Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-09-01 Controversy over an Obama–Ayers connection

The neutrality of this article, and the wording of the leading paragraph in particular, is in dispute.


 * Note: Please limit posts to this page to brief statements about the nature of the dispute until a volunteer adopts the case. Keep ongoing discussions about the topic to the appropriate talk page(s), but feel free to provide links to the talk page(s) where discussion has happened (and may be ongoing) for the convenience of the informal mediator and other parties. This will help keep discussion from fragmenting out across more pages and make it easier for a volunteer to review the case. Thanks!

Who are the involved parties?
Freedom Fan  Noroton  Scjessey  Wikidemon  ImperfectlyInformed

What's going on?
The neutrality of this article, and the POV adjectives in the leading paragraph in particular, are in dispute.

Specifically, certain users insist on using subjective adjectives to describe Bill Ayers. These users are Scjessey, Wikidemon and ImperfectlyInformed.

These adjectives are the opinions of specific persons who are not directly mentioned.

Currently the first sentence of the article reads "The controversy over an Obama–Ayers connection arose during the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign of the significance and details of Presidential candidate Barack Obama's contacts with his constituent Bill Ayers, a former leader of the Weather Underground Organization who later became a mainstream professor of education at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a 'very respected and prominent' member of local society'."

The description of Ayers as "very respected and prominent", "constituent", "mainstream", etc. is clearly inappropriate and is about as POV as anything I've seen in Wikipedia. Freedom Fan (talk) 19:21, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

What would you like to change about that?
All parties to the dispute need to participate and agree upon a fair and neutral introduction to this article, regardless of their personal feelings.

I support removing all such adjectives and just stating the facts in an manner worthy of a reputable encyclopedia.

The alternate sentence I have proposed is:

"The controversy over an Obama–Ayers connection arose during the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign regarding Presidential candidate Barack Obama's contacts with Bill Ayers, a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and a former leader of the Weather Underground Organization."

Furthermore the next statement needs to briefly explain why there is a controversy, which is the whole point of the article. I suggest something like:

"Obama's judgement in associating with Ayers has been called into question because the Weather Underground was responsible for a series of bomb attacks on the Capital and Pentagon during the 1960s, and Ayers remains unrepentant regarding his self-admitted role in the bombings."

I would like to state that I am not associated with any particular candidate, nor have I ever worked on any campaign for a candidate for political office. I am just interested in having the article comply with the Wikipedia policy on expressing a neutral point of view. Freedom Fan (talk) 19:21, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Rejecting (as named party) as premature
The nominator seems to have arrived at the Barack Obama articles a couple weeks ago, proposed mediation there after attempting unsuccessfully to insert various things about Obama supposedly having a Muslim background, attempted to denigrate a charity Obama worked on, promoted and briefly revert warred over inserting some kind of anti-Obama conspiracy theory,, then without having participated yet on the present article inserted a neutrality dispute tag, discussed the matter briefly, added what he/she thought was a consensus edit, reverted after that was rejected as being non-consensus,, then immediately proposed and initiated a mediation request.

The nominator has no idea what my position is on his proposed edit, or Scjessey, or Noroton.(from the edit histories, although there is talk about private email) It is unduly bureaucratic and likely to harm, rather than help, attempts to reach consensus to bring a mediation case three hours after a proposed edit supported by a single editor is reverted by another single editor. Before even considering mediation we should first have a consensus discussion and establish that normal editing process is not working.

Moreover, should consensus break down I still have serious reservations that mediation would be productive. I will go over those if and when that becomes an issue. Wikidemon (talk) 05:56, 2 September 2008 (UTC)


 * The nominator's tendentiousness and personal attacks (below) indicate that mediation in which this editor takes part will not be productive. Their complaint seems to relate to editor behavior, and is better suited for the article probation talk page or some other administrative forum. Wikidemon (talk) 16:21, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Mediation Absolutely Necessary
Wikidemon is simply attempting to poison the well. There has been no exchange of private email on my part, perhaps Wikidemon can say the same? This editor has misrepresented my edit history, all of which I stand by; I have never proposed anything I thought to be misleading or unverifiable in accordance with Wikipedia policy.

All Wikidemon demonstrates is that he also is actively involved in editing articles related to Barack Obama, and has an obviously consistent bias in this regard. However, that is irrelevant as everyone has a bias, so I won't return the favor and stalk this editor, or question his motives, or use personal attacks.

I will note that Wikidemon has attempted to delete my comments even on the talk page of one article, which was already under probation for edit warring even before my involvement.

Another unbiased editor has characterized this entire article as "Republican POV Bullshit".

Mediation is definitely neccessary. The sunlight of mediation has already caused certain editors to lose some of the obviously POV adjectives such as "respected and prominent" language, which was defended and reverted for days.

However, the first sentence still contains POV wording such as "mainstream" and "nationally-recognized". Neither of these terms even appear in the sources these editors use to support. Regardless, such highly POV adjectives do not belong in the opening description of this controversial article. Freedom Fan (talk) 15:53, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Mediation No Longer Necessary
I wish to close this request for mediation. Issue has been resolved. Thank you. Freedom Fan (talk) 16:51, 3 September 2008 (UTC)