Talk:Keith Windschuttle

Very long/overly detailed
I find this article to be very long and overly detailed. Other opinions appreciated. Melonkelon (talk) 22:46, 23 June 2015 (UTC)

An unfortunate consequence of the subject being controversial. If you look at the history of the article, some users tried to turn the 'Keith Windschuttle' article into a 'Keith Windschuttle is wrong about everything' article. Rather than the article being a fairly simple straightforward summary of his career and of what Windschuttle argues in his books, it got loaded up with every criticism (valid, spurious or simply political) of his work that could be found along with misrepresentations of his work (see above in the section on 'Number of Aborigines killed' regarding the discussion about how some users wanted to represent his estimate of approximately 120 Aboriginal deaths for which there is some plausible written record in existence as though it was a claim that British settlers killed no more that 120 Aborigines in total). This, of course, ensured that other users felt the need to correct the misrepresentations and include Windschuttle's responses to the criticisms or other material to clarify the situation. Once this happens it is hard to reduce an article back down to the basics as each side doesn't want their material removed. There have been numerous edit wars with regard to this article.58.173.152.42 (talk) 03:21, 24 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your comment and insight. Interesting to know. Melonkelon (talk) 04:02, 24 June 2015 (UTC)


 * This is more of an attack page than a biography. Some of the material bears no relation to the subject, and seems to have been introduced in order to insert an unpublished argument. Any editor so feeling should write a book themselves, and refrain from using Wikipedia for that purpose.


 * I intend to remove about 90% of the critical material here. Maybe it could usefully be used in a new article on a different subject, but it doesn't belong here in this BLP. --Pete (talk) 03:41, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Merge Macleay Press into this article?
Macleay Press doesn't seem notable apart from its connection to Windschuttle. I propose merging and redirecting to this article. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 20:46, 28 March 2020 (UTC)


 * Agree. For an article that's existed for 12 years, it has gone nowhere on its own. HiLo48 (talk) 23:18, 28 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Agree. Now defunct. Paul foord (talk) 09:44, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
 * ✅. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 16:06, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

The Fabrication of Aboriginal History, Volume Three, The Stolen Generations 1881–2008
This section seems to be overly long, and most of the sources in it are now dead links which makes it very hard to verify. In explaining the thesis of the book it also seems to result in sentences that seem inappropriately worded for Wikipedia and partly unclear if they are facts or Windschuttles opinions. One example "In Western Australia, the majority of the children who are claimed to have been removed and placed in state Aboriginal settlements, in fact went to those settlements with their destitute parents." appears without reference and unclear how substantiated this claim is, but could be read as independent fact as opposed to a claim made in the book. I would like to clean up this section but I can tell this is a contentious area, so I don't want to clean up too much if there is consensus for the current version of this section? Dauwenkust (talk) 00:09, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

I've added some sources that are live links and a page reference to the book. I also restored versions of some wording that appears to have been removed because of dead links/no clear sources. This includes an edited version of the sentence mentioned above - "In Western Australia, the majority of the children who are claimed to have been removed and placed in state Aboriginal settlements, in fact went to those settlements with their destitute parents" attaching a live link as a reference as well as including "Windschuttle states''..." or "Windschuttle argues..." to clarify that this is what he argues in the book, not necessarily a declaration of an independent fact. While the Stolen Generations is a "contentious area", this section is clearly a summary of what Windschuttle argues in his book & should accurately reflect what's in the book. It cannot be a neutral statement about the Stolen Generations but, as a summary of the book, has to be what Windschuttle argues & therefore needs to include enough detail to give a reader a sense of the arguments & evidence. If someone has verifiable, reliable sources for a "Critical Responses" section, it would be appropriate to add that after this section.2001:8003:E121:E400:30BC:129:6771:C168 (talk) 06:44, 1 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree the section is way too long and spends most of its time evaluating the text, rather than describing it. This whole article seems to be an attempt to evaluate whether he is racist or not, which is misguided. The article should follow standard biography style. Which would include mentions of accusations of racism, of course, but not attempt to engage in an evaluation of its merits. Ashmoo (talk) 10:18, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Questionable label in the first sentence
This is a BLP violation because 1) it exaggerates a negative claim far beyond its prevalence in reliable sources and 2) it presents a contested opinion in wikivoice. A more neutral phrasing is "Windschuttle argues that genocide is not an accurate characterization of the colonization of Australia", but that's already obvious from reading the lead. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  18:55, 1 June 2021 (UTC)