User talk:SpeakerToAnimals

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[edit] Neutral point of view

Articles on Wikipedia are expected to conform to our neutral point of view policy. What this means is that we do not try to discern absolute truth with regard to controversial issues but to present what other people have said about them, without engaging in the debate. In practice this means that criticism of the sort you added to the Harry's Place article should be referenced to external sources, rather than simply stated. Thanks. --Cherry blossom tree 11:52, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Response

I don't know how to respond to your comment as there does not appear to be a reply link. However, should this message get through you might like to follow the following link to Harry's Place were each of the comments are bourn out:

http://hurryupharry.bloghouse.net/archives/2006_11.html

The articles entitled 'Saddam to Swing ' and 'Mourning Saddam' demonstrates conclusively the blog's support for the death penalty in the case of Saddam.

The article 'A protester screams in Gaza...' demonstrates conclusively their uncritical support for Israeli attacks on Palestinians.

In what way can you or they deny these facts?

Replying here is fine. You can reply on other people's talk pages by clicking the (usually) blue link in their signature. You can sign your posts by typing ~~~~. When replying people generally indent their text using colons as I have done. See Wikipedia:Talk page for more.

I think you misunderstand me. I have no interest in denying these 'facts', though it is possible to use other these and other posts to come to different conclusions. The way we get around the fact that people can look at the same evidence yet come to different conclusions is to describe the debates over an issue by looking at what other commentators have said about an issue, rather than trying to come to an agreement over what is true, which is impossible to do on controversial topics. An article on the rise of Methodism, for example, could say that EP Thompson presents arguments for it being a product of working class despair but that his views are not widely accepted in the academic community.

Applied to this case it means that we cannot state as fact that due to certain posts Harry's Place cannot be considered part of the left (or that it is a hate site) but if these views have been stated in third party sources then we can report this, as long as we do not give undue weight to certain views over others. There's more on this at Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. Thanks. --Cherry blossom tree 15:47, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hate Site

I think evidence that Harry's Blog is, in fact, a hate site can be found in their archives here:

http://hurryupharry.bloghouse.net/archives/2006_10.html

under the heading 'Who Is He?', where the blog published several pictures of a Muslim protestor they believed had reported a member of the blog to the police for threatening behaviour.

The article appealed to readers to identify the protestor.

This is the same means of intimidation practiced by the far-right group Red-Watch, as noted by some of the commentators on the blog, and encourages vigilantism.