Thank you, Elian. That was very well put. As one of those who have contributed to the pro-Israeli bias, I must apologize.
I also find the pages you mention very one-sided. I don't know enough about the situation to fix it myself.
If there is anything I can do to help you to fix these pages, please let me know. I offer my editing services to you.
Ed Poor
From: elian [mailto:elian@gmx.li] Subject: [Wikipedia-l] NPOV and the israeli-palestinian conflict
When I discovered Wikipedia I was really fascinated and decided to join the project. One of my first selfimposed limitations before I even knew about the NPOV-policy, however, was not to write about the Israeli-palestinian conflict because I consider myself as biased (having friends who are palestinian refugees). [snip]
On Thu, 2002-10-03 at 22:43, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
Thank you, Elian. That was very well put. As one of those who have contributed to the pro-Israeli bias, I must apologize.
I also find the pages you mention very one-sided. I don't know enough about the situation to fix it myself.
If there is anything I can do to help you to fix these pages, please let me know. I offer my editing services to you.
Ed Poor
From: elian [mailto:elian@gmx.li] Subject: [Wikipedia-l] NPOV and the israeli-palestinian conflict
When I discovered Wikipedia I was really fascinated and decided to join the project. One of my first selfimposed limitations before I even knew about the NPOV-policy, however, was not to write about the Israeli-palestinian conflict because I consider myself as biased (having friends who are palestinian refugees). [snip]
Ed, please reply below, not above, quoted material - it helps reading flow.
To add to what Ed said - I don't think you should necessarily 'disqualify' yourself from editing articles because you consider yourself biased. One perfectly good way of arriving at NPOV is for people with opposite biases to edit the same article. Just go ahead and edit it, and if you get it wrong, i'm sure someone will be happy to fix it :)
Adam Williamson wrote:
One perfectly good way of arriving at NPOV is for people with opposite biases to edit the same article. Just go ahead and edit it, and if you get it wrong, i'm sure someone will be happy to fix it :)
I think this is right, but it only works if both sides approach things in the spirit that Elian and Ed Poor have shown: an earnest willingness to work to generate an _encyclopedic_ report.
--Jimbo
Adam Williamson aw280@cam.ac.uk writes:
To add to what Ed said - I don't think you should necessarily 'disqualify' yourself from editing articles because you consider yourself biased. One perfectly good way of arriving at NPOV is for people with opposite biases to edit the same article. Just go ahead and edit it, and if you get it wrong, i'm sure someone will be happy to fix it :)
First, it's not only a problem of bias but also a problem of language difficulties - it takes me more than three times longer to write in English than in German. Plus, often it's a question of subtle nouances of formulations which make the difference in the neutrality of an article, as I tried to point out. As a non-native speaker I can feel that something is "smelling" but my corrections would eventually make things only worse. (I already had such a problem in a discussion with maverick where I still don't know what exactly I got wrong in grammar - anyway, sorry mav)
Third, I have serious doubts that the normal wikipedian strategy you described would work in this special area. My impression was that articles tend to grow longer and longer, each writer adding deeds, arguments, objections, denials, accusations of each side, leaving it totally to the reader to sort out the relevant material. This is not my vision of a NPOV-encyclopedia and nothing I want to participate in.
Finally, I could do, but you would agree that 15 simultaneous edit wars are not a very pleasant situation to be in?
So I'd prefer a consensual attempt to make the articles NPOV, which seems to be made possible by Ed's generous offer. Maybe I should also talk to Uriyan.
greetings, elian
"Poor, Edmund W" Edmund.W.Poor@abc.com writes:
Thank you, Elian. That was very well put. As one of those who have contributed to the pro-Israeli bias, I must apologize.
First of all, thank you for this reaction. I expected flames and everything else, but not this, so I am completely surprised :-)
I also find the pages you mention very one-sided. I don't know enough about the situation to fix it myself.
There's a simple answer: read as much of the conflict as you can get hold of. Read personal memories and autobiographies from both sides, read about the enthusiasm and the hard efforts of the Jewish people building the state Israel and their fear of "being driven into the sea" by the Arab states, but read also about the Palestinians living in the Westbank under military law, with no political freedom, no right to vote. I'd like to recommend you the autobiography of Sumaya Farhat-Naser, a peace activist, but I think there is no english translation. Read the book of Morris about the Palestinian refugees.
Imagine yourself living under all of these conditions. Think about everything and then start writing.
If there is anything I can do to help you to fix these pages, please let me know. I offer my editing services to you.
gratefully accepted :-) I put up a list of articles which need IMHO minor or major modifications, plus a proposal for points to pay attention to when editing articles about the conflict.
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Elian http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Elian/Proposal
If you could help to oversee the articles and modify them, this would be very nice. I'd also appreciate help in formulating the neutralizing-guidelines.
greetings, elian
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