User talk:A1

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You were missing the above template, so duly added. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:50, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Ukrainian rally

I've put a few short remarks on the talk page of your submission. It's late here, so I'm not able to go through the submission properly. It's always concerning when we see such a disconnect between the mainstream narrative and that submitted here from — I assume — someone on the ground. Where the two conflicting stories can be resolved, we usually end up with the proper story. Any additional information you can give on the talk page to help with reviewing would be a great help. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:50, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi. I made a serious try to review this, but had some verification problems. I'm really hoping we can address these problems and publish. English-language sources would be really helpful if they can be found, but if Ukrainian sources are what can be provided, it would be helpful to put some notes on translation on the article's collaboration page. Please see my review comments. --Pi zero (talk) 21:55, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

Well. It's published.

After a not-ready review, when you think the article is ready you should resubmit it. I really meant to remind you of that yesterday, but was seriously distracted yesterday, and somehow found myself today with only about six hours till the article would have gone stale. And just reviewing it would probably take most of that time even if I started right away. So I couldn't take the time needed to consult with you about it, and I decided to treat it as if it had been resubmitted. I don't recall having ever done that before, but I knew I'd feel terrible if the article didn't get published merely because I hadn't reminded you yesterday to resubmit.

I included the original Ukrainian of the direct quote from the mayor. I love it when we can do that, providing readers with the original non-English as well as the English quote. Most English news sites just provide an English translation, so I figure this is some extra value we can offer. --Pi zero (talk) 22:52, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

OK, thank you. Though I don`t understand what does it mean "resubmit", but I hope it is not so critical. Also I must say you are incorrect with renaming. --A1 (talk) 21:54, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

I had asked you to rename it. The old name was not allowable; it was non-neutral. Maybe the name I chose wasn't ideal, but since you didn't address that problem, I had to. Otherwise it couldn't have been published.

It was impossible. We must call the things as they are, do we like them or not. OK, maybe the reason of this rally looked non-neutral for somebody, but the rally was indeed against terrorism. Also you could see quiet a lot of posters with the word terror ("террор"). And we can`t provide censorship just because we don`t like some words, used by organisers and participants of this march. Maybe, if you have sources that somebody in your country claim Ukrainians in "non-neutrality" during the march, you could add them. --A1 (talk) 22:24, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

This is not about what the banners say. It's about a headline that appears to endorse a poltical position, which Wikinews does not do. If we had had a detailed discussion on this two days ago, perhaps we could have figured out a headline that would both make clear that the protesters were using the term terrorism and at the same time maintain Wikinews's neutrality. But it's too late now. It's not reasonable to change the headline in a major way just before 24-hours after publication. More than 24 hours after publication, no changes of article substance are allowed. After that, we could only issue a {{correction}}, a big ugly red banner at the top of the article saying we got something fundamentally wrong.

It's not at all obvious to me that the alternative headline is wrong. Most of the Ukrainian-language sources have titles that translate to some variant on what I called the article: they indicate it was a rally in memory of the people who were killed. As far as I can tell, the rally was against terrorism in memory of those killed. So both are correct. Reading the article makes it very clear what the people in the rally thought about the terrorism issue, so we're maintaining Wikinews neutrality and making the terrorism message of protesters very clear.

hough U

If you can show it was not a rally in memory of those killed, we can issue a correction. --Pi zero (talk) 23:04, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

By the way, "Ukrainians rally against terrorism" is also the title of one of the sources, and we don't duplicate source headlines. So we couldn't use it even if it weren't a neutrality problem. --Pi zero (talk) 23:10, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

Terrorism is not politics. Terrorism is a kind of crime. And if somebody say "stop terrorism" it is not a political position. It is a position of law and human rights. "Killed" may be OK if it is clear that killed by terrorists. --A1 (talk) 23:30, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

As a news site, we've been dealing with stories about terrorism as long as we've existed. It's not like this is something we've never encountered before. We've thought it through very carefully.

• There is absolutely no problem with us reporting that someone said "stop terrorism". But we cannot say, in Wikinews's voice, "stop terrorism", because that would be advocating a political agenda. We do not advocate a political agenda. It doesn't matter whether it's a "good cause"; Wikinews does not make judgements about what is or isn't a good cause. The reader is responsible for making those judgements; our task is to provide objective facts, so that the reader can make informed judgements. And our neutrality is an important tool in helping us to provide objective facts. For one thing, it allows us to talk to both sides of a controversy.
• There is absolutely no problem with us reporting that someone said "that is terrorism", or "those people are terrorists". But we cannot say those things in Wikinews's voice, because there is no way to prevent the definition of terrorism from being political. Nobody —well, almost nobody— admits that something they approve of is terrorism. So judgements about what is and isn't terrorism can't help being subjective, politically charged. We do not make subjective judgements. We don't decide which side is right or wrong; again, our task is to provide objective facts so that readers can make informed judgements, and our neutrality is an important tool in helping us to provide objective facts.

--Pi zero (talk) 03:31, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Firstly, terrorism is not a kind of politics. Terrorism is a kind of crime. So while saying "stоp terrorism" or "against terrorism" - it is not political agenda.

Secondly my report was not a report about Wikinews actions. Wikinews team was not organisers of this march, as well as nobody from Wikinews took a speech or used a trademarked posters during this rally. So don`t worry, there was no "Wikinews's voice" in this event. In opposite my report is about an action organised by other people under such agendas as against terrorism (once more emphasize that this agenda is not political). And Wikinews coudn`t deny this. In extreme cases you could say that somebody else denies it, for example, "according to Mr Putin this rally was not against terrorism but just the next nazi action paid by Mr Obama". --A1 (talk) 09:53, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

It is irrelevant whether or not terrorism is a kind of politics. That has nothing whatsoever to do with this article. When I described the original headline as appearing to take a political position, the political position I was referring to was the position that the Donetsk/Luhansk People's Republic militants are terrorists. If you don't see that that is a political position, perhaps you are misjudging the word "political". A headline "Ukrainians rally against terrorism" definitely gives the impress that Wikinews is endorsing that position. There may be other ways of wording the headline that would make the intended meaning clear without appearing to endorse their political position, but that particular wording of the headline does not do so.

Since you had also mentioned saying "stop terrorism", although I don't remember our article ever saying that, I also pointed out that "stop terrorism" is a political agenda. So is "stop crime", just as much as "lower taxes" or "support economic growth". --Pi zero (talk) 14:47, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Wikinews must describe events as they are. If people make demonstration against terrorism we must call it against terrorism. And no matter if somebody of us regards the question about Donetsk/Luhansk People's Republic political or not. But you`ve done the worth - you add the name which lead to misunderstanding. The meaning of the word "die" does not reflect a violent character of death. --A1 (talk) 15:20, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Several points, here.

• The original headline was identical to the headline of one of the sources, and therefore would not have been acceptable for that reason regardless of the meaning of the headline.
• You have failed to recognize the implications of the original headline. There are three possible meanings there: (1) Ukrainians rally against terrorism in general; (2) Ukrainians rally against something specific that they consider to be terrorism; (3) Ukrainians rally against something specific that Wikinews considers to be terrorism. The third one is a likely interpretation by readers, and would be a violation of neutrality, and therefore the headline cannot be used. In fact, even after they've read the entire article they might still interpret the headline in the third way. We needed a headline that did not allow the third interpretation.
• The current headline does not imply that the deaths were non-violent. So it does not mislead readers on that point.
• Since you're picking on the word "die", seemingly there's nothing wrong with the assertion that the rally was (among other things) in memory of those who died in the incident. That being so, I don't think there's any grounds for issuing a {{correction}} about the headline.

--Pi zero (talk) 17:56, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Ok, I see it`s no reason to discuss your censorship here any more because you don`t hear me, and you have a power here, and me - not. --A1 (talk) 11:59, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

This is nothing like censorship. The headline probably could have said that the rally was against terrorism, if you had worked with me, while there was still time, to figure out a way of saying that without implying that Wikinews endorses a political position.

I put in a lot of work to help you publish, on a global news site, reportage of what is happening in Ukraine. You've responded with some of the worst insults one can make against a journalist — publishing false statements, and censorship. At first I thought you were simply not realizing some of the subtleties of what various headlines mean in English, but now I suspect you just aren't willing to face up to your own lack of objectivity. You need to learn to recognize your own biases, instead of insulting others as way to avoid recognizing them.

Consider talking about it with some other Wikinewsies besides me. You could raise the subject at the policy water cooler. --Pi zero (talk) 13:38, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

The resubmit confusion worked out okay, this time.

When you first write an article, there's a {{develop}} tag at the top, which displays a box that says the article is under development, and when it's ready to be reviewed, click the submit button. Clicking the submit button causes it to go on the review queue, of articles requesting a reviewer to review them. When a review finds an article not-ready, as happened to your article on the first review, there is a {{tasks}} tag at the top, which displays a box that says the article needs improvements, and see the collaboration page for details, and when it's ready to be reviewed, click the submit button. You did your best to fix the problems with the article, but you didn't do the submit thing, so the article didn't go back on the review queue. --Pi zero (talk) 22:09, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

OK thank you. This seems to me rather complicated but quite possible. --A1 (talk) 22:24, 22 January 2015 (UTC)