Talk:Stalin Society
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I am not going to edit out the removal of references to the NCP without getting support from others who agree as I'm not sure which point of view is more neutral on this one. I'd point out that no prominent member of the Labour Party is currently also a member of Socialist Appeal but that doesn't mean the two organisations aren't linked... Or indeed the relationship between Ken Livingstone and Socialist Action.
While I don't expect to see Andy Brooks stand up at a Stalin Society meeting, and indeed there may have been a factional disagreement over the increasing domination of the society by the Brar-ites, I still feel the link between the organisations is relevant.
However, I don't have the open sources to state a watertight case.
Samchallis 14:52, 18 July 2005 (UTC)
Samchallis -- I've replied on the NCP discussion page. The point is that the NCP as a party does not have any connection with the Stalin Society and the disagreements pre-date Brar. Those disagreements were not based on the NCP's understanding of the role of Stalin but on the petty sectarian nature of the officers of the Stalin Society that made it impossible for the NCP to work with them in any capacity. This is a simple fact. Whether any individual members of the NCP are members of the Society is irrelevant as the Society is not proscribed by the NCP. The question is simply the relationship between the NCP as a party and the Society. There is none and there hasn't been one for over a decade.
This society exists in Sweden to. http://www.geocities.com/stalinsallskapet Why don´t you write about it?
User user:Cmdr has been repeatedly removing the following paragraph from the article, claiming it to be nNPOV:
The society publishes essays on its website denying any of the crimes of Stalin and the Stalinist regime including the Katyn Massacre [2] the Ukrainian Famine (Holodomor) [3] and the Stalinist show trials [4] which they variously blame on Germans, dismiss as propaganda, and describe as fair process.
I cannot understand how this can be seen to be the case, as all information is fully referenced to the Society's own website, and following the links fully confirm its claims. If there is any disagreement over the form of the words, that can be raised and discussed here, but blanking a relevant and fully-referenced paragraph over nebulous claims of nNPOV is entirely inappropriate.86.0.203.120 21:49, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
- The paragraph is written from a hostile POV. However, even rewriting the paragraph from a NPOV would not add anything to this wiki article, as it would simply be listing links to documents that appear on the organization's website (and a link to the Stalin Society's website is already provided in this wiki article). Some of the documents in question originally appeared in other publications (i.e. various communist newspapers/journals), and were simply reposted on the Stalin Society's website. Finally, I see no point in stating the obvious - that there are pro-Stalin articles on a pro-Stalin website. It would be redundant, and debating the history of Stalin is not appropriate for this article (there is already a Joseph Stalin article). This is why I think the paragraph should just be cut out entirely. Cmrdm 05:50, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
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- I cannot see that it is written from a hostile point of view: it merely refers to a series of clearly referenced statements that can be found on the Society's own website. If, however, there is disagreement over the form of words, blanking the information is still not the answer. The fact that some of the articles appear on other websites is neither here nor there: their uncritical reproduction on the Stalin Society website appears as a clear endorsement. Morever, the paragraph in question actually begins "The society publishes essays on its website", so I'm not sure where the bone of contention actually lies. Once more, your point that "debating the history of Stalin is not appropriate for this article (there is already a Joseph Stalin article)" is irrelevant in this context: the inclusion of the information is not intended as a discussion of the crimes of Stalin, but of the position of Stalin Society regarding them. It is of course true that one would expect to see pro-Stalin articles on a pro-Stalin website, but it is always helpful to include specifics, and difficult to justify the removal of relevant and properly sourced details from a very small article on grounds of "stating the obvious". Not that it actually is obvious: it would be entirely possible to generally support Stalin's position whilst accepting the historically orthodox position on particular negative events and activities. This constitutes important information that is not included on the Stalin page, nor should it be.193.195.75.20 (talk) 14:44, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
[edit] tiny, ageing and schism-ridden society
Feels like censorship. Is it a tiny organization? Has it not had a lot internal break ups with people leaving or kicked out the organization? Schism? Is not the organization trying to address long dead political leaders? Ageing? Review NPOV designation - Four reasonable, verifiable descriptions about the organization. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bobanni (talk • contribs) 07:34, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
- It all sounds relevant to the article, which is anyhow too short, can well use some expansion. I think the objection (from someone else) was that the reference was already there -- it's better style to use [1] the second time around. So why not try adding that material from the Independent article, again, but with more attention paid to style? Turgidson (talk) 15:55, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] opinion peice
This article is basically an opinion piece, written in a vulgar style deliberately designed to misrepresent the Stalin Society. I corrected a number of things which were undone. Yet I can't see any justification for saying that the Stalin Society "blames it on the Germans", when in fact they blamed the Nazi Regime, or in privileging the work of Johan Hari - a known liberal, anti-communist polemicist - as somehow authoritative on the Stalin Society, due to him attending one meeting, which he then reported on for a liberal, anti-communist newspaper. Hari's article contains no content and no political analysis. So why should his hearsay be put in this article with the disclaimer "the society has been called...", well, no, one polemicist called it that. Those are weasel words. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lenin2008 (talk • contribs) 17:53, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
- I agree completely. User:Biophys also vandalized the article by adding a crude sentence in the reference section, which contained expletive language. I also corrected a few spelling mistakes, if you don't mind. Cmrdm (talk) 22:49, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
- No problem.
Also, User:Biophys justifies her/his argument by saying that s(he) was "restoring sourced views. If "this is only one view", please provide alternative views with sources per WP:NPOV)" (see discussion of the main article page). However, I don't see this logic. It remains "only one view" whether or not I can find "alternative" views on the internet (in fact I can, because the Stalin Society responded to Johan Hari in a letter, which is included on the same page as his Independent article, however, I don't see hwo this minor dispute merits discussion on this page). In fact it will remain onyl one view, until considerably more people can be found expressing that they share that view, and prefereably backing it up with authoritative knowledge and understanding.
Perhaps I should go on to the Johan Hari page and mention that the Stalin Society criticised him. No? Didn't think so.(talk) 13:14, 3 June 2008 (UTC)Lenin2008Lenin2008 (talk) 13:14, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
- If you can not provide alternative sourced views, it means that cited view is a majority view. The deletion of a sourced majority view is unacceptable per WP:NPOV.Biophys (talk) 19:01, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
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- There is no basis of replacing "Nazis" with "Germans", or your removal of anti-revisionist, or for saying that Bill Bland was "the leader of a movement". The articles on the organization's website do not "blame Germans", they expose crimes committed by the Nazis. Cmrdm (talk) 22:28, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
- Lenin2008, I think that section of the article needs to be rewritten so that readers can understand the context of the situation (showing how minor/irrelevant it was). The criticism parts of the article need to be organized into a criticism section, which most other Wikipedia articles have. If you have additional sources, please feel free to add them after my edits. Cmrdm (talk) 22:28, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
