Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Double Seven Day scuffle

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 00:16, 29 March 2008.

[edit] Double Seven Day scuffle

Quite a short article, about a very short fight between South Vietnamese secret police and a group of famous US journalists which lasted less than a minute in all probability, and only one punch landed. I used a book about the experience of journos in South Vietnam, so that's probably about as specialised as we can get for a source. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 05:23, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Comments

  • with all the talk of the photos of Arnetts bloodied nose - could you not include it? I was rather expecting to see it and was disappointed!
  • there are quite a few copyediting/grammar type errors, eg "was tall man" and "speaking French....(who was?)" and "hardened public feelings" rather than "public feelings hardened".

Fainites barley 23:42, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Copyedited. Unfortunately, it's unusual that the actual punchup is the most famous instance of journalist confronations mentioned in Prochnau's book about the experiences of media in Vietnam, but the actual picture is not there. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 08:23, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
  • It must have been in the papers at the time so someone must have it in their archives! Its like doing an article on the hoax moon landing without the piccy of the flapping flag. Fainites barley 16:05, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Managed to scrounge one out. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 08:08, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
Great picture.Fainites barley 08:03, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Although you have removed errors the prose could do with tightening. eg 'blithely'.
Fixed. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 08:08, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Support Nice little article. Fainites barley 23:57, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Comment I don't want to either support or oppose at this stage, as I've only had a cursory look at this article, (though my first impression is leaning towards the latter). My main concern is with the prose in some areas, such as here: "The editor of the New York Times told Halberstam that it was out of line for him to send cables to the White House without the authorisation of his superiors. " In this particular example, a direct quotation from that editor of the NY Times may make the prose appear more professional, but a similar result can be achieved if a better choice of words (instead of 'out of line') is used. Perhaps another copy-edit is needed in other places. The article's length is indeed quite short! I'm curious as to why no other Wikipedia articles are linked as sub-articles (in a "see-also" section for example)? Parts of the article also lack wikilinking to other relevant articles, which it could do with (eg; Washington) - this, among other little issues, is something that I would've expected the GA review to pick up on, although I am more concerned that the reviewer (in this case) has said very little in his review at all. After all, a GA review should clearly state how the article satisfied the GA criteria, and specifically note any suggested improvements (or if there are none that the reviewer can think of), and should not merely be a checklist (especially if the article was not quick-failed!!) In my opinion, the GA review for this article sadly did the opposite, and I hope it is not a common practice by this reviewer, or any other GA reviewers, to review articles in this manner, especially when making a recommendation that the article go through to FAC! Ncmvocalist (talk) 12:24, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Direct quote added for Halberstam. And the article was expanded a little more from some bits and piêces lying around. I personally think the links are obvious, but more things have bên linked. Also, there is no real need for a see also section when there is a big template of related topics at teh bottom. Blnguyen (vote in the photo straw poll) 08:13, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
Good. Yes, the template does seem sufficient - it was a fault on my part for not noticing it. As for linking, I think it's generally better to wikilink to other Wikipedia articles as much as possible (except, if for example Washington appeared several times, then keeping it to once per paragraph is sufficient). It is interesting that among other features, being able to navigate between relevant articles in this way is something that many non-Wikipedians find attractive about using Wikipedia. Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:30, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Support I personally enjoy vignettes like this and would love to see more of them zipping through FAC. --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:58, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Support. Interesting article, well-referenced. Meets my criteria for FA. Khoikhoi 03:32, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Comment The redlinks should probably have at least a stub to explain what these are in at least a little bit more detail. Ncmvocalist (talk) 05:58, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Although not part of the criteria, I have created the relevant stubs. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 03:17, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Support --Laser brain (talk) 14:22, 28 March 2008 (UTC) Comments - great article, I really enjoyed reading it. A few comments:
    • "Halberstam, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the Buddhist crisis, was a tall man, standing around 20 centimetres (7.9 in) taller than the average diminutive Vietnamese policemen. He waded into the fracas swinging his arms, reportedly saying 'Get back, get back, you sons of bitches, or I'll beat the shit out of you!'" I think you can eliminate the word "diminutive"; it doesn't lend any additional explanation to the point that Halberstam was taller. Additionally, is there any more information in your sources about this part of the incident? I mean, normally police officers have weapons. It seems ludicrous that a man swinging his arms around would scare off professional police officers. Were they unarmed? Did they have orders not to use their weapons? At least in some countries, even motioning as if you might assault a police officer will get you beaten and/or arrested. There is no indication of why Halberstam wasn't arrested; from reading your description, he is the one I most expected to be.
    • "The photos of Arnett's bleeding face were circulated in US newspapers..." Can remove the "were".
    • Why don't you cite any print news or journal sources for this event? There must be tons of stuff out there. --Laser brain (talk) 05:00, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
I have made the language tweaks that you suggested. The information in the books didn't explain why the cops didn't arrest Halberstam etc. Yes it is surprising. There had been a few embarrassing incidents for the government in 1963 during the protests - Hue Vesak shootings, Hue chemical attacks and the self immolation of Thich Quang Duc involving police brutality, so possibly they wanted to do pretend to be civilians randomly harassing Americans instead of pulling a gun and show that they are government officials bullying people. Since at that time the Diem regime was getting massively criticised for repression. Another thing, is that you would be surprised how skinny Vietnamese people can be, even trained army people - just look up some history books, eg see how bony General Le Minh Dao is, the article has a picture for you. I'm not sure why we would want the news article for use as a source, because the correspondents for the Vietnamese news at the time are the journalists who are in the fight, they are too close to the action to be neutral, which is why I used the books, which are by historians and professors. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 06:04, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for your responses, I have stricken my comments and changed to support. Good work! --Laser brain (talk) 14:22, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.