Talk:Tea Party movement/Moderated discussion/Archive 1

Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party
There appears to be agreement on a sub-article to be called "Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party". As such I will create a sub-page /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party, and editors can propose here the material to be placed in that sub-article.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  09:43, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I suggest we start with the content of the whole section called "On issues of race, bigotry and public perception." I think Ubikwit should write a summary style lede for it. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 12:05, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Well since you've honored me with such a request, P&W, even though I really need to concentrate on my RL occupation, I have taken a look over that section and here's what I have found.
 * First, it might indeed be plausible to do the same thing with this section as the elections/GG/GOTV material, except that there is the high-profile issue of immigration that looks to me like it will have to have its own section in the main article and a mention in the Agenda section. In other words, I think that the main article could include a summary of this section and be linked to the sub-article, and deal with a nominal amount of quote/source material (just enough to illustrate the point) from this section that relates to negative impressions of the TPm on immigration--which has received broad coverage and is currently a nationwide focus--in an immigration section.
 * With respect to a summary introduction/lede, it seems that the current version could be modified along the lines of the following.
 * Here is the current version"Since its inception, the Tea Party movement has struggled with charges of racism. Opponents cite a number of events as proof that the movement is, at least in part, motivated by bigotry and intolerance. Supporters, however, say the incidents are the work of 'a few bad apples', a small fringe that have unfairly maligned the movement."
 * Here's a proposed first working version for a first paragraph.
 * -- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 13:11, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I have just created the subpage /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party. I used the first paragraph of the main article lede, then the paragraph you just wrote, then the content of the section called "On issues of race, bigotry and public perception" from the main article, then a reflist. Everything has to start with something. Edit away, mates. regards ... Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 13:20, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure the phrase "charges of xenophobia and racism" feels quite right. One of the alleged incidents was homophobic in nature. Another one was anti-Islamic. These two don't fit very neatly within either "xenophobia" or "racism." I think the word "bigotry" feels right in this context, since it is all-inclusive. What do you think? Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 13:23, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * P&W, Ubikwit's 'edit' is entirely OR. This is what he wants in the article. It's not what exists in the real world. The tea party has not "struggled with xenophobia and racism since it's inception" or at any other time. That's total fiction. Where are the sources that say that? Where is the evidence? And I'm not talking about a "scholarly" source which means there are no reliable sources like ABC News and The New York Times, so you've gone to Google Books and typed in "xenophobia," and whatever comes back you plaster the article with it. Sorry, the TPm is NOT known for xenophobia and racism. Not at all. It is known for opposing the huge spending, the bailouts, Obamacare, etc. It was not formed to attack immigrants or a black president. Malke 2010 (talk) 13:47, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Malke, I'm being very careful with this — notice that it says "struggled with charges of xenophobia and racism." Apparently you didn't notice the two words I'd boldfaced here. Granted, political hacks from the left have attempted to portray the Tea Party as a reincarnation of the Ku Klux Klan, by focusing everyone's attention on these alleged incidents, and claiming or implying that they're representative of the entire movement. They're masters of the innuendo. I'm sure you can find a reliable source or two that express that train of thought. Let me know what you find, and I'd be happy to support its inclusion. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 16:43, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The onus is on you to find a source. You and Ubikwit and Xenophrenic are the ones who wants it in the article. Show me the "charges of xenophobia and racism." Who charged them? What reliable source is quoting what individual or group that "charges the tea party movement with xenophobia and racism"? There was no xenophobia and racism. The tea party came about because of the bailout, the FED policies, Obamacare. It's fiscal, and that is the dominate issue, not these fringe behaviours the media promotes. If you want a source to back up your claims, you go find it. Fringe behaviours do not deserve this kind of weight. At all. That's the point of eliminating this. It's overshadowing the entire article and it's creating the most trouble. Malke 2010 (talk) 16:54, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I simply modified the current opening paragraph, toning it down and filling it out, and adding "xenophobia" based on previous Talk page discussions. Labeling that "entirely OR" maybe a little much. I would agree that xenophobia is more likely a term to be found in academic studies, and perhaps relates more to immigration than this section. The point about homophobia is also salient, as that doesn't fall under xenophobia or racism. If bigotry is deemed ample to sufficiently cover racism, then it could be used as a comprehensive term in the article in the same manner as it is used in the title. On the other hand, maybe the article should list the specific types of bigotry, corresponding to the specific examples cited. But maybe that wouldn't need to be in the opening paragraph, etc.


 * Upon reflection, I agree that xenophobia relates more to the immigration issue, and I seem to recall it being mentioned in that context. At any rate, feel free to propose modifications or alternative versions, as appropriate.
 * Incidentally, I was not involved in editing that material at all, and Xenophrenic is far more knowledgeable than I about this material.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 14:15, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'll be helping, of course, but I tend to let editors with strong personal opinions express them early on, so everything is on the table. I also tend to completely avoid exercises in redundancy, like the proposal to delete negative information (with the same people supporting it) at the top of this page, followed by the identical proposal yesterday (with the same people supporting it) just above. Several editors have already expressed valid concerns about such proposals, and those concerns should be addressed. Xenophrenic (talk) 16:29, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Something like this (with more encyclopedic wording) would be more accurate. Some of the millions of supporters did bad or bad-sounding stuff, as is inevitable with any sampling of people of that size. A tactic of opponents is to give those instances prominence and assert or imply that they are characteristic of the movement. North8000 (talk) 14:25, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * That is not an NPOV construction. The title of the subarticle is "Allegations...", not "False allegations...". Whether the allegations are substantiated or not is for the reader to decide. We are simply supposed to present the material in RS in a coherent manner, etc.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 15:14, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm not convinced of the usefulness of creating more articles for the "incidents"; my proposal had the goal of replacing them completely with encyclopedic treatment of the matter. I also don't think we should expand into the realm of "alleged incidents"; the actual incidents should suffice. I'll probably be focusing more on SilkTork's proposed sandbox page for a bit instead. Xenophrenic (talk) 16:29, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Those are all viable concerns. There are some fine lines here that need to be brought into focus. I don't, however, think that the title of "Allegations..." is an equivalent to "alleged incidents". It is simply a title that enables the presentation of all incidents that might fall under such category, and the scrutinizing of such incidents. The point is to detail the specifics of actual incidents and the reactions to them, on both sides. In my opinion it's plain that there are bigots and racists in the TPm, but that shouldn't be much of a surprise, on another level, as such individuals are not exclusively found in the TPm. The fact that they are inclined to become politically involved may say something positive about the TPm, in a counterintuitive manner. The question as to what ends might prove another worthwhile exploration...
 * So the interesting point for the article is what reactions within the movement have held sway, etc., and how those incidents have affected the viability of the TPm in the public sphere. I think that it's clear that they have had a negative impact. From there, the question arises as to how the TPm leadership has responded, etc., and where are they headed.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 16:59, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * (e/c)But you're not including all the things that the actual tea party leaders are saying. You single out Dale Robertson and teaparty.org. Dale Robertson does not have a tea party. He simply bought the domain name teaparty.org and tried to sell it to legitimate tea party groups. He has a for-profit organization. He's one guy. You and Xenophrenic, and apparently now P&W, totally ignore the undue weight of putting him in a dominate position while totally ignoring Tea Party Patriots and Freedomworks. Why is it your editing never includes what they say about racism and immigration? They have the largest following in the U.S., yet what they have to say isn't in the article. Malke 2010 (talk) 16:38, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Generally there is not a question of whether the occurrence of a cherry-picked trivia incident is true or false, it is the claims of broader meaning in the the wording, and giving it false importance via inclusion inn the top level TPM article. North8000 (talk) 17:42, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Dale Robertson and teaparty.org
Dale Robertson and teaparty.org are trivia and do not in any way represent the tea party movement. Dale Robertson does not have a legitimate tea party organization. He bought the domain name, teaparty.org and tried to sell it to legitimate groups. This is the very trivia we voted to keep out of the article. The vote is unopposed, it's past the 24 hour mark, therefore, the rule is if it is not directly about the tea party movement, it does not go into the article. Dale Robertson's behaviours and comments are not about the tea party movement and therefore do not belong in the article or in any subarticle. Malke 2010 (talk) 17:17, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * While your assertion regarding what is or is not "directly about the tea party movement" is something that needs to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, it may be the case that you are correct with respect to Dale Robertson. He would appear to be an example of the fairly commonplace occurrence of domain name scamming. -- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 17:31, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Or it may not be the case. Robertson founded the 1776 Tea Party, was an active Tea Party leader and activist (even appearing on news shows as a TP spokesman), and only became "not representative of the TP movement" after he attracted unwanted controversy. It wasn't until after all that when he offered to sell off his domain names - not part of a scam. Xenophrenic (talk) 18:06, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The NYT has never mentioned the guy. At least according to their full site search. Nor do googlenews searches show him to be much of anything, ever.  Making him of exceedingly marginal importance at all to the general subject of the article.  Cheers. -- when the NYT never mentions him, I consider him an eensy bit non-notable.   Same goes for the Washington Post -- zero mentions.   So I go to yhe local paper for him ...  Robertson went to the "Coffee Party" organizational meeting ...   his own local paper does not call him a major Tea Party figure.  Really!  So we are left with opinion colimns hitting him ... without any real connection to the movement as such at all.   So the "Tea Party leader" is unsupported by reliable sources per WP:BLP  in the first place.  He was at a Tea Party event - that is all that is supported.  Cheers. Collect (talk) 18:32, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I think it's interesting that the legitimate Tea Party groups don't consider him a major player, and the legitimate, unbiased news media don't consider him a major player, but there are certain opinion columnists who choose to portray him as a major player in the TPm so that they have a strawman to attack. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 19:02, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * There are no "Leaders", remember? Why spend so much effort poking at that strawman? Even ABC acknowledges the problematic nature of determining who-has-what-stature-in-the-movement. He is/was the leader and founder of 1776 Tea Party and TeaParty.org. You are allowed your personal opinion as to his importance in the movement, of course, but I prefer to go with what reliable sources convey. (And my Google News search returns tens of thousands of hits.) Robertson pops up in quite a few academic papers, articles and books in a Google Scholar search, too. All TP groups (and their leaders) are "legitimate" until they aren't, according to sources. Group 'A' calls group 'B' fake; group 'C' calls group 'D' establishment usurpers riding the Tea Party brand; group 'D' says group 'A' is AstroTurf-Tea-Party, because they are for-profit and controlled by advocacy interests; Group 'C' says group 'B' is fringe, because they take stands on social issues, etc. The in-fighting is nothing new, and TeaParty.org isn't the only one in that ring. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:06, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Since the NYT and WaPo and the Houston Chronicale all do not even give him much mention at all, there is a certain amount of disbelief when an opinion columnist asserts he was one. Using Google Scholar (18 hits total)  - first hit is for a book which has all of this to say:  The 1776 Tea Party has adopted a deliberately confrontational posture. One of its leaders argued, “Most of the other TP’s [Tea Parties] are afraid to make such a powerful stand. We tell the world we have Core Beliefs! We don’t step on toes, we step on necks!... “46 The organization’s founding president is Dale Robertson, a former Naval officer who served with the Marines  No claim that he was a leader of anything else at all.  Second source: same result.  Third source: Some of the most highly sought after Tea Party speakers include: Sarah Palin, Dale Robertson and Tom Tancredo which simply says he speaks a lot.  Fourth: calls him a website founder.  Fifth: calls the movement "teabaggers" and might not be a really good source.  Sixth:  a review not phrased in NPOV language based on a book in the list already  Seventh: stresses a vast right wing radio conspiracy   And so on.  None are "scholarly analyses of the Tea PArty Movement" at all.  So using them to prove the NYT, Chronicle and WaPo missed out on something is a non-starter here.  BTW, "FDR" and "lesbian" gets over 3000 google scholar hits.  "Nixon" and "mass murderer" gets 891 hits.    Collect (talk) 20:24, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Xenophrenic is making the "I saw Elvis" argument. Somebody says they saw Elvis, therefore, Elvis isn't dead, and we should load up his biography with Elvis sightings just in case the spotters have it right and the coroner got it all wrong. Dale Robertson has a website, not a tea party, not a group. He's not a leader of anything. And yes, there are indeed leaders in the movement. Jenny Beth Martin, Tea Party Patriots. Sal Russo, Tea Party Express. Even Matt Kibbe from FreedomWorks, which is not a tea party but an "ally" as ABC News calls him. Malke 2010 (talk) 21:08, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Google-games are fun, Collect, but I've no interest in seeing how important or unimportant we can paint any particular TPer is. He's mentioned in news sources as well as scholarly sources. Obviously he's the source of some bad press, so I understand the effort to twist & turn to justify removal of all mention of him. Claiming that reliable sources don't mention him at all, or don't refer to him as a leader when they do mention him (incorrect on all counts), doesn't advance the discussion. I responded to your "Baxter" comment above, by the way. Xenophrenic (talk) 21:21, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
 * You brought up the "google hits" argument, not I. As for WaPo -- I used the "search archives" function on their website ... which is what most folks do when searching newspaper articles.   The article you found says: "People are so angry they don't even want these political parties at their events," said Dale Robertson, president and founder of TeaParty.org, which he said has 6 million members. "I've been attacked viciously by Republican groups. They've called me all kinds of slanderous names."   The problem is that his organization never had "6 million members" which makes his strength as a self-proclaimed founder of a "6 million member organization" pretty iffy if you really wish to use that as a source.    In fact, I think he is like Bernie Madoff who claimed to have $65 billion dollars .   The "claim" is not even stated as a "fact" by WaPo if you notice.   In fact, I would be delighted if you used that article as a "reliable source" as it makes very clear that he is a bit of a self-promoter. Collect (talk) 21:48, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Collect, I think the Washington Post article you want is in the link I provide below. The reporter from Mother Jones is criticizing the very article Xenophrenic is claiming proves that Dale Robertson is whatever he's claiming he is. Go to the Mother Jones article. The link is there. Malke 2010 (talk) 22:04, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Also, the reason Xenophrenic gets millions of hits for Dale Robertson is because Xenophrenic is using the hits that go with this Dale Robertson, the actor. LOL. Malke 2010 (talk) 22:29, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Stephanie Mencimer of Mother Jones had this to say about Dale Robertson. She is criticizing the WashPost for using Robertson as a "spokesperson" for the tea party. Mother Jones, isn't that your Mother Ship, Xenophrenic? Here is the most telling quote from the article entitled: ''Wash Post Quotes Bogus Tea Party Leader: ''

"Like many of the media hounds claiming to represent the grassroots Tea Party movement, Robertson's main credential is opportunism. Last spring, as the movement was taking root, he had the foresight to register a whole bunch of tea party domain names, including teaparty.org, Texas Tea Party, Houston Tea Party, HoustonTXTeaParty, and so on. Then he tried to sell the names back to the actual Texas tea party leaders, making veiled threats about lawsuits over their use of the Tea Party name. 

''The former Navy officer who claims to be running for governor of Texas has even put some of the domain names on eBay, with the stated intent of saving his house from foreclosure. While real Tea Party leaders have distanced themselves from Robertson, the media have embraced him and his false claim that he founded the entire Tea Party movement. Despite efforts by Tea Party leaders to publicize Robertson's phony creds and racist sign-making habits, Robertson has appeared on Fox News, C-Span, Russia Today, as well as a host of radio shows, and he's been quoted with authority in a variety of newspapers. The Washington Post quote, though, is definitely a coup for Roberston, and a true embarrassment for the Post, which really should have known better."''

Malke 2010 (talk) 22:06, 10 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Based on your quoted text"Despite efforts by Tea Party leaders to publicize Robertson's phony creds and racist sign-making habits, Robertson has appeared on Fox News, C-Span, Russia Today, as well as a host of radio shows, and he's been quoted with authority in a variety of newspapers. The Washington Post quote, though, is definitely a coup for Roberston, and a true embarrassment for the Post, which really should have known better."there is no question that he is notable and should be mentioned in regard to some aspect of the development of the movement. Obviously he didn't need to get some sort of license or certificate before he started his self-serving enterprise flying the banner of the TP. His case at least demonstrates another blip in the narrative of development from "protest movement" to "activist movement with structure".
 * removed BLP vio, whether he is notable on the main article summary of the section at hand is questionable, but in another section detailing the abovementioned narrative, perhaps, given the amount of coverage in RS.
 * Maybe something along the lines of removed BLP vio-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 01:38, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Careful there. Even Talk pages are subject to WP:BLP restrictions. Wouldn't want you to get in trouble. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 03:41, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I removed it. That can't stay there like that. Malke 2010 (talk) 04:13, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * OK, thanks for the warning (and removal). I'll have to read that policy. Let's try another hypothetical sentence"In the early days of the movement, Tea Parties attracted a number of activists that made alarming displays of bigotry, generating widespread controversy within and without the movement."-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 04:59, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * What's the source for that suggested edit? Malke 2010 (talk) 12:36, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * It's not a suggested edit, just a hypothetical sentence that might point to a way in which to introduce a section/topic. You can't just attempt to arbitrarily discount a figure like Robertson, so my hypothetical sentence is based on a perception of what I gather from the sources, more specifically: only one of the incidents listed in the "...race, bigotry..." section occurred later than 2010; Skopcol is cited for reduced activity and membership since 2010 and a transition to "placing more emphasis on the mechanics of policy and getting candidates elected rather than staging public events"; the source used in the shift to GG/GOTV subsection includes a quote related to the transition from a decentralized protest movement to a structured activist movement.
 * I don't know whether there is a source that specifies that in more detail than Skopcol, and don't have time to examine this matter in depth.
 * It appears to me that the above disagreement regarding Robertson is counterproductive. Instead of trying to eliminate him from the already downsized list of incidents, you should be trying to figure out how to integrate a discussion of his significance as described in RS into a fitting narrative.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 13:43, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * You can't just attempt to arbitrarily discount a figure like Robertson ... Ubikwit, I've been agreeing with you a lot lately so I suppose we've been overdue for a disagreement. Discounting a figure like Robertson isn't arbitrary. It's supported by reliable sources. Mentions of Robertson in the most neutral RS such as NYT & WAPO are scarce. Compared to legitimate TPm organizations like Tea Party Express, FreedomWorks and Tea Party Patriots, Robertson is a speck on the windshield. He's never been a leader or spokesman for anything except himself and his own wannabe-ism.
 * ... you should be trying to figure out how to integrate a discussion of his significance as described in RS into a fitting narrative. That sounds a lot more constructive, but I would have used the word "insignificance." And yes, I suggest a reading of BLP policy, particularly since we're discussing specific, named, living persons who are not public figures. I've read a lot of policy in the past few weeks. It's good to review now and then, just to be sure we're on solid ground.
 * Phrases like "alarming displays of bigotry" and "widespread controversy" are themselves a bit alarming in an encyclopedia article, at least to me. You would need to be able to put quotation marks around them. These would need some really solid, neutral sourcing. Huffington Post and Talking Points Memo aren't going to do it.
 * The exposure of IRS harassment of Tea Party organizations has the potential to become a really huge part of the story. Registration as non-profit organizations was deliberately obstructed from the early days of the TPm in 2009, until just one month after Obama was re-elected. Real coincidences are extremely rare, particularly in politics. The timing was just too convenient. The delayed registration as NPOs may have been a significant factor in the decline of the Tea Party since 2010, since the apparent refusal to register them could have had a chilling effect on their organizing activities for that crucial two-year period. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 16:36, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Robertson has nothing to do with the tea party movement. He saw an opportunity and took it. That's it. He was asked to leave a tea party rally in Texas. He tried to sue tea party groups because they used "tea party" in their name and on their websites. He does not belong in the article. On the other hand, Ubikwit seems intent on keeping out content that is 100% relevant to the tea party, e.g., get out the vote. The decision has been taken that unless the material is directly about the tea party movement, it's out. That includes Dale Robertson. He is not directly about the tea party movement. Malke 2010 (talk) 16:51, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * In regard
 * "In the early days of the movement, Tea Parties attracted a number of activists that made alarming displays of bigotry, generating widespread controversy within and without the movement."
 * we would need a specific source, although the statement is undoubtably true. Dale Robertson, however, cannot have an mention without such a statement, because we would need a reliable source that he is (or was) associated with a TPm organization, other than cybersquatting.  No such source has been presented, and no such source is likely to be forthcoming.  In fact, if we cannot find a reliable source which associates him with the TPm, what is presently in the article is probably a WP:BLP violation. — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 17:01, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * I think that Robertson is representative of the anarchic state of affairs under the decentralized "protest movement" status, and the fact that he has been denounced by other TPm that have become more prominent in the subsequent stages where a bit o consolidation and refocusing of resources and efforts is taking place is significant with respect to describing the evolution of the TPm as such.
 * I don't think that Robertson himself is particularly notable in any other context. Bear in mind that he was a part of the media circus, so he might fit under there, but the sign with bigoted signifier is why he is under the current section. Why didn't he just use the term "slave" as the counterpart to "slave owner"?
 * If you consider the material emphasizing the decentralized, unstructured characteristics, such as the quote by Utah congressman Jason Chaffetz, I don't see how you can discount Robertson as probably the most high-profile activist that has been rejected and denounced by the TPm at large presently.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 17:05, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * As I said, we need a source associating him with the TPm, other than in his own mind. It might be of interest, except the short statement must say something like "TeaParty.org (with no association with the TPm other than the name of the website) owner Dale Robertson...."  It's still a WP:BLP to imply he's associated with the TPm other than in his own mind and that of a few opinion-writers.  — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 17:11, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * It's like including David Duke in the main article on the Democratic Party. — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 17:13, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * This is all Ubikwit's opinion. Robertson has nothing to do with the tea party movement. The tea party movement did not promote him, did not rally around him, did not support him, and never acknowledged him. If they had, then he would be an important figure. None of that happened. Malke 2010 (talk) 17:19, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Jenny Beth Martin said this about racism and what the tea party movement is really about:



"There is no racism in the Tea Party movement, according to the head of one of the largest national Tea Party groups. In Tea Party Patriots, we have no place for that," Jenny Beth Martin said on CNN's American Morning when asked about the potentially "radical views" of certain members.

''"If we see somebody who's doing something racist, we tell them to leave our events. We're there for our core values. We want to reclaim our founding principles in this country."  According to Martin, the Tea Party movement is focused on getting the government to listen to their key principles, which she listed as "fiscal responsibility, constitutionally limited government, and free markets."''

That belongs in the article. Not Dale Robertson. Malke 2010 (talk) 17:19, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Steep, which is published by the University of California Press has a section about Robertson and the teaparty.org on pp. 73-75. A Google books search for "Dale Robertson"+"Tea Party" shows a host of sources claiming he was one of the founders.  Sean Hannity of Fox News Channel for example says he "helped start the Tea Party movement."  TFD (talk) 17:31, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Are these not reliable sources associated Dale Robertson with the TPm?


 * 1) Dale Robertson Talks About The NAACP With ABC News
 * 2) Republicans woo 'tea party' members, but face activists' distrust of GOP
 * 3) Walker Campaign Disavows Controversial Tea Party Group
 * 4) Tea Party Leader: 'We Are Turning Our Guns On' Moderate Republicans
 * 5) ‘N-Word’ Sign Dogs Would-Be Tea Party Leader-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 17:39, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * As I posted above, all of that has been debunked by Mother Jones Magazine:http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2010/01/wash-post-quotes-bogus-tea-party-leader Malke 2010 (talk) 17:52, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

1. "teaparty.org" is an SPS for Dale Robertson and is not RS by Wikipedia rules. It is full of self-serving, self-published claims - such as the outre claim of "6 million members" which it does not have and has never had. 2. WaPo says " Dale Robertson, president and founder of TeaParty.org, which he said has 6 million members." is a huge red flag that he was full of it. 3. But a recent email from TeaParty.org asking for donations to Walker's campaign claims that Walker is "one of" the controversial group's "sponsors"  is a huge red flag -- Robertson was raising money for himself it appears. Especially since the Walker campaign denied any connection. Mother Jopnes in your cite stresses Robertson's main credential is opportunism. which to me is a clear indication that he had nothing to do with anything other than "opportunism." While real Tea Party leaders have distanced themselves from Robertson, the media have embraced him and his false claim that he founded the entire Tea Party movement. Yep - the source you aver shows him to be a tea party leader shows the exact opposite! 4. HuffPo ids him as  head of Teaparty.org . If "teaparty.org" is, in fact, a bit of a fraud with its "6 million members" then for us to associate Robertson with the TPM in general is also then a fraud. Arthur is right on this one - it is exactly like using David Duke in the Democratic Party article. There is sufficient RS sourcing that he is not a "tea party leader" and likely was never one. Collect (talk) 18:07, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * "Robertson was raising money for himself it appears"? Based on what? The donation link in Robertson's email goes to the Walker campaign. Xenophrenic (talk) 09:27, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
 * TFD posted a couple of sources, including an academic source, and I posted mainstream news media (ABC News, etc.) sources, and you are still in denial. I don't know, it's a little exasperating to have to argue against the convoluted and somewhat irrelevant assertions made above. RS are RS, and you can't make synthetic statements about what they say severally or in combination, correct? You can try to maintain that they were wrong after the fact, but that doesn't change the fact that he was basically the poster child of the TPm for hos 5 minutes of fame. -- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 18:15, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * You're making a tedious argument. Dale Robertson has nothing to do with the tea party movement. It's already been agreed that unless something is directly related to the movement, it doesn't go into the article. Dale Robertson and his website is not directly related to the movement. That's been clearly shown with RS. Time to move on. Malke 2010 (talk) 18:33, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Steep was published two years after the investigative journalism article, and is written by Lawrence Rosenthal, head of the Center for Comparative Studies of Right-Wing Institutions at Berkeley, and Christine Trost, the program director, and published by the academic press. They say that teaparty.org is "the smallest of the national Tea Party factions" with between 6 and 12 thousand online members, and was not sold.  Instead, Stephen Eichler and Tim Bueler of the Minuteman Project joined the board and the site is still active.  "Dale Robertson's grandstanding as "a founder of the Tea Party movement," combined with the negative attention attached to his group, has created some distance between [teaparty.org] and the other factions."  That does not mean it was bogus.  The fact that Robertson appeared on FNC as a spokesman for the movement shows his acceptance as a leader.  TFD (talk) 18:44, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Having 6,000 members and claiming 6 million members is the hallmark of a fraud.   And IIRC, CBS News hailed Clifford Irving for his historic auttobiography of Howard Hughes -- that did not, however, make his work into an autobiography   Hoaxers on tv do not equate to being real spokespeople for anything -- other than their own self-interests.  As Mother Jones says. Collect (talk) 18:50, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Now we're relying on MJ are we?
 * It doesn't matter, because Robertson is discussed and was recognized by many RS during his tenure as head of the TPm. That's why they interviewed him...
 * It is WP:SYNTH and WP:OR to try and combine aspects of the MJ story with other info to reach your own conclusion about DR, a fervent and patriotic TPm leader who fell on hard times and couldn't sell his URLs, etc.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 18:57, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I think your sarcasm about him is notable. The MJ quotes are usable - SYNTH refers to using different sources to make a claim found in neither source.  It does not refer to using a single source for the statements made in it.  Clearly MJ has a pretty good feel for a con-man here (using it in the non-legal sense of being one solely looking out for his own interests).  Collect (talk) 19:07, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Insofar as MJ is RS of course it is usable, but it is not the case that a statement made in MJ discounts all statements made in all other RS, thereby negating the statements in all other RS (as the MJ article dismisses all other "media"), and that is a synthetic statement incorporating the MJ quotes, if not quotes from anywhere else. That would represent a violation of WP:DUE with respect to all other RS, and the logic used to do so probably amounts to WP:OR.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 19:23, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Collect, that is why we should rely on academic sources, rather than what tea party activists and tea party organizations say. Incidentally is there any reason why you are championing Stephanie Mercimer's 30 January 2010 article as a reliable source, while you posted to RSN that her article in the May/June 2012 issue is not reliable? You said her article was "subtitled unsubtly....which I suggest indicates that it is not an "investigative article" as one editor has claimed." You called it an "opinion piece." TFD (talk) 19:25, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Opinions should always be cited as opinion. The "6 million member" claim by Robertson was reported in reliable sources - the "opinion" which should indeed be cited as opinion, is that Robertson according to the MJ opinion:  While real Tea Party leaders have distanced themselves from Robertson, the media have embraced him and his false claim that he founded the entire Tea Party movement.  Which is precisely in accord with all my posts about sources.  Where opinions get cited as "fact" is where the "opinion article" caveat comes in play.  Cheers. Collect (talk) 19:43, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Did you mean this ABC source above? His rather remarkable claims (6 million members?) stem from his other remarkable claim to having "founded" the movement. He did register a couple Tea Party-themed URLs and began building a protest website a couple weeks prior to Rick Santelli's 'rant' on CNBC, and even before Keri Carender's 'Porkulus' protest, so he therefore lays claim to "starting" the movement. Through some twisted logic he extrapolates that to mean he has something to do with sparking the existance and inter-relatedness of all the separate groups that sprang up afterward. Hence the "millions" of members in "his" movement.  Yes, he was just as much a part of the early movement as any other activist fumbling their way through organizing and expression of their "populist outrage", until his racism became public. Only then was he suddenly "not a part of the movement". Yes, he has been referred to as a Tea Party leader (see the above WaPo source for example: not the least of which is that tea-party leaders want nothing to do with any political party ... cue Robertson quote). Saying that sources don't exist will not magically make those sources disappear. Yes, a reporter from Mother Jones says Robertson is opportunistic (and later "Capitalistic" - oh, no!); laughs at his claim that he started the movement; and says he's not authentic (but then she goes on to say the same about Tea Party Express, oh, no!). You can hear his take on some of this stuff during his C-SPAN interview here; it gets interesting at the 11:00 minute mark when a competing local Tea Partier phones in... Xenophrenic (talk) 19:34, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Saying he was as much a founder as anyone is belied by the MJ opinion that he was pretty much a fraud with false claims. Cheers.  BTW, the Clifford Irving "autobiography" of Hughes was - in fact - a fraud. Collect (talk) 19:46, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Can you explain why you posted to the reliable sources noticeboard that an article by the same reporter in the same magazine was merely an "opinion piece" and not a reliable source, while claiming that this article is reliable? TFD (talk) 19:56, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * First of all THIS PAGE IS NOT FOR ATTACKING ANY EDITORS. Is that sufficiently clear? Second, misrepresenting my posts is a silly, inane and jejune mode of discussion.  Third, my posts at RS/N were with regard to claims of "fact" which were made in an article subtitled  They're trying to buy a presidency - and they expect a big payoff on their investment and has But now, thanks to the Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United that upended decades of limits on campaign donations, financing a presidential race is the exclusive domain of the kind of megadonor whose portfolios make Mitt Romney look middle-class which I averred was, indeed, an "opinion piece".  Your mileage as to what is "opinion" seems  rather to differ from mine.  The claim it was used for was for "fact" and not for "opinion" as you damn well know, and your trying to bring up this sillyness here is not what this entire moderated discussion is supposed to be about.  Now do you have an actual interest in reaching a moderated result here? BTW, I was not the persopn using MJ as a "source" - it was presented by another editor, and all I did was point out that it totally contradicted the claim he was trying to use it for.  Cheers. Collect (talk) 20:07, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The Mother Jones article by Stephanie Mencimer is absolutely a reliable source. And none of Ubikwit's or TFD's sources show how Dale Robertson is directly related to the Tea Party movement. None of them. And the ruse about "scholarly" articles just means an editor is trying to fit a source to his POV. Ubikwit has already admitted he has a view he's trying to source. Nothing about Dale Robertson is directly about the Tea Party movement. Mother Jones is absolutely correct. Malke 2010 (talk) 20:45, 11 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Collect, The article "Wash Post Quotes Bogus Tea Party Leader" says "Stephanie Mencimer is a staff reporter in Mother Jones' Washington bureau." Her article on Romney supporters says the same thing.  Her entry for Mother Jones says, "Stephanie works in Mother Jones' Washington bureau. A Utah native and graduate of a crappy public university not worth mentioning, she has spent the last year hanging out with angry white people who occasionally don tricorne hats and come to lunch meetings heavily armed."  It is not a personal attack to point out that by your own criteria, her current article is not a reliable source.  My opinion is that her articles are reliable sources for facts, but subsequent books published by university and academic publishers, written and reviewed by professors with PhDs, are more reliable.  A good approach is to identify the best and most current sources and report what they say, rather than search for sources that say what we want them to say.  TFD (talk) 20:54, 11 May 2013 (UTC)\
 * Your post is incredibly far afield for this talk page. My position on opinions being cited as opinions is pretty well established on several thousand articles - and your post here is not seemingly intended to further the purpose of this talk page. Collect (talk) 21:08, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * TFD, you mean these are the sources that support your POV. "Scholarly" is code for, "I can't find what I need, so I'll google books the word. . ." A reporter has far more information than Ph.D. trying to publish in order to avoid perishing. Malke 2010 (talk) 21:05, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

And this from an actual tea party group in Dale Robertson's '''home town: '''
 * http://houstontps.org/?p=1050

  Malke 2010 (talk) 21:06, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 'A Note on Dale Robertson, self-described “tea party leader”
 * Wednesday, January 6, 2010
 * By Felicia Cravens'''
 * In response to questions we have received regarding Dale Robertson and his involvement with HoustonTPS, and specifically in reference to his attendance at our rally on 27 Feb 2009, we would like to state that:''
 * 1. He is NOT a member of our Leadership team.
 * 2. He owns a website with which we have never been affiliated.
 * 3. He has never been a part of organizing any of the Tea Party rallies in the Houston area, or any other area that we can find.
 * 4. We addressed some issues involving him back in April.  Here it is on our website, where Mr. Robertson himself comments:  http://houstontps.org/?p=318
 * 5. ''We do not choose to associate with people that use his type of disgusting language.
 * ''A search on Google yields plenty of information about Mr. Robertson, and a search of the various leadership teams among legitimate national tea party organizations show him nowhere to be found.
 * Malke2010, Sleet says, "The 1776 Tea Party, also known as TeaParty.org, is the national faction most directly connected to the anti-immigrant movement. Its corporate headquarters are in Woodlake, Texas, north of the Houston area, where a Texas certificate of formation nonprofit corporation was filed in February 2009. Its staff positions are situated in California. With 12,458 online members as of June 1, 2011, the 1776 Tea Party is the smallest of the national Tea Party factions.... The 1776 Tea Party's founding president was Dale Buchanan." So yes it does explain how Robertson is related to the Tea Party.  And presenting the most recent scholarly sources is not a ruse, it is what editors are supposed to do.
 * Your listing of comments from people you identify as Tea Partiers is original research. However their comments remind me of the book, the History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.  Every time the book was updated, the most recent defections and purges meant that individuals had to be "airbrushed" out.  TFD (talk) 21:11, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * TFD, Richmond Virginia Tea Party questions fundraising by Dale Robertson https://www.richmondteaparty.com/beware-fake-tea-party-fundraising/ Also, N.B. the tea party is NOT a part of any anti-immigrant movement. If you want to write an article about Dale Robertson and his beliefs, that's fine. But he doesn't belong here. Malke 2010 (talk) 21:19, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * TFD, my listing of what the tea party groups are saying about Dale Robertson is not original research. It's what they are saying on their own websites about a guy who is not part of the tea party movement. Malke 2010 (talk) 21:24, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Jenny Beth Martin said this about racism and what the tea party movement is really about: "There is no racism in the Tea Party movement, according to the head of one of the largest national Tea Party groups. In Tea Party Patriots, we have no place for that," Jenny Beth Martin said on CNN's American Morning when asked about the potentially "radical views" of certain members. "If we see somebody who's doing something racist, we tell them to leave our events. We're there for our core values. We want to reclaim our founding principles in this country." According to Martin, the Tea Party movement is focused on getting the government to listen to their key principles, which she listed as "fiscal responsibility, constitutionally limited government, and free markets."Malke 2010 (talk) 21:34, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * You are assuming that in order for Robertson to have been part of the Tea Party movement, he must have been a member of the Houston Tea Party Society and also assuming that what their website says is true. That is OR.  The Tea Party consists of many groups and individuals of which teaparty.org, which operates out of California, a"angry white people" (which is what the reliable source Mother Jones editor calls them) to understand what the Tea Party is about is OR, best left to scholars.  TFD (talk) 21:46, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm not assuming anything. And have you actually Googled the 1776 Tea Party? It just goes back to Dale Robertson. And have you checked his list of tea party groups? They aren't affiliated with him. And if you click on the link of "other groups" there are groups, also not in any way related to him, that have nothing to do with the tea party movement. Your argument is OR. You ignore the obvious evidence and appear ready to grab at any "source" to link Dale Robertson to the tea party movement. You can't do it which is why you are making the "scholarly" argument. If Dale Robertson were truly directly about the Tea Party movement, you wouldn't need Google books. And did you read the last link about the fundraising. It explains all about his California branch. https://www.richmondteaparty.com/beware-fake-tea-party-fundraising/ Malke 2010 (talk) 21:59, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

I see nothing in this entire thread indicating that he is acknowledged by any element of the TPM as being a part of it. North8000 (talk) 00:18, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Vote on Dale Robertson
Please indicate if you support or oppose removing the material on Dale Robertson.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  18:33, 13 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Remove as not being shown to be reasonably germane to any significant part of the movement in general at all. IMO, material not relevant to the general movement (in this case specifically shown not to have relevance) does not belong in an article on the general movement. This is not "Anecdotipedia" Collect (talk) 18:43, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Strongly Oppose Removal The individual in question is the most representative of the right-wing fringe opportunists attracted to the TPm in its early stages. He was in synch enough with these people to be ahead of them in acquiring the domain names, etc. The presence of individuals like him are probably part of the reason that the TPm has staged fewer and fewer public events since 2010, because the sponsors want to avoid the negative publicity.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 18:52, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Remove per Collects reasoning.  Arzel (talk) 20:03, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment: I don't WP:VOTE. Dale Robertson material is generally considered negative content, with regard to the TP movement. That being said, I predict the responses to the very general request for votes at the top of this section will fall along very predictable lines from the handful of editors participating on this page. Per the discussions above, it has been shown that Robertson did indeed have relevance to the movement during the earliest year or two. The social media organizing conduits provided through his founding of TeaParty.org (and even 1776 Tea Party, still listed under the umbrella of TeaPartyPatriots.org here) have promoted and scheduled hundreds of rallies and events since 2009, and still do.  Since Robertson's racially charged remarks and other contraversial actions came under public scrutiny, many Tea Party spokespeople have done their best to ostracize Robertson from the movement and disclaim him as not representative. Prior to that, he was a sought-after speaker; had been quoted as a spokesperson for the movement; and appeared on news programs and C-SPAN to give the usual movement talking points about taxes, spending and "returning to constitutional values". TeaParty.org is still very active (more active than TeaPartyExpress.org, TeaPartyNation.com and TheTeaParty.net), and the grassroots participants there certainly feel they are part of the movement. He was definitely relevant to the first half of the movement, despite his pariah status today. Assertions about his irrelevance to the movement are inaccurate.  Xenophrenic (talk) 21:06, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Remove unless a consensus here feels it is appropriate to present Robertson's story as a cautionary tale about self-promotion, and how it can produce a dead end. Check the timelines on all your sources, gentlemen. A few reliable sources were fooled into calling him a "founder" or a "leader" in past years, but not any longer. That's the smart way to approach this material if it's included at all: early on, some reliable sources were fooled — but now, after the Mencimer op-ed in Mother Jones, nobody will give him the time of day. Not the news media, and certainly not the Tea Party. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 21:39, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Remove As a minimum, he was ostracized by the TPM for that comment which makes it about / representative of him, not the TPM. As a sidebar, as written it tries to mislead people that url squatting makes him prominent in the TPM.  Finally, digging so deep so as to try to use url squatting to indicate prominence is an indicator that there probably is no prominence.   North8000 (talk) 00:24, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Remove This fellow is not directly about the Tea Party movement. Malke 2010 (talk) 15:05, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * remove Reductio ad absurdum Darkstar1st (talk) 16:59, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Oppose Removal The information is sourced, he appeared as a leader on WP:RS, etc.  Perhaps a way to deal with this is make the clear point that the tea part is an umbrella term for many different movements.  Some don't think a whole lot of some of the "leaders" or groups.  That said, this should be governed by WP:Censor.  Casprings (talk) 01:02, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

Discussion about vote

 * I guess you didn't get the memo. The "URL squatter" meme has already been disproven; his ambitions were beyond that. He really did see himself as the "originator" of the movement, and his intentions were to turn it into an actual third political party, and ride that into political office. As the movement erupted around him, Robertson snapped up several more URLs (and registered DBAs) not to resell, but to try to control and meld into his organization. (The only URL he ever tried to resell was TeaParty.org, which he paid almost $5000 for, after his rep was trashed.)  Yes, he was a Tea Partier - he was at the Feb. 27, 2009 Houston rally with his infamous sign, protesting - not selling URLs. He was at the April 15, 2009 Texas rally, again protesting, not selling URLs, and still pushing his group as the original and real movement leader. Saying "he was ostracized by the TPM for that comment which makes it about / representative of him, not the TPM" is nonsensical. Xenophrenic (talk) 14:05, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Threaded confrontational argumentation here is not going to help -- and asserting that something was "disproven" actually requires sourcing, as we have no sources saying the claims that he was "bogus" have been "disproven" AFAICT. YMMV, but "proof by assertion" seldome works. Collect (talk) 14:17, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Here it would seem that we have the gist of your claimed spelled out in black and white.
 * You are attempting to assert that if another source doesn't directly refute the claim made in a MJ opinion piece that the MJ opinion piece has more WP:WEIGHT than even academic sources that substantially refute your attempt to claim Robertson is not notable on the base of an adjective from an opinion piece in MJ.
 * It is getting a bit difficult to take such an assertion seriously.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 14:50, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * @Xenophrenic Swipes like "I guess you didn't get the memo" are about as rough as you get which is why I like you despite...... :-) . You missed my point regarding the url. Which is that the wording is (incorrectly) implying either prominence or that his views are TPM vies by saying that he owns a particular URL. North8000 (talk) 14:20, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * That's not a swipe, North ... just conversational style. I didn't miss your point, I was refuting it. He was indeed a prominent TPer in the early stages, and his quick fall from grace does not undo that. The wording conveys that he was a prominent TPer involved in a one of those "incidents" that observers point to as suggesting some sort of "race" factor. @Collect: "the claims that he was bogus?" You mean that word that only appeared in Mencimer's headline? He's "bogus" because he claims to be the originator of the movement, and because he lays claim to the millions in "his" movement. You say there are no sources refuting the claim that he is "bogus", as if that is what we are arguing. We are not. I said the "URL squatter meme" was disproven. You can call the gentleman "bogus" all you want and I won't argue (I would suggest worse), just don't try to conflate that to mean he wasn't an early prominent Tea Party leader and organizer. He was, and for that there are ample sources. Repeatedly asserting otherwise won't make it true. (And by the way, MJ is both a website & magazine, with the same content not always appearing in both, although both are RS under the same editorial control.) Xenophrenic (talk) 15:06, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I thought it was was clear that I was referring to the "owns the url" part of the wording, but perhaps not. North8000 (talk) 21:25, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Proposed wording is: Dale Robertson, founder of 1776 Tea Party and owner of the website TeaParty.org, protested in February 2009 with a sign that said "Congress = Slaveowner, Taxpayer = Niggar".
 * It's not the "owning" of the url that makes him a TPer, btw - just so that's clear. Even during his first few weeks of operation of his site, he was implementing all the social media tools necessary for grassroots organization, event scheduling and promotion, etc., as this March 2009 snapshot shows. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:41, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I rather think you do not currently have WP:CONSENSUS here for your position - you might wish to provide stronger arguments for it than have been presented heretofore. Collect (talk) 23:02, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Huh? What "position" are you talking about? Xenophrenic (talk) 23:05, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Discussion on proposed removal of Robertson material
There is one sentence in the main article. Some sources mention Dale Robertson, usually in relation to the proposed /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party article. The single sentence in the main article is not helpful to the general reader - would it be more appropriate to deal with Dale Robertson in more depth in the /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party article?  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  20:08, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The single sentence about Dale Robertson in the main article is prefaced by:
 * Since its inception, the Tea Party movement has struggled with charges of racism. Opponents cite a number of events as proof that the movement is, at least in part, motivated by bigotry and intolerance. Supporters, however, say the incidents are the work of "a few bad apples", a small fringe that have unfairly maligned the movement. Examples include:
 * It is one of a half-dozen examples presently listed, and is useful to the general reader to the extent that examples can be useful. Those examples are what remain from a much larger list before being trimmed. Those examples were further trimmed by condensing them from detailed multi-paragraph sections to mere bullet-points. I believe that section can be re-written more encyclopedically, to the extent that even those last remaining bullet-point examples are no longer necessary, and can be relegated to mere footnotes and citations. I proposed as much above, but editors seem more intent on expanding those bullet-points instead. Xenophrenic (talk) 21:06, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree that the six bulleted points would not seem to be excessive, but a more integrated, encyclopedic treatment would be desirable. Could you summarize here in a concise manner the proposals you made above? I don't want to wade through that swamp again.
 * I will reiterate that one strategy would be to create a section on Immigration, under which some of the material could be treated in conjunction with xenophobia.
 * Material that would appear to be excessive in the section is material such as the verbose rebuttals by Herman Cain and Ward Connerly. It would seem to be absurd to assert that Ward Connerly is as notable with respect to the TPm as Dale Robertson. Yet there is an entire paragraph dedicated to him in which he harps on "the Left". That paragraph would seem to be in violation of WP:NOTFORUM.
 * It would seem that since an organization of the stature of the NAACP has been involved, that the section on bigotry and race should remain intact and trace the issues and their resolution in a chronological manner.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 03:51, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I would be happier discussing the trimming/removal of a bulk of material, and how to deal with it (delete or move to a sub-article) than discuss one sentence at a time. We need to be dealing with broad strokes here in order to move this along. It looks like there is a move toward consensus on removing the Robertson sentence - can we consider if there is related material that can be deleted/moved to a sub-article at the same time, along the lines suggested above?  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  14:48, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * If the above vote constitutes consensus, then I gather that overrides policy.
 * The only point I can see conceding to those who are not only trying to claim Robertson should not be noted on the main article page with respect to bigotry but overall is that the book Steep was published in 2012, so it appears not to have been taken into consideration heretofore. That book makes Robertson appear to be notable with respect to more than the bigoted sign referred to in the material at issue.
 * The MJ opinion piece has no bearing on the content in Steep.
 * In fact, the more I think about it, the material in Steep would tend to deprive the title of the MJ article (i.e., "Bogus Tea Party Leader) of verity. He was not always a "bogus" TPm leader.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 14:55, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

I, too, would be happier dealing with a bulk of material, rather than one sentence at a time. Dealing with it comprehensively is the only process that makes sense. I absolutely don't agree that "(delete or move to a sub-article)" are the only choices in how to deal with such material. Take for example the whole section on Racism/Bigotry. What began as reporting on separate but frequent "fringe" incidents 4 years ago eventually resulted in surveys and polls being taken to examine the subject in more depth. Results from those polls and surveys, in turn, prompted further study and detailed academic research, which has only recently become available. Look at any of the high quality sources published recently, ones that have studied the movement in depth, and you'll find they have devoted sections - sometimes whole chapters - covering this specific subject matter. Our article on the TP movement should reflect what current scholarly studies of the TP movement say, not the present cobbled-together mess that has remained largely unchanged for a long time.

RE: "It looks like there is a move toward consensus on removing the Robertson sentence..." If you ask for a "vote" with a question such as: Please indicate if you support or oppose removing  (insert negative or unflattering content here)   ... I can tell you how your vote results will turn out before the first response is posted, if I know who will be voting. The numbers aren't all that important to me; I'm more concerned with the discussion reasoning. If you see a consensus trending toward removal of the sentence, SilkTork, how would you concisely summarise the prevailing reasoning for doing that? Here's my take. I only see 2 intelligible (to me, anyway) attempts at justifying removal that I would summarize as: While it is true that he is no longer in the news, that doesn't mean his past actions didn't happen. While it is true that other TPers denounced him and disassociated themselves after his racist incidents, that doesn't mean he ceased to exist in the movement. He was still quite active after the MJ article, and has been busy with TP petitions and mailings as recently as mid-2012. The TeaParty.org site has grown to 30K registered members, and it is a busy site. (Contrast that to the Houston Tea Party Society, cited heavily by the MJ reporter in her piece, which is now dormant.) So those two reasons don't really hold water. Xenophrenic (talk) 22:21, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * 1) Robertson (and his group and his website) aren't relevant to the TP movement. Since he was rejected by other TPers, past actions of his aren't relevant to the movement.
 * 2) He's "not any longer" a relevant part of the movement so remove; after the MJ article, he's a leper.
 * Consensus editing means that sometimes we have to put aside our personal objections and work as part of the team. It means that sometimes decisions are made that are not right, but by accepting those decisions both the article and Wikipedia remains stable. While we work toward perfection, it is accepted that Wikipedia is not perfect, and we certainly don't disrupt Wikipedia in aiming for perfection. There are over four million articles on Wikipedia, the majority of which are in a poor state with factual errors and BLP violations. We do what we can in a reasonable and realistic manner. And we pick the issues to make a stand over with extreme care. Blocking progress on an article by disputing a single sentence can be seen as tendentious, even when reasonable arguments are put forward. I cannot account for those voices who have spoken - I can only see what has been said so far. There was discussion on the sentence which was not reaching a conclusion. I called for a show of hands to make things clearer. You chose not to make a vote but to continue the discussion. At the moment I see six hands in favour of removing the sentence, and one hand in objection - on that basis there is 85% in favour, which is a clear consensus to remove the material. If you put your hand up to object, that would make 75% in favour, which is borderline. At that point I would ask for further discussion on the matter. It would help me to help you if you went along with the procedure. I am looking for broad strokes. I don't want to get bogged down on small details. And I don't want to unnecessarily read hundred of words of comment.
 * I have read your comments above, and I can see you are putting forward a reasonable argument as to why you feel Robertson should be mentioned in the main article, but that argument is disputed by a majority of others. My suggestion is that Robertson is mentioned in a sub-article, and his relevance/importance to an understanding of the Tea Party is developed further in that sub-article. One sentence saying he held up a banner is not sufficient to explain his importance to any reader who does not understand the topic. Even if that sentence is pre-faced by saying that incident is an example of charges of racism, it doesn't explain who Robertson is, or why people took note of his banner in particular, or his overall relevance to the party as detailed above.
 * I will look into the Talk:Tea Party movement/Moderated discussion/Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party article shortly, and then consider if a new article needs to be made for allegations of racism, or if bigotry and racism can be combined in the same article.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  08:10, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * There is too much time and effort being spent on this single sentence, which is sort of a case of missing the forest for the trees. If we can actually address the big picture (broad stroke) issues of the main article, things should fall into place.
 * I would be in favor moving the entirety of the current section to the subarticle if progress could be made on introducing a section dealing with immigration, which would seem to be more of an agenda level topic than a peripheral issue related to incidents of poor conduct, even if a pattern can be discerned there.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 09:27, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * ok, great! :) please change your oppose above to support. Darkstar1st (talk) 09:46, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Let's wait for a few more comments on this motion, in the meanwhile, have you seen this threadReliable_sources/Noticeboard?-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 10:13, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * That thread has absolutely no content which contradicts the discussion here.  Right now we have discussed the issue for long enough times two.  It is long past time to get on to the next stage, as I would like this to be done before 2016 election rime. Collect (talk) 11:58, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * What "next stage", exactly?-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 13:39, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Delete the item from this article. North8000 (talk) 14:15, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

You mean moving it to the subarticle, I gather, and going through the bulleted list one item at a time?-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 14:38, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for the comments, SilkTork. They provide a little more clarity to the situation and also shine a light on some misperceptions that I didn't realize still existed. Specifically: Um, no - but the fact that you hold that misperception is probably more my fault than yours. I have argued against the flawed reasoning for removal presented by other editors, but do not misunderstand that to mean that I feel Robertson needs to be mentioned in the article. I have not made that argument. In fact, my proposal (See above: Let's work on developing that encyclopedic treatment of the issue....) would likely result in the effective elimination of the very content we've been discussing. So why, you may ask, am I arguing against the reasons for proposed deletion of the content if I am not pressing to have the content remain in the article? Simple: If content is deleted based on faulty reasoning during a "consensus" poll, and endorsed by an arbitration committee member during a moderated discussion, it becomes much easier for tendentious editors intent on disrupting article improvement of related content to cite that process in support of their disruption. There is a very good reason I asked you: SilkTork, how would you concisely summarise the prevailing reasoning for [deleting that sentence]? I note with dismay that you did not address that question. If the only reason is a majority "show of hands", then that equates to a gross violation of WP:CONSENSUS policy. I am tempted to jump on that offer, if only to force a discussion that actually produces solutions. Up until now, editors appear to be talking past each other instead of with each other. But I don't want to throw a speedbump into your process. Instead, I'll reiterate my positions as concisely as possible, and then observe as you proceed as you see fit: I see that you have just proposed some new alternatives below, so maybe those discussions will render my concerns moot. Xenophrenic (talk) 21:21, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I have read your comments above, and I can see you are putting forward a reasonable argument as to why you feel Robertson should be mentioned in the main article...
 * If you put your hand up to object, that would make 75% in favour, which is borderline. At that point I would ask for further discussion on the matter.
 * Re: The single sentence about Robertson's racist sign. I've no opinion about the sentence in the main article either way, as I don't think it will exist after the broader section on "racism" is properly written. In the main article. If it is to be removed, however, I will argue against any false pretext for that removal which could be maliciously cited later as some sort of enshrined precident.
 * Re: Other material on Dale Robertson (and groups/websites) in broader context in the main article. There is nothing else presently in the article, so this would be an "expansion" issue. Ubikwit has recently cited additional relevant information concerning Robertson's activism and groups in the TP movement with regard to matters like immigration. My concern is that some editors are of the following mindset: Since some TPers completely disassociate themselves from Robertson, our Wikipedia article must also completely disassociate itself from information about Robertson. That's contrary to WP:NPOV editing.

For those who lament discussing one sentence at a time
Examine the page. There's a majority who want to move on, and there's a minority who are fighting like the Japanese at Iwo Jima. They're badly outnumbered, they're losing the content dispute, they don't want to lose, and so they fight for every inch. See WP:BATTLE. It's been like that for months. If you want faster progress, something has to change. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 11:19, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * This one is certainly is a good and very typical example of the problems and history of this article. Except maybe we could avoid the typical next step on negative trivia,  ("trivia" here meaning cherry-picked-for-impression items whose germaneness/significance to the topic does not merit inclusion on the top level TPM article) which is:  for the discussion to go nowhere, and then long term editing persistence determining that the negative trivia stays in, as it has with every such contested trivia item that I can remember. North8000 (talk) 14:23, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * If you are willing to propose working on the agenda related topical matter, such as the constitution and immigration, then I think we may be heading toward a middle ground with respect to the notion of what is "germane" and what is, shall we say, "peripheral".
 * Perhaps a few bytes could be spent exploring that issue, because I think you may have thought that the elections related material was germane, at one point, anyway.
 * At any rate, I would support an article structure for the main article that concentrated on the history of the movement through to the contemporary status, and topical matter that can be reasonably construed as being part of the agenda, with some correspondence and overlap between the evolution of the movement and the evolution of the agenda, particularly with respect to more controversial issues such as immigration. One has to recognize that there has been movement on such issues, though.
 * It would be nice to relegate the race and bigotry material to a subarticle and deal with the main article in a more substantive manner.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 14:37, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

How to manage the section "On issues of race, bigotry and public perception"
This section On issues of race, bigotry and public perception, seems to generate the most contention and while we have Silk Tork here it would be good to address this section now.

'''Should this section be: '''
 * 1. Reduced to a paragraph and create subarticle.
 * 2. Removed altogether
 * 3. Reduced and no subarticle created.


 * Please vote indicating which number you support. Thanks. Malke 2010 (talk) 18:09, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * The section is not encyclopedic. It presents a number of incidents and various comments when it should briefly summarize expert sources, only referring to specific incidents if necessary to explain what they are saying.  The mainstream view is that although the movement is mostly white, it is not overtly racist.  Its open nature has allowed racists to attend rallies, but they have not been well-received.  However some observers view their attacks on social welfare programs etc. as inherently racist since they are more likely to affect minorities.  TFD (talk) 18:23, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * TFD raises salient points.
 * The section is a disjointed agglomeration of POV-push against POV-puh attempting to seek a false equilibrium.
 * A mentioned above, I would support removing all of the material in this section to a subarticle. It would seem to merit a subarticle, as many high profile individuals are quoted in relation to the various incidents. Aside from that, Xenophrenic has mentioned that much more material has been removed already to achieve the current consensus version of the section.
 * My concern would be that several of the bigoted statements were made in a context that relates to immigration, at least indirectly, so I think that insofar as reliable sources address individuals and groups associated with such statements or positions, they merit inclusion in a subsection under the agenda section on immigration; or alternatively, maybe a section on immigration, with only the main points mentioned under the agenda section.
 * It is notable that the early "protest movement" which provided a forum for such individuals to promulgate such controversial and offensive stances have been scaled back and the TPm taken on more of a "structured activist movement". It would seem a natural progression in weeding out opportunists attempting to play on baser forms of populist sentiment that the movement would evolve in such a direction, and that would seem to be the logical narrative for the article to follow.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 18:37, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

A sub-article is lined up: /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party. I will action removal of the On issues of race, bigotry and public perception section after 24 hours - pending no objections or queries, and at the same time put /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party into mainspace. The sub-article already contains much of the material to be removed from the main article, though presented differently (more clearly perhaps).

It would be useful to:

a) Agree that the title is the appropriate one. Bigotry does include racism, though some may associate it more with religious and social intolerance. Also, are people comfortable with an article title that prominently associates bigotry (and possibly racism) with a political movement that disassociates itself from such allegations? I notice that other articles that have been named "Allegations of ..." have mostly been renamed. Pausing for thought here - but would a more balanced sub-article be more appropriate? Perceptions of the Tea Party - in which a more rounded view is given, not just the bigotry and racism in one article - as that gives a one-sided story.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  20:17, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

b) Agree what summary is to be left behind in the main article.

Would it be worth looking at the structure of the main article at this point? It might help to consider where in the article a summary would go, and if some sections could be pulled together to facilitate that. What relationship do Public opinion, Commentaries on the movement, Media coverage, and On issues.... have? Could they be grouped together as sub-sections in a larger section of, say, "Opinions and coverage", or "Commentary" or "Views"?

I may wait longer than 24 hours in order for the above points to be addressed.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  20:17, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Agree Strongly agree with SilkTork's comments in "a)", and note that they are important and should steer the course on this. North8000 (talk) 21:04, 15 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Agree and note that a significan number of articles are still named "allegations of" because that is what the article consists of. I would suggest in the long run that we seek to remove anecdotes which are not of general connection to the TPM - and try to find sources which discuss the topic qua topic. Where anecdotes are used, moreover, the disparate comments regarding such anecdotes are needed to conform with WP:NPOV.  In such a case, a proper term might be "Perceptions of social positions of the Tea Party movement" or the like as being slightly more specific as to what we are talking about perceptions of. Collect (talk) 21:28, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agree with a) Perceptions of the Tea Party. That is neutral and balanced. Also agree with b). Those sections could be grouped together as subsections. Excellent. Thanks Silk Tork. Okay, please put me down for yes to all that, or whatever the majority go with if I can't get back in time. Really heavy commitment at RL job at the moment. Malke 2010 (talk) 00:08, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment The suggestions are thought provoking, but I have some reservations.
 * First, what is under the "public opinion" section of the article is more limited in scope than public opinion as it only contains information on coverage. The "media coverage" section includes material related to public opinion, with the only point of difficulty I see relating to Murdoch, Fox News and the active promotion of the TPm by that media outlet. It would seem that the content of that passage is no public opinion per se about the TPm, but a comment by an executive of a media outlet improperly acting like a propaganda arm for the movement, which is a topic that should be included in a section providing coverage of astroturfing (which is where?). Ideally the comment by Murdoch should remain, but it would require better integration to fit in a section relating to perceptions about the TPm. The commentaries section does not reflect public opinion, but the opinion of the current administration, only, with no other extensive expert commentary.
 * "Perceptions of the TPm" would be a good section name under which to consolidate those sections as well as the racism/bigotry summary.
 * It does not seem that "Perceptions..." would suffice to portray the content of the proposed subarticle, however, which is almost exclusively about incidents of racism and bigotry by TPm activists and attempts at refuting the allegations that the by extension entire TPm is racist or bigoted. The initially proposed title of /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party is more appropriate to the topic matter and represents an acceptable compromise. I would not support the "Perceptions..." title for the subarticle.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 05:47, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agree that Perceptions doesn't cover the sub-article as currently being written. The idea would be that the article would deal more widely with perceptions, rather than just the bigotry and racist perceptions.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  17:36, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * It's a somewhat problematic assemblage of topic matter. I think there would be a risk of throwing the baby out with the bath water if, in removing the anecdotal account of incidents that may represent patterns of certain type of problematic behavior, we were to relegate material other than anecdotal accounts of isolated incidents.
 * Looking more closely at the Media coverage section, with the possible exceptions of the Murdock quote and the Francis Fukuyama commentary, most of the material has a fairly high degree of topical consistency with respect to the somewhat shocking bias in coverage, which is an issue that the rise (and decline/transformation) of the TPm has served to bring to the fore, along with the importance of the Constitution (and ack of knowledge thereof).
 * The Francis Fukuyama material, if explicated a little more thoroughly, would seem to fit in with the Commentaries subsection, which maybe could become a section of its own with a subsection for the Obama administration and a subsection for "Other experts" or something along those lines. It seems that his presentation of contradictions and comparison with Occupy would have enough substance to be treated as a commentary--if presented properly--as opposed to a media piece. Foreign Affairs sort of straddles the news media and peer-reviewed divide. I would say that such commentaries represent a higher level of analytical sophistication than can be adequately accommodated under the category "perception".
 * I think that the presence solely of polling data under Public opinion represent a somewhat paltry if not facile treatment of public opinion. I don't know that public opinion per se about the TPm i very informed, and that is one reason the number of publications about it has increased dramatically over the past couple of years. I would think that the polling data might fit better with the election related material, as the time frames also parallel the elections.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 18:56, 16 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Agree that the solution for bigotry/racism material is Reduced to a paragraph and create subarticle. I prefer the title /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party, but could accept Perceptions of the Tea Party if it will move things along a little faster ... Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 12:10, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agree with SilkTork when he paused for thought, and keenly considered that perhaps a more balanced approach with a more rounded view would be more appropriate, instead of "just the bigotry and racism in one article - as that gives a one-sided story." Setting up a sub-article entitled "Allegations of..." is, in effect, setting up another list article. It opens the floodgates for the re-addition of the numerous incidents (and subsequent "oh no we didn't"/"oh yes you did" back-and-forth in media and reliable sources) that have been previously trimmed down to what now remains in the main article. I disagree with the suggestion to "remove" content from the main article relating to the role of race and racism in the TP movement, instead of "replacing" it. That role needs to be encyclopedically covered in the main article, as conveyed by the most thorough and highest quality reliable sources to cover the matter to date. It isn't a "sub-article" tangential matter, as it is integral to the TPers policy stances, their "take back America" rhetoric, and the values they express as most important. The sub-article is for the "examples" (incidents), and related commentaries and opinions. Xenophrenic (talk) 18:11, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Specifically addressing SilkTork's point b) above (Agree what summary is to be left behind in the main article.), I propose as a preliminary step:
 * 1) Remove the present content from the section titled: On issues of race, bigotry and public perception
 * 2) Rename that header to "Race and racial attitudes"
 * 3) Add a See also: followed by a link to the sub article: Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party
 * 4) Add the following text to that section:
 * 5) Add the following template to the section:
 * Xenophrenic (talk) 09:53, 20 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Xenophrenic (talk) 09:53, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

From the above it appears to me that, other than Ubikwit, there is agreement or acceptance that Perceptions of the Tea Party is a less problematic title. I am a little unclear on Ubikwit's concerns, which appear to relate more to the loss of material, than to the balancing of the article. My suggestion is that when I unlock /Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party, I also change the title to Perceptions of the Tea Party, and it remains in draft form to be worked up ready to move into main space. If after a period of editing, in which its form and future direction are a little clearer, we can look again to see what remaining concerns people have.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  11:20, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Agreed Collect (talk) 11:29, 21 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Comment My concerns are twofold: first, that you are indirectly suggesting that the material under the "Commentaries" and "Media coverage" sections be removed from the main article, which I would be 100% opposed to; secondly, if the proposed "Perceptions" title is used on the subarticle, there is a strong possibility that the POV in a plurality of academic sources in relation to Race and bigotry are going to be obfuscated under the guise of presenting other "perceptions", which in fact are few and far between. Where is the sourcing that substantiates notability for such an article in the stated terms? None of the concerns I raised above in a point-by-point basis have been addressed with respect to specific contents in the main article as it stands presently.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 13:47, 21 May 2013 (UTC)


 * As one of many examples of notability of the question of racism and the TPm, here is one by a UK professor from the flap of a book being published by Princeton Univ this week

"'This original and important book is the most well-researched and significant scholarly study of the Tea Party movement and its members yet to appear. Unfolding a profile of Tea Party activists threatened by liberal changes and ill-formulated images of big government and state regulatory power, Parker and Barreto tease out core beliefs and views, ranging from commonplace conservatism to racist antagonism (my emphasis) . Their book is an outstanding contribution to understanding American politics.'--Desmond King, University of Oxford"
 * The commentary from this book as well as others requires mention on the main article according to WP:DUE as an important academic source.
 * As with the book Steep published by UC Press, for which there were no claims made that the source is unreliable at RS/N, the above-mentioned book will also be deemed RS, at RS/N if necessary, so there would appear to be no basis in policy for excluding relevant material in the article, whether it reflects negatively on the movement or not, so long as the article reflects the POV in sources with proportional WP:WEIGHT.
 * It is beginning to look to me like this moderated discussion is setting the stage for a quasi-officially sanctioned one-way drift toward a non-negative presentation of the TPm, which doesn't match what I see in RS.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 14:43, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Might you tell us all what part of WP:RS covers blurbs from book flaps? Cheers. Collect (talk) 14:56, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Are you saying that because the obviously positive critique of the book by an academic from another country is referred to in a blurb that it is somehow less than relevant to notability? That was meant to demonstrate notability of the topic matter, nothing more, so I don't understand your comment.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 15:08, 21 May 2013 (UTC)


 * @Ubikwit Your argument near the end of your post is essentially that policy does not prohibit the presence of the subject material, and implicitly that that is grounds for inclusion.   IMHO that is too low of a bar and not the norm. North8000 (talk) 14:59, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * It is, in effect, a book review. Not a very long one, but that's what it is. If the book by Parker and Barreto gets its own Wikipedia article (and I'm sure it will, since I'm sure they use the word "racist" at least once and it can be cherry picked into a quote), then that's where book reviews about the book should go. If you want to get all policyfied about it, it's a tertiary source and we prefer to rely on secondary sources. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 03:32, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Repeated reverts with query about consensus
at 8:40 16 May, 8:33 16 May, and   22:30 14 May all remove material added at  13:40 on 14 Nay for which I had thought WP:CONSENSUS was fairly clear here. Query: Is there consensus to reject the edit made by P&W? Collect (talk) 08:54, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * No, there isn't. Accordingly, I have reverted Xenophrenic. The inventory of anecdotal evidence has been moved to the bottom of the article. And this incident has been added to a list of incidents, which propel me toward a conclusion that no inventory of anecdotal evidence belongs anywhere in Wikipedia mainspace. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 13:59, 16 May 2013 (UTC)


 * It's becoming quite a chore to keep up with all of the pages and subpages coming within the scope of this discussion. I don't see where there is any basis in discussion on this page for the edits on that page. I made a statement related to this issue above"The title of the subarticle is 'Allegations...', not 'False allegations...'. Whether the allegations are substantiated or not is for the reader to decide."There is no basis in fact for asserting that the incidents themselves are "alleged"; rather, it is the significance of the incidents with respect to how they reflect on the TPm that is at issue. -- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 15:19, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

@Collect: 1) What specific material are you saying was added, and 2) Where is the discussion about adding that specific material (and the 'consensus' outcome of that discussion)? It is not at all evident from the 13:40 link you provided.

@Phoenix and Winslow: Your most recent edit summary says:
 * (Xenophrenic, you don't have consensus. We (meaning Collect and I) are the ones who have consensus. If you want to change this, put it to a "vote" in moderated discussion.)

Wow. Just ... wow. I don't think I have the patience to trudge through yet another lengthy tutorial discussion explaining what WP:CONSENSUS is. Your reflexive revert, in addition to shuffling the content back to your personally preferred but undiscussed format, also removed several reference citations, factual corrections, content additions, punctuation fixes, etc. Nice. Xenophrenic (talk) 16:51, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Survey on sectional arrangement of 'Allegations' sub-article
All right Xeno, I've restored the missing refs etc. that you've complained about. Now let's "vote" to confirm who has consensus. This version is favored by Ubikwit and Xenophobia. This version is a rearranged version, and is favored by Collect and myself. Please indicate "Support" if you prefer the rearranged version, or "Oppose" if you prefer the original version supported by Xenophrenic.

When I was creating the second version, someone put in a "citation needed" tag seeking support for this "questions" statement: Questions have also been raised about media coverage focusing on these incidents, and allegedly using them to paint a distorted picture of the Tea Party. However, plenty of WP:RS support for that statement was already in the article. It was just scattered. So I gathered it all into one place, right after the "questions" statement and the "citations needed" tag, and this made a separate section out of it right after the lede. (Another example of the "Be careful what you wish for" lesson.) The inventory of anecdotal evidence doesn't deserve anything close to the amount of WP:WEIGHT that it gets by being at the front of the article, so I've moved it to the end. (Please read the linked article, anecdotal evidence, for reasons why.) The news media focusing on these incidents and "painting a distorted picture of the Tea Party" is what deserves that amount of weight. Some of the anecdotes are unproven, therefore the section header must say, "Alleged incidents."


 * Strongly support for the reasons set forth above. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 19:23, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Your assertion would seem to approach the tendentious POV-push threshold.
 * The only incident on the list that could be construed to be not fully proven is that relating to"several black lawmakers said that demonstrators shouted racial epithets at them..."The factuality of the other incidents seem to be uncontested.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 19:43, 16 May 2013 (UTC)


 * If I remove the word "alleged," would the proposed rearrangement get your support? Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 20:18, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * NO, do not remove "alleged." There's no evidence, therefore it's 'alleged.' There isn't anything tendentious or POV pushing about it. Malke 2010 (talk) 20:54, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The word alleged is not the only problem. Your ordering of the material reverses the causal relationship of the media coverage and the occurrence of the incidents. The media covered the incidents because they were significant, out of the ordinary, and offensive. The media did not invent the incidents.
 * Subjective assessments about the media coverage of the incident should not precede the description of the incidents, as there are more than one assessment of media coverage, which is basically a third level commentary derivative of a secondary commentary on the occurrence of the actual incidents.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 05:36, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Subjective assessments about the media coverage ... Emily Elkins (whose research was reported in The Washington Post) was objective and professional. The only other statement in that section is from the WaPo ombudsman, another objective professional. Professional, dispassionate analysis deserves much more weight than anecdotal evidence. Reversing them again, to put the anecdotal evidence first, would defy WP:WEIGHT. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 12:54, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * What do you mean there is no evidence? All of the incidents (and more) are thoroughly documented with photographs (of sign wielding activists), Twitter tweets, videos, personal statements by the perpetrators, etc.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 05:36, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * You must have been speaking to Malke; please allow me to respond. If even one incident on the list is unproven, then the header for the whole list must say "Alleged." Otherwise, readers believe that they've all been proven. You have admitted that at least one of the incidents is unproven, Ubikwit. If you can write a header that more accurately describes the mix of proven and unproven incidents, I'd be very happy to use it. regards ... Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 12:54, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Certainly. Look, because one of say, ten, incidents lacks hard evidence of being caught on audio or video tape doesn't mean that you denigrate the status of the other incidents. If necessary, have two separate categories of "incidents" (such as those recognized by other TPm groups and leaders), and a category of "alleged incidents", such as the one which depends on the verbal testaments of the lawmakers and others present at the scene.
 * Also, it seems that you may have missed my comment about the ordering of the sections above.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 13:21, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * In this case the "one out of ten" that's unproven (arising from the Obamacare protest at the Capitol, 3/20/2010) happened at the same event as another allegation (spitting on Cleaver) that's being discussed in a different section: the section on media coverage at the beginning of the article. We could gather all three allegations arising from the same event (spitting on Cleaver, racial epithets at two others, homophobic epithet at Frank) into the media coverage section. We could do it in a "these allegations are unproven, but this other one was caught on tape" format — not using those precise words of course — and cite the ombudsman's analysis as the source. At that point all remaining allegations in that inventory of anecdotal evidence would be proven, and I believe both Malke and I would accept an "Incidents" header without the word "Alleged." Does this proposed compromise work for you? Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 14:15, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, something along those lines sounds like it would work, but I'm not familiar with all the details, so someone who is would have to work with you more closely on ironing out the details.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 15:34, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Also I did notice and respond to your comment about ordering of the sections. Here is my response again: "Professional, dispassionate analysis deserves much more weight than anecdotal evidence. Reversing them again, to put the anecdotal evidence first, would defy WP:WEIGHT." Please read the linked article, anecdotal evidence, for several very good reasons why. Anecdotal evidence about individual members of large groups is considered to be extremely weak. regards ... Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 14:23, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The point I was trying to make is not that the focus should be on the anecdotal evidence and in a manner that blows it out of proportion, but that there are three or more levels of analysis going on here. The first level is the reporting/analysis of the incidents in the media. The second is analysis of the media analysis by media outlets to which you have pointed. The third would be analysis in academic sources.
 * I believe that there are more media outlets than the Washington Post that have published articles or responses in relation to this issue, so there would seem to be more than those pieces.
 * Based on the above-described state of affairs, with respect to readability and granularity, it seems that the incidents themselves have to be presented firs (after the background info/introduction), followed by the different levels of analysis in progression.-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 15:34, 17 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Support "Alleged" does not mean "not factual" - it means asserted - and has no connection with being "false" or not.  The events are "alleged" to represent the TPM as a movement, and, in that sense, "alleged" is the proper word to be used. Collect (talk) 20:31, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support. Alleged is exactly what it says. There is no evidence, therefore it's 'alleged.' Malke 2010 (talk) 20:54, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Support Alleged is exactly what it is.  As a sidebar the fact that the only findable "evidence" has been cherry picked anecdotes of statements of individual, where the only actual TP organization response has been the opposite,  I think that it's pretty clear that the allegations are false. North8000 (talk) 13:10, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Strongly oppose-- Ubikwit  連絡見学/迷惑 13:21, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Words in bold - I still don't WP:VOTE, as it is against Wikipedia policy. I also wouldn't support an implementation of an edit that deletes several reference citations, article improvements, factual corrections, etc., which is what you were asking. As near as I can tell from the above discussion, there is a proposal to shuffle some content based on a perception of "weight", convey more about media focusing on these issues, and describing incidents as "alleged" (heh, haven't seen that oldie-but-goodie in a while). I see the discussion picked up again below, after SilkTork's locking of the sub-article, so I'll head there to address them individually. Xenophrenic (talk) 18:29, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
 * WP:VOTE is not policy, it is a useful guideline, and it's worth reading that guideline. This discussion page is fairly loose and fluid, and the aim is for contributors to air views and ideas in order to reach a consensus on how to improve the Tea Party article. At times, in order to assist me to gauge consensus, I am calling for a show of hands. This is not done in place of discussion, but in addition to discussion, and so I can have some quick clarity. You may note I pay particular attention to those who oppose an action. Having a show of hands quickly identifies for me who still has objections, and I can focus on their objections. If I still don't have enough information, I will ask for further comments. Taking part in the "voting" process helps me move this along. If you have remaining doubts about this use of gauging consensus, please raise it on my talkpage. For now, I would prefer discussion on this page to be focused on discussion on developing the article. It's too easy to get side-tracked. Any other concerns people have about the process itself, please raise on my talkpgae.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  10:55, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I never said WP:VOTE is policy; I said I don't vote because to do so goes contrary to Wikipedia policy. Specifically WP:CONSENSUS and WP:NOTDEMOCRACY, actual policies. I only make that statement as a general reminder to editors, a very necessary reminder, in fact, during this moderated discussion. Please note that while I routinely issue that reminder, I still participate in your process by then offering my views, objections and (what I hope is) constructive input. As for this particular "vote" under which you've commented, you didn't initiate it as part of your process. Another editor did with: "Now let's 'vote' to confirm who has consensus."  Xenophrenic (talk) 17:49, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Points noted.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  08:57, 22 May 2013 (UTC)