On 4/25/07, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
daniwo59@aol.com wrote:
I recently came across the following article: _http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Sylvia_Browne_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Sylvia_Browne) . To get you
up to speed, Sylvia Browne is a self-professed psychic.
Invevitably, James Randi is not impressed. Neither is Danny.
On the other hand, does this merit an article. She is an LP, so this is essentially a "Criticisms of a BLP" article. On the other hand, it is
quite
well-sourced, at least from a perfunctory glance at it.
Still, do we want to open the door to these kinds of articles?
Criticisms of
Sylvia Browne could lead to Criticisms of Uri Geller to Criticisms of
George
Bush to Criticisms of Tom Cruise to Criticisms of [pick your favorite].
The
very hypothesis of the article is POV. Surely, this is not what we are
here
for.
I'd really like some input. Ideally, it should be merged, but the
precedent
this poses should also be mentioned.
Merge.
"Criticisms of ..." articles are bound to POV, especially when the subject is a person. The entire article seems to focus on her personal dispute with James Randi, and his obsessive campaign to find fault with her. The tone of the article takes sides with Randi, and fails to recognize that he is as big a part of the problem as she is.
Psychic phenomena of all sorts are controversial, but if the objective is to discuss such phenomena dispassionately and objectively it cannot be done by focussing on a personal feud between two publicity seeking personalities Strangely the claim that Browne's psychic visions are bunk presupposes that there are claims by others that are not, and that she is instead not representative of mainstream psychics.
The sources for this article are indeed plentiful, but seemed chosen with the sole intent of highlighting sensationalism. While I would be highly critical of Browne as a representative of psychic phenomena, I also think that the article puts too much stress on the failures of her public performances, and is there purely to make her look bad.
Ec
This fued between the two of them gets a huge amount of play (although I don't ever remember her name, just his) in the press, in academia, in the various skeptic groups. Even if the article were more approrpriately titled feud between the two or something, it would still be mostly negative and mostly from Randi's POV, because he's the one instigating the battle, *because that's what he does for a living*, and because the feud is not quite only about Randi's criticism of her, it's a back and forth thing. Oh, and what he does for a living is attack people who make their livings like Sylvia Browne makes hers, and Sylvia Browne is often the leading lady in sales in her area.
That is what Randi does, publicize his criticisms of supposed psychic's public performance failures. That's where psychics fight back when they do, where Randi has established the battle ground.
The article is about his obsession to find fault with her and her personal dispute with him, so that it's entirely about what it's about, hardly seems like a complaint.
The article is not about objectively discussing psychic phenomenon, it's about a dispute between two of the main players on either side of the attempt to do so.
So, let's see, a feud by two notable people, based on their occupations, carried out in full public mode, and the question is, should it be covered by Wikipedia?
I will look at the article though. I think the title could be more appropriate, but I don't know enough about the feud to know that for certain.
KP