Talk:Gerald Hannon

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You have new messages (last change).
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.
Portal:Biography
 Biography Portal
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the Project's quality scale. Please rate the article and then leave a short summary here to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article. [FAQ]
This article is within the scope of WikiProject LGBT studies, which tries to ensure comprehensive and factual coverage of all LGBT related issues on Wikipedia. For more information, or to get involved, visit the project page.
B This article has been rated as B-Class.


The section on the conflict between Hannon, Steed and Bird clerly takes Hannon's POV. It needs to be made NPOV. Homey 21:51, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

It does no such thing. I wrote almost everything in the article, and I have no way whatsoever of knowing Hannon's POV on the matter. Bearcat 11:31, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Anon reversions

  1. According to all existing sources, Claire Hoy's reports on the Body Politic controversy were published in the Toronto Sun, not the Toronto Star. If you're sure he was with the Star, then show some proof that all of the other sources are wrong. Wikipedia's goal is verifiability; even if something is factually wrong we have to back up the change with sources, and at this point all the sources on the Hannon controversy say Hoy was with the Sun at the time.
  2. Not a single one of the arrested men in Project Guardian was found guilty on the child pornography charges. Several were found guilty of other offenses such as prostitution or drug possession, but there was no child pornography. You will not conflate the guilty verdicts with the non-existent child pornography by falsely implying that only 30 of the men were acquitted on the pornography charges; they were all acquitted on the porn charges and 12 were found guilty of other things that had nothing to do with porn. Wikipedia is required to be accurate and these are two separate issues. The existing description is to stand as written.
  3. Wikipedia's WP:NPOV rule requires that we describe Hannon's work as what it is, and not as what some people think of him even if they've been factually and verifiably proven wrong. The article will not describe him as an endorser of pedophilia or even as a person "widely perceived" as one; it's a verifiable fact that he isn't one, and it constitutes libel to even imply otherwise.

NPOV does not mean we have to give all subjective opinions equal credibility; it means we report the actual known facts. Bearcat 00:53, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Questions for the author

Why are there no footnotes on this page? Does this mean sources have not been cited? Also, what is the Wiki policy regarding this "off the record" material? Shouldn't this also be cited. I've seen many articles tagged by Wiki editors as "not citing their sources".

Does the opening paragraph follow the Wiki standards? Why does it mention he grew up in Ontario? I've never seen location of childhood on a Wiki article before.

The article seems to be entirely biased in favour of Mr. Hannon. I've read most of his published work, he always takes a controversial stance. In my opinion, some mention should be made of what could be called his continued attempts to be controversial. There's a significant possibility he is engaged in some form of self promotion through the media to serve his own personal agenda, possibly an attempt to make himself famous. In other words, is it just a coincidence after all these years that he continually finds himself in controversy?

Also, what interests does he hold regarding pedophilia or child pornography? Why does he bring up these subjects in his work, and subsequently find himself accused of involvement, or at the center of controversy? Pedophilia is one of the biggest societal tabboos, so it will always draw strong opinion, and not neccesarily level headed opinion either. It's a "hot button" issue which is always very controversial and draws a great deal of attention. I've seen many Wiki articles tagged as "lacking objectivity", this could be one of them.

I'll refrain from wild accusations, but this article appears to have been written by a close supporter of Mr. Hannon, if not Mr. Hannon himself, and as such, lacks objectivity and doesn't cite sources. 206.47.255.188 22:36, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

References are cited at the bottom of the page. Regarding the "off the record" stuff, you're misreading the section if you think Wikipedia is citing anonymous sources; Ryerson Review of Journalism published the statement, and RRJ is the Wikipedia source. And, frankly, as the author of most of this article, I can assure you categorically that I'm neither Gerald Hannon nor a supporter of his. Personally, I actually agree with your assessment that he's a publicity hound who'll say or do just about anything to get his name in the news — but under NPOV rules, the article can't say that unless it can be independently verified by external sources that this is the case. As written, the article is a neutral summary of the facts of the case; it is not Wikipedia's job to editorialize or offer subjective theories as to an article subject's motivations. Bearcat 22:47, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I still can't find those citations. Usually they look like footnotes in a reference paper. Here's an excerpt from the Bruce Sprinsteen article: In ninth grade he transferred to the public Freehold Borough High School, where again he failed to fit in. He completed high school but felt so uncomfortable that he skipped his own graduation ceremony.[2] He then attended Ocean County Community College briefly but dropped out.[1] Maybe it's something with my computer.

Your second sentence (A recurring theme in his work has been exposing popular culture's use of...), is that a statement of opinion? Or is this a widely held belief of literary critics or journalists? This is why I'm concerned with objectivity, because this statement appears to be the opinion of the article's authour. I'm new to Wiki, but this may need to be footnoted or perhaps explained to the reader.

thanks for your comments Bearcat, I'm new to Wiki, don't know how to log in yet, my name is Brent. brilliant use of "quotes" ;)

Wikipedia policy does not require footnoting of every individual statement in an article; it's encouraged, certainly, but the only requirement Wikipedia has is that the sources be listed in the article, which has been done here. The fact that the references are listed at the bottom of the article is all that's required. If you'd like to go through and footnote each statement to the relevant reference page, then more power to you, but no Wikipedia policy requires anybody to do that if the source list is already present, and no Wikipedia policy permits you to impose such an expectation of responsibility upon anybody else.
I watchlist this article because it's more than once been marred by editors who thought NPOVing it somehow required portraying the pedophilia accusations as accurate or legitimate, but the simple fact is that calling him a pedophile or even a pedophile sympathizer is an absolutely unacceptable violation of WP:BLP. As I've said before, NPOV does not mean we can or should report Heather Bird's or Claire Hoy's opinions about him as anything other than opinion — and it does not mean that we have to state that a proven factual inaccuracy in Bird's column was merely claimed to be inaccurate, either. Bearcat 04:44, 21 February 2007 (UTC)


[edit] NPOV

This article has serious NPOV issues. It completely rejects any criticism of Hannon and reads like a defence brief. I have removed small things like the italics, which were used to stress parts of Hannon's defence, but it still has many problems. For instance, it completely condemns Fantino's work in London, yet twelve charges were, in fact, carried through to conclusion. As well, it seems to me that the police investigating activities involving youths who are barely above the age of consent could be seen as an honest mistake, rather than as a homophobic attack. There is confusion about newspapers. For instance, regarding the role of Heather Bird and Judy Steed, their newspapers are aparently mixed up. As well, Steed is condemned outright for challenging Hannon, who should not be completelly let off the hook for his exploration on "men loving boys loving men". There are also speculative and downright ludicrous statements like the movie deal, with Richard Geer supposedly playing Hannon. And it's not as though there is a lack of footnones. There are no footnotes, and the two links are hardly enough to say the article is sourced.Alaric the Goth 12:49, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

The thing about the criminal charges in Project Guardian is already explained quite clearly and neutrally. There was no child pornography being produced; the twelve charges that carried through to conclusion had nothing to do with the original purpose of the investigation. The description of what happened in the case is not POV — it notes what happened in an entirely neutral manner, and quite clearly indicates that Hannon and The Globe and Mail were reprimanded for labelling as fact an article that should have been called an opinion piece. If you would like to propose an alternate way to write the section, I'm all ears — rewrites are fine, as long as they're accurate, but to date every single person who's ever previously targeted the Project Guardian section has rewritten it to falsely imply that the twelve convictions were obtained on the child pornography charges. If you can come up with a way to revise the section that doesn't violate Wikipedia policy, then by all means, be my guest — but to date, nobody who's ever taken issue with the section as written has proposed a new version that could actually stand under Wikipedia policy.
Regarding Bird and Steed, I don't know what you mean about their newspapers being mixed up; the article doesn't associate Steed with any newspaper at all, and according to every source Bird was with the Toronto Sun at the time of the Hannon controversy.
Again, Wikipedia policy does not require individual statements to be footnoted if the sources are listed. It is the preferred style at this point, yes, but an article not using that style does not constitute a neutrality issue if the sources are named at the end of the article.
The movie offer is not speculative; while it's obviously ludicrous to imagine that somebody would offer him a movie option on this, the sources clearly indicate that, crazy or not, a movie proposal was made.
And finally, as for "not completely letting Hannon off the hook", I'm curious to know exactly what criticism you propose to level against someone for writing an article about other people. Remember, a criminal court actually determined that no crime was committed by merely writing and publishing the article, so I'm genuinely at a loss to guess what criticism you could possibly have in mind that wouldn't itself be a violation of WP:NPOV and WP:BLP.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again for the record: I'm not in any sense a fan of Hannon's. But both WP:BLP and WP:NPOV require that we stick to the facts; there's no place in the article for subjective opinion. And unfortunately, in my experience about 75 to 90 per cent of the time when people raise the specter of NPOV on Wikipedia, what they really mean is that the article isn't ideologically torqued in their direction, not that there's actually a neutrality problem per se. Bearcat 18:03, 21 February 2007 (UTC)


In five minutes of checking, I found one serious error: the claim that Ryerson found Hannon completely clear of any breach. I have alaredy fixed that line to show he was reprimanded and a letter was placed in his file. I suspect there are others, even in that paragraph. I suggest you stop owning this article and let others check for sources that are not so slanted, and rewrite the article in a way that reflects societal concerns and is also fair to Hannon. Alaric the Goth 18:52, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not owning the article; I monitor it for problems precisely because people do regularly add inappropriately slanted content to it, such as the false claim that 12 people were convicted on child pornography charges. And again: this article is to reflect verifiable facts, not "societal concerns". Not because I say so, but because WP:NPOV and WP:BLP say so. And incidentally, "wrongdoing" involves breaking the law, not breaching subjective standards of propriety, so a letter of reprimand in the suspension matter is not incompatible with the fact that he didn't do anything illegal. Bearcat 19:05, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

First, people do have real concerns about people advocating or even condoning sex with children. Second, the article said Hannon was found to have not done anything wrong. Legality is not the only definition of wrong, especially for a teacher, and Ryerson did find he acted improperly and disciplined him for doing so. And you do own this article. You wrote it and you are the only one defending this version. I do not want to get into an edit war with an administrator but I think you are, if you are not Hannon, still much too close to this situation. Alaric the Goth 19:25, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I am not "too close to the situation" (how could I possibly be?) or "claiming ownership of the article". Again: I have no objection to edits, on your part or anybody else's, that pass Wikipedia policy on WP:NPOV and WP:BLP. If your revisions to the article respect those policies, I have no problem with them and will not revert them. What I have an issue with is edits that violate Wikipedia policy, such as falsely claiming that 12 men were convicted on child pornography charges in Project Guardian. Bearcat 19:35, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I added this sentence "Boy-love is not child molestation." from the article to show there were legitimate causes for some concern. Alaric the Goth 19:30, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

As well, I have taken out the link to the Ryerson Review of Journalism article, as it does not work. There is probably a new one available. I also have to wonder about the RRJ article as a source, as the magazine department at Ryerson was in the middle of the controversy and hardly a neutral source. Same, actually, for the timeline provided by the GLBT group. Alaric the Goth 20:02, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
If you go to the RRJ's main page, they're currently undergoing some site redesign and indicate that some pages are temporarily unavailable. It would be best to monitor for if and when it comes back; in the meantime, it would probably be better commented out (like this: <!-- bla bla -->) rather than removed, and I'll list it for reference here:
Though, for the record, we can't challenge sources based on assumptions about their potential biases; both are perfectly valid sources unless you can find actual evidence that their information is specifically wrong in some way. Bearcat 20:13, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
I have already found and corrected several errors, including the claim Ryerson exonerated Hannon when, in fact, they put a letter of discipline in his file. Alaric the Goth 12:15, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Maybe Alaric or any other interested party could advise on the following issue. I posted on the user discussion page last week, but I should have posted here. I'm new to Wiki, so I don't know what fits into policy, but the first paragraph doesn't seem to fit the usual biography format, and it contains statements of opinion which may need to be explained or cited. If nothing else, this will help me learn about Wiki. Thanks, Newbie.

(start last week's post here) Hey Bearcat, any plans to fix that Gerald Hannon article? It's currently rated B class. I don't have a quarrel with any details or specific information, but the basic structure is a little ambiguous. Also there don't seem to be any citations. Everybody else uses them, it makes this article stand out for scrutiny...hmmm, no footnotes, maybe this is all just opinion?

here's a suggestion that mimics the usual biography style:

Gerald Hannon (Born Augtober 87, 1944 in Marathon, New Brunswick) is a Canadian journalist, authour, and professor of journalism. His works include x books/novels, as well as numerous articles for magazines such as Toronto Life, etc. etc. He taught journalism at Ryerson U for x years.

Hannon gained fame as a result of references to pedophilia in "The Body Politic" (1971) and "Men Loving Boys Loving Men" (1977), which led to criminal investigation/charges/arrest for x (list any criminal charges here and cite them). Eventually he was cleared of all charges/charges were dropped/he was not convicted.

Hannon was a controversial figure because critics/journalists/law enforcement agencies maintain his work condoned pedophilia(citation), but Hannon/Bearcat/Somebody else claims Hannon's work attempts to expose society's homophobic practice of blaming gay men for pedophilia/child abuse(citation needed).

The Body Politic was a magazine; "Men Loving Boys Loving Men" was an article in that magazine. They aren't two separate incidents. Bearcat 04:47, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps you should deal with his idea, rather than rejecting it because of a single error. Alaric the Goth
Why is it my job to "deal with his idea"? I don't own the article. Bearcat 16:36, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mediation

  1. There has never been an RFC on this topic.
  2. There has never been an AN/I notice on this topic.
  3. All there is at this point is one day's worth of discussion in which I clearly indicated that I don't have a problem with properly sourced factual edits to this article; I only have a problem with the factual distortions that some editors have previously inserted into this article (such as the patently false claim that Project Guardian resulted in twelve men being convicted of producing child pornography).
  4. Furthermore, Alaric has pointed out what he disagrees with in the current version of the article; he hasn't actually proposed any changes for discussion. As such, there's no unresolvable disagreement to mediate here; there haven't been any actual changes put up for there to be any disagreement about.

Given these points, I don't see how the mediation request can be viewed as anything other than an attempt to bypass the normal processes by starting off directly at what's supposed to be the avenue of last resort in a dispute. And given that I have indicated here every willingness to cooperate with properly sourced and factual edits, there has yet to be any real dispute to resolve. When there's actually something to mediate, then sure, I'll agree to mediation. But not until that actually happens. Bearcat 04:47, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


I've taken a run at editing this, removing some of the superflous material, changing Hannon's removal from Ryerson to "his contract was not renewed" rather than say it was terminated, and adding Fantino's new position as commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police. With a few more tweaks and some sourcing, it should be OK. I would like to do a Nexus search regarding some of the claims made about the Toronto journalists and what they are alleged to have written about Hannon. Alaric the Goth 17:39, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

That fixes a few things. I couldn't make changes because I'm ignorant of the facts of the case, judging from my "Body Politic" error. Maybe an addendum for his awards? And an addendum for his published work (or partial list)? Also the statement about his opponents and suppporters might fit better in a section called "Themes in his work" or "Interpretations of his work". I see those for authors and film makers sometimes. What's a Nexus search?

A Nexus search is a look through news databases. Usually, you plug in a key word, like a name, and all the news stories in major papers on that search term are found by the search engine. In this case, I think the article is alright and pretty much fair to the parties invoilved, but i would like to make sure the journalists who are quoted are, in fact, being represented accurately. NPOV and WK:BIO aren't just about the entry's subject, they are about everyone mentioned. Alaric the Goth 20:53, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Seems fair. "Award winning" just showed up in the last revision. Is there a list of what awards he won, or citation? Pentiumjim 19:54, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I've removed the "award-winning" claim until some citations can be provided. Since I didn't add it, I have no idea what the awards are or would be. Bearcat 22:12, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Hannon has won a large number of (Canadian) National Magazine Awards. 70.51.242.217 00:40, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Is there a list available?Pentiumjim 20:10, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../g/e/r/Talk%7EGerald_Hannon_3ab3.html"