User talk:Professor Ninja

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[edit] Hay guyz!

Sometimes I fall down. Do you?

[edit] NCdave and the Terri Schiavo page

Hey Professor, just wanted to make a friendly suggestion re: ongoing conflict with NCdave on the Schiavo debacle page. The back-and-forth between you and dave has started to get a bit heated (not that I blame you, and you're certainly not the first), and since you've shown yourself to be a reasonable and competent editor (and he..... hasn't), I wanted to ask if you could possibly de-escalate your half of the rhetoric. Especially since this has a chance of going to moderation or above at some point, I don't want dave to have any ammo he can use against those editors who have actually worked hard to un-$%*& that page.

We've all seen that dave won't back down, won't be convinced, and is more than willing to fill up pages and pages of text if he can find a willing partner, and that can really sidetrack the already glacial process of consensus on that page.

I also think that a dave without someone to conflict with illustrates well the "if a tree falls in the forest" situation, especially since all of the regulars to the page, and I assume others after 1 to 2 visits, know he's a POV crusader. Take a look at his contributions, last I checked he only ever edited Terri, partial-birth abortion, and other obvious choices. Basically, I think your wit and your effort are better served on a more worthy target.

Fox1 03:03, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Oh, probably Fox, I should. It's not just his POV that drives me nuts, it's his dereliction of the truth. If he made honest assertions, I'd have no problem. There are counter-Michael Schiavo assertions to be made, validly, logically, and honestly that would contribute to the controversy surrounding the entire ... forget you struck through it, debacle. And stuff like that gets me heated up. The talk page is probably due for another truncating now anyway, maybe that would settle me down. Professor Ninja 03:11, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This might interest you. I don't know if it belongs in the story, but just in case you started to question yourself in the face of all these people who believe that M. Schiavo is evil and the Schindlers are saints - from NY Times (headline: List of Schiavo Donors Will Be Sold by Direct-Marketing Firm):

The parents of Terri Schiavo have authorized a conservative direct-mailing firm to sell a list of their financial supporters, making it likely that thousands of strangers moved by her plight will receive a steady stream of solicitations from anti-abortion and conservative groups.

Guettarda 18:36, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I wasn't sure if edits on the polling pages were allowed. I'll put something back in. FuelWagon 23:36, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] RFC

I have filed a request for comment on NCdave. You can visit the page by going here. I have left this message on your talk page since you have been involved in the dispute resolution process regarding his edits in the past. Mike H 11:33, Apr 12, 2005 (UTC)

I suggest that you review the edit history of the User_talk:Boothy443#Sorry. [1]. Bovlb 00:02, 2005 Apr 13 (UTC)

For those of us who've never been through one, what exactly is the deal with an RFC? does anything actually happen? or do we blow smoke on a page and go back to our business. I looked at the wikipedia rfc page and it doesn't actually mention any sort of consequences to an RFC. If there is, is there any sort of timeframe? FuelWagon 22:21, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)


What ever happened to this? Is NCdave still participating or has he been run off? --AStanhope 18:08, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

He came back a couple of days ago, and another guy has just popped up who seems just as bad. Proto 11:26, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Jdavidb

I edited opposite Jdavidb on the Terry article. We had a disagreement about the vegetative Terri pictures. He followed wikipedia policy and engaged in a discussion rather than edit warring, then he compromised substantially in proposing a modification that not just more neutral than the NCdave-POV-pusher state of the article, but more neutral than the changes I'd made. In the course of this discussion he was rational and polite. It is my strongly held opinion that Jdavidb is deserving of respect, for he is a rarity in that he shares some views with the christian fundamentalists as well as having the understanding of wikipedia policy and the calmness to act in the best interest of the article at, potentially, the expense of pushing his personal perspective. I think that Jdavidb may be uniquely able to help tame the new wave of editors issues like this will draw (as we've seen from the blog posts) because he is able to speak to these editors in a capacity that you and I can not: because he is in far more agreement with their position than we are.... Because of all this I think we should hold his edits up as an example of what NCdave *should* have been doing, and enlist his assistance in getting POV pushers like NCdave away from these issues, and not attack him just because he made some comments exposing his POV here and there. I am greatly disappointed that you appear to be using the NCdave RFC as a pulpit to make negative comments about JdavidB's intentions and if you continue to do so, I am going to have to withdraw my support on the NCdave RFC for a simple reason: while I disagree with the religious fundamentalist viewpoint, my participation in the Wikipedia will *always* be for the betterment of mankind and not to push my own views, so I refuse to be a party to any issue in which a rational person would suspect might have been created to denounce someone because their personal pov differed from mine, rather than their actions within our community. --Gmaxwell 01:56, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Rather than continue the discussion on the RFC, because it is vastly off topic, I have decided to reply to you here:

"Can you, in fact, provide any cogent argument as to why of all the users here who've taken issue, my referenced reply is the worst breach?" Perhaps not, but more importantly I don't have to... Discussing this with you has become exactly like discussing NPOV with NCDave on Terri Schiavo. I am not going to waste any more of my time, so bugger off. --Gmaxwell 17:53, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Ah, nothing like a personal attack. Well, so long as we're clear that you withdrew support out of spite for me, and not any logical or valid reason. Most importantly of all, however, is much like your lack of need to back up your petty little grudge, is my lack of need to bugger off. Professor Ninja 22:16, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)
Huh? 'I do not think that word means what you think it means.' I don't claim to know you, so I have no basis to make a personal attack from. Nor do I have any desire to make any such attack, for I have no grudge against you. Your decision to attack the motivation of anyone not carrying your torch in this matter does not make you a bad person in my eyes, but it has made the RFC something that I don't want my name attached to. I was clear enough about this in my earlier talk page message to you. There is no requirement that I substantiate my position on this matter whatsoever, however I have chosen to specify some of the more influntial factors in the hopes that someone will take action and amend the situation so that I can re-add my support. I have not produced this explination so you can debate me on it, nor so I can waste my time answering your neverending stream of come-backs and counter-arguments, and certantly not so you can make the outragious claim that my reply is a personal attack. My vote is my business, not yours, thus my bugger-off. --Gmaxwell 23:34, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Looking for the 2nd DCA October 2002 order.

Maybe you know where to find the 2nd DCA October 2002 order discussed by Matt Conigliaro that we have been talking about. I looked at his site and the 2nd DCA website at [2] and can't find it. Maybe it is a different date? If you have a clue, I would appreciate it, because I would really like to read it. Also it would appear to deserve a link, wherever it gets referenced. Tropix 07:49, 2005 Apr 16 (UTC)

[edit] RFC

Yes, I'm still working on Schiavo and the realted articles, but I took a much needed, 24 hour wikiholiday. Regarding AStanhope's comments and personal attacks in general, your argument may be justified but I tend to defer to the semi-policy of removing personal attacks. I don't think it's unfair to remove personal attacks, as I think it encourages more productive discussions in general. That is of course, my opinion. --Viriditas | Talk 06:56, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Government involvement in the Terri Schiavo case

Viriditas wrote, "Aloha. I'm not following the use of "Ms." in relation to Schiavo, as that means she was unmarried or divorced, which is not the case. I think we should remove all references to Mrs. or Ms. --Viriditas | Talk 00:13, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)" Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:A_ghost"

Couldn't disagree with you more strongly on this one. Mrs. indicates a married woman. During the Equal Right Movement, Ms. was established to simply mean a woman, with no designation of marritial status, past or present. Miss continued to be used to designate a (usually young) that had never married. These terms can be fluid, based on the preference of the woman.

However, in Western English-speaking cultures, refering to anyone by nothing more than their surname is normally a mark if disrespect. The only exception is within military organizations (which are by nature de-humanizing) or certain Eastern cultures (where clan names is a mark of honor). Using surname only is considered to be de-humanizing. It devalues the individual. This is why the American Psychiatric Association trains therapists to require abusers to refer to victims by their name. I'm sure that you have no desire to devalue Ms. Schiavo. Since your straw polls favor using either Mrs. or Ms. by a wide margin, change your "policy". Now.--ghost 05:54, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

In case anybody's wondering what he's talking about, he apparently got confused between the sequence of letters V-I-R-I-D-I-T-A-S and P-R-O-F-E-S-S-O-R-(space)-N-I-N-J-A and decided to give me a sternly misspelt lecture on a topic I wasn't involved in, or found my talk page a suitable place to carry on conversations not related to me. I've sent up a lazy riposte here, and as a precaution against him deleting it, here's the diff.

No, I wasn't/am not confused. I looked at the Government involvement... page prior to posting, and found the source of the change. That brought me here. Anything that you or I change becomes related to us.

The primary issue that disturbs me is the lack of any title. Please show me a style guide that suggests this. Webster's disagrees.

As to, "...my talk page is not a place for your garbage. And don't give me orders." I apologize for the tone. I was offended. As appearently, I did to you. (Two wrongs don't make a right...I think I remember you telling someone else that.) If I can't disagree strongly with you on your talk page, where should I do it? In the article? Again, the tone was too strong. I apolgize for that.--ghost 06:25, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I stand (slightly) corrected. American Journalistic Style allows for the drop of the appelation that I find offensive. Formal style does not. Formal Style endorses the use of Ms., where the preference of the lady in question cannot be determined. (So, you were right. ;-) ) The international reader will expect Formal Style (as I did).--ghost 07:30, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
The links you requested are on the Talk: Terri Schiavo page. Perhaps they'd fit better in the Style Manual. However, I'd like to make our case for use of Ms. Schiavo when refering her.  ;-) BTW, it is the policies of both the NYTimes and Wall Street Journal to use Formal Style. For good reason.--ghost 07:51, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I have petitioned for a switch on the Talk: Terri Schiavo page from Journalistic to Formal Style. If accepted, this would restore the use of "Ms. Schiavo". Happy Christmas. (On a personal note, I saw a mention your Mom wasn't well. I hope this finds her feeling better.)--ghost 03:57, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] External links

See Wikipedia:External_links. Yes, the link is good, but I believe the user removed the link becaue it requires registration. In such a case, we should try to determine which primary source document is being referenced and use that instead. This tends to happen quite frequently, as many public articles convert to registration after two weeks or so. --Viriditas | Talk 22:20, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

FYI..I'm experiencing this problem on other pages. I may just move the links to a footnote format, in effect preserving the record of the citation. --Viriditas | Talk 01:55, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] LRod

LRod has expressed concerns about my reversion of his content removal. Since I am interested in fairness, could you take a look at his diffs to see if his deletions were justified? --Viriditas | Talk 08:29, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I am sorry to hear about your mother. I hope everything will be ok. Regarding LRod, I could see his deletions being relevant if that section was split. The thing is, I'm concerned about losing content through removals like this. Perhaps we should put a note on the talk page that tells people that when they remove text, they should move it to talk. In all fairness, I don't think LRod's removal of content was such a bad idea, (I could be wrong) but in the interests of continuity, we need to keep a closer watch on content removals. I think I'll go check out the timeline and see if it's already there, and if not, preserve his content removal on the timeline. Of course, we could just add the content back in to the main article. What do you think? --Viriditas | Talk 01:52, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] GMaxell's NCDave projection-fest

I just left a comment tangentially relevant to you on GMaxwell's talk page (sorry - in a hurry - no link). --AStanhope 17:52, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] hello

Hey, is this microphone on? ;) FuelWagon 21:51, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Jack Thompson

I replied to your comment on my talk page outlining why the paragraph you added is unsatisfactory. Please reply there. silsor 07:18, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Mentioned you re:some deleted text in Talk:Terri Schiavo in April 2005

I mentioned you in this RfC on Tony Sidaway as having text deleted by him. patsw 17:01, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Welcome back

Hello again, Professor! Welcome back, from someone you were in opposition to! I saw on your talk page, or someone else's, just before you disappeared, that your mother was ill, and I wondered was that why you were gone. I hope she's okay now.

My first experiences of editing Wikipedia were not pleasant, and I appreciated that you were initially the only one "on the other side" who was willing to discuss, and, if necessary, apologize. I am not NCdave, and I have never wanted the article to say that her estranged husband wanted to starve her to death. But I have been very concerned that the article reported every unverifiable claim that Michael Schiavo made as if it was not open to question (the noise of her collapse woke him and he immediately called 911, and he studied nursing because he wanted to learn how to look after her, and his decision to remove the feeding tube was a result of his finally accepting that she wouldn't recover, etc.) while every unverifiable piece of information coming from the Schindlers' side was qualified with "the Schindlers claim that". I have now been working at the Terri Schiavo article for over six months, and I consider that my efforts have been successful to the extent that a lot of the Michael Schiavo stuff is now clearly marked as what he (or his lawyer) said. I'm still there at Terri Schiavo, but most of my Wikipedia time is spent on other articles – some of them uncontroversial ones. Regards, Ann Heneghan (talk) 08:02, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

I express my condolences regarding your mother. May she be in joy and peace with God. I was one of the more controversial editors on the Schiavo article, and, while you may not agree with each and every edit, I hope I made the article a better presentation. Even as I speak, we are continuing work on Terri Schiavo. I am too busy to regularly edit -due to real life responsibilities, not the least of which is getting a (paying) job and paying my bills -my college loan; and, if you want to take my place, I welcome you. (I say "paying" job, since the job of Wikipedia editor is nonpaying and volunteer.) Welcome back to Wikiepdia, Prof. Ninja. Take care,--GordonWatts 03:55, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for your reply. I'm sorry to hear about your mother. I'm very blessed in still having mine. And yes, of course I remember your apology, as well as the fact that it was made in public rather than on my talk page! I did appreciate it. NCdave has been gone for months, by the way, but I don't know why. Regards, Ann Heneghan (talk) 18:57, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Jack Thompson (attorney)

Hey, just relax a bit. The new article is actually pretty cool. Before, we just had a bunch of libel that was really unsourced urban legend. Now, we have irrefutable sources. Just keep in mind that when a person does bad things, somebody will notice, and when the truth is told about bad people, then we will have an article that is accurate about all of the bad things about them. - CorbinSimpson 02:43, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Irwin article

Thx for fixing my edit - I kept getting edit conflicts - I couldn't properly proofread - so i just saved and hoped for wikihelp :) --Trödel 15:38, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Instead of deleting the weasel word sentence - I rewrote it with attribution to Ben Cropp per The Australian article - and you fixed the tongue twister - agreed re the trouble - it should be sprotected if it isn't already - that should raise the signal to noise ration :) --Trödel 15:44, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] wikipedia Source?

You posted this on the Steven Irwin talk page:

Oh look, apparently you can't upload non-commercial images. Apparently very broad image licences now count as no image licence. Way to score, Wikipedia.

Can you provide link to wikipedia policy page? I find it difficult to believe that "non-commercial" images can't be uploaded. Does this include public domain stuff?

After all, the Rodney King video was very definitely not "commerical" video and it was all over the news (and netted the guy who took it $20M from all the TV stations that used it without permission!).

Nothing personal about the barb picture. As for a pic of the exact species of stingray in question, I don't think it's appropriate, but good people can disagree (at least they used to be able to). I wouldn't feel a picture of the animal needed to be removed.

PainMan 19:04, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to image

Wikipedia sucks sometimes.

You canNOT say that enough times! The worst thing about wikipedia isn't even the vandalism and other bs we've seen with the Irwin article.

The worst thing are the little cliques of people that decided that they own a particular page (for example see the articles on the band Rush, comedian Dennis Miller, and quite a few others). They get together to make sure that only the version they want goes up and basically declare war on people who make edits they don't like.

There are also a large number of people of the Left-wing political persuasion determined to inject their ideology into articles. They are generally allowed to get away with murder.

The problem is no central control. And these "Admins" are often at cross purposes so a person that doesn't like what one Admin does can search out another (who agrees with him or her) and then get that Admin to do what they want.

PainMan 19:34, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Please refrain from removing my comments.

I've contributed over 20,000 edits to this site (and 150,000 with my bot) and you think I can't say a few words about a fallen icon?! Lighten up. --kingboyk 19:53, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I see. How many Featured Articles have you written? (2 for me). GAs? (12). Templates? (Lost count). And what do you have? Page after page of talk page and minor edits. --kingboyk 20:04, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Your recent edit to User talk:Kingboyk

Please see Wikipedia's no personal attacks policy. Comment on content, not on the contributor; personal attacks damage the community and deter users. Note that continued personal attacks may lead to blocks for disruption. Please stay cool and keep this in mind while editing. Thank you. -- Longhair 20:14, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Please do not make personal attacks on other people, as you did at Talk:Steve Irwin. Wikipedia has a policy against personal attacks. In some cases, users who engage in personal attacks may be blocked from editing by admins or banned by the arbitration committee. Comment on content, not on other contributors or people. Please resolve disputes appropriately. Thank you. -- Longhair 20:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Please show me the diffs where you have been personally attacked and I will act accordindly. It's a sad time for a lot of people. A little sensitivity never hurt anyone. Keep that in mind please. -- Longhair 20:25, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
I hear you. Let's leave it be. Some users may very well be a little edgy today and not thinking rationally. It's understandble. I don't feel 100% myself. Chest beating isn't agaisnt policy, being outright nasty is. I'm done with this. Thanks for your explanation anyway. -- Longhair 20:36, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your recent edit. It shows good sense and your moments of personal attacks weren't an ongoing thing. Gave me a smile anyway :) -- Longhair 20:42, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Your defence of the eBay listing. It's ok. Everyone has their back up a little here today it seems. Thanks for returning to the worthwhile fold. :) -- Longhair 20:48, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "A man hears what he wants to hear..." or see as the case may be...

Haha, I never noticed the left-wing cabal myself. Most of the time I notice right-wingers trying to inject their POV

No conservative would ever try to inject POV! How dare you! I will have you know I'm a Charter Member of the Vast Right-Wing Consipracy (Gold Member Badge No. 31).

Just kidding. No emoticons, they take themselves a little too seriously around here.

"I know I am, but what are you" (a losse translation of tu quoque). We tend to notice what we don't like.

At first I thought wikipedia would be a wonderful thing. Sadly, it hasn't worked out that way. Some of the scientific articles are very good. But in totality, it's a huge disappointment--only a few notches above Yahoo!'s chatboards in far too many cases.

PainMan 23:58, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I'm teh clas act man!

Wanna go for ice cream? Kyaa the Catlord 23:35, 5 October 2006 (UTC)