Talk:Quebec Biker War

RfC started to discuss replacing Criminal Org Infobox with Org Infobox
Please comment on an RfC to replace Template:Infobox Criminal organization with Template:Infobox Organization for active motorcycle clubs. Thanks! --Dbratland (talk) 20:51, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Shedden massacre
I removed the reference that the Shedden massacre was one of the events that ended the Quebec biker war. First thing, the Shedden killings were as I understand it, not the work of the Hell's Angels as claimed here, but rather a case of the Bandidos liquidating one of their own chapters. Second, the war ended in 2002, and the Shedden killings happened in 2006. Third, that was in Ontario and this is about the Quebec biker war. The Shedden massacre really seems to be off-topic here, and unless someone can present proof that what happened in Shedden is linked to the Quebec biker war, the reference to the Shedden killings should not be on this page.--A.S. Brown (talk) 01:54, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

SO MUCH REPETITION!
Enough said. 174.115.100.93 (talk) 17:21, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Copyright violations?
Recently contributor excised 2,267‎, bytes with the edit summary "Reverted good faith edits by 63.135.29.110 (talk): Copyright issue re https://www.outlawsmc.be/History"

Clarification please. Dates are not copyrightable, as per Feith v. Rural. Dates are facts, and the SCOTUS ruled facts aren't copyrightable. Other countries, like Australia, follow a "sweat of the brow" theory of copyright, where someone can claim a copyright simply for compiling a list of facts.

But the wikipedia is governed by US copyright law.

If, 63.135.29.110 copied a prose list, verbatim, that would be a problem. If dates from a prose list were included here, that would not be a problem, as per Feith v. Rural.

I looked at https://www.outlawsmc.be/History. It is far longer than 2,267 bytes.

Was revdel really necessary here, given that it obfuscates what was excised? If the dates 63.135.29.110 merit inclusion, surely it would be trivial to make the minor revisions, so it wasn't a verbatim copy? It wouldn't matter if the dates were in the same order as https://www.outlawsmc.be/History, as under US law facts aren't copyrightable. Geo Swan (talk) 04:30, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
 * , I am very aware that dates alone and not copyrightable. As you can see, the source document has dates and then text discussion of what happened on those dates. Had the editor simply copied the dates it would've not been a copyright violation although it would've been a silly thing to do. Rest assured I did not revert and Revdel because the editor added some dates.


 * It is my opinion that rewriting text is not trivial, but you have the source so if you can do it, go for it. you don't need to see what was specifically added it was a verbatim copy of a portion of the source material. S Philbrick  (Talk)  12:02, 24 November 2020 (UTC)


 * , Okay, so why the revdel? In the past we never would have revdel'ed something like this.  A simple reversion was all that was required.  En.wiki is something like 20 years old.  We have something like 10 million articles.  So, how many individual edits has that been?  2 Trillion edits?  How many contained innocent or duplicitous lapses from COPYVIO?  500 million?  A billion?


 * What would the projects revision history look like if administrators went back and revdel'ed a billion instances of trivial copyvios? Answer?  Swiss cheese.


 * Revdels are inherently disruptive, and should be used very sparingly, because they disrupt the ability to use diffs.


 * When should a revdel be used? If there is an individual who thinks there is a real-life threat to their safety, and someone maliciously or lazily puts their not publicly availiable real-life address in a wikipedia article, or on a wikipedia talk page, the perceived real life threat justifies a rev-del.  But, in this case, you put a link, in your edit summary, to the material you say was the target of the copyvio.  So, your rev del provided absolutely zero value to anyone.  You weren't protecting anyone's real-life safety.  And even if, for the sake of argument, there was a genuine real life reason why the material at https://www.outlawsmc.be/History should never be copied again, because, oh, I don't know, it contained trivially easy instructions on how to make an Anthrax germ warfare terrorist bomb, you provided a link right to it.


 * Please, if you ever consider using revdel again, only do so if there is a genuine real-life threat to safety. Please rely on the traditional simple reversion, for simple copyios, or the simple inappropriate use of bad words.  Geo Swan (talk) 14:51, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
 * , > Okay, so why the revdel?
 * Because that's the established policy with respect to copyright violations.
 * > In the past we never would have revdel'ed something like this
 * When do you mean? Revdel has been established policy for years. Prior to that it wasn't because the concept hadn't been invented.
 * > A simple reversion was all that was required.
 * No, a simple reversion leaves the copyright violation in the history, and clever people could link to the earlier revision, leaving us potentially liable
 * > So, how many individual edits has that been? 2 Trillion edits?
 * No. Your edit adding this comment was Revision ID 990,446,379, so we are still a bit shy of one billion. (EN Wiki only).
 * > How many contained innocent or duplicitous lapses from COPYVIO? 500 million? A billion?
 * I don't know but given that we haven't yet reached 1 billion edits, it is clearly not close to that level. I'm sure that there are remaining copyright problems, many of which are in the process of being reviewed, and if you will be missed but not close to those numbers
 * > What would the projects revision history look like if administrators went back and revdel'ed a billion instances of trivial copyvios?.
 * There are not close to a billion instances of trivial copyvios.
 * > Revdels are inherently disruptive, and should be used very sparingly, because they disrupt the ability to use diffs.
 * The vast majority of edits are not copyright violations so revdels are used sparingly. What's the rationale for wanting to cite a diff to a copyright violation?
 * > Please, if you ever consider using revdel again, only do so if there is a genuine real-life threat to safety.
 * That's not policy.
 * Geo Swan seems to be under the impression that the primary purpose of Revdel relates to threats to safety. Have you ever heard this? S Philbrick  (Talk)  03:30, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Sometimes revision deletion is done if someone reveals another person's real-world identity. This could potentially result in a threat to the safety of the person being doxxed. Temporary revision deletion is often done, and then Oversight should be contacted to hide the diff even further. It's criterion WP:RD4. But this is only one of several criteria that are listed in the policy (there are 6 different criteria). Geo Swan, hiding revisions that violate our copyright policy fall under criterion WP:RD1 of the revision deletion policy. The material Sphilbrick hid in this particular case was a copy of the prose in the timeline visible at https://www.outlawsmc.be/History and meets the criterion for redaction under RD1.— Diannaa (talk) 13:32, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't know but given that we haven't yet reached 1 billion edits, it is clearly not close to that level. I'm sure that there are remaining copyright problems, many of which are in the process of being reviewed, and if you will be missed but not close to those numbers
 * > What would the projects revision history look like if administrators went back and revdel'ed a billion instances of trivial copyvios?.
 * There are not close to a billion instances of trivial copyvios.
 * > Revdels are inherently disruptive, and should be used very sparingly, because they disrupt the ability to use diffs.
 * The vast majority of edits are not copyright violations so revdels are used sparingly. What's the rationale for wanting to cite a diff to a copyright violation?
 * > Please, if you ever consider using revdel again, only do so if there is a genuine real-life threat to safety.
 * That's not policy.
 * Geo Swan seems to be under the impression that the primary purpose of Revdel relates to threats to safety. Have you ever heard this? S Philbrick  (Talk)  03:30, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Sometimes revision deletion is done if someone reveals another person's real-world identity. This could potentially result in a threat to the safety of the person being doxxed. Temporary revision deletion is often done, and then Oversight should be contacted to hide the diff even further. It's criterion WP:RD4. But this is only one of several criteria that are listed in the policy (there are 6 different criteria). Geo Swan, hiding revisions that violate our copyright policy fall under criterion WP:RD1 of the revision deletion policy. The material Sphilbrick hid in this particular case was a copy of the prose in the timeline visible at https://www.outlawsmc.be/History and meets the criterion for redaction under RD1.— Diannaa (talk) 13:32, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * > Please, if you ever consider using revdel again, only do so if there is a genuine real-life threat to safety.
 * That's not policy.
 * Geo Swan seems to be under the impression that the primary purpose of Revdel relates to threats to safety. Have you ever heard this? S Philbrick  (Talk)  03:30, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Sometimes revision deletion is done if someone reveals another person's real-world identity. This could potentially result in a threat to the safety of the person being doxxed. Temporary revision deletion is often done, and then Oversight should be contacted to hide the diff even further. It's criterion WP:RD4. But this is only one of several criteria that are listed in the policy (there are 6 different criteria). Geo Swan, hiding revisions that violate our copyright policy fall under criterion WP:RD1 of the revision deletion policy. The material Sphilbrick hid in this particular case was a copy of the prose in the timeline visible at https://www.outlawsmc.be/History and meets the criterion for redaction under RD1.— Diannaa (talk) 13:32, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Geo Swan seems to be under the impression that the primary purpose of Revdel relates to threats to safety. Have you ever heard this? S Philbrick  (Talk)  03:30, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Sometimes revision deletion is done if someone reveals another person's real-world identity. This could potentially result in a threat to the safety of the person being doxxed. Temporary revision deletion is often done, and then Oversight should be contacted to hide the diff even further. It's criterion WP:RD4. But this is only one of several criteria that are listed in the policy (there are 6 different criteria). Geo Swan, hiding revisions that violate our copyright policy fall under criterion WP:RD1 of the revision deletion policy. The material Sphilbrick hid in this particular case was a copy of the prose in the timeline visible at https://www.outlawsmc.be/History and meets the criterion for redaction under RD1.— Diannaa (talk) 13:32, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Sometimes revision deletion is done if someone reveals another person's real-world identity. This could potentially result in a threat to the safety of the person being doxxed. Temporary revision deletion is often done, and then Oversight should be contacted to hide the diff even further. It's criterion WP:RD4. But this is only one of several criteria that are listed in the policy (there are 6 different criteria). Geo Swan, hiding revisions that violate our copyright policy fall under criterion WP:RD1 of the revision deletion policy. The material Sphilbrick hid in this particular case was a copy of the prose in the timeline visible at https://www.outlawsmc.be/History and meets the criterion for redaction under RD1.— Diannaa (talk) 13:32, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Quebec Biker War
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Quebec Biker War's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "julian": From Lennoxville massacre:  From Rock Machine:  From Maurice Boucher:  

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 13:29, 13 November 2021 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Quebec Biker War
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Quebec Biker War's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "oocities.org": From Giovanni Cazzetta: https://www.oocities.org/wiseguywally/GiovanniCazzetta.html From Claude Vézina: https://www.oocities.org/wiseguywally/ClaudeVezina.html 

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 15:10, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

Unreliable vs. reliable sources
I have it as a rule that merely asserting that a source is unreliable is not helpful. If one feels a source is unreliable, it is up to the editor making those claims to be prove it. Alex Caine's book The Fat Mexican pushes a number of conspiracy theories that not supported by any evidence. For those interested about why Caine's book is not reliable, see here:. Yes, I know it is a blog post, but it is from the blog of Peter Edwards, the crime correspondent of The Toronto Star and a leading authority on Canadian organized crime. Beyond that, there was much material that was copied verbatim from an article in The Montreal Gazette, which is no doubt the work of CanadianHistorian who was blocked for that reason. Likewise, CanadianHistorian has made citations from Jerry Langton's book Showdown that I cannot find in his book. And finally, one cannot use the websites of the Rock Machine as a source. Outlaw biker clubs often liked to inflate their numbers and Langton says quite clearly in his book that most of the supposed chapters from the Rock Machine do not in fact exist. --A.S. Brown (talk) 08:24, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Possible mistranslation
From the article - " Tousignant then called his mistress to break the news, leading her to say "All! Congratulations!" ". Since his nickname was "Toot", isn't it likely she said "Toot, congratulations!", rather than "Tout! Congratulations!" (French for "all") ?

Since "All! Congratulations!" doesn't make sense, even in French. Seems like some clipping was translated when it shouldn't have been, and it found it's way here.


 * 84.68.177.160 (talk) 08:59, 3 May 2022 (UTC)


 * ✅ You're probably right. I made that change.  signed, Willondon (talk)  14:29, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

Probable misquote
I don't have access to the source referenced but at the end of the Background section is a quote containing the phrase, "members didn't have to own a bike to bike." I'm guessing the last word should have been "join" or "belong" or similar. ManlyMatt (talk) 11:41, 11 May 2023 (UTC)


 * I don't have access either. I could see the quote being accurate, where the second 'bike' is being used as a verb meaning "to live the biker life", as "bike to bike" is an arguably catchy phrase. My two cents.  signed, Willondon (talk)  13:23, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Recent revert of large contribution to Aftermath section
I recently reverted a large portion of the recent contribution to the Aftermath section. It is well sourced, and contains a lot of valuable information, but it is packaged as a lengthy criticism of Langton's journalism by synthesizing those sources. The sources report on facts that contradict Langton's reporting, or his predictions that didn't age well, but the sources don't actually mention him or anything about his journalism. That's where the synthesis comes in. Unless there are sources that specifically address Langton's journalism, I think there's a better remedy: integrate the new information and sources into the section as it deals with the Quebec Biker War, and leave the Langton part out of it. I don't have time now, but I expect to be able to return to it in the future if needed. signed, Willondon (talk) 13:44, 31 May 2023 (UTC)


 * Criticism of Langton's journalist ability was not my actual intention of this writing, just simply to show his words spoken above were incorrect and can be seen as misleading, I believe that his final statement does not depict the situation following the conflict and into the modern day at all, this is supported by several prominent journalists and publications.
 * Though you are right most references do not mention Langton or his journalism, most of those discussions are on online blogs which can not be used as refs, also synthesis/original research of published material to imply a new conclusion is allowed under these circumstances, "is acceptable only if a reliable source has published the same argument concerning the topic of the article." Both groups bring up the topic "New Rock Machine's connection to past Rock Machine" but Langton is the denominator. however the one part about addressing criticism in his novel is legitimate, he talks for about 3 pages, he also lists biker blogs as one of his main sources, which as you know are not seen as legitimate source by Wikipedia guidelines. He does speak ignorantly about the subject of these other clubs without actually taking the time to research the subject, based on actual facts on references that I posted, his comments about the Outlaws, Rock Machine and Loners can be seen as non legitimate, for example Alex Caine wrote something in a book that turned out not to be true, I have seen several editors on Wikipedia argue against the legitimacy of Cain's references. Why shouldn't Langton be checked aswell. Either way the reason why I put so much evidence into it is because people will back up Langton no matter what unless you provide evidence, either way this information that I entered is important and I would prefer if you could enter it again if you have the time in a format that you would see as suitable. 96.47.179.2 (talk) 18:57, 31 May 2023 (UTC)
 * The comment is actually block evasion by CanadianHistorian (MMA & History). Leaving that aside, is a bit rich that an editor who uses Langton quite regularly as a source devotes an entire section attacking Langton as a source. Essentially, for CanadianHistorian Langton is a reliable source when says that something that he likes and is not reliable when he says something that he does not like. More importantly, CanadianHistorian does not seem to understand Langton's point here. What is saying here is that the Canadian Hells Angels are the dominant criminal syndicate in Canada. The number of chapters and members that the Rock Machine, the Loners, and Outlaws have at present are besides the point. CanadianHistorian is assuming that because a biker gang has a website giving a certain number of members that must prove that they are important players in the underworld, which does not logically follow. More importantly, CanadianHistorian is a blocked editor and is not supposed to be editing at all. If he wants to come back, he should appeal his block. But in this case, there is no point because he engaged in sock puppetry very extensively ever since he was blocked in April of last year. --A.S. Brown (talk) 23:27, 17 June 2023 (UTC)