Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 19:59, 22 February 2011

In application and enforcement of the Arbitration Committee's decision at WP:DIGWUREN#Discretionary sanctions, the following discretionary sanctions apply to the article Mass killings under Communist regimes (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views): No editor may make more than one revert per week on this article (see WP:EW for the meaning of "revert"). All editors with Eastern Europe-related sanctions are banned from editing this article and its talk page. For the purposes of this ban, these editors are all who have at any time been the subject of remedies, blocks or other sanctions logged on the case pages WP:DIGWUREN, WP:EEML or WP:ARBRB, irrespective of whether or not these sanctions are still in force or whether they were imposed by the Arbitration Committee or by administrators. Violations of these restrictions may be reported to the arbitration enforcement noticeboard and may result in blocks or additional sanctions without further warning. This sanction can be appealed as described at Misplaced Pages:DIGWUREN#Discretionary sanctions.  Sandstein  22:25, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Mass killings under communist regimes article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Misplaced Pages? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Article policies Neutral point of view No original research Verifiability

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60Auto-archiving period: 15 days

Discussions on this page often lead to previous arguments being restated. Please read recent comments, look in the archives, and review the FAQ before commenting.

This article has not yet been rated on Misplaced Pages's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. History Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject History, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the subject of History on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.HistoryWikipedia:WikiProject HistoryTemplate:WikiProject Historyhistory Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. This article has been marked as needing immediate attention. Politics This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics ??? This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Human rights Mid‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Human rights, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Human rights on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Human rightsWikipedia:WikiProject Human rightsTemplate:WikiProject Human rightsHuman rights Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Socialism Mid‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Socialism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of socialism on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SocialismWikipedia:WikiProject SocialismTemplate:WikiProject Socialismsocialism Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

This article was nominated for deletion. Please review the prior discussions if you are considering re-nomination: Deletion discussions: Keep, 13 July 2010, see discussion. Keep, 13 April 2010, see discussion. No consensus, 8 November 2009, see discussion. No consensus, 24 September 2009, see discussion. No consensus, 3 August 2009, see discussion.

Article milestones Date Process Result August 10, 2009 Articles for deletion No consensus September 1, 2009 Peer review Reviewed October 2, 2009 Articles for deletion No consensus November 15, 2009 Articles for deletion No consensus April 22, 2010 Articles for deletion Kept July 19, 2010 Articles for deletion Kept

Template:Controversial (history) Template:Pbneutral

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Mass killings under communist regimes article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Misplaced Pages? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Article policies Neutral point of view No original research Verifiability

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60Auto-archiving period: 15 days

Neutrality

This article infers a connection between Communist regimes and mass killings, which is not explained. There is no discussion of who has made the connection, what connection they have made, or the level of acceptance of their views. /Accordingly it reads like cold war propaganda and is an embarrassment and a disservice to readers. Also, most of the sources do not directly address the subject but are written about events in individual countries. Much of the literature is taken from books that are either published outside the mainstream academic press or comparatively recent. Accordingly we cannot discern what level of acceptance they have in mainstream writing - in fact they probably have none. TFD (talk) 03:38, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

As I recall you argued there were no sources for "communist genocide", that it was a synthesis, etc. when there are hundreds of books on the topic—the preponderance being genocide by (self-declared) "communists" but also genocide committed against the same. PЄTЄRS J VЄСRUМВА ►TALK 05:30, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

The name of that article was changed precisely because of synthesis problems. By the way, if you wish to explain the horrors of Communism to people, they have been well-documented in reliable sources. You should allow this article to be written in a neutral tone and allow the readers to form their own opinions. Intelligent readers are able to discern bias and distortions and may question why the article is written in a biased manner, and may even come away with a more positive view of Communism, if only because they develop a negative view of anti-Communists. TFD (talk) 05:47, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

@TFD rsp to mine, what you call "synthesis problems" were arguing over the lead, quoting the U.N. genocide resolution and a whole pile of additional WP:OR arguing over what the article was about, forcing the discussion toward the need to agree on the article lead. No one (well, at least one camp of editors, by appearances) was interested in representing what scholarly sources refer to when discussing "communist genocide" (for example, whether genocide by or of communists or both) as that meant having the words "Communist genocide" appearing as a Misplaced Pages article title. PЄTЄRS J VЄСRUМВА ►TALK 17:25, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

We don't have articles such as breeds of chicken raised under Communist regimes or mass killings in Protestant nations. Why? Because no one can see any connection between them. You obviously draw a connection in your mind, but you need to be explicit about what the connection is in the article. The is for example a website called Republican Sex Offenders, which basically lists republican sex offenders. However, if you want to create such an article here, then you need reliable sources that draw a connection between republicans and sex crimes. TFD (talk) 17:44, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

1. You are going to have to explain what you mean by "infer a connection between Communist regimes and mass killings", because it make little sense to me as a criticism. I understood your prior point that the article should not take a side on a connection between communist ideology and mass killings, but the connection between the regimes and the killings is both uncontroversial and explicitly made: many of these regimes engaged in mass killing. Does the Slavery in ancient Greece article infer a connection between ancient Greece and slavery? How can an article "infer a connection" on what are essentially facts? There is disagreement in sources on numerical estimates for events and on intentionality for a few events, but no disagreement on the validity of the topic itself, which even the sources you have presented to criticize the topic have acknowledged. The scholars are in fact named in the article. Their "levels of acceptance" are not because it would be original research for us add that on our own. Therefore, the only "level of acceptance" that is relevant here is whether or not a source meets Misplaced Pages's standard for reliable sources. All the sources used here do.

2. That many or even most sources used in the article focus on a single event is irrelevant to the POV tag. They are only used to describe the event they document. That is a neutral use for them. The sources which discuss multiple regime discuss these events, so it is appropriate that this article also does.

3. "...it reads like cold war propaganda..." Please be specific. According to the WP:NPOVD, you must address "specific issues that are actionable" because "Simply being of the opinion that a page is not neutral is not sufficient to justify the addition of the tag." AmateurEditor (talk) 01:18, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

1. The article "Slavery in ancient Greece says "Slavery was common practice and an integral component of ancient Greece.... Most ancient writers considered slavery not only natural but necessary.... The study of slavery in ancient Greece poses a number of significant methodological problems. Documentation is disjointed and very fragmented, focusing on the city of Athens." This article does not say for example: "Mass killings were common practice and an integral component of Communist states.... Most Communists considered mass killings not only natural but necessary.... The study of mass killings under Communist regimes poses a number of significant methodological problems. Documentation is disjointed and very fragmented, focusing on the the Soviet Union."

2. No idea what you are talking about.

3. If you have to misrepresent the facts in order to present your views, then readers will distrust you. Ironically your approach will create sympathy for Communism. Having watched the Manchurian Candidate, I believe that some extreme anti-communists may be secret Communists, trying to discredit democracy by appearing to be extreme.

TFD (talk) 04:43, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

1. I did not bring up the Slavery in ancient Greece article as a cookie-cutter imitation of this one. Every topic is unique and must be treated on its own terms. I brought it up to debunk your argument about an inferred connection being made by the existence of this article between mass killing and Communist regimes. Just as slavery was not unique to ancient Greece and an article on that topic does not infer that there was a special connection between the two beyond the fact that it occurred, so mass killing was not unique to Communist regimes and this article does not infer a connection beyond the facts of what occurred. There were, however, in both cases, unique circumstances and characteristics that have been examined in reliable sources and so articles in Misplaced Pages are justified.

2. If you explain why you don't understand, then I can try to clarify things.

3. Having reread the previous posts, I see now that you were referring to propaganda due to the three specific omissions from the article you mentioned in your second sentence: who has made the connection, what connection they have made, and the level of acceptance of their views. I tend to think of propaganda as the presence of deliberate untruth or inaccuracy, rather than the absence of anything, so that word confused me. As I mentioned previously, the scholars are in fact named in the article, along with their views, in the "Proposed causes" section of the article. The "levels of acceptance" are not because it would be OR without sourcing. AmateurEditor (talk) 14:34, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

There was in fact a connection between slavery and ancient Greece, it was part of the economic and social system, incorporated into law and defended by political leaders of the time. Furthermore, Greece is a country. However, we do not have an article called "slavery in ancient Greece, Peru and the Confederate States, because someone believes we should group these countries together. TFD (talk) 15:27, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

This is (appears to be typical here), dispute "A" by raising "we don't have 'B'". Let's stick to the topic. This article is not about genocide by democracies, slavery in ancient Greece, or anything else that is being raised here that has no bearing on the topic. All appearing to be the exact indulgence in WP:OR and WP:SYNTHESIS that editors and then turn around and accuse the article of. PЄTЄRS J VЄСRUМВА ►TALK 16:00, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Vecrumba, the analogy is far from perfect but it can be useful. TFD, yes, there was a "connection" between ancient Greece and slavery. No, ancient Greece was not a state, it was a collection of city states which often differed (and went to war with each other). These city states are grouped together in the article because that is how reliable sources characterize the topic. Similarly in this article, there is a connection between Communist regimes and mass killing found in reliable sources and "communist regimes" is the characterization found those sources. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:27, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, please do not put words in my mouth. I never said ancient Greece was a state. However the individual states were connected by contiguousness, ethnicity, language, religion and customs. They self-identified as a people, identifying non-Greeks as "barbarians" and cooperated among themselves in various areas including the Olympics and the Trojan and the Greco-Persian wars. Please give me credit that I advanced far enough in my education to study classical history. TFD (talk) 16:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Since we weren't talking about modern Greece, I assumed a typo. But all that matters here is how reliable sources characterize a topic, TFD. In this case, they use "communist regimes". It is not a violation of NPOV policy. AmateurEditor (talk) 16:53, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Notice there is no Mass killings under ancient Greek regimes article, even though mass killings occured in Sparta and perhaps other Greek states. In order to write such an article you would have to explain why mass killings was an aspect of Greek, rather than specifically Spartan, culture. TFD (talk) 17:00, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

That article probably doesn't exist because there are no reliable sources for it, unlike this one. AmateurEditor (talk) 17:06, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

There certainly are. There just are not many editors hostile toward ancient Greece. TFD (talk) 17:14, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

No, that source does not mention "Greek regimes" or speak of mass killings in ancient greece more generally, so while it could be used to add facts to a Mass killings under ancient Greek regimes article, it cannot be used to justify the existence of such an article or the title of an article. The sources I excerpted here for this article, however, do justify this one. AmateurEditor (talk) 17:56, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)AmateurEditor, TFD didn't write Greece was a single state, he wrote it was a country, and that is true. It was a single nation united by common national economy, religion, language, culture and the Olympic games. The Greeks saw themselves as the single entity, by contrast to the barbarians from the West and the North and to the ancient peoples from the East. Therefore, it is correct to speak about them as about the single country divided onto many city-states.

The TFD's point seems to be correct, because we cannot group different categories arbitrarily, or based on the viewpoint shared by only a part of scholars. For instance, although we can list "slavery in ancient Greece, Peru and the Confederate States", because nominally the economy of those country was based on slave labour, however, it would be incorrect to group these countries separately from, e.g. Rome, Hellinistic states of Asia Minor, etc. Moreover, if we need to group any slave countries, we have to discuss slavery of Antique times together, because that phenomenon was different from the slavery during, e.g. Ancient Egypt, Central and Southern American civilisations and American slavery.

Similarly, many authors prefer to group mass killings committed by authoritarian regimes, others focus on totalitarian regimes only; some authors discuss mass killings in Asia, others discuss counter-guerilla mass killings; other authors discuss authoritarian or genocidal traditions in some particular Asiatic or European country; only small part of authors discuss mass killing in connection to Communism.--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:22, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Paul, I was addressing the point TFD seemed to be making, rather than what he literally said, because it seemed to be the more generous thing to do. It doesn't help us achieve consensus to nitpick, and I wasn't interested in going off on a tangent. This article does not "group different categories arbitrarily". The example of "slavery in ancient Greece, Peru and the Confederate States" is not something we can justify as a Misplaced Pages article because it is not a distinct topic found in reliable sources. It is also in no way comparable to this one, which groups things based on how reliable sources have grouped them. If other reliable sources have grouped things differently, then they can be used to justify other articles (or even changes to this article, depending on the circumstances). AmateurEditor (talk) 17:56, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Exactly, whereas some scholars group these events in such a way, and call them "mass killings", others group them differently, and sometimes use different terminology. Therefore, the article cannot present the current content as the mainstream views.--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:35, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Grouping the Communist regimes together is not at all controversial. The topic of mass killings as a topic is not controversial. The subtopic of mass killings under Communist regimes should also not be controversial. I know of no evidence that the topic of this article is at all controversial as a topic of study. I think you and I agree on this, although TFD does not (please correct me if I am wrong, either of you). There is definitely controversy between scholars within this subject, but it seems to be limited to three things: the best terminology to use for the topic as a whole, the regime intent behind a few events, and numerical estimates for events. I am not aware of any other controversies. Currently, each source's views are being presented as the views of that source alone. If you think a view presented in the article is being presented as the mainstream view while actually being outside the mainstream, then please make your case. AmateurEditor (talk) 20:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

I have been unable to find a single book about mass killings under Communist regimes. If some writers do group them together, then we owe to readers to say who they are, why they group them together, and provide commentary from reliable sources on their scholarship. Otherwise, this article is synthesis. TFD (talk) 21:08, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Here's a single book: Red Holocaust (2009 book). The article does say who the writers are. You can add the rest if you want and can source it. TFD, you started this talk page section to talk about "Neutrality". I answered your concerns and you ignore me ("...we owe to readers to say who they are..."). Why should I not ignore you in return? AmateurEditor (talk) 21:29, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

That is a start. We can look for sources that discuss the views presented in the book, and see how widely held they are, and develop a proper neutral lead. TFD (talk) 21:38, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

That book is mentioned in the very article we are discussing. An article you have apparently not familiarized yourself with, despite your prominence criticizing it on this talk page. And you still haven't acknowledged that the article does in fact mention the writers as you just demanded it do. Please stop what you are doing right now and take the time to read (or re-read) the Misplaced Pages article before continuing with your criticism of it. AmateurEditor (talk) 21:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

(out) My apologies, we did discuss this book before but I forgot about it because it is obscure. This book is a reliable source for facts, including what other academics say. He says, "Western public culture is profoundly uncomfortable with the Red Holocaust. It is inclined toward denial because a communist state policy of mass civilian slaughter impugns the west's faith in reason, progress, harmony and justice.... For the same reason, it is prone to excuse the mote, and when all else fails, to sermonize. Many however, resist believing that this dismal outcome was fated, or that communists employed massive violence to build and spread their systems. This treatise challenges the notion that communist economy was ever sound...."

In other words, Rosefielde acknowledges that he is presenting a minority view. His book False Science: Underestimating the Soviet Arms Buildup. An Appraisal of the CIA's Direct Costing Effort, 1960-1985, for example, was standard neo-conservative fare, arguing about the imminent danger of the Soviet Union months before its collapse.

We cannot present minority views as consensus views. We cannot use the existence of minority views as a hook for a coatrack, which is what this article does.

What we should do is explain Rosefielde's views and the degree of acceptance they have received.

TFD (talk) 02:46, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Here is a link to Rosefielde's 1988 book False Science, published by Transaction Publishers where he outlines the "Team B" conspiracy theory about how the Soviet Union has surpassed the U.S. in military ability and the CIA is hiding the fact from the American people. Months later the Soviet Union collapsed. TFD (talk) 03:28, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Apparently the Soviet Union collapsed because its economy could not sustain the massive arms build up. --Martin (talk) 06:03, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

There were several reasons for collapse of the USSR, and the massive arms build up was just one of them.--Paul Siebert (talk) 12:23, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Another major factor was the inability of a Soviet "planned economy" to actually find increases in productivity - the Chinese current system, by substituting the ability for rapid decision making for the inflexible "5 year plans" of the Soviets, and by allowing strong rewards for innovation and productivity, appears to be avoiding some of the worst problems of the Soviets and of the Mao-period China. No matter what the economic system, people work harder and smarter when they see rewards for doing so. (preceding is personal opinion based upon course work in economics, etc., and is not presented as an "Article edit") Collect (talk) 12:45, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Michael Harrington's analysis - "socialism" in the Soviet Union, China, and other countries was a method for rapid industrialization. It was not a step from feudalism toward communism but toward capitalism and has been successful, especially in China. TFD (talk) 14:56, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

As a reader and only minor editor, I probably should have no input, but I feel strongly after reading this article that it is terribly biased. I actually only clicked on the link to read this article because the title was so surprising. I wanted to know what scholarly connections had been drawn between mass killings and communism. I was quite disappointed as the article is merely a jumbled bag of occurrences with no explicit thread linking them. The implicit message was clear enough, though, "communism causes genocide". I think that this article may be salvaged if it was reframed as a description of a minority view point of socio-political history and a discussion of the notable scholars who hold that view.

The current article is basically a list of atrocities suffered under communist regimes, which is a valuable exercise that someone should undertake, but not wikipedia. 67.183.110.101 (talk) 16:09, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

External link to the Global Museum on Communism

The external link to the Global Museum on Communism should be removed from this article because it fails external links. See Links normally to be avoided:

Except for a link to an official page of the article's subject, one should generally avoid:

• 2.Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research, except to a limited extent in articles about the viewpoints that the site is presenting.
• 13.Sites that are only indirectly related to the article's subject: the link should be directly related to the subject of the article. A general site that has information about a variety of subjects should usually not be linked to from an article on a more specific subject. Similarly, a website on a specific subject should usually not be linked from an article about a general subject. If a section of a general website is devoted to the subject of the article, and meets the other criteria for linking, then that part of the site could be deep linked.
• 19.Links to websites of organizations mentioned in an article – unless they otherwise qualify as something that should be linked or considered.

The most obvious reason not to include is (19) - the site has its own article and the link should be there. (2) applies because the site is not scholarly or neutral. (13) applies because the site is not directly about mass killings under Communist regimes.

The issue was brought to the EL noticeboard before. The editor who restored the deletion of this link stated that it "seems a proper external link - does not fail WP:EL for sure". He appears to have forgotten the previous discussion.

TFD (talk) 02:39, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Try citing the EL standards: Is the site content accessible to the reader? Is the site content proper in the context of the article (useful, tasteful, informative, factual, etc.)? Is the link functional and likely to remain functional? To which the answers are all "yes." The site is not commercial, not a "fan site", and in fact represents an organization chartered by Act of Congress, presenting factual material to readers. Further, this has been discussed many times now, and the result has been the same every single time. The site is not only government sanctioned, it has information relevant to the article. Which, oddly enough, is the primary criterion for an external site! Unless, of course, you assert that an organization charted by the Congress is offering intentionally misleading material? But that was already dismissed in the past - so there is no leg to stand on there. The Global Museum on Communism is a project of the non-profit, non-partisan Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, established by an Act of Congress on December 17, 1993 and signed into law by President Bill Clinton. seems fairly reputable, I would say. Collect (talk) 02:47, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

This very obviously fails WP:ELNO because it is "only indirectly related to the article's subject". Since the article has no other external links, it is also fails WP:ELPOV. Typical of Collect to get appears to have amnesia about a recently established consensus. --FormerIP (talk) 03:11, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Aha -- so references to "millions of victims" clearly have no relationship to Communist excess deaths? Interesting take, that! BTW, your personal asides do not belong on any talk page on Misplaced Pages. I ask you redact such. Thank you most kindly. Collect (talk) 03:18, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

My pleasure. --FormerIP (talk) 03:35, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Apparently this material:

The breakdown of the number of deaths is as follows:

65 million in the People's Republic of China

20 million in the Soviet Union

2 million in Cambodia

2 million in North Korea

1.7 million in Africa

1.5 million in Afghanistan

1 million in the Communist states of Eastern Europe

1 million in Vietnam

150,000 in Latin America

10,000 deaths resulting from actions of the international communist movement and communist parties not in power.

Has nothing to do with this article. Nor does this:

The VOCMF has a three-phase mission:

The 1st phase of the mission, to memorialize the victims of communism, was realized with the dedication of the Victims of Communism Memorial in Washington, DC on June 12, 2007.

The 2nd phase of the mission, to educate the public, has been initiated with the launch of the Global Museum on Communism on June 16th 2009.

The 3rd phase of the mission, to document the evidence, is to be realized with the eventual construction of a permanent self-standing 'bricks and mortar' museum in Washington DC.

Nor does this:

Welcome to The Global Museum on Communism, an international portal created to honor the more than 100 million victims of communist tyranny and educate future generations about past and present communist atrocities.

None of this has any relevance to this article. Eh? Collect (talk) 03:23, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

(ec, a few now) I really fail to see how it fails. As an obvious parallel, the U.S. Holocaust Museum was also established by an act of Congress, no one has a problem citing it as a source on victims of Nazism. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 03:30, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

And I don't remember any consensus about non-inclusion, only editors advocating there was a consensus who wished to (my perception) suppress it as a source. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 03:32, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

There's a consensus in that multiple editors were against it and one editor was in favour. Of course, consensus can change, but ignoring the discussion and reverting anyway is not good form. --FormerIP (talk) 03:37, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

"Any relevance" is not the criterion. The content of the site is "only indirectly related" to the alleged academic discourse that is the subject of this article (i.e. it is not a site about "mass killings"). In any event, it also fails WP:ELPOV, as stated above. --FormerIP (talk) 03:35, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

The link is entirely relevant to this article and as such I have restored it. Tentontunic (talk) 08:15, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

RfC: External link to the Global Museum on Communism

Please consider joining the feedback request service. An editor has requested comments from other editors for this discussion. Within 24 hours, this page will be added to the following lists: Politics, government, and law History and geography When discussion has ended, remove this tag and it will be removed from the lists. If this page is on additional lists, they will be noted below.

Should the article Mass killings under Communist regimes contain an external link to the Global Museum on Communism website? TFD (talk) 23:19, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

• No. Inclusion of the link is a violation of external links. The specific problems are (1) we should not have links to sites where there is already an article about the organization, (2) the external site is not about "mass killings under communist regimes". but about the horrors of Communism in general, and (3) the site presents a specific non-mainstream point of view, viz., it presents as fact that Communism killed over 100 million people, while this article presents that number as an extreme upward estimate dismissed by mainstream writers, and the organization is run by Lee Edwards, the self-desribed historian of the American Right (who does not write for an academic audience) and has been involved in a number of extreme anti-Communist organizations. The relevant section of WP:EL says:

Links normally to be avoided:

Except for a link to an official page of the article's subject, one should generally avoid:

• 2.Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research, except to a limited extent in articles about the viewpoints that the site is presenting.
• 13.Sites that are only indirectly related to the article's subject: the link should be directly related to the subject of the article. A general site that has information about a variety of subjects should usually not be linked to from an article on a more specific subject. Similarly, a website on a specific subject should usually not be linked from an article about a general subject. If a section of a general website is devoted to the subject of the article, and meets the other criteria for linking, then that part of the site could be deep linked.
• 19.Links to websites of organizations mentioned in an article – unless they otherwise qualify as something that should be linked or considered.

TFD (talk) 23:19, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

• Yes Non-commercial site with official Congressional charter with material relating to deaths under Communist regimes. I would also support a link to a non-commerical site saying no deaths occurred, as long as readers were helped. The purpose of any EL is to help readers, period. As for making judgements on who the director is (clearly anyone with an opinion on one side is OK, but people with the "wrong" opinion become grounds for rejection of a site? I did not find that in the policies or guidelines, so that issue is not even valid to raise here. And I would ask that you not issue judgements about anyone at all being a member of an "extreme anti-Communist organization" without strong WP:BLP level sourcing. Collect (talk) 23:32, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

The main "extreme anti-Communist organization" was the World Anti-Communist League, "founded in 1966... under the initiative of Chiang Kai-shek. ... was placed under watch by the Anti-Defamation League, which said that the organization had increasingly become "a point of contact for extremists, racists, and anti-Semites"." TFD (talk) 00:25, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Eh? The ADL did not say "everyone in that organization is a racist, extremist, anti-semite" at all. Yet you think that is sufficient for labelling a person as "involved with extreme anti-communist organizations"? Sorry - it fails the smell test for WP:BLP Collect (talk) 01:26, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Note further that the ADL has cleared that organization. One ought not elide that fact. Collect (talk) 01:35, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• No. The link would clearly violate WP:EL, as already noted. To give any prominence to a site pushing such a fringe outlook would also violate WP:NPOV. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:34, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• fringe? President George W. Bush addresses his remarks Tuesday, June 12, 2007, at the dedication ceremony for the Victims of Communism Memorial in Washington, D.C Darkstar1st (talk) 01:07, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Whether it is fringe or not as a source is not the point. --FormerIP (talk) 01:33, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• No. As discussed above, it isn't in line with WP:EL and particularly WP:ELPOV. --FormerIP (talk) 01:33, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
  • • Just provide a link with another POV - where only one link is provided, it is pretty clear that this is not a veto power because the other side chooses to keep all links out. Collect (talk) 01:36, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Who's choosing to keep all links out? If you can find a balanced selection of links for inclusion, that might change the whole situation. --FormerIP (talk) 01:40, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I have repeatedly asked for other links. If only one link is provided by anyone, then using it is not violating any policies. Just add one with a distinctly different POV if you feel this particular link has an evil POV. But attacking the people running the site is silly. Collect (talk) 01:46, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think the guideline really cares who finds balancing links just so long as they are found. I'm pretty sure it doesn't cease to apply just because you have asked other editors to deal with the problem for you, though.

In any event, as you can see from the above, ELPOV isn't the only issue, even though it might be the most significant one. --FormerIP (talk) 02:02, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Yep - the fact that a person is somehow an "extreme racist fascist" seems key here :). I did not provide this link, but I dang sure feel deleting it because those who dislike it will not provide another link is quite against WP principles. Collect (talk) 02:10, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I think the key WP principle here is WP:BATTLEGROUND. It isn't up to other editors to parry your assault. What matters is the resulting content conforms to policy. A single EL with a clear POV doesn't do that, so find some others that could go with it. --FormerIP (talk) 02:23, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• Comment This seems like a pretty trivial issue for an RfC....? In reviewing WP:ELPOV, it does seem to bear on this question. BigK HeX (talk) 02:39, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• Yes. As much as I dislike adding yet more non-outside editor opinion to a RfC which is supposed to solicit input from uninvolved editors, there are a few points I think need to be made. Some objections to the use of this site an an external link in this article are not actual violations of WP:EL:

1) "we should not have links to sites where there is already an article about the organization". This reason is not even one of the items on the WP:ELNO list and seems to refer instead to the irrelevant issue of whether to use an external link or a wikilink for a term in the body of an article.

2) "the site presents a specific non-mainstream point of view". Even if this characterization were accurate, which it is not, it would qualify the link as one "to be considered" and therefore does not justify removal.

The possible actual violations of External links to avoid so far raised are the following:

1) Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research, except to a limited extent in articles about the viewpoints that the site is presenting. This has not been shown to apply. The onus is on the accuser to show that this is the case. The site has contributions from many reliable academics and scholars:.

2) Sites that are only indirectly related to the article's subject: the link should be directly related to the subject of the article. A general site that has information about a variety of subjects should usually not be linked to from an article on a more specific subject. The link is directly related to the article's subject but the information is organized by country. The site as a whole, however, is about those killed under Communism as a whole, which is why linking to the main page, rather than to the individual country pages, is most appropriate.

3) On articles with multiple points of view, avoid providing links too great in number or weight to one point of view, or that give undue weight to minority views. Add comments to these links informing the reader of their point of view. A single link is not a case of "too great a number of links". This justification, then, argues not for removing the link but for altering its presentation. AmateurEditor (talk) 03:16, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

• No It seems like the discussion is tending toward including the link in the context of other external links, which I would support. TimidGuy (talk) 12:03, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• Yes The link to the Global Museum on Communism is entirely within the article scope. Tentontunic (talk) 12:06, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• Yes Obviously related. Please remember "Misplaced Pages is not censored." Just because people dislike what a mainstream source says doesn't mean that it is "fringe" or can be removed. Smallbones (talk) 13:51, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• Yes. It seems like a reasonable link. I am aware of WP:EL, but we can be a little bit flexible when it comes to external links. All we are saying to the reader is "Here is a link. It has something to say about the general subject. We don't certify that anything there is correct. All we are certifying is that its something that reasonable people might find interesting". Herostratus (talk) 17:50, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• No. In addition to the WP:EL points raised by TFD, I would also like to add WP:ELPOV. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 22:06, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Was the Hungarian Revolution a "communist mass killing"?

I am unaware of any scholars calling the 1956 Hungarian Revolution a communist mass killing. But Darkstar1st is asserting that it was.

Were the Hungarian killed in the Soviet response to Hungary's violent revolution victims of a mass killing?

At Mass killing, I'm only finding a bunch of links to Genocide, Mass destruction, and Mass murder. How are mass killings defined? Was the Hungarian Revolution a mass killing? (If so, was the counter-revolutionary Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War yet another episode of mass killing?) Zloyvolsheb (talk) 03:09, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Do we have a source that calls it a Communist mass killing? It seems to be more an act of war or counter-insurgency, and the scale was too small. TFD (talk) 03:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

"Scale was too small"? and Hungary is not a huge nation. And calling the legal government of Hungary "insurgent" is absurd. Nagy invaded no one. Overthrew no one. But one can call it a "counter insurgency"? Only if one calls the Soviet troops the lawful government :) Collect (talk) 09:16, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

here is a photo of the pre-teen "insurgents" http://www.allposters.com/-sp/Budapest-Boys-from-Twelve-to-Late-Teens-Carrying-Rifles-Fighting-During-Hungarian-Revolution-Posters_i4921483_.htm?aid=95620932&DestType=7&Referrer=http://hungarian-revolution.purzuit.com/ Darkstar1st (talk) 09:46, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

To suggest that the Soviet military intervention in Hungary was 'counter-insurgency' is absurd. That anyone should advance such arguments seems to me to demonstrate just how ridiculous this debate has become. Rather than discussing the supposed article topic, people are now looking for ways to add or subtract 'killings' to support their POV. This is propaganda, plain and simple - as indeed is the entire article topic. The idea that whole swathes of history (and the lives of millions) can be reduced to a 'scorecard', and then used to 'demonstrate' the evils of a supposed political program (never explicitly discussed in the article, which almost implies that the objective of 'communism' was mass murder), is not only absurd, but offensive. Likewise, to try to portray the overthrow by Soviet military force of the legitimate government of Hungary as some sort of police action is also ridiculous. This whole 'good' vs 'evil' comic-book analysis of history should have no place in a legitimate encyclopaedia. AndyTheGrump (talk) 11:30, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Andy. While all of the information belongs in the individual country or system articles, the rationale for this article would also support "scorecard" articles for "Capitalism and mass killings" (we could even work the U.S. Civil War into this one), "Catholicism and mass killings" (remember St. Bartholemew!) and "Insert ethnic group, religion or political system of your choice here and mass killings".Jonathanwallace (talk) 12:09, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Valentino, who is the only writer to use the term "Communist mass killings" distinguishes between them and "Counterguerilla mass killings" ("The effort to defeat guerilla insurgencies"). He puts the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan into the latter group. It seems to me that the Soviet invasion of Hungary had greater similarity to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan than it does to actions of Soviet governments against its own people. The invasion of foreign states is not unique to Communism. In fact some non-Communist states have also invaded foreign countries. TFD (talk) 14:45, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Piled higher and deeper? So you would assert that the Soviet Union was the rightful government of Hungary, and Nagy was an "insurgent"? (noting you have not withdrawn the assertion that Hungarian deaths were due to "counter-insurgency"). Collect (talk) 15:01, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Trying to step back from the increasingly heated discussion. The fact this comes up at all indicates how woolly and poorly thought out this article is. "Mass killing" is such a large, ill-defined category, it can arguably include killings of soldiers during wartime (which do or do not violate Geneva conventions), killing of civilians in your own country, and of civilians in other people's countries (in peace or in wartime). The most narrow useful definition for this article would probably be "killing of civilians in your own country" and would cover the allegations about the USSR, China, Cambodia, etc. Hungary (forgetting the not very useful "insurgency" concept) is an example of "killing civilians in someone else's country during a military invasion". If we keep the field this broad, then "Democracy and mass killing" would also include discussions of the bombings of Hiroshima and Dresden, use of pilotless drones, cluster bombs and huge munitions in Iraq and Afghanistan today and all that good stuff. In cases like this, the broader the article, the less useful it is. Such topics are probably better discussed in narrower articles. Genocides in history has problems of its own, but at least is not titled "Mass killings by governments".Jonathanwallace (talk) 17:32, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Collect, I think you have got ahold of the wrong end of the stick. Deaths that resulted from the Soviet invasion of Hungary should be considered deaths that resulted from the Soviet invasion of Hungary because Hungary was not part of the Soviet Union. TFD (talk) 22:26, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I have tried to deal with your precise words. First the revolution deaths were "counter insurgency" deaths. That did not fly. Now you seem to say the people executed by the Soviet-installed government after the Soviets seized power are not "mass deaths under a communist government" because the Soviets were not the government of Hungary? I rather think that an executed person sorta blames the people in charge and does not think "Oh well - this is just a military death from an invasion." YMMV. Collect (talk) 23:05, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Collect, do you think that the killings were motivated by Communist ideology or were they part of extraterritorial aggression? TFD (talk) 23:43, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Collect, it's really, really beside the point to give in to speculations like whether the "executed person sorta blames the people in charge and does not think 'Oh well - this is just a military death from an invasion.'"

My original question was what does and does not count as a "mass killing". Is it several thousand, several hundred, or several dozen people? Do we include wartime deaths, deaths from insurrections and from rebellions? The previous consensus (if we can even call it that) has been that scholarly sources specifically referring to certain events as "mass killings" will suffice as WP:RS those events as instances of mass killing, but attempts at paranormal communication with the dead (accordingly) will not. Benjamin Valentino characterizes a mass killing as the intentional killing of 50,000 or more innocent people during five years. Which seems to particularly rule out the Hungarian Revolution.

Of course, that's Valentino's view, and it's rather interesting that we have an article on Mass killings under Communist regimes, but no proper article on Mass killing (just a short disambiguation page). At any rate, we should at least stick to relying on actual scholars, and not try to ask the dead or engage in other forms of WP:OR. Please stick to WP:V. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 23:49, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Since the current article is based mostly on the Valentino's views (according to him, "dispossessive mass killings", e.g. famine deaths, etc are considered as mass killings), we must stick with his definition of mass killings, so 50,000 is definitely a threshold. In addition, all combatants should be excluded.

Regarding your notion about "mass killing" (in general), the ambiguation page creates an impression that the interpretation of this term in Misplaced Pages is much stricter unless it is not applied to Communism. That is a serious big neutrality issue, which should be addressed in close future. In particular, I cannot understand why all general consideration about terminology should be here, not in the "Mass killing" article.--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:01, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

The reason we only have this mass killings article is that the article was original created by User talk:Joklolk who has been permanently banned as a troll, and called "Communist genocide". When the article was nominated for deletion because it was original research, editors decided to change the title. While we have an issue about what constitutes mass killings, we also have an issue as to what constitutes communist mass killings. Communists mass killings are not just mass killings by Communists, otherwise this article would be pure synthesis, but mass killings that are somehow different from mass killings by people with other ideologies. TFD (talk) 04:20, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

This is not true, and I have pointed this out to you before. The move discussion started ten days before the AfD, being in two parts here and here The move discussion closed and the article was moved on 24 (or 25 depending upon time zone) September 2009, on the same day as the AfD was opened . What I find amazing is that you fully participated in the move discussion so I don't know how you can claim it came after the AfD. --Martin (talk) 09:16, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

"Nexus article" requires re-work and sourcing

This is effectively a "nexus" article about the connection between Communism and murder, yet (as Andy points out in the previous section) skips any discussion of the actual connection, assuming we all understand it. A "nexus" article should illustrate that the connection itself is notable. That is why we don't have "Mass killings on Tuesdays". (See also the very funny Judaism and bus stops deletion discussion.) As it happens, the Communism/Mass killing nexus is notable, but the article never bothers to establish notability. It would become encyclopedic if recast as an article on the work of notable historians, sociologists etc. who have examined the Communism/mass killing nexus. Specific country examples would then come in through their work. There is no lack of such sources on many of the examples mentioned. FWIW, articles on "capitalism and mass killing", "democracy and mass killing" and so forth could be similarly sourced. History is "indeed, little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind. " Gibbon. Jonathanwallace (talk) 13:05, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Note Anti-communist mass killings and its edit history, especially those adding material to that article. Collect (talk) 13:21, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I'll take a look. BTW, I note your interest in WP:ADVOCACY articles from your talk page. I think this one fits the bill, because of its failure to focus on the work of notable historians and sociologists. in other words, instead of properly reporting on advocacy, it skips that step and becomes the advocacy itself.Jonathanwallace (talk) 13:35, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

(Collect--I segregated this as a new section and made some hopefully nonsubstantive changes to my first comment to clarify that. Since you had already replied, I'm mentioning it because such edits are disfavored if they undermine the sense of the replies. I think I avoided that here.) Also wanted to mention that the article lede, "Study has been made of states that have declared adherence to some form of Communist doctrine, and have killed significant numbers of people or facilitated their deaths" is a perfect example of weasel words. Jonathanwallace (talk) 13:44, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

The prior lede was not weaselly - this one was produced by , , (sock edit), and such edits as , , and especially such edits as . There have been eight AfDs on the article (under two names) so that part is pretty much settled as a non-starter (last one was a very strong "keep" result). Collect (talk) 14:11, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, not really arguing it should be AFD'd, just intelligently fixed. Anyway, this has all inspired me to try writing an essay on "notability in nexus articles" where a preposition connects two concepts. Jonathanwallace (talk) 17:21, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

@ Collect: If the only lede that is acceptable to contributors is one that suggests that an article is promoting a minority viewpoint based on a dubious synthesis, shouldn't we take this as a sign that it actually is one?

@ Jonathanwallace. That sounds like a very useful essay: let me know if you want my input. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:28, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Andy--yes, I will let you know as soon as I have a draft in userspace.Jonathanwallace (talk) 17:34, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Before you devote your time in improving this article, you should read through the discussions which have been archived. TFD (talk) 06:12, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think either Jonathanwallace or I are suggesting an essay on this specific topic: the problem is much more endemic in Misplaced Pages. Frankly, I've more or less given this mess up as a lost cause, and see the solution in actually changing the criteria (or at least the attitude) for what makes an article acceptable to be more worthwhile than in engaging in the sort of pointless Wikilawyering and endless going over the same grounds that we see here. It looks more like a role-playing game than a debate about encyclopaedia content, and while it is using the deaths of millions as fodder for debate, I'd rather not play along. AndyTheGrump (talk) 06:43, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

This is not paraphrasing

I strongly object to this revert by Tentontunic .

Valentino does not state "some Eastern European and African countries". He writes that mass killings by communists occured "Eastern Europe and Africa." It's common knowledge that there were mass killings in the USSR (which can be taken to include various of Eastern European countries) and in Ethiopia, but nobody has been able to point out where else they occured. The article does not discuss any mass killings in Africa outside of Ethiopia; it's likely that Mengistu's Red Terror is the only example of mass killing under a communist regime in Africa.

But the word "some" is synonymous with "a few" and therefore strongly implies something to the effect that mutliple African regimes carried out mass killings. That isn't claimed by Valentino, and Tentontunic's (and AmteurEditor's) edits cannot perforce be regarded as a valid paraphrase. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 21:48, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Fixed, which is really what you ought to have done. Tentontunic (talk) 22:11, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for being a gentleman and fixing that ever-so-politely. You, know it is rather hard to fix things yourself when people revert you while the article is on 1RR. Meanwhile, please list the Eastern European countries where scholars say communist mass killings occured. Otherwise, we should revert back to my version. As I originally pointed out, saying "Eastern European countries" and "Africa" is helplessly vague, since "Eastern European countries" may well mean the USSR. And since the only African state where there was an African Red Terror was Ethiopia, we can refer to Mengistu's Ethiopia in place of "Africa". Zloyvolsheb (talk) 22:21, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

However Mengistu's Red Terror is the only example of mass killing Then this means there are two? Thus the original statement would have been correct, we ought to in fact add Mengistu's Red Terror to the article? Is this what you are in fact stating? Tentontunic (talk) 22:15, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand what you're talking about. What do you refer to by "two"? You do realize that Ethiopia is in Africa, right? Zloyvolsheb (talk) 22:21, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Terribly sorry, I made an error in my geography. An normal edit would not have been an issue I am sure, I made mention of this on your talk page I believe? Tentontunic (talk) 22:53, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I have restored Eastern European, for I am quite sure that the USSR contained quite a large chunk of it. Tentontunic (talk) 20:59, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Why? We already mention the USSR in the lede - so it's pretty redundant, isn't it? It reads: The highest death tolls that have been calculated are in the People's Republic of China under Mao, the Soviet Union under Stalin, and in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge'. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 21:03, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Because we ought to point out were the killings occurred, and a great many happened within Eastern Europe. Tentontunic (talk) 21:13, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

But they happened in Eastern Europe in the USSR (under Stalin). Do you not see the redundancy? Zloyvolsheb (talk) 21:41, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Tens of millions, not millions butchered

Anyone with the vaguest grasp of twentieth century history knows that this is the case. So why is Misplaced Pages pretending otherwise? Has it become so grotesquely propagandised by the totalitarian left? Jprw (talk) 18:29, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Change it to the smallest and largest estimates, that ought to be satisfactory to all and it is of course WP:NPOV Tentontunic (talk) 18:32, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Can anyone explain why a Wiki "grotesquely propagandised by the totalitarian left" would have an article entitled "Mass killings under Communist regimes"? AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:40, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Because totalitarian leftists will not allow this article to be titled Red Final Solution or The Red Holocaust. Also, I'm not sure that being a famine victim under, say, Mao's crappy agricultural policy really counts as "being butchered" but whatever, I'm patriotic and don't want to sound like a liberal-leftist-hippy. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 20:24, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Since the google.scholar gives just 5 results for "Red Final Solution" , and all of them are chemical articles, and just 65 for "Red Holocaust" , these two terms are definitely fringe. A possible explanation is that Western scholars are predominantly totalitarian leftists...

Interestingly, one of those sources (Norman Rich. Central European History Vol. 37, No. 2, 2004 ) states that "However horrendous the crimes of communism were, there never was a Red Holocaust ". I think, that statement should be added to the article. --Paul Siebert (talk) 04:52, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Tens of millions lost their lives in various episodes of mass killings by these regimes...

I encourage newcomers to read the talk page where this issue has already been discussed. Whereas the fact that tens of millions lost their lives prematurely under Communist regimes (mostly as a result of civil wars, famines or diseases) is indisputable, only small part of scholars characterise all these events as mass killings. As a rule, only such events as Kampuchean genocide, Great Purge, or Ciltural revolution are characterised as mass killings. However, they caused million, not tens of millions deaths. I already explained that on this talk page before. I suggest to self-revert the recent changes in the sentence quited above, and to discuss the lede on the talk page first. If the change will not be self reverted, I'll revert it, and any other attempt to restore the current wording without a consensus will be considered as edit warring.--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:46, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Given the fact that almost ten million died in the enforced famine in the Ukraine alone (I presume that we can all agree that this qualifies as a mass killing) I would suggest that it is nonsensical and deeply misrepresentative to be discussing mass deaths under communism in terms of millions and not tens of millions. This is indisputable; therefore "Tens of millions lost their lives etc." should remain as being perfectly reasonable, accurate and non-problematic. From the introduction to Robert Conquest's Harvest of Sorrow:

Fifty years ago as I write these words, the Ukraine and the Ukrainian, Cossack and other areas to its east -- a great stretch of territory with some forty million inhabitants -- was like one vast Belsen. A quarter of the rural population, men, women and children, lay dead or dying, the rest in various stages of debilitation with no strength to bury their families or neighbours. At the same time, (as at Belsen), well-fed squads of police or party officials supervised the victims.

I can't believe that we actually need to be arguing this. Jprw (talk) 08:15, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, to say only millions died prematurely under communist regimes is obviously false. Given Stalin alone is held to account for some twenty million we are already into "tens of millions" after all. It would be far easier and NPOV to cite both the high and low figures bandied about. Tentontunic (talk) 08:27, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, we cannot. What we have is: during Kampuchean genocide (the only officially recognised genocide committed by the regime that identified itself as Communist) ca 2 millions were killed. During the Great Purge 0.7 million were executed; a total amount of killed was ca 1.2 millions. By contrast, the amount of people who died prematurely under during the Stalin regime (famine and deportation deaths, camp mortality, diseases, etc) is 15-20 million, and we can speak about tens of millions. However, most scholars do not describe those deaths as mass killings. Accordingly, we can speak about tens of millions victims, but only small part of them belongs to the lede, because the article describes famines in a controversy section. The lede must reflect what the article says, and all these arguments have already been presented on this talk page.

I again propose you to self-revert and remind you that the article is under 1RR. --Paul Siebert (talk) 13:42, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

I have no need to self revert, please look at the articles history. How do "Most scholars" describe Stalins actions then? I have certainly seen his actions described as genocide. For instance Stalin's Genocides Norman M. Naimark. Princeton University Press (19 July 2010 ISBN 978-0691147840 Tentontunic (talk) 08:24, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Was the famine in the Ukraine (let me remind you again, one single incident from 1932-33, which possibly claimed upwards of 10 million lives) under communism a mass killing or not? Jprw (talk) 15:06, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Likely a "counter-insurgency"? Collect (talk) 15:11, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Even the Black Book of Communism (not the most leftist sources) estimates the number of the victims in the USSR to be around 15 million (of course, I mean not the notorious Courtois' introduction, but the chapter written by Nicolas Werth, the least controversial part of the book; btw, Werth did not support main Courtois' claims). This included Holodomor and other events. Regarding the famine of 1932-33, the number of 10 million is disputable. Estimates range between ca 3 and ca 10 million (the article currently says 6-8 million). In addition, it is not correct to claim that all of those victims were just starved to death, a considerable part of victims died from typhoid fever, from other diseases exacerbated by malnutrition and poor sanitary conditions. And, most importantly, although the fact that these deaths did occur in indisputable, these events are not described as mass killings by most scholars.
Again, the edits you Jprw made contradict to what the reliable sources (and the article) say. They must be reverted immediately, and after that we can continue our discussion.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:26, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Do you think the holocaust qualifies as a mass killing? Jprw (talk) 17:25, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes. Are you going to self-revert? Re Naimark's "genocide", other scholars, e.g., Ellman, clearly state that there is no sufficient ground to speak about strictly defined genocide. With regard loosely defined genocide, this term is applicable to so wide range of events that its usage simply become senseless. I request you to self-revert.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:30, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Then the deaths in the Soviet Death Camps (let's leave out China and North Korea for the moment) also qualify as a mass killing? Jprw (talk) 06:02, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

According to Steven Wheatcroft (the source is cited in the article), there were no death camps in the Soviet Union.--Paul Siebert (talk) 06:35, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

They were in effect death camps, as you surely must realise. Just as the famine in the Ukraine was in effect a gigantic Belsen, supervised and facilitated by the State under direct orders from Stalin (he even admitted it to Churchill at Yalta). So the deaths in the Gulag, a system set up and supervised by the Soviet State, can also qualify as a mass killing. Or is it a case of "all deaths are equal, but some deaths are more equal than others" (i.e., if you die in a Nazi death camp you're part of a mass killing, but if you die in a Soviet death camp, you're not). Another question for you – do you think that holocaust victims who died from diseases brought on by malnutrition and poor sanitary conditions should not count among the 6 million who died? Jprw (talk) 06:53, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Re "They were in effect death camps" That is what you say. Reliable sources available for me contradict to this your conclusion.

Re "if you die in a Nazi death camp you're part of a mass killing, but if you die in a Soviet death camp, you're not" Please, read the article: Stephen Wheatcroft. The Scale and Nature of German and Soviet Repression and Mass Killings, 1930–45. Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 48, No. 8 (Dec., 1996), pp. 1319–1353. He analysed this issue in details, and concluded that the difference was very significant.--Paul Siebert (talk) 08:00, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

For your convenience, I provide the extended quote from this source:

"The nature of Soviet repression and mass killing was clearly far more complex than normally assumed. Mass purposive killings in terms of executions were probably in the order of one million and probably as large as the total number of recorded deaths in the Gulag. In this narrowest category of purposefully caused deaths, the situation is exactly the opposite to that generally accepted. Hitler caused the murder of at least 5 million innocent people largely, it would appear, because he did not like Jews and communists. Stalin by contrast can be charged with causing the purposive death of something in the order of a million people. Furthermore the purposive deaths caused by Hitler fit more closely into the category of 'murder', while those caused by Stalin fit more closely the category of 'execution'. Stalin undoubtedly caused many innocent people to be executed, but it seems likely that he thought many of them guilty of crimes against the state and felt that the execution of others would act as a deterent to the guilty. He signed the papers and insisted on documentation. Hitler, by contrast, wanted to be rid of the Jews and communists simply because they were Jews and communists. He was not concerned about making any pretence at legality. He was careful not to sign anything on this matter and was equally insistent on no documentation"

"The Gulag was neither as large nor as deadly as it is often presented, it was not a death camp, although in cases of general food shortage (1932-33 and 1942-43) it would suffer significantly more than the population at large. There were not 12 million deaths in the camps as suggested by Maier; and it seems highly unlikely that there were as many as 7 million deaths between 1935 and 1941 as claimed by Conquest citing Mikoyan's son. With a maximum number of inmates of 1.5 million in 1941 the Gulag was nevertheless of demographic significance and more than twenty times as large as the prewar Nazi concentration camp system at its peak following Kristallnacht. But all the same, twenty times as large as pre-war Nazi concentration camps does not make anything like Auschwitz."

Please, note, that the quote has been taken from the reliable secondary source, which was written by a reputable scholar and published in the high level peer-reviewed scholarly journal. You cannot reject these conclusions just based on what you read in obsolete books or popular web sites.--Paul Siebert (talk) 08:11, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, to say there were no Soviet death cams is also incorrect. Sakwa, Richard The rise and fall of the Soviet Union, 1917-1991. Routledge; 1et edition 17 Jun 1999 ISBN 978-0415122900 p232. Kun, Miklós Stalin: an unknown portrait. Central European University Press 1 March 2003 ISBN 978-9639241190 pX. Vizinczey, Stephen Truth and Lies in Literature: Essays and Reviews University of Chicago Press New edition 1 Feb 1988 ISBN 978-0226858845 p307, this took all of two minutes to find. I still await a response to my reply to your question above. Tentontunic (talk) 08:24, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

You should address these your arguments not to me, but to Wheatcroft. Please, take into account that many books written before 1990 (and some of those written later) do not take into account the data from declassified Soviet archives and similar documents, and, therefore, are based on obsolete and inaccurate earlier estimates, which contain dramatically inflated figures.--Paul Siebert (talk) 08:31, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, you are the one stating there were no Soviet death camps. I believe you have just been proved wrong. I will also point out to you that two of the books presented above were printed after 1990. Please do not assign undue weight to one scholars opinion. Tentontunic (talk) 09:03, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

There were no death camps, Tentontunic. The writers who employ the locution "death camps" to describe the Soviet Gulag camps are using hyperbole—ie, they are not to be taken literally. More careful scholars do take the pains to point out the distinction and explicitly mention that there were no extermination or death camps (). E.g., Professor Daniel Chirot, who writes about both Nazi and Soviet brutalities in Modern Tyrants: The Power and Influence of Evil in Our Age (Princeton University Press, 1996)

The stories that subsequently came out of the prisons and camps show how much sadism and wanton cruelty there was on the part of the police interrogators, and within the camps, by the guards. As in Nazi Germany, the trips to the camps were themselves nightmares of overcrowding, famine, and thirst, with many perishing on the way. Nevertheless, these were not death camps as were the German ones, because there was no plan to systematically exterminate all the prisoners.

Zloyvolsheb (talk) 16:59, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Gulag A History by Anne Applebaum (2003) is also an excellent and important overview of the Gulag system. To take one statistic from the book, it is estimated that between 1941-42 one quarter of the entire Gulag population starved to death. Millions were tortured, starved, and worked to death, the life expectancy was three months in some of the Siberian camps. They were to all intents and purposes death camps. The term Gulag has rightly come to mean a symbol of oppression and totalitarian power; how disturbing that some on this talk page seem so keen to ignore so many facts and accounts from the historical records. Jprw (talk) 13:32, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Note threading when you say "you." Collect (talk) 16:14, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Sorry. Fixed.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:30, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Applepaum etc.

To avoid future arguments similar to those from the last posts of Jprw, Tentontunic, and other newcomers, let me reproduce some old arguments and sources I already presented on other talk pages.
Opening of formerly classified Soviet archives compelled most western scholars to re-consider their views on the Soviet history (Doing Soviet History: The Impact of the Archival Revolution Author(s): Donald J. Raleigh Source: Russian Review, Vol. 61, No. 1 (Jan., 2002), pp. 16-24) Currently, most scholars and political writers who write about Stalinist repressions use for their works a seminal article published in the American Historical Reviews by J. Arch Getty, Gábor T. Rittersporn, Viktor N. Zemskov. (Victims of the Soviet Penal System in the Pre-War Years: A First Approach on the Basis of Archival Evidence Author(s): J. Arch Getty, Gábor T. Rittersporn, Viktor N. Zemskov Source: The American Historical Review, Vol. 98, No. 4 (Oct., 1993), pp. 1017-1049). To avoid accusation in OR, let me quote such a rightist and anti-Communist scholar as Robert Conquest, who wrote:

"We are all inclined to accept the Zemskov totals (even if not as complete) with their 14 million intake to Gulag 'camps' alone, to which must be added 4-5 million going to Gulag 'colonies', to say nothing of the 3.5 million already in, or sent to, 'labour settlements'." (Robert Conquest in "Victims of Stalinism: A Comment." Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 49, No. 7 (Nov., 1997), pp. 1317-1319 )

Interestingly, these data, obtained based on the exhaustive analysis of declassified Soviet archives, have been carefully checked by other western scholars, including cross-check (comparison of the figures taken from local and central archives, analysis of the number of NKVD troops who guarded the camps, etc), who came to a conclusion that it would be highly unlikely that these figures were forged.

"Cheating on a large scale could surely have been detected. So when the records show that there were 2.6 million zaklyuchennye in 1950, plus 2.3 million in spetsposeleniya (i.e. in exile, but not behind wire), and that this was the highest such total in Soviet history, this does seem likely to be close to the truth, and estimates made in and out of Russia which name much higher figures have to be revised downwards." (Terror Victims. Is the Evidence Complete? Author(s): Alec Nove Source: Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 46, No. 3 (1994), pp. 535-537)

Based on these figures, Michael Ellman concluded that:

The best estimate that can currently be made of the number of repression deaths in 1937-38 is the range 950,000-1.2 million, i.e. about a million. This is the estimate which should be used by historians, teachers and journalists concerned with twentieth century Russian-and world-history. Naturally it may, or may not, have to be revised in the future as more evidence becomes available. Most of these repression deaths were deliberate NKVD killings ('executions') but a significant number were deaths in detention (some of which were also deliberate). An unknown number of them were people who died shortly after their release from the Gulag as a result of their treatment in it." (Soviet Repression Statistics: Some Comments. Author(s): Michael Ellman. Source: Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 54, No. 7 (Nov., 2002), pp. 1151-1172)

Now, in light of all said above, let me discuss the Applebaum's book and the interpretation of her conclusions made by Jprw. Firstly, by contrast to the authors quoted by me, Anne Applebaum is a political journalist. She never did her own archival studies and relied on the works published by others. In actuality, majority of figures she uses in her book were taken from the GRZ article (either directly, or indirectly, from the works of other scholars who used GRZ's data). For instance, she claimed that, according to official statistics, on January 1950, the Gulag contained 2,561,351 prisoners in a camps and colonies of the system . Let's compare this figure with the data from the Getty, Rittersporn, Zemskov's article. According to them, there were 1,727,970 inmates in the Gulag camps and 740,554 inmates in colonies.

1,727,970 (Gulag, Zemskov) + 740,554 (colonies, Zemskov) = 2,468,524 (Gulag, Appelbaum)

Taking into account that the GRZ article is an original work (Applebaum and all scholars cite this article) it is obvious that Appelbaum took GRZ's data, not vise versa. In other words, it is simply ridiculous to contrapose the data of Appelbaum (taken in actuality from the works of serious scholars) and the works of these scholars themselves.

Jprw writes (referring to Applebaum):

"To take one statistic from the book, it is estimated that between 1941-42 one quarter of the entire Gulag population starved to death. Millions were tortured, starved, and worked to death, the life expectancy was three months in some of the Siberian camps. They were to all intents and purposes death camps."

Getty writes:

"More than half of all GULAG deaths in the entire 1934-1953 period occurred in 1941-1943, mostly from malnutrition. The space allotment per inmate in 1942 was only one square meter per person, and work norms were increased. Although rations were augmented in 1944 and inmates given reduced sentences for overfilling their work quotas, the calorie content of their daily provision was still 30 percent less than in the pre-war period. Obviously, the greatest privation, hunger, and number of deaths among GULAG inmates, as for the general Soviet population, occurred during the war." (Getty, Rittersporn, Zemskov, Op.cit.)

In other words, we have the same facts, that have been represented quite differently: whereas Jprw makes a stress on the WWII time mortality (probably implying that the same events occurred during the whole period of Gulag history), GRZ write that that was an extraordinary period of the Gulag history, and that it was connected with desperate food shortage in the USSR as whole during that time. Obviously, the arguments that "Millions were tortured, starved, and worked to death..." is either Jprw's or Applebaum's inventions, because the only source of reliable information (the articles of serious scholars quoted above, as well as the works of Wheatcroft and similar scholars) contain no such figures.

"After a brief discussion of Zemskov's figures and those of Nekrasov, I pointed out that these figures gave a maximum number of 2.53 million prisoners in the camps, colonies and jails, 2.75 million special exiles (spetsposelentsy) and 65 332 in exile or banishment, which gave a total for 1953 of 5.35 million. 'These figures are, of course considerably smaller than those cited by Conquest and Rosefielde for the Gulag population alone'. The camp mortality figures that could be calculated from the Zemskov data indicated an average level of 70 per thousand for the 1934-47 period. When applied to the smaller level of one to two million in gulag for 15 years, they would account for about 1.6 million deaths..." (Victims of Stalinism and the Soviet Secret Police: The Comparability and Reliability of the Archival Data. Not the Last Word. Author(s): Stephen G. Wheatcroft. Source: Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 51, No. 2 (Mar., 1999), pp. 315-345)

Enough for today. I'll add more sources/quotes/references if needed.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:25, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes and please do not forget to add Conquest's reply to Wheatcroft which can be found here . I'll leave you with one quote from it:

Throughout his piece, Wheatcroft is concerned to misrepresent and impugn my motives -- the traditional recourse of the sectarian. It would be hard, apparently, to explain to Wheatcroft that my early works on the Soviet Union were undertaken out of a wish to discover the facts. Academics, in the sense Wheatcroft intends, had not done so (and work by the leading Russianist, Sir Bernard Pares, and the leading social scientists, the Webbs, and most others, were valueless). I have avoided the abusive tone Wheatcroft has used against me, but I will not conclude without mention of an acquaintance who had attended a talk of his at the time the mass graves were being discovered, telling me that when she raised the subject, he dismissed it ("rather testily"!) as rumours. Yes, after all, bodies are not documents.

Jprw (talk) 06:34, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. The only thing that remains unclear for me is what relation does it have to the subject of our discussion. The key points of my post in this section are:

1. That archival materials that become available after the collapse of the USSR forced the western scholars to re-consider their viewpoint on some key aspects of Soviet history;
2. That the data are considered reliable by most scholars, including Robert Conquest;
3. That these data do not support earlier estimates of the number of the Gulag inmates and camp mortality;
4. That the maximal population of Gulag camps was ca 2.5 million (btw, close to the prison population in present days USA ), the total amount of those passed through Gulag was 14 million, and the amount of deaths in captivity was ca 1.5 - 2 millions, not "tens of millions".

Regarding the disagreements between Wheatcroft, Rosenfielde and Conquest, their dispute is long, they sometimes disagree, sometimes they accept the validity of each other's arguments, however, I see no direct relation between that and the subject of this section. --Paul Siebert (talk) 07:06, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

PS. Thank you for pointing my attention at the http://sovietinfo.tripod.com site. It contains interesting, although not complete collection of the works published by the western scholars about Soviet repressions. It gives a reader a more or less adequate impression about the whole spectrum of views, with Conquest and Rosenfielde on the right part of spectrum, Wheatcroft on the left and Ellman in the middle. Try to read all of that, it is really interesting. I hope that will help you to somewhat re-consider your views.--Paul Siebert (talk) 07:43, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes I agree it is a valuable source. I hope it also helps you understand that Wheatcroft, who you like quoting so much, emerges from this source as a kind of extreme left-wing equivalent of David Irving, and that in terms of establishing accuracy and objectivity, it might be inadvisable to rely on him so much, if at all. Jprw (talk) 11:30, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Firstly, I cited Raleigh, Conquest, Getty, Ellman and Nove, and I cited Wheatcroft only once in this section. Therefore, your statement that I like to quote him so much is not correct.

Secondly, as regards to "left-wing equivalent of David Irving", the non-exhaustive list of Wheatcroft's publications in peer-reviewed western scholarly journals is below:

1. The Scale and Nature of German and Soviet Repression and Mass Killings, 1930-45 Stephen Wheatcroft Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 48, No. 8 (Dec., 1996), pp. 1319-1353
2. Towards a Thorough Analysis of Soviet Forced Labour Statistics S. G. Wheatcroft Soviet Studies, Vol. 35, No. 2 (Apr., 1983), pp. 223-237
3. A Note on Steven Rosefielde's Calculations of Excess Mortality in the USSR, 1929-1949 S. G. Wheatcroft Soviet Studies, Vol. 36, No. 2 (Apr., 1984), pp. 277-281
4. On Assessing the Size of Forced Concentration Camp Labour in the Soviet Union, 1929-56 S. G. Wheatcroft Soviet Studies, Vol. 33, No. 2 (Apr., 1981), pp. 265-295
5. More Light on the Scale of Repression and Excess Mortality in the Soviet Union in the 1930s S. G. Wheatcroft Soviet Studies, Vol. 42, No. 2 (Apr., 1990), pp. 355-367
6. Stalin and the Soviet Famine of 1932-33: A Reply to Ellman R. W. Davies, Stephen G. Wheatcroft Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 58, No. 4 (Jun., 2006), pp. 625-633
7. The Reliability of Russian Prewar Grain Output Statistics S. G. Wheatcroft Soviet Studies, Vol. 26, No. 2 (Apr., 1974), pp. 157-180
8. The Scale and Nature of Stalinist Repression and Its Demographic Significance: On Comments by Keep and Conquest S. G. WheatcroftEurope-Asia Studies, Vol. 52, No. 6 (Sep., 2000), pp. 1143-1159
9. Toward an Objective Evaluation of the Complexities of Soviet Social Reality under Stalin Stephen G. Wheatcroft Slavic Review, Vol. 58, No. 1 (Spring, 1999), pp. 91-95
10. Further Thoughts on the First Soviet Five-Year Plan R. W. Davies, S. G. Wheatcroft Slavic Review, Vol. 34, No. 4 (Dec., 1975), pp. 790-802
11. Victims of Stalinism and the Soviet Secret Police: The Comparability and Reliability of the Archival Data. Not the Last Word Stephen G. Wheatcroft Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 51, No. 2 (Mar., 1999), pp. 315-345
12. The Great Leap Upwards: Anthropometric Data and Indicators of Crises and Secular Change in Soviet Welfare Levels, 1880-1960 Stephen G. Wheatcroft Slavic Review, Vol. 58, No. 1 (Spring, 1999), pp. 27-60
13. New Demographic Evidence on Excess Collectivization Deaths: Yet Another Kliukva from Steven Rosefielde? Stephen G. Wheatcroft Slavic Review, Vol. 44, No. 3 (Autumn, 1985), pp. 505-508
14. Steven Rosefielde's Kliukva R. W. Davies, S. G. Wheatcroft Slavic Review, Vol. 39, No. 4 (Dec., 1980), pp. 593-602
15. Understanding Stalinism: A Reply Stephen G. Wheatcroft Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 58, No. 7 (Nov., 2006), pp. 1141-1147
16. A Further Note of Clarification on the Famine, the Camps and Excess Mortality A Further Note of Clarification on the Famine, the Camps and Excess Mortality Stephen G. Wheatcroft Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 49, No. 3 (May, 1997), pp. 503-505
17. Soviet Industrialization Reconsidered: Some Preliminary Conclusions about Economic Development between 1926 and 1941 S. G. Wheatcroft, R. W. Davies, J. M. Cooper The Economic History Review, New Series, Vol. 39, No. 2 (May, 1986), pp. 264-294
18. Stalin, Grain Stocks and the Famine of 1932-1933 R. W. Davies, M. B. Tauger, S. G. Wheatcroft Slavic Review, Vol. 54, No. 3 (Autumn, 1995), pp. 642-657

Note, that each of these articles, by contrast to the Irving's books, have been wetted by a western scientific community, and I doubt far leftist views to be so widely supported by Western scholars. However, if you believe you are able to support your claim about Wheatcroft with reliable sources, please, do that.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:55, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

This is not OR

Re the edit by Jprw on 18:10, 12 February 2011, see Mass killings under Communist regimes#Others. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 18:15, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

I reverted that. The other sentence he tagged about the 70 million number, however, does have problems. For one, that number refers only to the big three (China, USSR, and Cambodia). Second, it is an upper limit estimate in a range given by Valentino on page 91. Since several recent disputes by new contributors here relate to the passage in question, I'll quote it here: "In this chapter I focus primarily on mass killings in the Soviet Union, China, and Cambodia - history's most murderous communist states. Communist violence in these three states alone may account for between 21 million and 70 million deaths. Mass killings on a smaller scale also appear to have been carried out by communist regimes in North Korea, Vietnam, Eastern Europe, and Africa. Documentation of these cases in secondary sources, however, remains inadequate to render a reliable judgment regarding the numbers and identity of the victims or the true intentions of their killers." AmateurEditor (talk) 19:22, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

You are right. I took that number from memory, and it actually referred to this three regimes only. The upper estimate Valentino cites for all nominally Communist (according to his own words) regimes is 110. However, I see one problem with citing this number (as well as with 70 millions, the number I added by myself): since Valentino did no his own research and relied upon other secondary sources, his estimate most likely came from the obsolete Rummel's works, who used old data, and whose figures, in most cases, are known to be skewed towards higher estimates. Sometimes the figures appear to be inflated dramatically. For example, argued that about 40 millions prisoners died in Gulag, whereas the generally accepted numbers range between 1-2 million. Therefore, I believe we have to modify this sentence as follows:

" According to these scholars, the total death toll of the mass killings defined in this way amounts tens of millions."

In my opinion, we cannot give more precise number in the lede, because that would be misleading.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:40, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

I have no problem with using "tens of millions". I also have no problem with including a range of estimates, but I can see how others might object. AmateurEditor (talk) 19:55, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Changed.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:29, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

On the other hand, much of the lead looks like a paraphrasing of the single source that you cite, which can't be satisfactory. Jprw (talk) 06:21, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

That demonstrates your unfamiliarity with the literature.--Paul Siebert (talk) 07:10, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

What do you mean? I was referring to the fact that most of the lead is Valentino on page 91 re-hashed. Do you not think we can do better than this, and use a variety of sources to create a richer and more balanced lead? Jprw (talk) 11:34, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

I mean that the lede more or less correctly reflects what the article says. The idea to combine all excess deaths (not only executions, but also famine victims, etc) in a category "mass killing" belongs to Valentino, therefore, it is natural to expect the article and theh lede to rely on his works.

--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:40, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Valentino summarizes the estimates of other scholars. If you have another source that does this differently, then please provide one. TFD (talk) 17:56, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Vietnam War ref

I have again reverted Tentontunic's recent edit -- this time because there is nothing about mass killings on p. 165 of Inside the VC and the NVA: The Real Story of North Vietnam's Armed Forces. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 23:24, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

I have just self-reverted myself right now per Tentontunic's appeal to 1RR, but this is still not a valid reference and has to go. I would therefore sugges that Tentontunic revert himself. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 23:29, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

(ec)I thanked you on your talk page, in retrospect I wish I had not. You need to WP:AGF and read WP:NPA you looked at the wrong page, I cited 185, not 165. The citations are for the Massacre at Huế and of course the Dak Son Massacre Tentontunic (talk) 23:33, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for correcting me. Albeit in fact there is nothing about "mass killings" on page 185 either. The page discusses the Vietcong and "terrorism", but says nothing (not one word) at all about mass killing, mass murder, or anything synonymous. It does describe two massacres, but these do not fit the definiton for mass killing offered by Benjamin Valentino (see the related talk section Was the Hungarian Revolution a "communist mass killing"?), and I think that it should be removed from here. Incidentally, the United States soldiers committed a series of massacres, most famously at My Lai, so if we don't remove it, we should reformulate this to the effect of something like "during the Vietnam War, both communist Vietcong and anti-communist American troops carried out massacres" (I could find many refs like that). Zloyvolsheb (talk) 23:46, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

A massacre is a mass killing. Valentino is not the word of god. American massacres belong in an article on american`s. Tentontunic (talk) 23:56, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Neither of these massacres occurred "under Communist regimes", but occurred in South Vietnam, which was a U.S. ally. TFD (talk) 23:51, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

The actions were carried out by communist regimes. Tentontunic (talk) 23:56, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

I have removed the massacres whilst we discuss the matter and have added another reference for Vietnam. Please explain why you feel a massacre is not a mass killing. Tentontunic (talk) 11:12, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

It does not meet the criteria for the only source presented in the article that defines "mass killings under Communist regimes". TFD (talk) 19:15, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

And which criteria would this be? A mass killing is a mass killing, why would a definition be required? Tentontunic (talk) 19:18, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Still awaiting a response on this question Tentontunic (talk) 21:31, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

POV

Another editor explained above why this article is POV and I am copying his comments below. Could editors please resolve this issue before removing the POV tag. TFD (talk) 20:22, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

This is effectively a "nexus" article about the connection between Communism and murder, yet (as Andy points out in the previous section) skips any discussion of the actual connection, assuming we all understand it. A "nexus" article should illustrate that the connection itself is notable. That is why we don't have "Mass killings on Tuesdays". (See also the very funny Judaism and bus stops deletion discussion.) As it happens, the Communism/Mass killing nexus is notable, but the article never bothers to establish notability. It would become encyclopedic if recast as an article on the work of notable historians, sociologists etc. who have examined the Communism/mass killing nexus. Specific country examples would then come in through their work. There is no lack of such sources on many of the examples mentioned. FWIW, articles on "capitalism and mass killing", "democracy and mass killing" and so forth could be similarly sourced. History is "indeed, little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind. " Gibbon. Jonathanwallace (talk) 13:05, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

And Jonathan is wrong, it really ought to surprise me that you would restore a BIAS tag on this article, yet on left wing terrorism you remove one within a few hours. You argue on communist terrorism to no end, you appear to be tendentious in your approach to articles which may be critical of communism in fact. Did you not just get warned for just this behavior? We have here an article, about mass killings which happened under communist regimes, it does not matter how many died under capitalism, or democracy, or the rule of the evil overlords of the mole people. What matters on this article is how many died under Communist Regimes. Tentontunic (talk) 23:14, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Care to explain why you think I am wrong? Do you think notability of a connection does not need to be established in an encyclopedia? Jonathanwallace (talk) 00:57, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

The connection is made in one of the sources already in the article, page 73 of Final solutions: mass killing and genocide in the twentieth century "The most deadly mass killings in history have resulted from the effort to transform society according to communist doctrine" A look in the archives also shows other sources which have been presented. Tentontunic (talk) 08:24, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, see that. The lede is still weaselly worded. An encyclopedia article should build from the central premise ("Communist regimes have a particular tendency to kill a lot of people") not justify it in passing after giving many examples. I'm also interested in the quality of the sources. I will spend some more time on it and will post suggestions here. Jonathanwallace (talk) 13:27, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I look forward to seeing your proposals Tentontunic (talk) 13:34, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

It would be helpful if you could provide sources for the article. TFD (talk) 13:47, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I have, my last few edits to the lede introduced several sources. Tentontunic (talk) 14:18, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Some edits

I just added the tag to the weasel worded lede ("Study has been made..."). In looking over the article, I then noticed the really remarkable assertion that Darwinism causes mass murder, sourced to Ann Coulter. Our official verifiability policy requires, "Exceptional claims require high-quality sources." Ann Coulter is not a reliable source for a historical link between belief in evolution science and mass murder. Jonathanwallace (talk) 00:52, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I just posted a query about this at the Reliable Source noticeboard. Jonathanwallace (talk) 01:16, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I would recommend moving Coulter's comments to the lead, because they draw a connection between Communism and mass killings which has been lacking. Mass killings under Communist regimes may be explained by their adherence to the Darwinian theory of evolution. Does anyone know if other scholars have the same opinion? TFD (talk) 02:53, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I understand your point, Jonathan, but I think Coulter's comments are representative of the level of scholarship on this topic and so I don't object to them being in the article. --FormerIP (talk) 02:55, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

How about renaming the article 'Mass killings by adherents to Newton's Theory of Gravity'? AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:56, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Coulter's book, Godless, which is the source used, was published by a division of Random House and Coulter is a reputable journalist writing for the National Review and appearing of Fox News Channel. She studied history at Cornell and has a doctorate (J.D.). TFD (talk) 03:36, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

""I like to stir up the pot. I don't pretend to be impartial or balanced, as broadcasters do..." http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/April06/coulter.pre.dea.html Reputable journalist? AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:42, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

TFD: I am trying to figure out whether your comments about moving the Darwinism-mass murder connection to the lede were serious or tongue-in-cheek. I've looked at your user page and still can't tell. Would you mind clarifying that? Jonathanwallace (talk) 13:35, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I would not use Coulter's writings. However all the polticial and social science articles suffer from the inclusion of popular, non-academic writing - this is just an egregious example. TFD (talk) 16:22, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

• Or you could move Coulter, George Watson's literary criticism, and Courtois' Introduction where he claims non-catholocism is an over all cause, etc. to a section "Fringe History and Sociology"; and leave the body section clear for real historical and sociological multi society claims, such as Valentino's dispossessive mass killing claim. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:56, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

to a high of 70 million

This is incorrect, the highest estimated number is 100 million, not 70. Also why on earth has this Billions of people have survived communist mass killings been inserted into the lede? It seems a little POV Tentontunic (talk) 16:29, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Why? Hundreds of thousands survived the Holocaust. Billions more survived the worldwide communist mass killings called the Red Holocaust. We should restore this point. Zloyvolsheb (talk) 12:11, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Zloy, not killing somebody is not news, and not a topic generally put in encyclopedias. For example, I didn't kill anybody today and presumably you didn't kill anybody today, but neither of those topics is going to appear in any newspaper or encyclopedia. Putting it in simply distracts the reader, like the smoke and mirrors of some cheap magic trick, trying to make 100 million deaths disappear from the article. Oh, actually they have disappeared from the article. Smallbones (talk) 12:39, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

IPOF, such material would require specific reliable sources making the claim. Such do not exist as far as I can tell -- making all of this speculation exceedingly moot. Collect (talk) 12:35, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

You actually want specific reliable sources that say billions of Chinese live in communist China, for exmaple? Otherwise, what speculation do you mean? Zloyvolsheb (talk) 12:39, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

As I already explained several times on the talk page, the edits similar to those made by Smallbones are highly misleading, and are not supported by a consensus: according to most sources except Valentino. Rummel and few others, 20-71 million were not killed, because the Valentino's definition of "mass killing" differs from the commonly accepted one. Accordingly, the words:

"The estimates of the number of non-combatants killed by these three regimes alone range from a low of 21 million to a high of 70 million"
Will be interpreted by an ordinary reader as if all these people were murdered, executes or exterminated, whereas the most common cause of these deaths was starvation and diseases.

I am intended to revert the lede to the last neutral version immediately after the issue with sanctions will be clarified (the only reason why I haven't done that immediately was that I thought it would be incorrect to edit the article when the situation with sanctions is unclear and not all users can work on the article; however, as I see not all users share this point of view), and I invite everyone to work on new lede on the article's talk page.
--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:11, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Re highest extimate of 100 million, it came from Rummel, who was demonstrated to give dramatically inflated estimates (for instance, he gives ca 40 million Gulag victims, whereas a current scholarly consensus is that the number of died in Gulag did not exceed 2 million). I repeated these arguments on the talk page many times, so all newbies are strongly encouraged to read the talk page to avoid repetitions of the same arguments again and again. See a message on the top of this talk page.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:15, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Only Rummel? attributes the same figure to Courtois rather than Rummel. No matter -- I just find the "billions did not die" comment from another to be on the order of "there were billions of people who did not see Babe Ruth hit a home run, therefore we can doubt that he ever hit one" type of reasoning. Collect (talk) 16:07, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Please, do not mention Courtois any more. The introduction to the BB is a highly controversial writing, if you want to use the BB correctly, use the Nocolas Werth's section about Russia/the USSR: he provides the numbers that are close to generally accepted ones. BTW, he also provides (in his interview) that the major causes of the brutality of the Communist revolution was the poorly accomplished Tsarist land reform, brutality of the WWI, and other factors not directly connected to the Communism. I am intended to add this, as well other similar pieces of information to the article infuture.

With regard to other sources giving high estimates, most of them are either obsolete, or they use the same flawed methodology as Rummel did. They belong to a Controvercy section, not to the lede.--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:24, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Proposal concerning new sanctions

I have proposed new discretionary sanctions for this article at User talk:Sandstein#Mass killings sanction, to allow their discussion by editors currently banned from editing this page to comment on them. (Nonetheless, editors who are banned from any general topic covering this article should also stay out of that discussion.)  Sandstein  22:07, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

from a low of 21 million

Why is Valentino the sole source for this number? Does it seem sketchy to anyone else to use this number and give the impression that Valentino is representing the lowest notable academic estimates for the USSR+China+Cambodia? This is especially so, when (IIRC) Valentino counts many deaths that other scholars do not believe are valid. BigK HeX (talk) 17:34, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Who else gives a low number? Personally I believe to much weight is being given to Valentino in this article, there are more than one source for such as the USSR Cambodia and China. Tentontunic (talk) 17:59, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I again strongly suggest you to read the talk page archives: it is simply non-polite to request others to repeat the same arguments simply because you are to lasy to read archives. I am explaining again, two types of mistakes are possible here: (i) infalted figures for death toll, and (ii) different interpretations of what is mass killings and waht is not. The high estimates of death toll come mostly from earlier writers (as Solzhenitsyn) or scholars (Rummel), and from those who reproduce these figures non-critically. In addition, whereas some scholars attribute most excess deaths under Communist regimes to mass killings, others prefer to discuss mass mortality, premature deaths, or speak about victims of Communist regimes. You must agree that "victim" is much more flexible, and do not necessarily implies "killing".

One more point. It is totally incorrect to combine almost fully non-contraversial categories (such as Kampuchean genocide, which was a pure example of mass murder) with much less clear cases, like Soviet famines.

Moreover, even the former case (KR genocide) is much more complex event than it is presented in the current article: the article implicitly assumes that these mass killings occurred predominantly due to the Communist ideology, whereas serious scholar outline at least two other causes, which are totally unrelated to Communism: desperate economic situation of Cambodian peasants (which lead to huge tensions between rural, Khmer, and urban, Chinese, Vietnamese, and other non-Khmer, population), and aincient Khmer traditions of revenge. In addition, the fact that the KR concept was seen as extremist even by Maoist Communists in China, and, therefore, was an example of ultra-extremist Communist doctrine (i.e. was a deviation from classical Communism) is also not reflected neither in the lede nor in the article. This, as well as other examples (which I can provide upon a request) demonstrate that both the lede and the article give a primitve and oversimplified picture which must be fixed.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:15, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

New editing restrictions

I propose that all editors who work on this talk page need to elaborate common rules, accordingto which we will edit the article in future. It would be better if we do that by themselves, because in that case the rules are more likely to be genuinely observed. I propose the following simple rules:

"You can make any edit, however, if the text you added has not been approved during the talk page discussion (that means that there were no reasonable, or substantiated opposition during a reasonable time, e.g. few days), it can be reverted by anyone, and anyone can report you if you try to do re-insert the text that again. Polls are not allowed. Your support or oppose has zero weight unless you presented a fresh argument, desirably supported by a reliable source. If you have been repeatedly reverted for systematic re-addition of non-supported text, you will be topic banned permanently."

This rule will allow all users, including previously banned ones, to work on this article, because it leaves no space for classical edit warring. Accordingly, 1RR or 1RR per week should be abolished, because anyone should be able to revert any amount of undiscussed and unsupported edits.
In my opinion, it is very important that we elaborate and accept these rule by ourselves. We already have an good example of efficient usage of these rules, the WWII article.
What do you think about that?--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:36, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Polls generally have little weight (see WP:VOTE) -- so that is a tad irrelevant. And defining "reasonable opposition" may be a problem - I would suggest that any text which is objected to as a new addition (text not found as of 10 days ago, say) should be removable. Thus no edit war, as the material would not be reinserted. As for "zero weight" that is absurd - no argument which is properly founded in WP policy or guidelines should be ignored. Lastly I would suggest a 10 lines of talk page edits per day per person here. If an editor can not be cogent in 10 lines, it is unlikely 20 lines will improve the post. Collect (talk) 19:49, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose Due to this Seven days ago two editors expressed disagreement with this addition. I removed the disputed content and have since waited for a response, both editors have been active on this page in this time. I had also added new references to the lede for mass killings in for Vietnam and North Korea, they appear to have vanished into the ether. These were reliable sources, and absolutely no discussion has been taken on their removal. Your proposal will make this situation worse, the article owners will remove content as they see fit, and quite happily ignore those they disagree with on the talk page. Tentontunic (talk) 19:59, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

1. ^ Cite error: The named reference NotRef was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
2. Links to websites are permitted when the website has been used as a WP:Reliable source, but not to direct readers to the organization's website or merely to verify that the organization exists, or that it has a website.
   No: "The Red Cross issued a press release that said..."
   Yes: "The Red Cross issued a press release that said..."
3. Links to websites are permitted when the website has been used as a WP:Reliable source, but not to direct readers to the organization's website or merely to verify that the organization exists, or that it has a website.
   No: "The Red Cross issued a press release that said..."
   Yes: "The Red Cross issued a press release that said..."

• All unassessed articles
• Start-Class history articles
• Low-importance history articles
• History articles needing attention
• WikiProject History articles
• Unassessed politics articles
• Unknown-importance politics articles
• WikiProject Politics articles
• C-Class Human rights articles
• Mid-importance Human rights articles
• WikiProject Human rights articles
• C-Class socialism articles
• Mid-importance socialism articles
• WikiProject Socialism articles
• Old requests for peer review
• Misplaced Pages requests for comment