User talk:Tomhab/JanFeb05

Talk page additions from January-Feburary 20005

User Martin2000
Hi Tom,

Should welcome you to the wiki, seeing as how it's your first day! However, since I've seen you on Baha'i pages I thought I should make you aware of this:

This user appears to be an identity created on 14th Jan whose only reason for being is to upload Baha'u'llah's picture and add it to Baha'i Faith and the one on Baha'u'llah. here is his entire list of contributions to Wikipedia.

You might want to keep an eye on these articles now I've posted this to the comment pages there. PaulHammond 21:31, Jan 30, 2005 (UTC)


 * Errrm, I've been mucking around on wikipedia for a couple of weeks, but only made my page today. I think its quite easy to tell who's out to attack the faith and who isn't (Amir seems to enjoy it). Its just important to make sure you challenge them in a way that can't be argued with. -- Tomhab 21:48, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Tomhab, I don't think it's wise to disrespect other people, especially Muhammad, in making our points.   We have to make our arguments based on our own facts.  We can, however, use how other things in Wikipedia have been dealth with.  If you look at the Islam talk page, you can see how things are done with a great civility. -- Jeff3000 23:35, Jan 30, 2005 (UTC)


 * Yeah... sorry didn't think I'd rise to it so easily. -- Tomhab


 * I would try adding something to your last statement in the Baha'i Faith article about Muhammad to ease the war. -- Jeff3000 23:44, Jan 30, 2005 (UTC)


 * Done - my mother would be proud of you keeping me in shape. -- Tomhab 23:50, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Belated welcome
Damn! And I so wanted to put this in, to see how it expands:

Welcome!

Hello,, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers: I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~&#126;); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Where to ask a question, ask me on my talk page, or place  on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome!
 * The five pillars of Wikipedia
 * How to edit a page
 * Help pages
 * Tutorial
 * How to write a great article
 * Manual of Style

And while you're at it, you should still look at Don't bite the newcomers, Neutrality says it's one of his favourite semi-policies (or is it a policy).

All the best, from another relative newbie,

PaulHammond 02:48, Jan 31, 2005 (UTC)

Baha'i attacks
Hey Tom,

I think you just joined at a bad time. Look back through the archived discussions. There was a lot of action there while Rick Boatright and others were discussing the presence or absense of links to articles on CB groups, like the Orthodox Baha'is, several of whom are active in Cyberspace. Rick (a moderator at soc.religion.bahai, I believe) was attempting to accomodate the Orthodox right to have a link from the article against overzealous editing from other Baha'is. Then, there was some activity involved in the process of getting the article up to standard for featured article status.

I came over here because someone on talk.religion.bahai put in a link to the article on Wiki. I read it, thought it was a solid article, explored Wikipedia and became a Wikiholic that very day. As a veteran of flame wars on trb, I really wanted to steer clear of Baha'i arguments here - most of my editing has been on Doctor Who articles (see The Tenth Planet, I wrote that!), a little bit on Frasier and the Simpsons, and whatever random areas I happened to come across.

Amir and Martin2000 both joined on Janurary 14th, and they clearly have issues with the Baha'is for some reason, though unlike Martin, Amir has edited other articles (one or two on Iran, I saw) and has gotten into a nasty row with another user in the couple of weeks he's been here (see User talk:Amir1)

Ironically, the only reason why I came back to the Baha'i article is because someone fixed comments that an anon vandal made on my talk pages, and the other victims of his vandalism were the Minor Bahá'í divisions article and Rick Boatright. Now Amir and Martin are stuck with me! - PaulHammond 16:35, Feb 3, 2005 (UTC)


 * Hi Tom, thanks for the note! Refdoc 01:13, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 *  I don't mind people adding facts to pages  you better not!!! :-) Refdoc 01:23, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Hey Tom, thanks for the msg. Yeah I noticed that the "Most great branch" and the "Most mighty branch" got mixed up.  I'll check my source and post again to try to clear that up.  In particular if your source doesn't name them both, it's probably wrong, just my opinion.  Abdul tended to re-interpret a LOT of stuff  Just wait....

Wjhonson 06:19, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Hi Tom,

Yeah - if someone edits your talk page then you get a "new messages" note when you sign in, so you know to go look there.

As to Martin and Amir's attacks, you are right, they are not interested in compromise - but there *are* procedures for dealing with people who don't play nice - someone already put up at request for comment on the Baha'i Faith article. Look into pages like Dispute resolution for the kind of things that can be done. You can RfC individual posters whose behaviour is disruptive, and eventually Request an arbitration on them also if no other resolution can be found. I've just seen that process come to a conclusion on an edit conflict at the Charles Darwin article. But, the first step is always supposed to be attempting to work with people on the talk pages. Most people here who want to make useful contributions are reasonable souls. The conflict resolution guidelines are just for the disruptive minority.

Hey, at least you're getting to learn more about your faith - how long have you been a Baha'i, btw? PaulHammond 15:56, Feb 6, 2005 (UTC)

Hi Tom: the passport photograph would have been taken shortly after Baha'u'llah's December 1852 release from the Siyah-Chal dungeon and before the start of His exile on 12 January 1853. Adib Taherzadeh, in The Covenant of Baha'u'llah, writes "...His neck badly injured and His back bent by the weight of heavy chains..." which would contribute to why Baha'u'llah appears as He does in the photo. I am minded that it is probably best to let the dispute about the photo come to a resolution before offering this information. What do you think? I am asking Rick Boatright, Paul Hammond and Gini too. --Occamy 07:39, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Paul's Baha'i break
Hi Tom,

Pleased to see you're still around. I've just put a note on my user page to the effect that I'm taking a couple of weeks wikibreak from editing the Baha'i articles - I found myself on the verge of shouting at Refdoc yesterday, and I don't think that's a good sign. If you need my support for any RfC's on users or issues to do with those pages, drop me a line. Otherwise, I should be taking an active interest in those pages again around mid-March, after I've settled in to my new job and home. PaulHammond 14:30, Feb 14, 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks, Tom.


 * No, I did mean Refdoc. I had already gotten annoyed with him lecturing me at the Baha'u'llah talk pages before I moved over to see that Brettz had reverted me without comment and restored his own spelling error of 30th(ish) Janurary.  Really, I hadn't been keeping that much of an eye on the Abdu'l Baha article, which is why it took me more than a week to see Brettz's first revert of my edits there.  Brettz is annoying, but nowhere near so much as Amir, and I figure is someone who I could talk to if I had the energy - it is a bit rich to have someone treating my edits as if I was some kind of Azali troublemaker in one place, while I am doing my level best to prevent Amir's vandalism at the main Baha'i articles - but I figure I have enough Baha'i allies to explain my motivations to Brettz should I need them later.  No - the time I knew I should reconsider my involvement was when I found myself seriously considering dropping a note to Amir's talk page inviting him to try his hand at editing the Abdu'l Baha article, to see how Brettz felt dealing with him instead of me.  See you around, I hope.  - PaulHammond 15:28, Feb 14, 2005 (UTC)

I've made the changes I thought were appropriate. Brettz9 02:27, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)

vs amir
Tom, Amir is pretty typical of the people we get in SRB. If you want to see intransigent, you could read the last 500 posts or so from SRB's resident Moroccan Moslem. :-(  Amir's not that bad acually, but he's been aculturated severely to think that Baha'is are liers, cheats, and conspirators, as were the Babi's before them.  Like Jews to Germany, Baha'is are the ultimate source of anything bad that happens to iranian culture. It's all a horrible Baha'i conspiracy, and we're a part of it.  It would be funny if it weren't so sad.  Eventually, I get mad, and I splatter blood everywhere.  I _hate_ editing this sort of crap, but I've been doing it for TWENTY YEARS on SRB.

Hey, Tom? Interested in becoming a moderator of Soc.religion.bahai? I have a spiffy brown shirt, some jackboots, and a pair of johdpurs that just might fit. :-)

Thanks for all your work on the Baha'i pages. It's hard, but valuable. Rick Boatright 18:22, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Oh yeah, I remember being that 18 year old know-it-all kid. :-) I was handed my head on a platter more than once. Fortunately, that was BEFORE usenet, and there are no archives of my embarassement.

Still, we can always use a steady hand in SRB. Rick Boatright 18:44, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

"Gawhar was pregnant" section
NPOV sates that if we can find a source for the claim then we report that that source claims that. If not it can be removed (no original reseach). And don't worry about me getting worn out by Amir1. Compared to some of my oponents in previous edit conflicts he is pretty minorGeni 20:45, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * The quoteing yourself problem is one we have encountered in the past. It is covered under the no original reseach rulesGeni 20:51, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Paul's move
I'm on my break at work now - started last week, moving this weekend - so in a little while I might get settled at my new place and be able to see what's been going on here in the meantime. Noticed your comment on Martin on the Baha'i page today. PaulHammond 14:05, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)


 * Dropped a few comments on your summary at my talk page, if you're interested. btw - whereabouts in the UK are you?  (email reply probably best) - if you're anywhere near where I'm moving too maybe we can meet up sometime?  PaulHammond