Talk:Former chaplain at Guantanamo tells about abuse and underage prisoners

is the quote in the third paragraph correct?

I was just about to read the article for "spoken wikinews" and stopped at the third paragraph. As far as I understood Mr. Yees intentions, I was quite surprised to "let him say" (I can go on ...), instead of (I can´t go on). Did I misunderstand the article? Gumboyaya 18:09, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I think he mean 'continue to tell about' instead of 'I can accept'. Maybe I shall change something to make it clearer. I look at it now. international 18:23, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Cheers, mate. Gumboyaya 18:38, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Dont know if its ok to break a quotation like this... but i did it. Anybody is free to object and revert. international 18:41, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Not sure if this article goes for news... yet. Im interested what James Yee have to say on his lecture. Anywikinewsie close to Dartmouth College (Hanover, New Hampshire, USA) tomorrow? Could be interesting original reporting.

• Susan Knapp. "Former Muslim Chaplain at Guatanamo to Speak at Dartmouth" — Dartmouth News, May 16, 2006

international 17:27, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Now article is little more newsier but not npow, going to serch after responses to his story later if no other fix it international 18:52, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

US statement

I cant find any good statement from US about Guantanamo prisoner treatment that fits the article. I think its nessesary to ad it before publishing. Anywikinewsie? international 06:36, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

NPOV

Here's the issues I have with this. "Abuse" needs to be defined - it's too ambiguous of a term. In order for this article to be published, it needs to be formatted into a news article, and not a piece just about Yee's claims. This article lacks a lot of balance, and only supports Yee's claims, and nothing more. Tagging NPOV, because this is little more than a transcript of the speech. --MrMiscellanious (talk) – 19:13, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with MrM's opinion and see no actionable objections. Ironically, the objection itself seems to violate NPOV as it appears to me to demand a higher and more esoteric standard of news which reports US government misdeeds and that would,if true, be in violation of our anglo/american pov policy. Neutralizer 12:17, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

In any event, I see that International has worked to try to address MrM's concern so I will remove the tag now. MrM waited some time before becoming involved in the article so it does not seem reasonable to let the tag sit here until he revisits the article; if anyone feels the tag is still justified after international's recent edits, please try to NPOV the article before tagging it. Neutralizer 12:24, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I publish and untag it international 12:51, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I also cannot understand MrM's claim of NPOV. Abuse IS defined within the article with examples. As the inital author, I would love to see another side of this story included in the article. However, I have not found any information that contradicts Yee's claims. Perhaps MrM can contribute this info? --Landreson 13:26, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

• Neither of you have even acknowledged anything I stated above. Back to develop, tagged again. --MrMiscellanious (talk) – 21:38, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Neither... I dont take you serious. international 22:13, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't think I asked for your opinion on me. Please stay on topic and discuss the article. I have reverted your removal of the tags, because you have done absolutely nothing to engage in any conversation that would allow the representation of users' approval of this article representing the Wikinews standards and quality of news that it holds. If you are not interested to engage in conversation, please do not remove any tags on the article. --MrMiscellanious (talk) – 22:18, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Ditto International and Landreson ; no actionable objections and concensus is for publishing. Neutralizer 00:28, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Unless you meet the concerns of the user(s) then there is no concensus. Do not assume that you three or two are a concensus. Follow policy and please make the necessary corrections. This is a community and you need to trewat it as such. Jason Safoutin 00:36, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Sory,dragonfir, what is the objection to the article you might have here? Yrtsihpos 01:34, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Landreson on the "abuse issue". Jason, please specify your objections. If you don't have any of your own, don't tag the article as it might appear that you act as a proxy. --vonbergm 02:00, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

The concerns are clearly stated by MrM above. And are easily read. I will not repeat them. You also will not remove tags by other users. If the tag is removed, without concensus and or fixing the issues, then it is considered disruption. Jason Safoutin 02:36, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Article is good for publishing. Dragonfire, dont follow your bad guru.international 03:57, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Agree with Landreson and Vonberm and international and Nutralizser and say publish please. Yrtsihpos 04:19, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

If you continue to ignore users concerns, then that is considered disruption. This is a community, NOT WikiPOV. Fix the issues or move on. But DO not continue to remove tags unless you make the corrections requested. Your refusal to collaborate is not acceptable behavior. Jason Safoutin 11:31, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

DF; who are you tlaking to with such hostility? Neutralizer 12:46, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Th hostility is that the suggestions made by MrM has been ignored. Blantantly. I should also point out that none of you need to be reminded of policy as all of you are quite familiar with it IMO. When you completely and utterly ignore a user, thats just wrong. Hostility? Ignoring the request of others in a Wiki-community is much more "hostile" IMO. Jason Safoutin 12:51, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

DF, Please tell the community exactly what you feel the issues are with this article? It seems to me that so far you have not given us 1 single actionable objection to work on? I could be wrong though; please tell me where your explanatory edit is. Neutralizer 12:52, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Note to community: Please note that the users, other than MrM have continupously removed a tag placed by a user, other than me (MrM) who made specific requests at the begining of this article. Please note that the users there after his request have refused to meet or even aknowledge those requests and thus completely ignoring them. This is disruption and IMO refusal to collaborate. Not in the edit summary of Neutralizers last edit: please see talk and try to express concerns through article edits rather than tag Well its not his to remove. Once again, ignoring the issues. Also publishing with NO concensus. Jason Safoutin 12:57, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, if nothing else I've gotten what I wanted: some first-hand experience with how Wikinews works. I guess it's both good and bad that an article as minor as this one has created such a major debate. Again, as the inital author I have to reiterate what others have been saying here. For those that keep unpublishing this article, please tell us EXACTLY what's wrong with it. And don't just say "What MrM said" because I've already responded to his claims and have heard nothing further on that. I can address his claims in more detail, but my general perception is that he simply dislikes the fact that this story was published. Can we decide NOT based on NPOV or bias WITHIN an article that Wiki shouldn't publish it? In other words, are we acting as editors to decide which stories we like and don't like? Because in that case, ok we can have a debate. But otherwise, I really don't see a case for NPOV. Re-read the article. "Mr Yee told about.." "James Yee was accused.." "On another aspect of the treatment he experienced, Yee said..." And then we have included as much info as I am aware of from the military perspective: "Gen. James Hill..." and "Col. William Costello..." etc. So the article is describing a speaking event. It is essentially paraphrasing the speaker, and filling in some background info cocerning a hot-button issue, as well as including some reaction from an opposing side. There is nothing "supporing" Yee's claims. The only thing I can agree on here is that there is not enough POV from the military, so I suggest that if anyone seriously wants to find out more about this, that they do some of their own investigative journalism - call the military PR and get a statement, interview eyewitnesses at Gitmo, etc, instead of taking it upon yourself to kill the article altogether. If you're goal here is to charge "bias" against anything you don't agree with, make a very thin case out of it, and then publish only whatever fits your own agenda, maybe you should apply for an editor position at Fox News.. --Landreson 13:39, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Get it together, guys. The story is well-sourced and published. If the tag makes some feel any better, then that's fine with me, but otherwise, I seen no problem with reporting what an individual said and attributing it to that individual. If there's any response, report about it in another story. That's my opinion, anyway. Thanks for the contribution, Landreson. Karen 13:44, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Alright, now it's not published, but same thing - get it together. State remaining issues with story and have them re-addressed. Karen 13:48, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

I have re-published the article as the editors who expressed NPOV concerns seem to have ignored Karen's suggestion. Neutralizer 23:52, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

You have ignored eveyones request. In fact, I am no longer wasting my time with you or your tag team. Jason Safoutin 23:57, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

I hear the puckering sound of someone telling us the grapes have soured.

I honestly hate to edit a story and find it locked in limbo by objections that aren't specific enough to be actionable. I'd hate to think we're all wasting your time here putting all these words into stories that might never be read because someone only objects just enough to get our attention, but never fully delivers an explanation. Sure, the story "only supports Yee's claims" - it's about Yee's claims, and it might be days to forever before someone delivers an official response. …precisely why I suggested that could be another story for another day. Karen 06:05, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Page is no longer protected

This article is protected due to: revert war, tag/untag. - Amgine | ^{talk en.WN} 23:59, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Amgine, one edit after a 10 hour wait can hardly be called a "revert war". Please also note that the user that insisted on the tag has given no explanation of his own during the last 24 hours in which he has reverted the article already 3 times. I have held off changing the tag to "publish" for the sole reason that I don't want to "solve" disputes by pushing people into 3RR. But not explaining concerns, even when asked by four different people to do so, is clearly disruptive. Your actions are implicitly condoning such behaviour and are not helpful. Please explain. --vonbergm 04:40, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

ok now for tag to go I hope so. Yrtsihpos 05:17, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Amgine just came a bit late to the party. No response from the main objector you-know-who, so thankfully colaboration moved forward instead of around in circles. I'd like to get used to this forward-progress experience a bit more. Karen 05:49, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Not news - May 5th speech

This article as it is currently written is not news. The gentleman in this article gave a speech on May 5th. During the speech he made many allegations about US treatment of prisoners. Some or all of these allegations may be true - but there is no news event here. Furthermore: Wikinews is not a soapbox: we do not publish editorials or opinions, not even if they are the content of someone's speech. - Amgine | ^{talk en.WN} 01:35, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

You have a point about the date, although May 5 is not so far away and wikinews has not preorted about this earlier. I will take a look at it later today. The article does heavily rely on the personal experience of Yee, which might make it look like an opinion. In the case of Guantanamo, there is no independent reporting on the conditions there available, so we have to resort to reporting peoples personal experiences, although these carry an inherent bias. Btw, you still have some explaining to do under the previous heading. --vonbergm 16:45, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Just a thought, but if a transcript of this speech is available and it was a public speech, it could be uploaded to en.Wikisource. This would obviate the arguments about POV/editorial/etc. - Amgine | ^{talk en.WN} 18:15, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Sure, if there is a transcript, it could be uploaded to wikisource. But I don't see what implications this has for NPOV concerns on this article. From looking above, this was initially triggerd by a talk he was giving at Dartmouth, and the old speech source was used since nothing was available from the Dartmouth talk at the time. Now there is, so by including those and making appropriate changes, the "not news" issue should be resolved. Collection of articles: [1] [2].

Amgine, please explain your latest unpublish. Your "May 5th argument" does not hold any more, so you better come up with a new reason. --vonbergm 04:31, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Publishing old news which is, in fact, an unabashed editorial with no critical response, is a violation of a range of Wikinews policy, including NPOV. Because person X says something is thus and so does not make it news or reportable. Please do not republish this article without showing there is a news event or phenomenon which is *new*. - Amgine | ^{talk en.WN} 04:32, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Amgine, you complained before that the article was based on an old event. As explained above, the original intention seems to have been to report on an event happening at the time, although initially there was no good source for it. Now there is, I added the source, restructured a little and added some new details from the new speach. Material from the old speach is still in the article as background. If you still believe that this is "not news", you need to give a new argument. Apparently you also argue that the article violates NPOV based on missing opposing point of view. As extensively discussed in [3] a missing critical response cannot be used to keep an article from being published if there is no response available and efforts have been made to locate and include a related response -- which clearly has happened in this article. --vonbergm 04:49, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

And to add, Amgine, how is a speech not a "news event?" I would assume that you would consider Bush giving a speech to be a valid "news event," no? Are we to assume that you are the person who shall decide which speakers are newsworthy and which are not? --Landreson 17:59, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

As vonbergm says its news and there is no excluded material that can call for npoving. Amgine, whats prevent untaging and publishing? international 18:11, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

To respond: If President Bush gives a speech in a dozen, or a hundred, places, the speech is not news. Who he is speaking to, the date, the location, how many people, possibly even the venue and the security are news. But not the content of the speech. Because it's old news.

This article was written with content from coverage of the May 5th event. That content has not changed. - Amgine | ^{talk en.WN} 07:00, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

The story isn't specifically about any particularly dated speech (event), but about the fact that this guy is giving this speech, making these claims. If U.S. President Bush did the same thing, it would certainly be news - newscasters would air the speech, then follow it with their summary - at least the first time the speech was reported. This is the first time Wikinews is reporting the speech, and it's not the speech that's being reported (the date, the location, how many people, etc.) but its content, the claims. Read the headline - it's about the former chaplain at Guatanamo telling about abuse and underage prisoners, which is news to me because I haven't attended any of the many speeches being made. This sort of story isn't about an event, but a phenomenon (defined as "An unusual, significant, or unaccountable fact or occurrence."). As best as I can interpret Wikinews:What_Wikinews_is_not, this story is not not permissible. Karen 09:00, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Karen, you say the story is not permissible, but seem to argue the opposite. Please clarify. --vonbergm 15:57, 30 May 2006 (UTC) Never mind, I suffered from pre-coffee reading diability... --vonbergm 19:07, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Heh! Karen 03:36, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Story continues

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060528/ap_on_go_co/marines_iraq_investigations

It is not wikilike for Amgine to come back 2 days later and block the story. This would be site disruption on other wikis. I will remove the tags. Amgine, please take the new source above and contribute a new story if you do not personally like this one but noone is the "bossman" of a wiki. I see from the Dispute Resolution history that your disruptions have caused many problems here on wikinews and you will soon have another Arbcom to deal with if you do not stop blocking and disrupting valid article production here. As Karen said; you came late to this article and have no authority over it. Please start collaborating. 64.229.29.191 19:33, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

This news story has no essentially new information, the general story has been reporte in Rep. Hunter calls for hearings about alleged "cold-blooded killings" of civilians by U.S. Marines over a week ago. --vonbergm 20:54, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

I thought it was about today's interview where he focusses on the coverup? 64.229.65.234 02:53, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

No, and that's why it should not be published. - Amgine | ^{talk en.WN} 04:24, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, you are right 64.229.65.234. The story you referenced has more focus on the coverup, but I am not sure if there is enough in it to make a new story and get it published at wikinews -- especially considering how hard it has been to get the first story published. People will object that it is "not news", that it gives Murtha "a platform to get his message out", and what have you not. Personally I see nothing wrong with reporting that story, although it will be just a short article. So if you have the energy, you got my (moral) support. And btw, why not sign up for a username? --vonbergm 04:29, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Why not just scrap this one and re-write about the events up to date? This was news, but when "contributors" come late and claim it's old news, that's because by now it is, and the more it's delayed, the older it gets. I've seen this used as a POV-censoring technique before. If I found a speech transcript story from a few weeks ago, I could unpublish it today claiming it's no longer news? Learn to identify tactics of "contributors" so you can prevent doing a lot of work on stories only to have them marked and tagged. For someone to come so late to this story to unpublish it is just a shame. Karen 21:16, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

I started to 'modernize' it little. It seems like there is no transcript of this speach so we can chose to make it much shorter but informative or let the article, after some tweeking, include both speaches. I leave it to you and other wikinewsies. international 21:33, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

I like your idea - expand it to be inclusive of recent events or contract it to be exclusive. It just seems like it needs to be done soon or just scrapped, because I'm not going to work on a story only to have one contributor come late and object. Karen 22:27, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Publish

Continual tagging in spite of consensus to publish seems disruptive to me. 64.229.184.222 22:19, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

That's the way it seems to me, as well. But if someone can edit it to add balance between the consensus and the objections, then I'd support re-publishing as soon as possible. It doesn't seem to me to be a violation of policy - but then I'm not an expert on interpreting the policy as some claim to be. Karen 22:25, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Headline fixed

There's an "n" missing in the "Guantanomo" in the title. Doldrums 18:20, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Good that someone use the eyes ;) Feel free to correct it. international 18:25, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

might as well wait till final publication, else will break a few links, i think. Doldrums 18:31, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Go, Doldrums, go! I fixed all the links after renaming. None of the three redirects are multiple redirects. I need to start checking the headlines closer. This is at least the third time I've missed something that you'd think was obvious in the headline. Karen 03:58, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Chronology of delaying of publication

The purpose is to synthesize the various delays of the publication of this articles and the reasons and couterarguments given. With a better understanding of this history, cases like this can hopefully avoided in the future. Although I will try to present this in a matter that is as factual as possible, I am afraid that my POV will enter in this analysis. I invite others to present their view.

• The difference between the version before the first NPOV and the final version is small, consisting of the reordering of paragraphs and the addition of information about a more recent speech. This diff covers a timespan of 7 days.
• The first NPOV concern was based on the following reasons:

1. The word "abuse" in the title needs to be defined.
2. "This article lacks a lot of balance, and only supports Yee's claims, and nothing more. Tagging NPOV, because this is little more than a transcript of the speech."

W.r.t. 1. it was pointed out that "abuse" is defined within the article. For 2. a discussion ensued trying to find statements contradicting Yee's claims. Several people reported that they could not find such statements.

• Many contributers concluded that the stated NPOV concerns were not strong enough to keep the article from being published. Over the next day the article was reverted to NPOV status once by MrM and three times by DragonFire, once by Ral315 and once by Amgine, and reverted to non-NPOV status twice by International, three times by Neutralizer, once by Yrtsihpos. During this time there was no additional attempt to explain the initial NPOV concern on the talk page. The last revert by Neutralizer was after a 10 hour wait with no edits or comments by parties placing NPOV tags. Amgine used this edit as pretext to protect the page (in the state that he just reverted it into), citing "edit warring" as reason. After unprotection by Chiacomo the article was republished by Yrtsihpos.

Two days later Amgine reverted the publish and taged the article "Not News". His explanation, the first explanation by people that taged the article since the initial one, saying

"This article as it is currently written is not news. The gentleman in this article gave a speech on May 5th. During the speech he made many allegations about US treatment of prisoners. Some or all of these allegations may be true - but there is no news event here. Furthermore: Wikinews is not a soapbox: we do not publish editorials or opinions, not even if they are the content of someone's speech."

In response to this, newer sources and information about a more recent speach (that became available while the article was in dispute) were incorporated into the article.

During the following 2 days the article was published (reverted) 4 times by various IPs and 4 times (in addition to the above noted revert) reverted to taged status by Amgine. The discussion on the talk page only saw sporadic responses from the tagger (Amgine), who also listed it at DR citing the same reason as on the talk page. All people commenting on the DR request, as well as all that commented on the article talk page (except for Amgine) did not follow Amgine's reasoning.

• None of the taggers made any constructive edit to the article. --vonbergm 22:51, 30 May 2006 (UTC)