User talk:Eflatmajor7th

Welcome!
Hello, Eflatmajor7th, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful: I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on talk pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place  before the question. Again, welcome! Hyacinth (talk) 01:16, 1 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The five pillars of Wikipedia
 * Tutorial
 * How to edit a page and How to develop articles
 * How to create your first article (using the Article Wizard if you wish)
 * Manual of Style

Talkback
SmartSE (talk) 10:58, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

I would like to discuss why you decided to undo my edit without even talking about it with me or others, and without providing any inline citations to support your views. There is a lot to be said about the hearing modality that was not on the Auditory system Wiki as of yesterday.

Do you plan to expand the Auditory system Wiki yourself in the near future. If so, I will await your changes. Otherwise I would appreciate it if we talked before you undo more material. Steamboat Jim (talk) 02:38, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

November 2012
Hello, I'm Jim1138. I noticed that you recently removed some content from Gustatory system without explaining why. In the future, it would be helpful to others if you described your changes to Wikipedia with an edit summary. If this was a mistake, don't worry, the removed content has been restored. If you think I made a mistake, or if you have any questions, you can leave me a message on my talk page. Thanks, Jim1138 (talk) 03:03, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Your submission at Articles for creation
 Thank you for your recent submission to Articles for Creation. Your article submission has been reviewed. Unfortunately, it has not been accepted at this time. Please view your submission to see the comments left by the reviewer. You are welcome to edit the submission to address the issues raised, and resubmit once you feel they have been resolved.
 * If you would like to continue working on the submission, you can find it at Wikipedia&.
 * To edit the submission, click on the "Edit" tab at the top of the window.
 * If you need any assistance, you can ask for help at the Articles for creation help desk, or on the [ reviewer's talk page] . Please remember to link to the submission!
 * You can also get live chat help from experienced editors.
 * Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia! davidwr/ (talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail)  22:50, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Broward Transitional Center concern
Hi there, I'm HasteurBot. I just wanted to let you know that Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Broward Transitional Center, a page you created, has not been edited in at least 180 days. The Articles for Creation space is not an indefinite storage location for content that is not appropriate for articlespace.

If your submission is not edited soon, it could be nominated for deletion. If you would like to attempt to save it, you will need to improve it.

You may request Userfication of the content if it meets requirements.

If the deletion has already occured, instructions on how you may be able to retrieve it are available at WP:REFUND/G13.

Thank you for your attention. HasteurBot (talk) 12:02, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

GEO Group page
I've noticed that you've made many edits on the page dating back to March or so. I don't recall having problems with them, but I'll review them.

My problem with Niteshift is that his edits in the vast majority, when he's not just changing a misspelling, seem to be to whitewash GEO's record. He viciously attacks anyone who disagrees with him when he's clearly wrong, spewing vulgarities and abuse. His lack of control makes me wonder about his mental state.

What kind of an editor would tell me to "go fuck" myself, or call well sourced info that I've added to the GEO pages, "bullshit?" I don't know if there's a word "Wikibullying," but given his behavior I expect there should be.

The corporation has been scrubbing negatives from its site for a long time, at least 4 1/2 years. The February/March dustup emanating from the massive edits by Abraham Cohen and his constantly changing cover up stories and going to an unregistered (with Wikipedia) IPN to scrub some more was just the latest.

Niteshift36, by the way, clearly condoned and minimized that corporate vandalism. He has been regular apologist for the corporation since the Cohen matter surfaced nationally (which, if remember correctly, with the FAU situation, he dismissed as "recentism").

For instance:

(cur | prev) 20:37, 14 April 2009‎ Pabloepaez (talk | contribs)‎. . (17,596 bytes) (-4)‎. . (→‎Controversy) (undo | thank) (cur | prev) 20:36, 14 April 2009‎ Pabloepaez (talk | contribs)‎. . (17,600 bytes) (+11,461)‎. . (Updated Relevant Company Information based on Federal filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission as well as public media reports. References are included within updated sections.) (undo | thank)

Pablo Paez is GEO's spokesperson.

By their actions, these guys are attacking Wikipedia's credibility. Shouldn't that count for something, with other editors in particular?

In the first of those edits above Paez heaped volumes of boiler plate on the corporation's page. I might note that no one busted him for it. He even eliminated the heading "Controversy" from the article.

You might want "better" sources than Mother Jones but it has been publishing hard copy for many decades and has a stellar record for accuracy, probably much better than CBS long term. The article that Niteshift36 erased was written by an author who I've been reading for many decades, and though I have occasionally had divergent opinions about his articles, he is an extremely solid reporter.

MJ has won many National Magazine and other awards. They've been on line for 20 years, longer than any competitor. They became famous in 1986 for firing Michael Moore. They note in their "About" section that he sued them and used his winnings to finance "Roger and Me."

I added the article about their infamous Reeves County, Texas, prison. It was written by a investigative reporter, James Ridgeway with impeccable credentials. Like Moore, Niteshift36 might not like him, but he's had one hell of a career. Check out the AP picture in the MJ article. It's worth at least a 1,000 words, after its prisoners "voted with their matches" after GEO killed off some prisoners through neglect. They were eventually sued and lost big, if memory serves.

(By the way, I find the AP to be a hell of a lot less reliable than MJ. I started paying attention to their shortcomings in 1992 or so when their reporter claimed that 110 meter WR holder Roger Kingdom ran a "slow" 13.20 in Japan. I doubt if ten people in the world had ever run that fast, up to that time. The more I paid attention, the more I realized that they had some reporters that were downright awful, and others who should have received Pulitzer consideration.)

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/05/americas-10-worst-prisons-reeves-county-detention-complex

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_Jones_(magazine)

Here's a Wikipedia capsulation of Ridgeway's career since the '60s. The guy is 77 years old and he's still doing great work because he loves his job.

Career history

Ridgeway began his career as a contributor to The New Republic, Ramparts, and The Wall Street Journal. Later, he was co-founder and editor of the political newsletters Mayday, Hard Times and The Elements. Ridgeway became nationally known when he revealed in The New Republic that General Motors had hired private detectives to tail consumer advocate Ralph Nader in an attempt to dig up information that might discredit him (Nader was behind litigation which challenged the safety of the Chevrolet Corvair). Ridgeway's revelations of the company's snooping and dirty tricks prompted a Senate subcommittee led by Senator Abraham Ribicoff to summon James Roche, president of GM, to explain his company's harassment — and apologize. The incident catapulted auto safety into the public spotlight and helped send Nader's book, Unsafe at Any Speed (1965), to the top of the bestseller lists.[1] He served as Washington correspondent for The Village Voice where he worked from the mid-1970s until April 2006. Following his departure from the Voice, Ridgeway was hired by Mother Jones to run its Washington DC bureau. On April 13, 2006's Democracy Now! broadcast, Ridgeway told host Amy Goodman that Michael Lacey, the executive editor of the Voice, "killed my column, and he asked me to submit ideas for articles to him one by one, which I did, and which he either ignored or turned down, except in one case...they won't say that I'm fired. I'm supposedly laid off." [2] Books, films and periodical credits

Ridgeway is the author and/or editor of twenty books, including The Closed Corporation: American Universities in Crisis, The Politics of Ecology, and, more recently, The 5 Unanswered Questions About 9/11... He was extensively interviewed for An Unreasonable Man, a 2007 documentary about Ralph Nader. His articles have appeared in The New York Review of Books, PARADE, Harper's, The Nation, Dollars & Sense,[5]The Economist, The New York Times Magazine, The Wall Street Journal and other magazines and newspapers.

Salon is also a publication with an excellent record. I disagree with them sometimes, agree at others, some like Camille Paglia make me crazy, but they indisputably hire very good people, including some of the touchier ones who resent editors and leave of their own accord. They publish work by excellent freelancers as well. They are often way ahead of the MSM on issues of considerable import.

You mentioned another publication in your comments and I can't recall which that one was, but I'd be happy to go back and comment on it also, if you'd like.

Please do take a look at what Niteshift eliminated wholesale from my edits, claiming essentially that none of the edits I'd done were useful or correct. Activist (talk) 06:21, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Off to bed, but one last comment. Slate, which I read occasionally, has been around since 1996 and has been owned for some time by the Washington Post. "Legit" enough? Activist (talk) 10:05, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Dear "Eflat major,"

You wrote, in response to my comments:

Thanks for your comments on my talk page. I have no problem with Slate, Salon, Motherjones, or for that matter DemocracyNow or RealNews, in fact I think all of these do great journalism. But the way I understand Wikipedia, most of what appears in these venues would be considered primary sources (investigative journalism) or opinion pieces and hence not appropriate as references for encyclopedia articles, especially controversial ones. If there is a fact that is worth mentioning in an encyclopedia article, it should probably have a secondary source at least somewhere in the news media, or at least an official primary source (like a court document or something). I'm sure I don't have to remind you about WP:PRIMARY and that Wikipedia itself is an encyclopedia, a tertiary source, and hence relies on secondary sources for credibility.


 * I'm a bit perplexed. MJ is an excellent secondary source. There's no reason not to use it. In terms of reliability, for instance, they are certainly miles ahead of the NY Times, for instance, which allowed Michael Gordon and Judith Miller allow themselves to be used essentially as stenographers for the Bush administration in its efforts to illegally invade and occupy Iraq. The propaganda published in the Times was crucial to that effort that has been responsible for precipitating over a million deaths and five million refugees in Iraq, the expulsion of the previously very diverse Christian community in that country, the destabilization of the entire region, of which the Syrian civil war is only the latest episode, the ten years of intense denominational and ethic warfare, the massive destruction of infrastructure, the elimination of the vast bulk of the middle and professional classes, the trillions thrown away by the U.S. in a lost cause, and the deaths of some 5,000 young American men and women. If you use the Wikipedia search box for the words "for-profit prison," with which Niteshift36 has such problems, you're directed to the "private prison" article. Look down in the references and you'll find that one of the first cites in that article was an MJ article referenced over seven years ago. If Niteshift and you, following his lead, have a problem with the publication and the article, it needs to be because it has gotten facts wrong, not because of its political leanings. Activist (talk) 23:17, 1 December 2013 (UTC)
 * If you'll look above in the discussion that I've left on my Talk page, you'll see that there were similar left wing objections to my posting of a link to a conservative site which hosted a film that captured some repulsive behavior by Andy Breitbart. I had also posted a campus newspaper article, presumptively neutral, that had attached film made independently at the same time of the same incidents from different angles. The MJ article on Reeves County was just one in a series about the for-profit prison industry. What you've done is replaced that article with a reference to some GEO Group corporate boiler plate. I can't begin to tell you how very disappointed I am with your response. Activist (talk) 23:17, 1 December 2013 (UTC)


 * You continued:

If the "fact" is a mere claim made in a venue such as those above without any other confirming source, it is not appropriate as a reference on Wikipedia.


 * I'd be happy to provide other articles and pictures, even, from source that covered the Reeves County death and subsequent riots and arson, but I have no confidence that they would not be erased as well. Those riots were an extremely notable incident in corporate history. Activist (talk) 23:17, 1 December 2013 (UTC)

In some venues such as those, there are plenty of cited sources for a story that would be fine references. Other times, referencing links are internal, dead, or missing. This does not mean that there is anything necessarily wrong with the original story; it could be investigative, the sources could be anonymous, etc. But it does mean, in the view of this editor, that it is not an encyclopedia source. For instance, your motherjones link you're pushing on the GEO article is turning up next to nothing. Nevertheless I'm keeping track of a few leads that may be able to make their way into the article in some relevant form. Speaking of this, I'm going to take the rest of this issue to the talk page at the GEO article, where most of this should be voiced anyway. Eflatmajor7th (talk) 00:33, 30 November 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm obviously okay with your moving it to that page and I'll go there next. My intent is to have an objective discussion of what I believe to be chronic scrubbing of well-sourced, critical information from the GEO Group article, to be replaced with promotional bilge generated by their public relations department. Activist (talk) 23:17, 1 December 2013 (UTC)


 * I appreciate your not getting as pissy with me as you might easily have, regarding my expressions of upset with the editing of the page. You wrote:

"What we're talking about here is encyclopedia articles, their content, and the references for that content. You were trying to use the motherjones article as a reference that a particular facility exists. That, as I said, is pointless. Instead I used 'some GEO Group corporate boiler plate'; of course I did, because that's the easiest reference to use for a trivial fact. What is not trivial is WHETHER that fact belongs in the article. This was the relevant discussion to have, which I had, with Niteshift on the talk page, while you were busy composing a summary of geopolitics for me. The Reeves facility is now mentioned in the article in case you hadn't noticed."


 * GEO operates over 60 facilities throughout the country and the world, and owns about 16 of them. It has conned some communities into building them, speculative facilities with marginal chances of success, so as to maximize its profits and minimize its risk. Some, like Clayton, NM, were absurd ventures and I can't imagine it would have spent its own dough building there. The remote town was conned into passing a bond issue to build it. There was no available labor pool, especially at the crappy wages GEO tries to get away with paying. It was hundreds of miles from where the inmates it would be holding had families and support systems, guaranteeing substantially increased recidivism. It was serviced by roads that were treacherous in the wintertime in particular, icy, winding, no shoulders and many miles from emergency services when the almost inevitable accidents occurred. They only reason it was built there was because the community and its birdbrained elected officials were convinced by the Music Men that it would be an economic driver. In fact, it did nothing for the community. The real reason it was built there was because the governor, Bill Richardson, was getting huge campaign contributions from GEO and he in turn had hired a GEO (as Wackenhut CC) warden to run the state system. That character neglected to fine GEO (and CCA) many millions that should have been levied for deliberate understaffing, until the new, Republican governor put a stop to the banditry. But the facility has not had anything of note that happened there, and may not until that bond issue inevitably tanks. That in my estimation, is a reason not to list it and dozens of others in that lead paragraph. Reeves County is an entirely different story. The county is saddled with ownership and it's a mess, as are many others GEO operates. The massive riots, emanating from the death of an inmate for whom other inmates had vociferously advocated, in major but unsuccessful efforts to get him medical care (as it was clear to them that he would die if he did not get attention), were notable by any criteria. So it seemed to me that it was a reason that Reeves County should be included in that short list. However, I did not feel that it should be devoid of context, which was the case when the reference was limited to the corporate self-shilling. Now I'd be happy to move that material to the controversy section but there is little doubt in my mind that it belongs in the article. It was far more significant than the New Castle prison, and I can't imagine even that truly salient material about that latter prison would survive Niteshift's purges. My referencing Reeves County at the top of the article was simply correctable shorthand. Activist (talk) 05:58, 2 December 2013 (UTC)


 * You continued: "I think Niteshift36 and I are both stumped as to what actual content, facts, you want to put in the article."


 * I don't think you should be speculating for Niteshift36 here. I want to insert content that legitimately and importantly reflects on the actuality of GEO's operation. I think he wants to whitewash the article. Neither you nor I know exactly what he thinks, but by his editing actions, and his abusiveness, I think that the "Duck test" likely serves us well. I don't think he's stumped at all, or he would have tried to work collaboratively with me on those issues of inclusion or exclusion. Instead, the clear message he gave me, eight months ago, was "It's my way or the highway." Activist (talk) 05:58, 2 December 2013 (UTC)


 * You need to go to the talk page and say what content you want to include, where, why, and what the references are. Then there will likely be a bunch of disagreements and caveats. You might have noticed, if you went through the history of the GEO article, that if it weren't for me and one or two other editors, the entire "controversies" would probably have been wiped in the wake of the stupid FAU stadium scandal. And the reason, had that happened, would not have been because anything in there was false, it would have been because the sources were shitty or missing, the writing was sloppy, and maybe most importantly, the content in there had not been justified as "controversial". So I argued that, rather than diffusing the section into the history section, we should find better sources and rewrite most of the section. Activist (talk) 05:58, 2 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Well, I haven't read the article section in some time and I should, obviously. When I run into sloppy though accuracte writing in an article that generates my interest, I usually just edit it to make it readable. I frankly gave up on it because I was unwilling to allow myself to be subject to Niteshift's tirades any longer, and I had much more important things to do that had been left undone. I thought the connections between Rick Scott and the massive GEO contributions to his campaign, GEO founder and board chair George Zoley, the Wests, Cohen (Zoley led the search committee that selected Mary Jane Saunders, the FAU president, Cohen was probably an ex officio trustee at the time, and Scott appointed and retained the U's trustees), the extremely sweet deal that GEO got for the naming rights, etc., etc., were all issues that deserved mention, but I saw little chance of getting any of them in there past Niteshift's big eraser. I really doubt he even read much of the stuff he was purging, that he was on autopilot when doing it. I should note, and I think I left mention of it on my TALK page, that I had not visited the GEO article in some time but was personally solicited by some other editor to return to contribute. Activist (talk) 05:58, 2 December 2013 (UTC)


 * If, for instance, you want to include a mention of the riot at Reeves, you'll first have to justify including that on the talk page... And if you think the motherjones piece is a good source for that, then it would be interesting to see you try to convince other editors that that's a good source. Again...the conversation should be had. You might also look at the sources I put on the talk page... Just because the article for private prisons cites all kinds of left-leaning media and aclu stuff, doesn't mean anything for another article. That's because groups of editors achieve consensus about specific articles they work on, and one article could have completely different approaches than another, and both could still be within WP policy. The relevant policy that was frequently brought up in the context of wiping the controversies section, not using certain types of sources, etc., was WP:UNDUE. I don't necessarily agree that it applies everywhere it's invoked, but again, that's life. Eflatmajor7th (talk) 00:40, 2 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Okay, you've made good points and as I get time I'll try to address them using your guidance. It doesn't mean we will necessarily agree, but I'll give it a shot and I expect we'll likely be able to achieve some relative consensus. As far as the my commitment to and participation in the general Wikipedia editorial process, an example: A few weeks ago I contributed to the July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike article, after I was horrified to see what an editorial mess it had become. It was a far more important international issue than the comparatively picayune matters of Reeves County or FAU or whatever, but no editor seemed to be taking any initiative to sort it out.  I did a lot of sorting, and though my edits were not comprehensive, I did a lot of research to make sure that those elements of fact were correct, printing out the 27-page military investigation report, for instance, and going over it paragraph by paragraph, and reading contemporary articles on it in foreign and domestic sources. But most of what I did was just to make it readable. I have often gone beyond the original sources in trying to get a good understanding of some details that might have been left murky by previous reporting in RSS, even to the extent of contacting involved reporters by phone or e-mail or even the participants in the articles themselves, not to do original research, but just to sort through what are often vague or inadequate descriptions of complex situations, and then returning to those secondary sources that best shed light upon them. If should also say that if I find articles claiming erroneous, but supposed facts about individuals or corporations or other entities about whom I'm somewhat apathetic or fairly negative, I change them as well to remove or modify the non-factual text. I'm with you. An encyclopedia needs to reflect reality. Activist (talk) 05:58, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification for December 18
Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Hearing, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Pinna (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ* Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 08:59, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Music Dynamics Lab
Thanks for your edit on the music psych page. Has the Music Dynamics Lab at Florida Atlantic University been shut down with Dr. Large's move, then? geordie (talk) 11:53, 4 May 2014 (UTC) he


 * My understanding is that there is no longer a music lab at FAU, and that Dr. Large moved his lab to UConn when he was hired. They seem not to have any university websites yet, although they have a facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/musicdynamicslab Eflatmajor7th (talk) 20:16, 4 May 2014 (UTC)

ArbCom elections are now open!
Hi, You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:50, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

Request for dispassionate consultation
I've been involved in disagreements with editor Niteshift36 for years, usually about articles in which GEO Group was somewhat or primarily involved. We just had other editors at ANI make comments and offer helpful suggestions about achieving resolutions of those impasses. I made some prior and subsequent edits to the Broward Transition Center article. I noticed that you'd authored it, and made the bulk of the contributions to it, before my own edits. Niteshift36 reverted parts of my edits, so I asked that we try to resolve the differences of opinion on the article's TALK page. In doing so, I noticed that you and Niteshift36 had a prior difference of opinion about it which you resolved amicably between you. If you have the time, I wonder if you might take a look at the status of the article and those edits, as you might have suggestions as how this process might be conducted in a less tempestuous manner between the two of us. Activist (talk) 07:08, 16 March 2017 (UTC)
 * And do you know why it was resolved amicably? Because he actually discussed the issue and didn't force an agenda. It wasn't "all or nothing" for him. Niteshift36 (talk) 17:53, 16 March 2017 (UTC)