Talk:James Hal Cone

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[edit] POV

It seems this page keeps getting modified to take Cone from the realm of theology and put him into the realm of politics (changing Liberation Theology to Liberal socialism). This seems to me to be a POV insertion. If I'm wrong, can we work this out in the discussion page? Thx. Lbdance99 (talk) 15:15, 8 May 2008 (UTC)


moved from article: Dear Sir or Madam:

In response to your e-mail to Professor Cone, he confirms that he had been a member of Alpha Phi Alpha while he was in college at Philander Smith in the 1950s.

Victoria Furio Special Assistant to James H. Cone Union Theological Seminary —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.51.251.74 (talk) 16:55, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Quotes/Controversy section

There needs to be a reliable secondary source to show that there actually is a legitimate controversy over each of these quotes by Cone. - Maximusveritas (talk) 13:38, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. I'm putting a NPOV box on this article; looks like someone cherry-picked quotes to make Cone look bad. --TimD (talk) 02:14, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Maximusveritas, Wikipedia has no such policy. Courtjester555, after the quotes section was added, I scanned Cone's book and spot checked several of the quotes and they seemed representative and in-context. Do you have any evidence that they are unrepresentative? If not, we should remove the NPOV marker. Jim2345 (talk) 17:12, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Quotes sections in general are frowned upon at Wikipedia. There is no specific policy against it, but it does appear to be the general consensus (Wikipedia:Quotations). This article is an example of one that wasn't featured until its quotes section was removed and sent to wikiquotes, which is the more appropriate place for such sections. I went ahead and moved this section to Wikiquotes as well. If any of those quotes generate a verifiable controversy, they can be added to the controversy section here. - Maximusveritas (talk) 19:07, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
I added the two quotes that have been removed. Should I have cited the secondary sources in adding the quotes, reporting the controversy rather than trying to reconstruct it? Actually, if you Google the quotes you get a number of places -- newspaper op-eds, blogs -- where the quotes have generated controversy. — J M Rice (talk) 06:08, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
Maximusveritas, the link you referenced does not, in any way, justify your claim that a quote must meet a "controversial" in order to be included. The quote added by J M Rice should be restored. Jim2345 (talk) 23:18, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

The "Black theology refuses to accept..." quote is taken from the polemic (POV!) and pseudonymous article ("Spengler") in Asia Times - directly linked by James Taranto at the WSJ blog post, and indirectly linked (via his own beliefnet post) by Rod Dreher at the Dallas Morning News blog. "Spengler" cites the Jones article, which is the only truly credible source of the bunch and which, not surprisingly, does not actually give the quote as such. Instead, "Spengler" has cobbled together different quotes to give a false impression. Even so, the pieces of the quote do not exactly agree with the wording of Cone's own writings. There is controversy, but a NPOV account of it would describe the creation and circulation of the questionable "quote" rather than simply repeating it. Hence, I'm deleting it. Semperegoauditor (talk) 05:36, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Controversy about Cone vs. controversy about Obama: needs to be differentiated? Semperegoauditor (talk) 05:52, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Introduction

I removed this ", and sympathetic with the Black Power movement" from the intro, because I am not sure it is accurate - is there a source on this? My understanding was Cone was writing in response to the Black power critique of Christianity.Lbdance99 (talk) 05:38, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

A sentence like "Cone is widely considered to be an anti-White racist" seems to me weaselly and POV, even without "unusually virulent". I don't want this to be an edit war, but I don't think this is appropriate for an intro paragraph. The controversy section, as well as the details of his philosophy, will speak for themselves. (I was the anonymous last reviser and took the sentence out again.) Semperegoauditor (talk) 13:45, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

I also think slipping in parts of Spengler's quote and/or the characterization "racist" is inappropriate for the intro paragraph: in either form, it's POV, constitutes participating in the polemic rather than neutrally observing, it depends on a non-credible source (internet polemic), and really does nothing more than add a negative characterization to the mention of "Black theology." It's more extreme, for example, than the intros to the Wikipedia entries on Louis Farrakhan and David Duke, and is the equivalent, say, of including in the intro to the Jeremiah Wright page a sentence like: "Wright is anti-American, as is proved by the fact that he said, 'God damn America.' " My two cents. Semperegoauditor (talk) 05:48, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I removed the following POV from the intro: "Professor Cone's teachings are essentially the same Marxist doctrine which was imposed upon the Cuban people by Che Guevara and Fidel Castro after the Cuban Revolution. In Cuba all other forms of religious teachings were removed, other than Marxist Socialism. Guevera and Castro were the major influences referenced in Cone's work, as persons who were instrumental in his socialist overtones and methodologies. Cone has been accused by some as making his divisive statements a theological standard in what should never be a united cultural viewpoint. In so doing, some believe he has usurped black history, and Professor Cone calls for others to follow his own narrow discription of "black theology". Cone's racist "theology" was repudiated by Pope John Paul II. Jeremiah Wright has repeatedly cited Cone as an influence on his teachings." I also added a comment and citation.Lbdance99 (talk) 18:38, 2 May 2008 (UTC)