Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 13:37, 29 December 2006

Could the involved parties please avoid editing Juan Cole until we can sort out the issues? Martinp23 13:37, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

To start with, I'd like the involved parties to post their side of the dispute in the sections prepared below. Try to ignore the comments left here by others in this preliminary stage and just write what your raw view of the debate is, what you're specifically supporting and why. For now, please don't reply to the comments made by eachother in your statements.

Please respect civility, no personal attacks and assume good faith in all comments on this page and, for that matter, ever. If you'd like to see another issue mediated upon, mention it in your statement and we'll take it from there. Also, for ease of reading, please sign yourposts. Thanks, Martinp23 22:16, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Is public participation/input in this dispute encouraged, discouraged or ignored? -CSTAR 22:23, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

For now, until I get the statements from the listed parties, I'm not encouraging non-parties to comment. However, once we've got this stage out of the way, I'll (depending oon how I feel then) invite outside opinions here or on the article talk page. Martinp23 22:33, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough, but please keep in mind that some of the issues at stake here have wider ramifications in Misplaced Pages. Also, though I am not a direct participant im this dispute, I have been a participant in discussions that have preceded this dispute.--CSTAR 22:37, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be useful to add CSTAR to the list of disputants or otherwise encourage his participation as he has offered valuable mediating input in the past and he is very familiar with the nature of the dispute.--csloat 00:02, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

It should be noted that I'm not neutral, so I don't have a mediating role to play. However, I am very concerned about the use of quotes from third parties in articles in general. As regards this specific quote from Karsh, a kind of modus vivendi had been reached by some of the parties involved. As a result I don't consider myself directly involved in this dispute, although I have an interest in oits outcome and the principles that are used to resolve it. For now it's best if I wait for a few days as suggested by the mediator. Then I will make some comments as an "outside opinion", although as mentioned earlier I should not be considered neutral.--CSTAR 00:45, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

CSTAR, if you wish, you can add yourself to the list of disputants here and make a statement below or you can make a seperate "outside opinions" section further down - my thinking in delaying this is that it may be helpful for all of us if the named disputants present their points of view before we get outside opinions, so if you'd like to mske an outside opinon, would you be happy to wait for a few days until I've got the statements from the parties done? To make it clear, I'm very eager for your opinion, but want ot make sure that it only surfaces at the right point :) Thanks, Martinp23 00:08, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to note that I may also be interested in contributing as a non party, depending on what gets covered by all other commenters. As a newcomer to an already present dispute, it is very possible that my own (non-neutral) thoughts will already be represented, so it may not be necessary for me to contribute. In any case, I will likely be following this. Abbenm 03:35, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Initial statements

Armon

Statement by Armon here

Commodore Sloat

Statement by Commodore Sloat here

Juan Cole is the WP:BLP of an academic. The named parties have been involved in frequent and often bitter edit wars over certain material in the biography. Some of the key points follow.

(1) There is a long section on the biography - four full paragraphs - about the "Yale appointment." Cole was never appointed at Yale. Yale considered him for an appointment (a job he had never sought or applied for), but he was not granted the appointment. I do not feel this is notable enough for four long paragraphs and a separate section -- I think one or two sentences indicating Yale considered him for a position but he did not receive it and that there was some controversy about it is more than enough. I am not saying we need to delete all reference to Yale here but I do not think that we need to take up this much space on a job that Cole never sought or received. I think a quote from Cole (or a quote that Armon cited in discussion from Zachary Lockman, president-elect of the Middle East Studies Association) is sufficient to establish what little notability there is to this issue. As it is, it appears as if the job Cole doesn't have (and never sought) is more important and prominent than the job he has been doing for over a decade.

(2) The second set of issues surrounds an attack against Cole as a "new antisemite." The three other editors in this dispute have supported versions of the page that attack Cole as an antisemite and then deleted any attempt to show that Cole was actually not an antisemite. As a bit of background, Professor Cole has long publicly opposed antisemitism. He has even opposed the academic boycott of Israeli academics, a boycott supported by many of his colleagues in Middle Eastern Studies. He has also specifically and vocally opposed conspiracy theories that suggest that Jews are behind the Iraq war. I can cite sources here but I think all the disputants agree and have seen the sources of this information.

The charge of antisemitism is based on the fact that Cole has criticized a prominent group of neoconservatives in the Bush Administration; a couple of these neoconservatives have very close ties to Israel's Likud party. Because Cole has criticized "Likudniks," arguing that some of them demonstrate "dual loyalties," some have interpreted this claim as antisemitic. Armon and the others have inserted the following material into Cole's biography:

Cole's claims that certain US government officials hold dual loyalties to Israeli interests has been attacked as an "anti-semitic conspiracy theory" and an example of new antisemitism. Efraim Karsh, professor and Head of Mediterranean Studies at King's College London, writes; "Cole may express offense at the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, but their obsession with the supposed international influence of "world Zionism" resonates powerfully in his own writings." Cole says the allegations of antisemitism are an attempt to stifle legitimate criticism of Israeli policy.

I do not feel this material comports with WP:BLP. It consists of claims about what Cole must be really thinking rather than about what he says. It consists of libelous name-calling that is explicitly at odds with what Cole actually has said publicly about Jews, about Israel, and about conspiracy theories. We have had a long debate about this issue that I would not like to revisit. The bottom line for me is this -- I do not see a dispute like this as notable unless there is a third party WP:RS -- authored by someone neutral, not an op-ed by someone with a horse in the race -- describing this as a notable controversy. We do not have that here; what we have is extremely biased sources attacking Cole and Cole defending himself.

However, if this material is to be included, I would insist on three things: (1) that material from FrontpageMagazine and Middle East Forum -- two sources with extremely partisan biases -- be removed, (2) That material which shows Cole's actual statements about antisemitism be included here (including his explicit statements about antisemitic conspiracy theories), and (3) that Cole's explicit response to the claims by Karsh be included. I had agreed to live with a version of the page that included Cole's response to Karsh but Armon removed that response, citing BLP issues. I felt that was phony, considering he had no problem with violations of BLP as they affect Cole -- Armon seems to want quotes attacking Cole included even when Cole's opponents fight freestyle, but he seems to want any quotes from Cole defending himself removed. I also found his actions disruptive and in poor faith as he removed this material after I requested mediation on this page. I protested his removal on the talk page and I urged him to show good faith by restoring the material, but he refused to do so. I am not asking for a judgement on his faith - I am willing to stipulate good faith in spite of the evidence here - but I am asking that Cole's response be included if we are going to have libelous charges of racism published on Misplaced Pages like this.

(3) I think there should be a clear statement about what should and shouldn't be included in this BLP. I do not think that it is notable every time a right wing blogger publishes a note attacking Cole's latest blog post. I would prefer this article stuck only to stuff published in newspapers and academic sources, but I recognize that some of Cole's notability comes from the fact that his blog is very popular and well-regarded. However, his blog is well-regarded (and controversial in some quarters) because he is a prominent and established academic, not the other way around. I think it's reasonable to include some information about controversies stirred up by the blog, but I don't think such controversies need to dominate the page (and I don't think every one should be included). A lot of material existed on a page Views and controversies concerning Juan Cole that was deleted because it was a POV fork of this page that had been created to circumvent WP:BLP. I do not feel that we should be merging that stuff into Juan Cole; the material has the same problems that it had on the fork page. A key question here is, how much "criticism and controversy" is appropriate in a WP:BLP of an academic?

Again I'd prefer to see a rule of thumb that if a controversy is not considered notable by a neutral third party publishing in a reliable source, that it really isn't a useful controversy to mention on a WP:BLP. Even when it is slightly notable, I feel there should be some sense of propriety and proportionality at work -- Christopher Hitchens pontificating about a private email Cole wrote to colleagues is really not more notable than Cole's history of refereed publications, for example.

Isarig

Statement by Isarig here

Cole's profession as an academic entitles him to the same protections afforded by WP:BLP to any other living person - no more, no less. On WP, there isn't currently, nor should there be, one set of standards for academics, and a different set of standards for say, CEOs or plumbers. If anything, Cole's high profile blog and numerous TV appearances places him in the ranks of Public Figures, where libel law tolerates much more criticism. So this isn't really about "how much criticism" should we allow in the biography of an academic, but about what sort of criticisms are appropriate on a biography of a living Public Figure, and about the notability of certain events.

With regards to the Yale issue, its notability has been established beyond doubt, through numerous articles published in reliable sources about the controversy, much of which, incidentally, was stirred up by Cole's supporters. I believe even csloat does not claim this incident is not notable. I am not taking a position on how much space should be given to this notable controversy, nor do I think there can (or should) be a hard and fast rule on WP with regards to this, along the lines of "6 lines is enough, 7 is too much". There should be enough space allocated to cover the main aspects of the controversy. If it ends up taking up 4 paragraphs, so be it. If the main issues can be covered in 2 sentences - that's fine, too. The issue of "how much space" a specific item should be given on WP is not a suitable topic for mediation, in my opinion.

A final note on Yale: Commodore Sloat makes much of the fact that Cole did not apply for the job. This is of course irrelevant to the notability of the incident (which is measured by public coverage, not by Cole's opinions of it). Additionally, while it is true that Cole did not apply for the job, and did not initiate the Yale process, it is false that he did not seek it once he was being considered for it. If he was not interested, he could have told Yale he was not interested and saved them much time and effort. If he was not interested, he would not have wasted his time interviewing for the position.

The second issue, the accusations that Cole as a "new antisemite" is comprised of 4 different, though related, topics: The notability of the accusations, their suitability for inclusion in a biography, the sources used to support the accusation, and Cole's response to them. The notability I believe has been established quite well: the accusation was carried by multiple media sources, including mainstream publications such as the Wall Street Journal, and widely circulated magazines such as The New Republic. Furthermore, the people making the accusation are notable academics and journalists in their own right - the head of Middle Eastern studies at King's College, a well known historian and anthropologist, and a well-known journalist who writes for the National Review Online, The Washington Times, & The New York Post - are the ones named in the article. On to the question of suitability: Commodore Sloat alleges that the material is unsuitable, because it is libelous, and because it requires speculation as to what Cole thinks. That is false. The accusation does not at all require us to speculate as to Cole's thoughts. As quoted in the article, the accusation is an opinion of a scholar on the nature of the material Cole writes - and that opinion is that that material contains themes that are common to those found in The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. This material, as opinion, can't be considered libel, and as discussed above, for it to be libel against a public figure such as Cole, it must not only be false (which it is not), it must be made with malice, that is, known to be false to the person making that claim, which is again not the case. And finally, that statement was made in a well known publication, years ago, and has never been challenged as "libel" by Cole or any of his supporters, but rather accepted as a fair comment on a matter of public interest. As WP:BLP tells us, "In the case of significant public figures, there will be a multitude of reliable, third-party published sources to take information from, and Misplaced Pages biographies should simply document what these sources say. If an allegation or incident is notable, relevant, and well-documented by reliable published sources, it belongs in the article — even if it's negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it." WP:BLP further uses an example of how to apply this policy: "A politician is alleged to have had an affair. He denies it, but the New York Times publishes the allegations, and there is a public scandal. The allegation may belong in the biography, citing the New York Times as the source". Here we have a nearly identical case: A well known public figure (Cole) is alleged be a new antisemite. He denies it, but The New Republic publishes the allegations, and there is public controversy. Using the above example, the allegation may belong in the biography, citing TNR as the source. Which brings us to the third issue, the sources used in the article. I agree with csloat that blogs should not be used as sources. However, none of the allegations in the current version of the article use blogs as sources. The specific quote which irks csloat, from Efraim Karsh, appears in The New Republic, which is a reliable source by WP standards. The 2 sources he objects to, Frontpage Magazine and Middle East Quarterly are not cut from the same cloth, and should be treated quite differently. Frontpage magazine is indeed a partisan source, explicitly so. While WP:RS does not preclude us from using such sources, albeit with caution, I personally am not a fan of using it, nor its equivalents from the other side of the political spectrum , such as Counterpunch, or Z magazine, or The Nation. (As a side note, Csloat exhibits an interesting double standard here. While demanding that Frontpage not be used as a source in the biography of Cole because it is partisan, he is quite happy to use an equally partisan (though of the opposite political ideology) source such as The Nation on other articles subject to WP:BLP which he has edited extensively, such as the Plame affair). MEQ, however, is quite a different beast. It is a scholarly magazine, with an editorial board comprised of academics who are known as experts in their respective fields, who come from a broad range of backgrounds and opinions. The contributors are similarly academics who are experts in their fields. The argument against it is that because it is published by the Middle East Forum, a think tank that seeks to promote "American interests", it is partisan. That is a very weak claim of partisanship, which is not even the editorial line of the magazine, but of a different (though affiliated) entity. And as noted above, WP:RS does not preclude the use of partisan sources. I see no grounds for questioning the reliability of MEQ or its suitability as a source. The final question is Cole's response. I have no problem with allowing Cole to respond, providing that the response is more than just name-calling. The article currently has Cole's response (it says Cole claims that those who accuse him of antisemitism do so in an attempt to stifle legitimate criticism of Israeli policy), sourced to an article of his. If csloat insists on an actual verbatim quot efrom Coel, saying th esame thing, I would not object to it.

Elizmr

Statement by Elizmr here

1. Juan Cole, Media - and MESA - Darling by Jonathan Calt Harris, Front Page Magazine, December 7, 2004
2. Juan Cole and the Decline of Middle Eastern Studies Alexander H. Joffe, Middle East Quarterly, Winter 2006 13(1)
3. Juan Cole's Bad blog, by Efraim Karsh in the The New Republic
4. Juan Cole, The Misuse of Anti-Semitism, The History News Network, September 30 2006; see also Juan Cole, "Criticize Israel? How dare they!" Chicago Sun-Times (23 April 2006) p. B2.