence of the validity of an online resource, but for me the consistency of time and effort put into the site alone is enough to give it credibility. Macauthor (talk) 18:06, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

The subject of this article is a public figure known only really in Asia. All of the content written or published about him originates from sources written in Chinese, Japanese, or Korean. If we are going to have an article about him English then we can’t remove sources and content simply because of our inablity to read those languages or because we’re too lazy to get an editor involved who does. If it’s better we can cite a link to the source in its original language.

There may be a few short articles that are little more than sensational headlines written by journalists who did not care enough to interview anyone involved with the subject, but if we only publish those articles then wikipedia risks the same legal trouble that both the Taiwanese and Korean broadcast channels experienced. The Taiwanese news broadcast released an official apology and the Korean New Broadcast agency were made to pay a fine to Providence church and subsequent fines if they failed to give at least 5% of broadcasting time to allow the church to defend itself. By excluding Jung Myung Seok’s publicly stated opinions and his organization’s point of view we commit what one court has already deemed to be libelous activity.

Without at least some mention of the religious figure’s teachings and accomplishments the article looks incomplete. It says he leads Providence - a religious movement. You can’t have anything referred to as a, “movement,” without at least 1,000s of people being passionate about the subject. No one becomes famous for a rape crime alone. Why do we have an article about Jung Myung Seok at all if we are not at least going to mention some details about what makes him worth reading an article on wikipedia about? If these sensational uninformative articles about a crime not worth mentioning on wikipedia by itself is all we are going to have here then we should just take down the wikipedia article altogether. A wikipedia article should have more than just a sensational headline about a crime committed. I agree with Harizotoh9 that we need to be careful. That’s why we must find a way to balance this article or just take it down altogether.

Wikipedia has no choice but to hold itself to higher standards than these journalistic agencies because unlike them wikipedia cannot afford to survive a libel suit, as harizatoh9 mentioned earlier. The rules of BLP allow enough flexibility for primary sources to be cited if used carefully. Since GospelofProvidence.com is a reflection of the subject’s own religious views, and since another editor already suggested it, let’s go ahead and restore the section on Jung Myung Soek’s theology.Macauthor (talk) 18:01, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Some of the statements on the previous version don’t even match each other. It says in one line that he was convicted of raping two girls, and in the very next line it says the court found him guilty of raping 6 members. It also mentions that he was charged with embezzelment and misuse of church funds. The numerous charges made against him may have been important at the time that article was written but they seem irrelevant now that he’s been convicted of two of the many charges made against him. Of course we can’t just assume they were dropped since we have no source saying so, because that would be synthesis which is against Wikipedia’s rules. Much of the content in the previous versions was redundant. The articles appear to have been written before the trial took place so let’s just make the section concise and up to date according to the more recent articles available online.

The self-proclaimed messiah stuff directly contradicts his own published sermons which are available online. As a matter of fact, the sources cited for this part are to dead links. For this reason I’m removing the contentious material. I’m not removing all the negative material like MrTownCar did, but let’s at least make an effort to stick to the verifiable facts and statements made by the subject himself just to be fair. Macauthor (talk) 04:27, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

The Providence websites are being cited for factual claims about his life. These cites completely fail WP:RS. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 06:51, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Please follow WP:RS which is Wikipedia policy. Shii (tock) 11:14, 15 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Macauthor should be aware (if he is not already) that a discussion of this issue is in progress on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard (WP:RSN). The consensus there appears to be that the sources used in Shii's version of the article are appropriate, but that Macauthor's version (based solely on Providence sources) is not.  Please note that WP:BLP bans contentious material unless it is backed up by reliable sources — which the current consensus version of the article appears to be.  Wikipedia's BLP policy does not say we must (or even should) omit reliably sourced material simply because it is or may be illegal in some countries (other than the USA, where Wikipedia's servers are located); see WP:NOTCENSORED.  I recognize that Macauthor was only warning of the possibility of legal action by others, and was not himself making any legal threats (something which is absolutely forbidden here; see WP:NLT) — but I would caution Macauthor to be very careful not to say anything that might even seem to a casual reader to be bordering on threats of legal action.  Finally, I would remind Macauthor (and also MrTownCar) that edit warring is not acceptable, even if you are convinced that you are right and that everyone else is wrong — and that civility requirements apply to edit summaries (e.g., identifying a specific editor's contributions as "libelous" is not an appropriate thing to put in an edit summary).  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 21:50, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Let me clarify that I would never imagine threatening anyone in any way and if any of my comments were taken that way earlier I in now way had any intention but to further the argument that Harizoto9 had already made.

The article being cited for the problems with Jung's trial is absolutely a reliable third party news magazine called, "Civil Government" published in Korea. It just happens to also have some translated quotations on ProvidenceTrial.com. The original source passes WP:RS.Macauthor (talk) 14:50, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
 * As for Civil Government magazine, I know nothing about this magazine. I don't know if it's independent or not. I don't know if it's reliable. I don't know the quality of it. I don't know if their quotations from it are accurate or quote mining. I don't know if their translations are accurate. There are just too many problems with that source. --Harizotoh9 (talk) 15:54, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Civil Governement is the translated title. It is a bonafide media source but it is NOT circulated in English. THe issue that deals with Jung is dated February 15, 2010. It is verfiable but will not be found with an English search on Google.14:32, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I confirmed that a magazine with this name exists in Korea, but I cannot get any information on (1) how notable it is (2) who sponsors it (3) how it is viewed by other sources. When I googled the terms "Civil Government + Magazine" in Korean, the top results were all about JMS. Shii (tock) 16:59, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
 * This allegedly major magazine has no article on the Korean or Japanese Wikipedias. Shii (tock) 17:02, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I just realized that most of the articles on its website http://www.mjnews.co.kr/ are uncredited plagarisms from Yonhap News and similar sites. Very strange website. Shii (tock) 17:12, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Regardless Shii's opinions abou the site it is still a verifiable third party source, and the other articles he found about Jung Myung Seok there confirm the details found in the Civil Government article. I ran a search and found some more articles which verify the court's penalties against the libelous news broadcasts. Many of Shii's links still link to dead links, 404 pages, or reroute not to any particular article but to the sites home page. A good example are the links to any articles on Asahi Shimbun. Let's fix the links or remove them. Macauthor (talk) 13:30, 28 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Please note that we must be careful about sources. Using sources tied to Seok or his organization must be done carefully as they are not independent.  They are essentially self-published and their use, especially with regards to living persons, is very limited on Wikipedia.  (see WP:SELFPUB, especially the part on claims about third parties)  Ravensfire ( talk ) 17:43, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Violation of BLP Rules
It is obvious by looking at Shii postings that he/she has a slanderous agenda. This individual incessantly violates the BLP rules and continues to post contentious and libelous information on this page. Additionally Shii continues to post bogus secondary sources as they can not be verified by going directly to the websites and searching the archives. The articles do not exist.MrTownCar (talk) 17:01, 28 January 2013 (UTC)
 * An article from a website does not have to be always on-line to be considered acceptable. Sites remove and/or archives articles all the time.  The requirement is that the source must be verifiable through enough information given in the reference - see WP:SOURCEACCESS.  It doesn't have to be easy for you to access, just accessable in some way.  For websites, you can always try using the Wayback Machine which can show you older versions of a website.  Also, your edit restored information that multiple uninvolved editors said was unacceptably sourced.  You need to stop using involved sources for contentious information.  You also removed mention of the conviction from the lead.  That's purely a POV edit - it was a major event that happened even if you disagree with it and needs to be included in the lead.  Please consider reverting your edit and discussing specific issues.  Aspects of your edit may be acceptable in a limited manner but if you continue bulk reversions without discussion nothing positive can happen.  Ravensfire ( talk ) 17:29, 28 January 2013 (UTC)
 * My apologies, MrTownCar, I misread your edit when I was looking at it. The conviction information IS in the lead.  Completely my error and I have struck-through my erroneous remark.  I think your version of the lead is far too long and needs to be trimmed.  Much of what you added belongs in the article body, not the intro section.  Ravensfire ( talk ) 17:37, 28 January 2013 (UTC)
 * For the sources that you said you could not find and thus discounted - would you mind listing them here to see if others can find the source? Ravensfire ( talk ) 17:38, 28 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Accusations that an editor is violating the BLP policy need to be taken up promptly at the BLP Noticeboard (WP:BLPN); making such accusations without following up on them may get you sanctioned for incivility. I would also remind everyone that, per the edit warring policy, edit warring is unacceptable (and can get you blocked) even if you are convinced you are in the right and other editors are in the wrong.  Discuss your differences of opinion regarding content or sources here (on the article talk page) or on the appropriate dispute resolution noticeboards.  If these problems continue with no sign that people are trying to resolve them, this article is likely to end up being fully protected for a time (in order to force a stop to the edit war), and/or disruptive editors may be blocked from editing in order to protect Wikipedia and convince them that they need to take our policies seriously.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 22:46, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

I have posted my grievances extensively earlier in the talk page and enumerated my grievances citation by citation. Shii has posted nothing in response to my edits and yet I am reminded about edit warring? I am at a loss considering how much I posted back in October 2012 about the dubious sources included in Shii version of the article when many of his references have no listed authors when you open the links.MrTownCar (talk) 04:05, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Civil government source
Civil Government is being used as a source for a few things in the article and I'd like to get some more information on it. Right now, the existing ref is not enough. It's pointing to Providence Trial webpage carrying a reprint of the article. That reprint doesn't have a whole lot of information. Civil Government is supposedly a monthly magazine but the reprint notice doesn't include year and month or page information. Some quick searches didn't turn up any information about civil government - who publishes it, is it still published, website, circulation size, editorial staff, reputation, etc. I completely understand I've got a major language barrier that's making this difficult so I'm asking for help. For an article like this, having most of the sources from a self-published sources is a Bad Thing. For this particular source, would editors more familiar with it kindly fill in the blanks? At a minimum, we need to get more information about the cite to use it. As written, it fails WP:V because you do not have enough information to verify that the content came from Civil Government. This is a contentious issue and Wikipedia has demanding standards on sourcing that aren't being met. Help would be appreciated. Ravensfire ( talk ) 23:23, 28 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Nevermind - re-reading the linked page carefully shows it's not a reprint (not sure how I read that), but a follow-up report of an original article. That makes it sourced to providencetrial.com and thus at best a self-published source.  This is will limit how this source can be used in the article.  Ravensfire ( talk ) 03:24, 29 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure you're reading it correctly. The line you're referring to is the first line of the article. It's basically the reporter, Moon Il Seok referring to an earlier article published by the same or some other source. None of it is sourced to ProvidenceTrial.com. The article, "Christians on Trial" http://providencetrial.com/christians-on-trial-jeong-myeong-seok/ on the other hand is clearly original research by the authors of the website and thus a primary source. If any of the cited references should be in question it might be that one. But if it you want more confirmation, you can check the details against some of the other third party news sources. You'll need to know Korean or use google translate to read the article at News Daily, http://www.newsdaily.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=29216, or if you speak Chinese you can read a Chinese translation of the news article from Jeong Gyeong News at http://tw.providencetrial.com/mjknews-2012-12/, or you can read it in its original Korean at http://providencetrial.com/wp-content/uploads/ptrial-articles/newsarticle.pdf. An English translation of the article is available at http://providencetrial.com/jeong-gyeong-news-article-about-the-problems-with-jungs-trial/ Macauthor (talk) 04:07, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Merging the versions
I think there are essentially two different versions of the article out here. Using the current version as one, that gives us version 1 and version 2. Information from both belongs in the final article - both versions are flawed. An edit war can go back and forth between the versions and editors get blocked OR we can work together to merge information from both into a single, NPOV article. It's the WP:WRONGVERSION (meaning to someone, it's always the wrong version) but I suggest taking the current version and adding to it. I've done some work culling out some of the most egregious puffery and starting to flag parts of the article that I think aren't adequately sourced. Please, use the talk page and use the noticeboard actively if there's a dispute. Ravensfire ( talk ) 03:38, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Ravensfire - let's merge the two versions. There appears to be some sources (not all) in both versions that are valid according to Wikipedia's rules. It's not up to us as editors to decide which side is right or wrong, but it is our responsibility to let the reference both sides if it is a controversial subject which this obviously is. But let's not forget what the subject of this article actually is. Jung Myung Seok is a living person who founded an international religious movement. There's far more to his biography than just the recent trial and conviction. I'd like to restore his page on wikiquote and keep the details of his biography even if they cite primary sources written by either the subject himself or the religious movement he founded so long as they are not contended by any other sources. An example of what I'm talking about is his service in Vietnam. In Shii's version of the article these details and photo keep getting removed. This not only makes the article one sided (as the version that MrTownCar insists on also does) but it also takes the focus away from the subject and makes it entirely about his criminal reputation. A version of the article that includes both versions would be much more substantial. Macauthor (talk) 04:26, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

The approach outlined by both Ravensfire and Macauthor is in proper spirit of creating a Wikipedia article. There are clearly two sides that disagree and there is also a process of reaching an agreement outlined by Wikipedia in WP:Consensus. Specifically, for such an article, consensus should be heavily built using discussion. Since this article falls under BLP, we must be extremely careful about what kind of material is posted. Under WP:Eventualism, BLP's should be kept neutral at all times to the best of our ability, rather than posting heavily weighted material knowing that someone will eventually object to it. Itsfiziks (talk) 14:54, 29 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Providencetrial.com is not a RS so there is nothing to be gained by merging anything sourced to it. Any so-called "translation" you want to link on providencetrial.com must come with an explanation of what the original source is and how that source is viewed by relevant media. World newspapers on the other hand are RS, assuming that there is not a more reliable source that contradicts them.
 * I will be happy to include anything related to his Vietnam service or anything at all, actually, as long as it is not sourced to providencetrial.com. Shii (tock) 09:00, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Continued vandalism of the article
Shii continues to subvert and rewrite this article unilaterally. I have posted a complaint on the BLP newsboard asking for help at the suggestion of an editor. In the meantime I have simply reverted to the previous edition of the article. THe existing article needs further work and more sources will be forthcoming but this takes time to gather the information and post it with appropriate sources.MrTownCar (talk) 13:40, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
 * "My unsourced version is a temporary measure to replace your sourced version." Shii (tock) 15:53, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I would rather a sourced version by a member of Providence than a falsely sourced version by someone who is not part of Providence and has never met someone from Providence.MrTownCar (talk) 16:15, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

False statements and non supporting/dubious citations in version restored by UKexpat
2 not verifiable in the archives of the australian

3 no author on AP article on Fox

4 Singapore news and AFP are unrelated news sources linked in one citation. cant verify article.

5 nathalie luca  the article does not support text that Jung was ever part of the unification church. He was never a member.

26, 27,28 jung preaches absolute sexual purity. There is no redemption in having intercourse with the Messiah. This is categorically untrue and contentious. By BLP rules this material should be removed.MrTownCar (talk) 16:12, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

6,7,8,29, 30 Shimbun references were cross checked with International Herald Tribune archives directly. None of these articles are verifiable.

9 radio australia 5 phrases posted, not a news article clearly fake.

10, 12 blog can not be used as citation. visitor board Korean national police agency

13 dead link

14,15 written in korean not verifiable

16 china post no author again!

17 HERALD TRIBUNE article not located in archives. I searched entire month of february 2008 article titles - no article located with that title.

18 dead link

19 yonhap article with no author

20, 21,22 in korean difficult to verify

23 wayback machine doesnt have URL

JMScult.com is pure propaganda. The fact that this is listed as the first link in external references is very revealing in the agenda of Shii and others who put forth this version of the article.MrTownCar (talk) 16:24, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Given the above flaws I am shocked ukexpat would restore such a version of this article to Wikipedia.MrTownCar (talk) 17:04, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Pot ... Kettle ... Black. Given that your preferred version is mostly Providence sources, it takes a lot of nerve to make that statement.  I'd suggest focusing less on the editors and more on finding good sources for this article.  Responses to your comments about specific sources.
 * 2)Really? Huh, I clicked on the link in the reference and what do you know, the article came up.  Source is acceptable.
 * 3)Author is not required, it's an AP report which often doesn't have an author. Source is acceptable.
 * 4)Source would be AFP but published on different site, extremely common. Article couldn't be found on straittimes.com or AFP's site but I did find it here which could be used as a convenience link for those that can't get to someplace that has better archives.
 * 5 Concur that it doesn't support Jung as a member of Unification, but does support forming dissident church. Would need another source to say he was a member of Unification.
 * 26, 27, 28 That's your POV which is irrelevant. What is relevant is what reliable sources state.
 * 6, 7, 8, 29, 30 Concur - not enough information given in source to verify so should not be used as they currently stand
 * 9 Umm, nope. Not a fake.  News article don't have to be long.  Source is acceptable.
 * 10, 12 Generally true that blogs cannot be used. Should not be used unless further information given
 * 13 Dead links aren't a problem - sources don't have to be online. Reference has to give enough information for someone to verify the information, somehow.
 * 14, 15 See WP:NOENG, in short, being in a foreign language is not a problem. Given the subject is Korean, it's to be expected.  Might see if google translate can handle Korean.
 * 16 Again, not a problem. Note that the article is from a news agency (AFP).
 * 17 IHT may not have it in their archives as it's from the AP. Found this in the AP archives from the same dates.  Could be the video version of the same article.  Text is included the link so may be a viable replacement.
 * 18 Concur and the cite is missing a lot of information that would have helped
 * 19 News agency again. Source is acceptable.
 * 20, 21, 22 Again, see WP:NOENG.
 * 23 Odd, again the link from the source came up just fine for me.


 * For the external links, I'd probably consider pulling all of them. Might be good question for the WP:ELN.  If we're using any providencetrial.com articles as a source, it really shouldn't be in the EL list. Ravensfire ( talk ) 20:51, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Regarding citation 17, It is truly curious that a link exists to an AP article that was never written! I searched the AP archive website and the text from the link provided above is not present in the AP archives either. I searched using the full title and parts of the title but to no avail. MrTownCar (talk) 00:06, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Article has been fully protected to stop the edit war
I have fully protected this article for two weeks in order to stop the ongoing edit war. I expect everyone to step back, take numerous deep breaths, and discuss the sourcing and neutrality problems civilly, here on the article's talk page, and/or on appropriate dispute resolution forums. I may come back and extend the protection period if no real progress has been made toward reaching a consensus during the next two weeks.

I froze the article at the [ current version], per WP:PREFER. I realize some people will complain that I have protected the Wrong Version of the text, but this would inevitably happen no matter which version was protected. Rather than argue this point, people should concentrate on sorting out the disputes and reaching a consensus.

Since it appears that one of the participants in the edit war is an admin, I will also note here that WP:ADMIN prohibits admins from using their special privileges as a means of gaining an advantage in a dispute. Absolutely no one (not even an admin) should change the existing version of the text while the dispute is ongoing, unless this is deemed absolutely necessary in order to satisfy other policies such as the BLP policy. Even if there is a serious BLP issue with the current, frozen version, I would strongly recommend any admin who wants to keep his "mop" should bring up the matter at the BLP Noticeboard and request intervention by an uninvolved admin.

My action here will surely be seen by some as distasteful, but I feel it is necessary in order to protect Wikipedia in general. Anyone who feels I have acted inappropriately is certainly welcome to bring up the issue at the Administrators' Incidents Noticeboard or other suitable forums. — Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 17:56, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * At the very least please restore the article to the unwhitewashed version. Thanks.--ukexpat (talk) 21:04, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * See the second paragraph. It's up to us to hash out improvements and make edit requests for them to be added to the article.  <b style="color:darkred;">Ravensfire</b> ( talk ) 21:16, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Sections with sourcing issues
Sections of this article are either entirely or partially based on sources from providencetrial.com which is at best self published for Providence itself. If it's not even that, it's a pure advocacy site that doesn't meet any criteria for a reliable source and needs to go entirely. Assuming it's Providence, it can be used as a source for very limited things and especially not for any claims about third parties. That's flat out against policy folks. Here are the sections that I believe need to be removed from the article.


 * From Media broadcasts and news reports, the block quote and the full paragraph underneath it as they contain claims about a third party and especially against BLP's
 * From Problems during Jung's trial, the block quote must be removed as a BLP violation

In addition, much of the trial and conviction section is just about purely sourced to providencetrial.com. Unacceptable. I'm going to post an edit request later today to remove the information listed above as BLP violations. If you object, please come up with POLICY based objections or come up with proposed rewrites that don't use providence as a source. <b style="color:darkred;">Ravensfire</b> ( talk ) 20:02, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I agree, it is absurd to have a BLP protected with these sources. Shii (tock) 22:03, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Neither of these two sources have anything whatsoever to do with ProvidenceTrial.com. They are strictly third party news sites.
 * 기독교복음선교회(JMS)와 정명석 총재, 가려진 10년의 진실 News Daily.
 * JMS(기독교복음선교회) 정명석 총재는 MJ News
 * The Jeong Gyeong News article, and the others mentioned within it, were printed in a Korean News Magazine. Policy says that the article doesn't have to be available online. But a copy of the original print is available in PDF on ProvidenceTrial.com and a translation is provided in both Chinese and English which might help if you are relying on Google Translate. Since the quotes on the wikipedia article are from ProvidenceTrial.com's translation - we should remove them. The details in this article are also confirmed by the link above which is available directly on the news site.Macauthor (talk) 22:25, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Civil government is a bonafide monthly publication in Korea written in korean. As I stated in your talk page,  it is not circulated in English and I gave the exact date magazine was published.  It is a verifiable source and thus consitent with Wikipedia policy. See WP:NOENG.MrTownCar (talk) 22:27, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
 * It is not "a verifiable source". This "MJNews" site has only ever been linked to by JMS members, whether in Korean or any other language. No other source acknowledges its existence, as far as I know. Scientology has its own magazine, Freedom (magazine), but it is not a RS.
 * Newsdaily appears to at least be acknowledged but I still regard it as suspicious. For example, the Korean Wikipedia does not link to it. I will ask Korean Wikipedia members if they can explain the nature of this source. Shii (tock) 00:14, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Broaden your search Shii and educate yourself. Civil government is online and therefore is verfiable. But you must Search with the korean title! not the translated title as you suggested you did in an earlier post. Each monthly magazine cover is posted on the web page. You must stop spreading your uninformed opinion as fact. Also it is not written by Providence so your scientology analogy is irrelevant.MrTownCar (talk) 00:29, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I did not search with the translated title. I searched with the Korean title. Putting something online does not automatically make it a source of truthful information. If you read the relevant policy pages, specifically WP:EXCEPTIONAL, we wouldn't need to have this discussion.  Shii (tock) 00:39, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * newsdaily.kr was confirmed to be an Internet-only source. Oh, hold on... it's just a summary of the "Civil Government" article anyway. Shii (tock) 02:27, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Civil government is a circulated magazine not an internet only source. Neither does putting something in print make it truthful either and hence my objection to most BUT NOT ALL of your citations. I am after the truth but you seem to treat this article less than seriously since you mentioned elsewhere the "entertaining history" on the Jung Myung Seok talk page.MrTownCar (talk) 03:26, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * What is entertaining is your ability to write paragraphs of text without understanding at all why Wikipedia has a policy of verification rather than "truth". I am getting the impression that English may not be your first language. Anyway, to make a decent article we will have to look past your obsession with ignoring the media. Shii (tock) 04:12, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

My obsession is discounting fake media on links to planted articles.MrTownCar (talk) 05:34, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

Jung Myung seok article-- next step
Now that you locked the article what is the next step in the dispute resolution procedures?MrTownCar (talk) 17:50, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * There needs to be some genuine "meeting of the minds" here — preferably on the article's talk page, but if that isn't happening, then on noticeboards such as WP:BLPN (general BLP policy), WP:RSN (reliability of sources), and/or WP:NPOVN (neutral point of view). I would strongly urge you to immediately stop making suggestions that editors who disagree with you are pursuing some sort of sinister agenda; you are doing yourself and your cause no favours by pushing such allegations, even if they are in fact true.  Instead of doing this, concentrate on the quality of the sources.


 * Per WP:SPS, so-called "self-published" sources are usually not acceptable on Wikipedia. Web sites such as providencetrial.com are going to be presumed to fall into this category.  Self-published sources may be used in certain narrowly delineated situations as sources on themselves, but an article which relies heavily on this kind of source is not acceptable.  I currently see problems with the sources being offered by both sides; I would much prefer to see widely respected English-language news sources used here if possible; for example, I would ask if the BBC, the CBC, or the New York Times have ever said anything about Providence or Jung Myung-seok.


 * A neutral point of view on a controversial topic is almost always going to involve a careful use of both "pro" and "anti" sources. Read (or re-read) the NPOV policy carefully; we are not trying to identify "the truth" about a subject, but instead, we need to give fair and balanced representation of all significant mainstream views that appear in reliable sources.  Since you mentioned my ties to Mormonism, I will note here that I sometimes need to bite my lip and allow properly sourced material that is hostile to my beliefs to appear in an article; in fact, I have sometimes reverted pro-Mormon "missionary tract" editing if it strays too far from our requirement here to work toward encyclopedic neutrality.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 18:20, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I posted at the BLPN as you suggested.  The only response I get is from SHii stating that there is an "entertaining history" on the talk page and UKexpat stating that he has reverted my whitewashed version.  Neither of these comments give me the impression of NPOV, civility or any desire to have a meeting of the minds. I am not sure what else can be done.   It is also curious that UKexpat started the sentence with the the word "And" giving me the impression UKexpat and Shii are the same person.MrTownCar (talk) 18:43, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Shii has been around since 2002 (with 17,000 edits). Ukexpat has been around since 2005 (with 90,000 edits).  The likelihood of these accounts both belonging to the same person is infinitesimal.


 * On the surface at least, the version which Ukexpat restored cites numerous mainstream sources which would normally be seen as being reliable for Wikipedia purposes — such as The Australian, Fox News, Agence France-Presse (AFP),  the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), Asahi Shimbun, Radio Australia, the International Herald Tribune, Reuters, Yonhap, and the Associated Press Television News.  The version you prefer, on the other hand, contains none of these sources, but instead appears to rely almost exclusively on self-published material from the Providence organization — material which, as I've already tried to explain, is not generally acceptable per Wikipedia's reliable source policy.


 * It may be possible to incorporate material from both sets of sources, but the self-published Providence material can probably (per WP:SPS) be used only to support claims made by Providence about itself or about Jung (but not in support of claims of objective fact). Where the mainstream sources and the Providence material disagree, it may be possible to include both conflicting claims with wording saying that this source claims this, whereas that source claims that.  If you need more guidance on how (if at all) both sets of sources can or should be combined, you might want to ask at WP:NPOVN — but please understand that you are almost certainly going to have to agree to some sort of compromise here; simply going to the NPOV noticeboard and trying to get someone to agree to your preferred version as it currently stands (without acknowledging contrary material from any of the mainstream media) is not at all likely to work.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 19:18, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Appreciate the intervention. Hopefully the article can be turned into something decent (which with the providence sourcing it's really not).  <b style="color:darkred;">Ravensfire</b> ( talk ) 19:50, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Point well taken about language that states this sources claims A and that source claims B.  I have a bigger issue to resolve and I will utilize a very specific example. One of the citations quotes an article from the International Herald Tribune February 20, 2008 with the title "South Korean religious sect leader extradited from China to face rape charges"  When one clicks the link you see todays edition of the IHT but not the actual article referred to in the citation. When I independently went to the IHT archives and searched for the article by title and date it can not be found. I combed hundreds of titles written for the whole month of February in 2008 in case the date was off a bit but to no avail. The article can not be found at all and is not verifiable despite being linked to a bonafide media outlet in the wikipedia article. In fact I also searched the AP archives and the article could not be found there either. This is in violation of the wikiepdia policies regarding BLP and quality verifiable sources containing contentious material.MrTownCar (talk) 23:39, 30 January 2013 (UTC)


 * An extended discussion about this content dispute really belongs on the article's talk page. Unless people object, I would like to copy the contents of this and the previous section over there, with a view toward having people continue the discussion there.  OK?


 * MrTownCar may (I repeat, may) have a legitimate point here regarding verifiability of source material. The supplier of a source bears the burden of proof that the source really does say what it is claimed to say — and while it is not absolutely necessary for sources to be easily accessible online, it is certainly preferable (if possible) for sources to be online — especially when contentious material is involved.  We should still assume good faith if a source doesn't seem to be were someone else says it is; while this could indicate deception, it's more likely to be either a clerical error (typo) or a change in archival location on the part of the publisher.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 00:54, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * no objection here please cut and pasteMrTownCar (talk) 03:19, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Just for the record and specifically regarding this IHT citation. The link could have a typo in the date and that is why I covered the whole month of February and even January and March 2008. I have independent knowledge that Mr Jung returned to s. korea in February 2008 so I know the year is correct. The AP archives go back to 1985 as stated on the opening page so there is no archival relocation. For these two reasons it is very hard for me to "assume good faith " in view of all that I have presented.MrTownCar (talk) 04:38, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * What you should have looked for was an AP article syndicated by IHT. Here it is, with that exact title in the HighBeam Research archive. IHT (or any media source) will not archive an old AP story because their license for it will expire. Shii (tock) 04:59, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

'''Thank you for proving my point in that you insist on posting fake articles. I already stated above that I did a thorough review of the AP archives and could not find this article. There is no article in the AP archive with this title or a title even close to what you just posted in the link above. I checked by title so the date is not an issue and the AP archive goes back to 1985. Keep your fake citations off wikipedia. My only obsession is the truth.'''05:46, 31 January 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by MrTownCar (talk • contribs)
 * Thanks for putting your comment in bold. It made it very easy to read. Shii (tock) 06:05, 31 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Highbeam Research is generally considered to be a reliable source. If you (MrTownCar) believe this news story is bogus despite its appearing in Highbeam's repository, please bring up your concerns at WP:RSN (the Reliable Sources noticeboard).  You have been repeatedly warned to stop making personal attacks on other editors and, instead, to focus on the sources themselves.  Consider this your last warning on this point — if you continue to cast aspersions on Shii or other editors, rather than strictly confining your comments to content, you risk being blocked from editing for a time in order to protect Wikipedia from disruption and to impress upon you that this is an important issue and that the Wikipedia community is serious about civility.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 06:26, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

I am perturbed Mr Wales that you call me out for casting aspersions when Shii has suggested English is not my first language and that I HAVE NO COMMON SENSE etc. but NO WARNING TO SHII FOR THESE PERSONAL ATTACKS? Seemingly not neutral for an administrator. Additionally, are you suggesting that the AP archives are less reliable than highbeam.com? I stated this article is NOT in the AP archives but a supposed AP article is on highbeam.com written at a very poor quality level and no red flags go up in your mind? I am doing exactly what you said and focusing on the articles presented themselves.MrTownCar (talk) 16:09, 31 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Everyone here should be careful in how they describe other editors — all the more so if some participants might not be as fluent in English as others. Without seeking to excuse Shii's "no common sense" or "entertaining history" comments, I would still say there is a difference of degree between those comments and repeated accusations / insinuations of lying and slander.  Even so, the fact that others may also be misbehaving does not justify you in doing the same (see WP:NOTTHEM).


 * If you believe the article in question (found on Highbeam, apparently from AP) is "written at a very poor quality level", I think you should elaborate on just what you mean. The article (or at least the first part of it, available without a Highbeam subscription) did not appear to me to be of suspiciously poor quality, but if you see something here that I missed, by all means help me and others to understand.  As for the general question of comparing the reliability of Highbeam vs. AP's archives — as I said, Highbeam is generally considered to be a reliable source, so if you believe something on Highbeam was fabricated, planted, or otherwise not what it seems to be, the burden is on you to establish this.  If someone says they were unable to find a Highbeam article in its alleged original source, they need to provide convincing evidence that the article really didn't come from where it seems to have come (as opposed to the possibility that they did their search wrong, or the piece was removed from the original source's archives for some reason, or some other non-sinister explanation).  As I said, if you really believe something is broken here, you should bring it up at WP:RSN, and please do so in as calm and non-alarmist a fashion as possible.  But unless a consensus of editors at WP:RSN or another suitable forum concludes that the article reported by Highbeam is in fact bogus, the article is entitled to a reasonable presumption of accuracy.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 21:07, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

The AP archives is a title search. Since the link on the wikipedia article gives the exact title it is very easy to cut and paste the title and search for it verbatim. It is not date dependent and therefore I see no way to do a search wrong. The odds of AP moving or misplacing an original article is infinitely small especially since the year of the archives goes back to 1985 and the article is 2008. I do not know of any other burden of proof I can bring to the table to shed light on this contentious article. I can only ask that you and any other reader / editor do their own independent search directly at the AP archives website and tell me what they find or not find.MrTownCar (talk) 22:42, 31 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I found this same news story in AP's "Worldstream" collection for 20 February 2008 — not only on Highbeam, but also on LexisNexis (where I have access through a local university and can see the entire article). The fact that this same story appears in a second highly respected source (LexisNexis) argues strongly for the story's authenticity.  I also tried — unsuccessfully — to find the story in the AP News Archive (www.apnewsarchive.com).  However, I then looked at Highbeam's AP Worldstream index for 20 February 2008 (which you can all find here), and I tried searching for a random sample of these articles on a whole range of topics, and none of them showed up from searching the AP News Archive.  While I cannot absolutely rule out (beyond any possible doubt, reasonable or otherwise) that the Jung Myung-seok extradition story (together with numerous other, unrelated stories bearing the same date) may have been fabricated by opponents of Jung and fraudulently planted on two separate, widely-accepted-without-question-as-reliable news sources, I believe it is exceedingly more likely that the story is authentic and that the AP News Archive is incomplete (or its search engine is having problems finding older stories).  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo)  06:54, 1 February 2013 (UTC) 15:08, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time to do your own research on this article. I wanted to clarify your comment "I tried searching for a random sample of these articles on a whole range of topics, and none of them showed up from searching the AP News Archive." Did you search the AP archives for non AP stories? I am sorry I cant quite follow what you did. I did search the AP archives for the other citation with the FOX link "Alleged South Korean Rape culture leader arrested in China"  5/16/2007 and this AP story is also not found in the AP archives BUT it did generate a link to a 1993 article and a second link to a 1997 article unrelated to MR JUNG. In fact both articles contained the words I posted in the search box (first four words) but not consecutively. Therefore finding older articles does not seem to be an issue for the AP archives search engine.MrTownCar (talk) 05:56, 2 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I looked on Highbeam for the AP Worldstream index for 20 February 2008 (the date of the Jung extradition story which is claimed by Highbeam and LexisNexis to have come from AP). This index contains hundreds of stories which (according to Highbeam) were originally provided by AP.  I randomly chose about a dozen of these stories and typed their titles into the AP news archive search engine, but they didn't show up.


 * In my opinion, the most reasonable explanation for this is that the AP news archive search engine isn't 100% perfect. How short it is of 100% perfection, I can't say, but at the very least I don't think we can categorically say that absolutely each and every genuine AP story from this particular time period is covered by AP's archive search.  But my opinion isn't what matters here — it's a matter of what a consensus of Wikipedia editors will decide to accept.


 * As I've said several times already, if you want the Wikipedia community to accept your position that this story must be fake (regardless of whether it is reported by LexisNexis and Highbeam), you need to put forth a calm, non-alarmist, non-accusatory case at WP:RSN and see if you can convince them. Yes, I know there has already been discussion at WP:RSN (see here), and also at WP:BLPN (see here), regarding this article, but you need to try again.  Simply saying (as you did at WP:BLPN, see the link I just cited) that the sources are "dubious and not verifiable" is not going to be enough.  And you're in a position now where material you are opposing is prima facie acceptable per Wikipedia policy (since, as I've said, Highbeam and LexisNexis are widely considered to be reliable sources for news stories) — so you'll need to give reasoned arguments to help reasonable, open, but skeptical third parties to understand why your position is valid despite its apparent fringeness — and I'm sure you're going to need an argument that sounds more convincing than "it doesn't matter if Highbeam, LexisNexis, or any other normally respected sources claim the story came from AP, it can't possibly be from AP because it doesn't show up in the AP archive site's search, thus Highbeam and LexisNexis must obviously be wrong and the alleged news story must be a fabrication".


 * If you refuse to try to make a proper case on a proper forum, and instead just stay here arguing (against all reason, as far as others can see) that this or any other news story hostile to Jung Myung-seok is unreliable (and therefore libellous) by definition, what I fear is going to happen is that once the full protection on this article expires (or gets lifted by someone else who decides I acted too hastily), you will most likely go back to edit-warring in favour of a version everyone else is rejecting as a one-sided whitewash — and based on what I've seen happen over the years in similar situations around here, that sort of behaviour is very likely to get you indefinitely blocked — which would be a net loss for Wikipedia, since whatever productive contributions you might otherwise have been able to make to this and related articles (or any other articles) would be lost to us.


 * This is, really, all I can say. I'm not going to discuss this with you any further on this article's talk page (or on my user talk page).  First, because you need to take your case elsewhere for proper consideration (as I've repeatedly tried to explain).  Second, because I'm trying really hard here to stay aloof and neutral — something I must do if I'm going to be doing things like fully protecting an article to stop an edit war, or perhaps blocking disruptive editors here (though some will probably say I've already become too WP:INVOLVED to do that because of all this discussion I've participated in about sourcing and neutrality policy; if we do have a resumption of edit warring, I'll probably have to go ask for help at WP:ANI).  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 07:55, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

Proposal for reforming the article
Shii (tock) 04:12, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * 1) The revision of the article reverted to by Ukexpat and myself is restored. This includes the "theology" section. This is because the whitewashed version of Seok's theology is sourced to blog posts, while my version is sourced to news articles. Regardless of "the truth", only one side has been regarded unbiased enough to be in the news.
 * 2) The following academic source is added from the Journal of Higher Education and Lifelong Learning: http://hdl.handle.net/2115/33015 (mainly the English abstract)
 * 3) Barring positive coverage of JMS, the "Civil Government" article, and the newsdaily.kr blog post which refers readers to it, is an WP:EXCEPTIONAL anomaly and should be limited to a two-sentence paragraph, opening with the words "In a Korean magazine called Minjung, the writer Moon Il Seok claimed that..."

Two problems Shii- one you give the impression that the truth is not important  when you make a statement "regardless of the truth".... Clearly your motives are less than pure. Two- are you suggesting to me that a journalist can not write an article that is slanted? Many but not all of the Korean original articles that are posted are in fact slanted and not written from a NPOV. Having said that, this is a criterion for posting BLP. I don't see the point of writing a BLP based on slanted articles. If you want to come out on this talk page and state that the truth is irrelevant and simply want to regurgitate slanted journalism that would be helpful so that all can see your agenda. I have no objection to negative material being posted about Jung Myung Seok BUT I insist that it be the truth and verifiable through cross checking references. Furthermore, your statement "only one side has been regarded unbiased enough to be in the news" is extreme and false. The min jung news article is objective and verifiable. There is also an article that was published in another unrelated journal this past December that will be posted when and if this page lock is lifted. Your declaration that the min jung article is an anomaly and only deserves two sentences in this BLP quite frankly is disturbing and again gives the impression of impure motives.MrTownCar (talk) 05:22, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Claiming that a guy who was on the run from the law for 9 years and then convicted of 6 rapes was set up by a huge conspiracy involving the police and judicial systems of three East Asian governments is WP:EXCEPTIONAL to anyone with common sense. If such a story were true it would be bigger news than some obscure quarterly magazine that apparently nobody reads but JMS members. Shii (tock) 06:07, 31 January 2013 (UTC)


 * It would be very helpful here if someone could supply a good explanation of exactly what Civil Government is — what organization publishes it?, what sorts of material is it noted for?, where does it get the material it publishes?, is it generally acknowledged to have some particular bias?, etc., etc. As for "truth" vs. "verifiability", it's been said that Wikipedia seeks "verifiability, not truth" — but as I understand this description, it's not supposed to mean we don't care if something is true or not as long as it appears in a "reliable source" — rather, what it really means is that even if we're sure something really is true, that's not sufficient, it needs to be verified through reliable sources — plus, per WP:NPOV, we aren't supposed to be trying to determine which side of a controversial topic is "the truth", but instead we're supposed to recognize and report on all the different positions that are represented in reliable sources, and acknowledge (where appropriate) that the sources disagree, and give readers enough information so they can make an informed choice for themselves (if they want to).  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 20:41, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

The korean title is Min Jung and it is not circulated in English. It creates internet news and a published journal. It was formerly called the POLICE Journal and became min jung in 2010. There is no obvious publishing bias that I am aware. It is not read only by JMS members as suggested above and it is a monthly magazine not an obscure quarterly magazine. Feel free to view at www.mjnews.co.kr

March 1, 2012 has an article about Jung Myung Seok and his face while praying on the cover. MrTownCar (talk) 22:59, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Found More Online News Site Resources we can cite
Here are some links to news sites which confirm much of the information on Jung Myung Seok's trial, the numbers of churches, members, and nations reached by his religious organization, "Providence."
 * Break News This is the article by Moon Il Seok posted in it's original Korean on Break News.
 * MJK News This news article confirms the details in Moon Il Seok's article.
 * Yonhap News Poetry published by Jung Myung Seok that gained media attention.

The following articles confirm the number of churches abroad and the key themes taught by Jung Myung Seok in Providence.
 * Break News
 * Yonhap News

This article confirms both the number of churches and the possibility of injustice against Jung Myung Seok due to premature media broadcasts. News Wave Macauthor (talk) 12:54, 31 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Break News: Am I missing something or is this the same as the Civil Government article?
 * MJK News: Well, this is significantly better than anything you've posted before. This is definitely a reliable source. I would accept a translation from providencetrial.com if you have one.
 * Yonhap News: This appears to be a press release, not a Yonhap News story. (본 콘텐츠는 해당기관의 보도 자료임을 밝혀드립니다)
 * Break News, II: This is an original article from a notable and possibly reliable webzine, according to ko:브레이크뉴스. Another good source. I retract my demand to have the "Theology" section reflect the AP and world media stories, since sources external to Korea are tertiary. This should also be used as a source for the Providence article.
 * Yonhap News, II: another press release (본 콘텐츠는 해당기관의 보도자료임을 밝혀드립니다).
 * News Wave: This is a reliable source, although I'm not sure what kind of article it is (I'm concerned it's an editorial). Google Translate is horrible for Korean.
 * Glad to see you've finally figured out how to employ sources. Now we can start to write a better article. I have no bias against sources I can't read, but I do hope we can get an accurate translation from someone. Shii (tock) 12:43, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, the article on Break News is the same article. It's an important find because all other versions cited before were provided by ProvidenceTrial.com, but this is strictly a third party news source confirming what we said all along, that it was a secondary source. Macauthor (talk) 12:54, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Key quotes from the Journal of Higher Education and Lifelong Learning
Since we're going to be relying on foreign language sources to rewrite this, I thought I would pick some key quotes from a Japanese academic source, the Journal of Higher Education and Lifelong Learning. The author based his study on interviews with former members.

page 10: 摂理がキリスト教としては特異な教団であり，教祖にセックススキャンダルがあるにしても，日本では被害者が加害者を刑事告訴する事件となっていない.
 * "Even though Providence is made out to be a peculiar sect of Christianity with a leader involved in sex scandals, in Japan there have been no reports of victims approaching the police."

page 11: 摂理の教義や教祖の性的放縦が多くの宗教団体から批判されており，それは正統／異端といった教義論争に加えて，宗教文化の品位を損ねる行為であると言える.
 * "The sexual indulgences of Providence and its founders are being criticized by the great majority of religions, and in addition to the doctrinal dispute over orthodoxy/heresy, it can be said to be damaging the reputation of religious culture."

page 10: 女性メンバーの中には，鄭明析の性的暴行を受け，宗教的意味を強要したり，教祖の恣意的行為を一切認めない教会の体制に失望したりするものが少なくない.
 * "Not a small number of female members were sexually assaulted by Seok, compelled through religious explanations, and became disappointed with the complete lack of recognition by the church system for the founder's selfish acts."

On page 4 a broad overview of Providence's 30 major lectures for new members is given, although the specific contents will apparently vary between lecturers. Among the 30 topics are:

page 4: 黙示録 20：4 ～ 6 ／教祖に会わないと天国にいけない.
 * In Lecture 20, Revelation 20:4-6 is used to justify the claim that "if you don't meet the founder [Seok], you won't go to Heaven."

page 4:マタイ 14：1 ～ 12 ／摂理や教祖へ裏切りは，歴史的大罪になる.
 * In Lecture 22, Matthew 14:1-2 is used to justify the claim that "those who betray Providence or its founder [Seok] are committing a great crime of historic proportions."

page 4: 伝道の書 1：9 ／教祖が再臨主であることを歴史の三段階で説明.
 * In Lecture 30, Ecclesiastes 1:9 is used to explain three proofs that Seok is the Messiah.

page 7: （3） 688 ＋ 1290（ダニエル書 12：11，日を年に換算）＝ 1978 年. 第二イスラエル民族の霊的開放. 鄭明析が伝道を開始した. だから，鄭明析こそ，再臨のメシアに他ならないという.
 * "688 + 1290 (from Daniel 12:11) is 1978, the spiritual liberation of the second Israel, when Seok began his evangelism. Therefore, there can be no other Messiah than Seok."

page 7:（4） 688 ＋ 1335 ＝ 2023 年. 神の王国完成予定とされる.
 * "688 + 1335 = 2023, when the Kingdom of God will arrive."

page 5: 三十講論が公刊されていないので，このような資料から何が教えられているのかを推測するしかない.
 * These "30 lectures have never been published, so [members] can only guess what is being taught from [official] materials [about them]."

Shii (tock) 13:13, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

How about a date month and year from this journal? Not properly referencedMrTownCar (talk) 16:11, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
 * http://hdl.handle.net/2115/33015 'Cult Problems on Campus : Why were students involved in the “Setsuri” (Providence) cult group?' December 2007 Shii (tock) 22:50, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for journal reference, it is noteworthy that the abstract is written in English but the article is written in Japanese. I wonder why the authors chose to do that?MrTownCar (talk) 01:13, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
 * English abstracts are standard for Japanese and other foreign language journal articles, for the benefit of foreign readers such as ourselves. Shii (tock) 03:51, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Adding some sources
"As of 2012, the JMS Survivor's Association claimed that there were still 10 women being kept for sexual purposes. At one point over 10,000 women were recruited for this." NoCutNews

"The prosecution produced videos of Jung preaching that he was the Messiah. On December 7, 2008, he formally renounced this teaching." NewsNJoy

"Videos were produced where naked women licked pictures of Jung." NewsNJoy

"There are still 30,000-40,000 followers of Providence in Korea." NewsNJoy

"In the 30 Sermons, it was taught that Eve was 14 years old when she first had sex with Adam." Religion in the Modern World (peer-reviewed academic book)

--Shii (tock) 00:58, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

At the moment ProvidenceTrial is listed as sources for much of the material. That site's "About Jung Myung Seok" page fails to mention his years as a fugitive, the crimes he was charged with, and the guilty verdict. ProvidenceTrial in no way shape or form is an unbiased news source: http://providencetrial.com/about-jeong-myung-seok/ And the notion that the convictions and trial were in any way controversial is simply a fantasy perpetuated by members of the cult backed up by zero reputable sources. Here is a list of links I have gathered which I believe should be considered for this article.

Links / Timeline November 2001, Accusations from Taipai – Jung fled Korea two years earlier: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/local/archives/2001/11/12/111168 Scans of Next Magazine Expose with English Translation: http://www.jmscult.com/Taiwan.html

December 2001, Victims of Alleged Sect Sex Crimes to File Charges Today (Taipai): http://www.chinapost.com.tw/print/20486.htm

Summer 2002, GACP & Bright Smile Movement (Front Groups Invite World Cup Spectators to JMS Cult HQ): http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/sport/archives/2002/06/13/0000140221 http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/sport/photo/2002/06/13/0000031988

October 2002, "Love" Cult Snares Japanese Students: http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp1.html

Summer 2003, Arrest in Hong Kong: http://www.scmp.com/article/423407/wanted-cult-leader-may-be-repatriated-south-korea http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hjbBXW7x6s

Summer 2006, Japan: http://wwrn.org/articles/22289/ http://theseoultimes.com/ST/?url=/ST/db/read.php?idx=3842

Police Raid Cult Facilities in Chiba: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20070120a2.html Police Raid More Cult Facilities in Chiba: http://wwrn.org/articles/23977/?&place=japan Australian Government Document Mentions Japanese News Reports about JMS (Setsuri): http://www.mrt-rrt.gov.au/ArticleDocuments/106/kor33212.pdf.aspx

The following articles are no longer online where originally published. Cult Aimed at Elite at 50 Universities: http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp7.html 2,000 Japanese join cult led by suspected sex offender on the run from Interpol: http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp6.html Cult Targeted Students at Top Universities: http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp15.html Cult Collects at Least 100 Million Yen Annually: http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp10.html Guru Said to Have Raped Prospective Brides Before Mass Weddings: http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp13.html

Example Japanese News Reports: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kM8kkML3MM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9LAUtwV6wI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4_KyqMWSpM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMPYYwgZzdg

August 2006, Keimyung Gazette: http://gazette.gokmu.com/news/article.html?no=189

2006: Victim Press Conference, Seoul: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ma_ucQsrAfc http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Four_Korean_women_accuse_JMS_leader_Jeong_Myeong-seok_of_rape

December 2006: JMS at UC San Diego: http://www.ucsdguardian.org/sports/item/8258-allegedcultsowsseedsviacampusevent?tmpl=component&print=1#.UI0nzm_MhSs Mar 10, 2007: JMS in Sydney: http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/claims-sect-using-social-groups-to-recruit-members/2007/03/09/1173166991757.html

March 2007: Japanese News Reports Jung Sighted in Costa Rica: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVk_uSNgCTI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jf5Nh9b3otw&feature=relmfu

May 2007: Arrest in China http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/asian-cult-leader-arrested/story-e6frg6so-1111113538594 http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,272712,00.html Brief Mention in World News Quick Take: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2007/05/17/2003361326 http://business.highbeam.com/435555/article-1G1-163389446/man-believed-leader-setsuri-cult-held-china http://www.culthelp.info/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3951

January 15, 2008: Members Vandalize Newspaper Office http://english.donga.com/srv/service.php3?bicode=040000&biid=2008011523598 http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/art/2008/08/147_27104.html (JMS mentioned in second last paragraph)

January 2008: Extradition Approved: http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?we_cat=3&art_id=59433&sid=16948473&con_type=1&d_str=20080103&fc=7 http://www.asiaone.com/News/Latest%2BNews/Asia/Story/A1Story20080102-43357.html http://www.chinapost.com.tw/asia/2008/02/21/143806/China-extradites.htm

Feb. 2008, Extradition & Arrest: http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/national/2008/02/23/56/0302000000AEN20080223001200315F.HTML http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2009/06/117_19368.html http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VddCsoeXcZA

July 2008: Former Prosecutor Barred From Becoming Lawyer for Leaking Personal Information to JMS Cult http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2009/07/117_27550.html

August 2008, Initial Guilty Verdict: http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2008/08/117_29224.html http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp28.html http://www.abc.net.au/news/2008-08-12/s-korea-cult-leader-jailed-for-sex-crimes/473842 http://article.joinsmsn.com/news/article/article.asp?total_id=3258123&cloc= http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=f341a144-96f3-401a-a0e3-21c11e21a2af&k=80283

Feb. 2009, Sentence Extended: http://koreajoongangdaily.joinsmsn.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2900886 http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?pp_cat=17&art_id=78076&sid=22642757&con_type=1 http://asiancorrespondent.com/23283/appeals-court-hands-cult-leader-four-more-years/ http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp29.html

April 2009, Sentence Upheld by Supreme Court: http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2009/04/117_43718.html http://article.joinsmsn.com/news/article/article.asp?ctg=12&Total_ID=3584113 http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/news/2012/01/19/14/0200000000AEN20120119007800315F.HTML http://www.rickross.com/reference/gacp/gacp30.html

Nov. 2009: Victim Awarded $43,000 Compensation: http://jmscult.com/home/node/39

Dec. 2009, Chinese Government Releases 30-Minute JMS Documentary (English Translation): http://jmscult.com/forum/index.php?topic=556.0

PeterDaley72 (talk) 22:33, 4 February 2013 (UTC)PeterDaley72 www.jmscult.com
 * Original source of the Nov. 2009 article is http://article.joinsmsn.com/news/article/article.asp?total_id=3877616&ctg=1200&cloc=home|list|list1 Shii (tock) 00:06, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Contents of Bible Study
Nothing more than the introductory lessons have ever been published by Providence Church. What was published above is quoted from members who left the church and isn't necessarily even correct or at least cannot be verified by any official publishings from the church. I believe these contents fall into the domain of intellectual property, if not by the letter of the law at least in principle, and thus should not be published on wikipedia.

It should also be noted by anyone not familiar with Providence that Peter Daley who recently posted some resources above is notorious for spreading false impressions about Providence, posting copyrighted videos from Providence with dubiously wrong subtitles on youtube, and the author of anti-JMS websites, and should not be considered an unbiased editor. I'm not attacking him personally, he's welcome to edit like the rest of us, but I just want to point out that his agenda is publicly available for anyone interested to see. Macauthor (talk) 10:25, 6 February 2013 (UTC)
 * "I'm not attacking him personally" Coulda fooled me! Also, you should let people know that those "copyrighted videos" are videos of naked women showing their love for Seok. As for the supposed copyright issues of publishing the church's actual doctrine as opposed to the "approved" contents, you are threatening to refight the battle of Scientology and the Internet which happened roughly 20 years ago. I'd advise against it. Shii (tock) 12:12, 6 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I don't know of any nude videos. What I'm referring to are sermon videos with clear Providence watermarks and audio tracks where he dubbed over the original voices with obscene comments.Macauthor (talk) 05:38, 7 February 2013 (UTC)


 * You shouldn't be trying to use YouTube videos anyway — YouTube is generally not considered a reliable source (e.g., because you can't say for sure whether videos have been dubbed or otherwise altered). Also, instead of using raw videos (primary sources), you should be looking for discussion about these videos (or the events portrayed therein) in reliable secondary sources — this should also allow sidestepping of any copyright issues..  And a site named jmscult.com is highly unlikely to be a reliable source; far more likely to be a blog or other self-published site.  Material on jmscult.com that came from some other source might be useful, but in that case, cite the material's occurrence in another (hopefully more reliable) source.  The jmscult.com site is presumably no more reliable a source than providencetrial.com is, unless it is being used solely as a source about a given side in the controversy.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 06:13, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. I wasn't offering my site as a source for the article. I simply gave a list of links to news reports that concern the JMS cult to aid in a more reliable article, one not informed by cult propaganda. But if anyone is interested in learning more about the cult, my site jmscult.com, is the largest English resource on the net. While Youtube videos may not be suitable here, I think it's worth pointing out they are 100% consistent with the published news reports. And I don't recall adding obscene language to JMS videos, sure I have made fun of some, but the longer sermons on my site are untouched and appear exactly as released by the cult to its inner members. PeterDaley72 (talk) 06:57, 7 February 2013 (UTC)Peter Daley

I'm curious about the use of the word, "cult." Since it is a word used very broadly with such strong negative connotations, I wonder what the proper guidelines should be for using a word loaded with so much stigma. It presumes a lot to label a religion a cult, and it reveals bias much like the difference between calling a political organization a "revolutionary" group or a "terrorist" organization. With a controversial issue like this that is hotly debated by two opposing sides is it really fair to assume one side of the argument with the use of such negative labels? I tend to think that wikipedia should avoid such language or use some kind of qualifier like we use, "allegedly" when a person accused of a crime has not yet been convicted. Also there are different types of cults. There are movies that fall into the "cult" genre because they have a cult following, personality cults (which you could call any organization pertaining to any charismatic leader), theological cults whose doctrines are seen as heretical from the point of view of a more traditional religious group, societal cults that are considered a threat to that society's commonly accepted lifestyle, and dangerous cults that end in mass suicides. Perhaps Rich could offer some tips or point us to the appropriate wikipedia policy on this matter. Macauthor (talk) 12:17, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

The word cult is used in every article about Jung's crimes. Here are some examples: http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2009/07/117_27550.html http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,272712,00.html http://theseoultimes.com/ST/?url=/ST/db/read.php?idx=3842

Why then should it not be used in this entry? And yes the word is often misunderstood, a few definitions can be found here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult#Destructive_cults But why are we debating a term so often used to describe the group in published articles? That you disagree is irrelevant. I too would like to hear other opinions on this. PeterDaley72 (talk) 13:19, 7 February 2013 (UTC)Peter Daley


 * The word is not used in every article describing Jung's crimes. The articles being cited that point out the problems with Jung's trial do not use it without some type of qualifying statement. I didn't say I disagree with the use of the term. I in fact used it when I edited the article, "the religious organization is often referred to as a cult by the media," but I do disagree with introducing the religious group as a cult matter of factly, especially if done so in the opening paragraph of the wikipedia article. I would also call into question any journalism that both introduces the religious group as a cult without any type of further definitions and doesn't include any comments from pro-providence sources as one sided sensational journalism just as the Korean court did when it sided with Providence in the libel suit against the broadcast companies. Macauthor (talk) 13:41, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

I do not consider articles describing criminal convictions one-sided. Again we see attempts to discredit factual news reports. The article that point out the fictitious controversies are not reputable in the least. How is it possible ProvidenceTrial is allowed to not only be a source here, but also to influence the whole article? PeterDaley72 (talk) 14:20, 7 February 2013 (UTC)Peter Daley


 * ProvidenceTrial is not being solely used to influence the article. In the article's current state it is, but in recent posts, Macauthor has cited several reliable sources that either support or are directly linked to on ProvidenceTrial. This is as reliable or even moreso than the 'rickross' citation that only contains copies of articles that are either impossible to find or just nearly impossible.


 * Let me know if I'm wrong about this but, there are really not as many convictions being cited by the articles as accusations, charges, and speculations. In the final wikipedia article, this should be reflected properly as accusations, charges, and speculations. Many of these articles, although they are talking about factual charges, are written without a reference to any kind of rebuttal. This is what I think Macauthor is trying to say is one-sided. Lastly, to emphasize MacAuthor's point: it cannot be stated as fact that Providence is a cult -- though by some definitions it may be true. Since we need verifiable facts, we should stay away from loaded and ambiguous words like 'cult' even if reliable sources use it to describe Providence. Itsfiziks (talk) 16:04, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your input. The articles prior to the conviction refer to allegations and charges because he was a fugitive for some 8 years. So yes, lots of articles do not mention the conviction because they were written before his conviction. Here is one article about the conviction: http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2011/04/117_43718.html And there are others. It mentions a few things I think should be re-added to the article. Jung's fleeing Korea after allegations were first made and the Interpol red notice. And this earlier article mentions Jung's arrest in Hong Kong in 2003 and the fact he again fled. Other articles mention that as well. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/asian-cult-leader-arrested/story-e6frg6so-1111113538594

The above Australian article also mentions Jung's prior membership of Sun Myung Moon's organisation, aka the Moonies. That is a fact that has been deleted from this article. Other articles mention his membership as well. I think is worth putting back in. Another article about the convictions and Jung's time as a fugitive: http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest%2BNews/Asia/Story/A1Story20090210-120829.html

Perhaps solely was an exaggeration, but of the 11 references most are from that site and there is not one from any English language news source despite there being many online. It is certainly heavily influencing the article.

The Trail and Controversy section is influenced by Providencetrial. The only reference to any controversy is on the group's own site that conveniently omits any reference to the guilty verdict and the numerous rape allegations made while he was a fugitive in his biography. It is a site for propaganda purposes only. Again I fail to see how that site could be considered a reliable source.


 * MacAuthor has posted the original source from which he drew facts from in a previous post which you might have missed by accident. Break News. This should be considered as a reliable source on it's own. It may be reasonable to cite this article directly in the final article rather than ProvidenceTrial.


 * If you agree this should be considered as a reliable source, along with the other sources MacAuthor cited in good faith here, then the subject of his guilt, accusations, charges, and other speculations should be considered controversial shouldn't it? Additionally, since this source shows that the subject of this wikipedia article was declared a victim of negative media by a court of law, any mention of negative media attention in the wikipedia article the subject has received should be clearly prefaced by this fact. Especially since the source refers to one of the first times he was ever accused of any crime. Itsfiziks (talk) 17:32, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

The Rick Ross articles that no longer appear elsewhere are at least consistent with the news reports still on. It may not qualify as a source for wiki, but you can't read those articles as well as the ones online and come to the conclusion there is anything suspicious about the articles listed. That's worth considering if you are to determine Providencetrial is a more reliable source.


 * Although Rick Ross articles are consistent with other reliable sources, since previously cited articles give clear evidence that the subject of this article has been a victim of negative media attention starting from some of the first public broadcasts about him and Providence, it definitely brings attention to the bias of articles written after 1999, which is all of them if I'm not mistaken. I'm not debating that there may be facts in the sources you cited, but we must be careful about what kind of light we shed on the facts in the final article. As we all know about WP:NOR, even writing something in a way that infers a fact that is not verifiable is considered original research. Itsfiziks (talk) 17:32, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

I appreciate the fact this is getting discussed. Do you have any objections to the material I mentioned in the above two articles being included? PeterDaley72 (talk) 02:01, 8 February 2013 (UTC)Peter Daley

Hey Itsfiziks. Thanks for your input. I'll think we'll have to agree to disagree and see what the consensus is. I really can't fathom how one article, which is inconsistent with numerous news reports should have so much influence over the article. Negative bias? Well he is a convicted serial rapist who spent 8 years on the run. An 8-year period during which allegations were made from women in every country he hid in. Such people rarely receive positive media attention^^ One paragraph mentions that a retrial is unlikely (understatement of the century), so why bother with the preceding sentence calling for one? Because one writer, obviously one of his followers, thinks there should be one? His original sentence was after all upheld and extended by the highest court in the country. Yet there is a reluctance to use any of the numerous articles about that verdict in this wiki entry. The idea that the whole trial and the guilty verdicts of the subsequent appeals was tainted by media bias is ridiculous. And it isn't the place of wiki editors to make such assumptions. If it's to be included, it certainly shouldn't dominate the article and it shouldn't be placed at the expense of material published in the numerous articles. Can common sense prevail and can we have some editors take a look at this who aren't followers of Mr. Jung? Any earlier deletion was made because one member thought a Fox article was fake. That is the kind of mentality that has turned this wiki page into a propaganda tool for the cult of a convicted serial rapist.PeterDaley72 (talk) 21:05, 9 February 2013 (UTC)Peter Daley


 * Agreed. Everyone here should carefully (re)read WP:NPOV and WP:BLP.  Also read WP:PSCI, WP:RNPOV, and WP:NPOVFAQ.


 * The NPOV policy does not allow us to exclude sources that would normally be considered reliable, simply because we don't like what they say (and therefore want to argue that said sources are all biased because we disagree with them). And while the BLP policy requires us to write "conservatively and with regard for the subject's privacy", this does not mean that all negative material about the subject must be excluded — on the contrary, if negative material about the subject is backed up by reliable sources, it must be included in order to preserve NPOV.


 * Per WP:UNDUE and WP:BLPSTYLE, we should not give undue prominence to minority views: "Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserved as much attention overall as the majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views." Since the JMS article is about as "devoted" to the views of Jung and his followers as we're currently going to see on Wikipedia, it would seem to me that this small exception to devoting time/space to a "tiny minority" may apply here — but we still must not suggest that the opposition claims are superior to (or even close to being on a par with) the official reports.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 05:55, 10 February 2013 (UTC)


 * A minority view? What determines a majority/minority - the number of editors who express their opinion here? There are three different articles found on four different websites, one of which is investigative reporting based on the journalist's research, interviews, and documentation from both parties/sides of the issue saying that Jung clearly did not get a fair trial. I'm not arguing that we should remove all other articles, but think it's fair to give both sides their due weight. I'd like to think that the investigative reports carry a little more weight than a few headlines regurgitating the same sensational labeling and lack of research. These articles are also more recent than many of the other articles and they mention more than just Jung's trial but also include the trial between Providence and the news media. Macauthor (talk) 13:30, 10 February 2013 (UTC)


 * See my comment below. Any such dispute should be taken up at the NPOV noticeboard (WP:NPOVN).  And I would strongly recommend this be done ASAP, since the full protection on this article will expire in less than three days from now, and it's not going to be in anyone's interest to have a resumption of edit warring.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 06:32, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Suggested new layout
Here is how I propose we move forward:


 * 1) Restore to this version by UKExpat.
 * 2) Add all of the mainstream and academic sources we have found here (see my quotes above).
 * 3) The final line of the "Jung's teaching" section should note, "since 2009, several articles have appeared in small Korean magazines claiming that Providence is a mainstream Christian sect and that Jung's trials contained irregularities".

Per WP:WEIGHT "it should always be clear which parts of the text describe the minority view... Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserved as much attention overall as the majority view." Shii (tock) 12:42, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

As I said above this section this would not be give fair weight to both views as described in WP:WEIGHT The information you'd be omitting is represented by more recent articles found in multiple languages with far more research from both parties/sides of the issue. These are also the ONLY articles that have any confirmation from the subjects involved. The articles Shii and PeterDaley have mentioned have absolutely no interviews, quotes, or even mention of the subject's own expresed views which would be the only way those articles could be considered unbiased reporting. This is also a WP:BLP and as such we should give fair weight to views expressed by the subject himself and the organization he founded has clearly expressed. It's also related to religion so we should include who says what about the subject. For instance if some extremely controversial things are said by former members then the wikipedia article should mention, "according to former members," instead of just mentioning it as confirmed fact. Macauthor (talk) 13:45, 10 February 2013 (UTC)
 * "more recent articles found in multiple languages" Incorrect. What you have found is 3 articles written in small Korean magazines. They have appeared in no other languages. They are translated by the cult itself.
 * "The articles Shii and PeterDaley have mentioned have absolutely no interviews, quotes, or even mention of the subject's own expresed views" Incorrect. The academic article was based on interviews between a professor and former followers of the cult. It explains Seok's views in great detail. The other media articles do as well.
 * "instead of just mentioning it as confirmed fact" These are not some blog posts by angry dissenters. This is widely available information, confirmed by professors and journalists around the world. Combine that with the evidence accepted at Seok's trial and it is clear that we have already established these claims as confirmed fact by Wikipedia standards. Shii (tock) 13:54, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

Per WP:WEIGHT, it has been brought up that there are far more sources from perhaps more reputable names about the subject's history of allegations, accusations, charges, and final conviction than there are about the supposed controversy. However, it does not seem like a proper use of this Wikipedia policy. This policy is specifically talking about two opposing views. The example given is: the earth being flat and the earth not being flat. In this case, we are not talking about dichotomous views. That is to say, the sources suggest that the subject has been convicted and they also say that this conviction could be tainted. Since it's possible for both of these statements to be true, it is does not seem appropriate to consider one as a "minority view" and the other as the "majority view" rather than two sets of sources about the same flowing story. This argument is in addition to the statements MacAuthor has made about the thoroughness of the research and recentness of the articles brought up about the subject's trial. Itsfiziks (talk) 04:26, 11 February 2013 (UTC)


 * The question can still be cast as two opposing views. The fact of Jung's conviction and imprisonment is undisputed AFAIK, but there is at least some degree of disagreement as to whether Jung is truly guilty of the things he has been convicted of.  A possible comparison might exist here between Jung and the case of Ukrainian politican Yulia Tymoshenko:  it is a settled fact that she has been convicted and imprisoned on various corruption charges in Ukrainian courts, but reliable sources show there is a significant controversy over whether she is a common criminal or a political prisoner.  A better analogy might perhaps be found in the case of Warren Jeffs (the so-called "Mormon fundamentalist" leader who has been convicted and imprisoned in the US); virtually all mainstream sources consider Jeffs to have been properly dealt with by the legal system, while only a very small group (basically limited to his followers) have rallied to his defence.


 * If there is a dispute regarding how to apply the NPOV policy here, it needs to be taken to the NPOV noticeboard and discussed there. And since the full protection of this article is due to expire in less than three days' time, I would strongly encourage interested parties to pursue an NPOVN discussion right away — I doubt anyone really wants to see this article descend into another edit war.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 04:50, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Itsfiziks' plan. My implementation of how that "single narrative" would be implemented is listed in the three bullet points above, giving due weight to the 50 international sources on one hand (remember, this guy was on the run in three different countries) and the 3 minor, whitewashed-looking sources on the other hand. If anyone disagrees with it, explain why. Shii (tock) 12:01, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Protection about to expire
Just for everyone's information, the full protection I placed on this article two weeks ago is due to expire in a little under 24 hours from now. I'm very worried that once the protection expires, some people are going to insist on resuming the edit war. In particular, I'm troubled that my repeated urgings to take NPOV or reliable source concerns to the respective noticeboard pages appear to have gone unheeded.

Although I've tried to confine my comments over the past two weeks to interpretation of policy and neutral attempts at mediation, I think I've become far too WP:INVOLVED to be able to act as needed in case things get out of hand after the article becomes unprotected. Accordingly, I've posted a notice on the Administrators' Incidents Noticeboard (WP:ANI), asking for uninvolved admins to come here and keep an eye on what happens to this page. — Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 18:21, 12 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I have re-introduced some of the sources I thought we all agreed on in the above discussions that took place during the freeze. Why have these additions been undone by Harizotoh? As we already discussed: The articles being cited are not sourced to ProvidenceTrial.com. The original sources are Korean news articles and news magazine articles. The reason there are links to ProvidenceTrial is because there are supplemental translations available to assist those using google translate to read the original sources. You can remove the translation references if you think necessary but the original sources are valid and should not be removed. Macauthor (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 16:52, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
 * You are being completely dishonest and untrustworthy at this point, and anyone who fails to see why should see my reply to you under the header "Suggested new layout", and your lack of a reply to that. You should not be allowed to edit this article. Shii (tock) 00:05, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
 * If you wish to file a topic ban request, then do so. If not, then you're wasting your breath and my time. — Rutebega ( talk ) 00:15, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Is there a place I can go to do that? Shii (tock) 10:20, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I believe such things are usually discussed at ANI. — Rutebega ( talk ) 14:30, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I think there is just too much liberty being taken with the sources. For instance, in reference to the Japanese research by Yoshihide Sakurai, it has an English summary at the beginning which would be useful to this article. But Shii does not borrow from the English abstract but instead picks out random details from the Japanese parts and constructs information from many articles in a way that is almost like original research. Can't we just quote simple facts from the references that help describe the subject of this article? And how many of these references lead to dead links or articles no longer available for the rest of us to read? At this point I'd like to be able to double check that he's not interpreting his sources poorly or just flat wrongly like he did in quoting this newsjoy article in saying that members confirmed the videos.Macauthor (talk) 12:11, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Stop inventing your own policies. Quoting from Japanese is nothing like original research. You can see the quotes I used above. Any problem with them? And the Newsnjoy article says, "5년 이상 지난 과거의 영상이며, 성상납의 증거가 될 수 없다"고 반박했다. (in that quote a Providence member is saying "these were taken over 5 years ago so the statute of limitations for sex slavery has passed", accidentally acknowledging that the photos are real.) Shii (tock) 22:38, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Is the "accidentally acknowledging that the photos are real" phrase in the source? Or is this your own inference based on what the source says?  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 15:17, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * It's my inference (and seems to be an obvious rational inference to me), but I have no objection to changing the wording to what the quote actually says. Shii (tock) 16:16, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I'd recommend taking out the inference. Given that this article is a BLP (and a magnet for controversy), we should follow accepted Wikipedia policies and guidelines as scrupulously as possible.  In this case, a Wikipedian's own extrapolation or inference, no matter how obvious or rational, is OR and should either be removed or else replaced by a reliable source saying the same thing.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 17:44, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Hi again. I'm a bit confused by [ this most recent edit] of yours, because I can't identify which part of the cited source substantiates the claim that "Jung's followers responded that the videos were made before 2008 and were therefore outside the statue of limitations."  I ran the source through Google Translate (I don't speak Korean), and nothing jumped out at me.  Also, BTW, "statue of limitations" should be "statute of limitations" — possibly just an accidental typo.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 00:14, 21 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Moved below Shii (tock) 05:29, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

I regret that none of the admins have seen fit to comment here, but per this ANI discussion Macauthor has been blocked for bad-faith editing. I therefore reverted his whitewashing from the article... for like the 20th time. Shii (tock) 01:22, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I have semiprotected for some weeks; this might avoid edits by IPs or new users trying to pick up things....Lectonar (talk) 15:39, 20 February 2013 (UTC)

Translating the Korean
Looks like I've been sloppy with my translation. What Jung's followers actually said is:

They didn't say anything about the statue of limitations, that was the result of me taking only a quick glance at the translations. Shii (tock) 05:29, 21 February 2013 (UTC)