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The subject of this article is controversial and content may be in dispute. When updating the article, be bold, but not reckless. Feel free to try to improve the article, but don't take it personally if your changes are reversed; instead, come here to the talk page to discuss them. Content must be written from a neutral point of view. Include citations when adding content and consider tagging or removing unsourced information.

Archives

Archive1

Archive2

PLANS

Criticism

I'm removing all unattributed criticism; I was trying to be gentle with edits, but you're right, the whole paragraph is unattributed and thus untenable for the Misplaced Pages. I'm trying to rewrite it in a form that respects the intent while recognizing that in none of the major studies done of Waldorf Education (by Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools in Britain, for example, or by UNESCO) have any of these issues been raised. There aren't any citable criticism of this particular issue, but it is something potential interested parties should know.

Many themes in the Support and Criticism sections under Debate were repetitive. There were also two sections labelled criticism, one with text and one with links. I have merged the two debate subsections thematically under the general aegis of 'Debate' and removed the 'support' and 'criticism' tags; if someone seeks criticism specifically, they will find the links.

In particular, the criticism that Waldorf 'hides its spiritual nature' has never been made by any reputable authority. In addition, since all published material on Waldorf education emphasizes this spiritual emphasis, the criticism has certainly not been relevant since the advent of the Internet. Dated at best.

PLANS web-site

See here for discussion of the accuracy of this site. Hgilbert 04:25, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

My - how quickly that was archived. Swiftly, remove the discussion from ready viewing. This, also, a very familiar tactic.DianaW 04:22, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

There are three links from this talk page to the sub-page. I hope this is adequate to ensure ready access. Hgilbert 04:25, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

External links

A friendly user drew my attention to the Misplaced Pages standards for external links. I have reorganized the link section but also tried to keep these standards in mind, in particular this.

Please explain exactly how this policy applies in these cases. There is history of removing anything critical of Steiner Education from this page. I am restoring these links. Lumos3 17:02, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Read the standards, in particular the links to normally avoid, which includes postings (thus discussion lists). The idea is that what you heard in your neighborhood bar is not an encyclopedia-quality citation; neither is a random discussion on the web. There is no indication that either is an authoritative source. I keep encouraging people to find citable material for adequate critical sections here; please do help find this!

The other standard is that pages (or publications) with demonstrably false material should not be cited; one frequently cited website (that of someone who has had no direct experience with Waldorf or Anthroposophy, but has garnered information off of discussion lists) includes such material, including the claim that Steiner was part of an organization called the OTO (a lawsuit over this claim in Germany found there was no evidence of this, and that it could be considered slander; the court ordered a book with this claim recalled from the market as a result).

By the way, the skeptics' dictionary link was not removed, it was simply moved to another list of links. I am leaving it where you have now put it; as long as it's somewhere, I'm happy. Hgilbert 19:07, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

I have restored the Plans site http://www.waldorfcritics.org/ PLANS: People For Legal And Non-Sectarian Schools. This is not a Forum site but the site of the principal organisation world-wide of people voicing criticism of Waldorf education. It is, to quote the criteria for external links "a notable proponent of a point of view in an article with multiple points of view." For this article to be balanced it should also include a description of PLANS and its activities. Lumos3 08:46, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

I think the first location is probably the best place for this mention if it has to be here. I do not think it is appropriate to have it linked to twice, and am removing the second location. I also have not seen any response to my criticisms of the site's appropriateness. I would like to see these addressed rather than ignored.

"World-wide" is an exaggerated term for the organization, incidentally; all of the organisation's 7 directors and 5 advisors listed on its webpage are from the United States of America. Hgilbert 23:52, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

I have restored the external link to PLANS which is not duplicated in the article as you state, the other link is to Misplaced Pages's own article on PLANS. I know you disagree with the content of the PLANS site . Neverthless it is the pricipal critic of Waldorf education and needs to be described and noted in an article on the subject if it is to give the public a view of all opinions. Lumos3 08:16, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Having found yesterday's restoration of the links to PLANS removed, I once again, three days in a row now, restored the links to PLANS. Vandals who apparently think critical review of Waldorf doesn't belong on this site continually remove them. This is demonstrative of the deceptive tactics of Waldorf fanatics - and EXACTLY the reason criticism of Waldorf and these very tactics is necessary and should be abundant on these pages. Pete K 06:36, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm the individual who removed the links. I did so for the simple reason that you're repeatedly linking a reference that was already there in the listed references to begin with. I described the reason for the edit, and I've repeated this on the discussion page the third time now. Please read this page before jumping to conclusions about page changes, and please read wikipedia's rules against personal attacks against other editors. Professor marginalia 16:07, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

What in what I have said do you perceive as a personal attack? I do not know you personally, nor do I address you personally. On the other hand, if you will read below, my name was brought up on this public site without my knowledge so that people here could discuss, of all things, my divorce and child custody. It is easy to grow tired of this nonsense. Please stop removing links to sites critical of Waldorf. There are many, many links to Waldorf Answers here, as well as Americans for Waldorf Education (a clone of Waldorf Answers). Both are personal blog sites and neither contains accurate information about Waldorf education. Pete K 15:32, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Waldorf and religion

Webster's is an authoritative source for word definitions but not for philosophical systems. Anthroposophy's religious status was tested recently in a court case brought in California; the courts indeed ruled that there was no admissible evidence that anthroposophy was a religion. Nor did Steiner himself believe or assert this, nor does any present-day member of the anthroposophical society. There is no anthroposophical ritual, dogma or church. The statutes of the anthroposophical society state that membership is open to anyone, regardless of religion, race, world-view, and so on. All this differs from every established religion. Hgilbert 01:56, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

There are anthroposophic churches: they're called Waldorf Schools. Anthroposophy is taught their and Anthroposophic study groups for adults are held there. In addition, the church know as "The Christian Community" IS and another anthroposophic religious instition. Waldorf schools and the "The Christian Community" were both created and founded by Steiner and are both controlled by the same anthroposophist power base.

The Christian Community is a separate institution founded by Rittlemeyer and others. It has a separate leadership and is no way connected to the Waldorf schools, each of which is in any case a legally and economically independent entity. Anthroposophy is not taught in Waldorf schools; study groups are held for the parents on demand, which generally means not at all. Hgilbert 19:00, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Hgilbert - Accoring to Salon magazine, HALF a of Waldorf teacher's training has to be in anthroposophy. There is nothing in Waldorf Schools that does not pass through the Steiner-anthroposophy filter. You only sound foolish when you make these ridiculous claims.

Waldorf teachers are educated in anthroposophy. But they do not teach this as a subject or bring it into the content of their teaching.

Please see lengthy Steiner quote on the Waldorf project page that refutes the above claim. --Pete K 02:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Here is part of the discussion referenced above: I'll suggest that everywhere where Steiner denies Anthroposopy is taught in schools - i.e. in public lectures, he was indeed following the advice he gave to teachers which was to DENY that Anthroposophy is taught in schools. But below is a very lengthy and very revealing passage that clearly shows what Steiner had in mind. For those who don't know, "Faculty Meetings with Rudolf Steiner" appears on almost every teacher traing reading list as required reading.

So, with that in mind, let's look at more of what Steiner had to say about teaching Anthroposophy directly to Waldorf students - this time not taking snippets out of context - Again from Faculty Meetings - pages 81-88 September 26, 1919:

"I do not wish to go into that now, but I mention it only to show you that we really must take religion seriously when we address it anthroposophically. It is true that anthroposophy is a worldview, and we certainly do not want to bring that into our school. On the other hand, we must certainly develop the religious feeling that worldview can give to the human soul when the parents expressly ask us to give it to the children. Particularly when we begin with anthroposophy, we dare not develop anything inappropriate, certainly not develop anything too early. We will, therefore, have two stages. First, we will take all the children in the lower four grades, and then those in the upper four grades. In the lower four grades, we will attempt to discuss the things and processes in the human environment, so that a feeling arises in the children that spirit lives in nature. We can consider such things as my previous examples. We can, for instance, give the children the idea of the soul. Of course, the children first need to learn to understand the idea of life in general. You can teach the children about life if you direct their attention to the fact that people are first small and then they grow, become old, get white hair, wrinkles, and so forth. Thus, you tell them about the seriousness of the course of human life and acquaint them with the seriousness of the fact of death, something the children already know.

"Therefore, you need to discuss what occurs in the human soul during the changes between sleeping and waking. You can certainly go into such things with even the youngest children in the first group. Discuss how waking and sleeping look, how the soul rests, how the human being rests during sleep, and so forth. Then, tell the children how the soul permeates the body when it awakens and indicate to them that there is a will that causes their limbs to move. Make them aware that the body provides the soul with senses through which they can see and hear and so forth. You can give them such things as proof that the spiritual is active in the physical. Those are things you can discuss with the children.

You must completely avoid any kind of superficial teaching. Thus, in anthroposophical religious instruction we can certainly not use the kind of teaching that asks questions such as, Why do we find cork on a tree? with the resulting reply, So that we can make champagne corks. God created cork in order to cork bottles. This sort of idea, that something exists in nature simply because human intent exists, is poison. That is certainly something we may not develop. Therefore, don't bring any of these silly causal ideas into nature.

To the same extent, we may not use any of the ideas people so love to use to prove that spirit exists because something unknown exists. People always say, That is something we cannot know, and, therefore, that is a revelation of the spirit. Instead of gaining a feeling that we can know of the spirit and that the spirit reveals itself in matter, these ideas direct people toward thinking that when we cannot explain something, that proves the existence of the divine. Thus, you will need to strictly avoid superficial teaching and the idea of wonders, that is, that wonders prove divine activity.

In contrast, it is important that we develop imaginative pictures through which we can show the supersensible through nature. For example, I have often mentioned that we should speak to the children about the butterfly's cocoon and how the butterfly comes out of the cocoon. I have said that we can explain the concept of the immortal soul to the children by saying that, although human beings die, their souls go from them like an invisible butterfly emerging from the cocoon. Such a picture is, however, only effective when you believe it yourself, that is, when you believe the picture of the butterfly creeping out of the cocoon is a symbol for immortality planted into nature by divine powers. You need to believe that yourselves, otherwise the children will not believe it. You need to arouse the children's interest in such things. They will be particularly effective for the children where you can show how a being can live in many forms, how an original form can take on many individual forms. In religious instruction, it is important that you pay attention to the feeling and not the world view. For example, you can take a poem about the metamorphosis of plants and animals and use it religiously. However, you must use the feelings that go from line to line. You can consider nature that way until the end of the fourth grade. There, you must always work toward the picture that human beings with all our thinking and doing live within the cosmos. You must also give the children the picture that God lives in what lives in us. Time and again you should come back to such pictures, how the divine lives in a tree leaf, in the Sun, in clouds, and in rivers. You should also show how God lives in the bloodstream, in the heart, in what we feel and what we think. Thus, you should develop a picture of the human being filled with the divine.

During these years, you should also emphasize the picture that human beings, because they are an image of God and a revelation of God, should be good. Human beings who are not good hurt God. From a religious perspective, human beings do not exist in the world for their own sake, but as revelations of the divine. You can express that by saying that people do not exist just for their own sake, but "to glorify God." Here, "to glorify" means "to reveal." Thus, in reality, it is not "glory to God in the highest," but "reveal the gods in the highest." Thus, we can understand the idea that people exist to glorify God as meaning that people exist in order to express the divine through their deeds and feelings. If someone does something bad, something impious and unkind, then that person does something that belittles God and distorts God into something ugly. You should always bring in these ideas. At this age you should use the thought that God lives in the human being. In the lower grades, I would certainly abstain from teaching any Christology, but just awaken a feeling for God the Father out of nature and natural occurrences. I would try to connect all our discussions about Old Testament themes, the Psalms, the Song of Songs, and so forth, to that feeling, at least insofar as they are useful, and they are if you treat them properly. That is the first stage of religious instruction.

In the second stage, that is, the four upper grades, we need to discuss the concepts of fate and human destiny with the children. Thus, we need to give the children a picture of destiny so that they truly feel that human beings have a destiny. It is important to teach the child the difference between a simple chance occurrence and destiny. Thus, you will need to go through the concept of destiny with the children. You cannot use definitions to explain when something destined occurs or when something occurs only by chance. You can, however, perhaps explain it through examples. What I mean is that when something happens to me, if I feel that the event is in some way something I sought, then that is destiny. If I do not have the feeling that it was something I sought, but have a particularly strong feeling that it overcame me, surprised me, and that I can learn a great deal for the future from it, then that is a chance event. You need to gradually teach the children about something they can experience only through feeling, namely the difference between finished karma and arising or developing karma. You need to gradually teach children about the questions of fate in the sense of karmic questions. You can find more about the differences in feeling in my book "Theosophy." For the newest edition, I rewrote the chapter, "Reincarnation and Karma," where I discuss this question. There, I tried to show how you can feel the difference. You can certainly make it clear to the children that there are actually two kinds of occurrences. In the one case, you feel that you sought it. For example, when you meet someone, you usually feel that you sought that person. In the other case, when you are involved in a natural event, you have the feeling you can learn something from it for the future. If something happens to you because of some other person, that is usually a case of fulfilled karma. Even such things as the fact that we find ourselves together in this *faculty* at the Waldorf School are fulfilled karma. We find ourselves here because we sought each other. We cannot comprehend that through definitions, only through feeling. You will need to speak with the children about all kinds of fates, perhaps in stories where the question of fate plays a role. You can even repeat many of the fairy tales in which questions of fate play a role. You can also find historical examples where you can show how an individual's fate was fulfilled. You should discuss the question of fate, therefore, to indicate the seriousness of life from that perspective.

I also want you to understand what is really religious in an anthroposophical sense. In the sense of anthroposophy, what is religious is connected with feeling, with those feelings for the world, for the spirit, and for life that our perspective of the world can give us. The worldview itself is something for the head, but religion always arises out of the entire human being. For that reason, religion connected with a specific church is not actually religious. It is important that the entire human being, particularly the feeling and will, lives in religion. That part of religion that includes a worldview is really only there to exemplify or support or deepen the feeling and strengthen the will. What should flow from religion is what enables the human being to grow beyond what past events and earthly things can give to deepen feeling and strengthen will.

Following the questions of destiny, you will need to discuss the differences between what we inherit from our parents and what we bring into our lives from previous earthly lives. In this second stage of religious instruction, we bring in previous earthly lives and everything else that can help provide a reasoned or feeling comprehension that people live repeated earthly lives. You should also certainly include the fact that human beings raise themselves to the divine in three stages. Thus, after you have given the children an idea of destiny, you then slowly teach them about heredity and repeated earthly lives through stories. You can then proceed to the three stages of the divine.

The first of these stages is that of the angels, something available for each individual personally. You can explain that every individual human being is led from life to life by his or her own personal genius. Thus, this personal divinity that leads human beings is the first thing to discuss. In the second step, you attempt to explain that there are higher gods, the archangels. (Here you gradually come into something you can observe in history and geography.) These archangels exist to guide whole groups of human beings, that is, the various peoples and such. You must teach this clearly so that the children can learn to differentiate between the god spoken of by Protestantism, for instance, who is actually only an angel, and an archangel, who is higher than anything that ever arises in the Protestant religious teachings.

In the third stage, you teach the children about the concept of a time spirit, a divine being who rules over periods of time. Here, you will connect religion with history. Only when you have taught the children all that can you go on, at about the twelfth grade, to - well, we can't do that yet, we will just do two stages. The children can certainly hear things they will understand only later. After you have taught the children about these three stages, you can go on to the actual Christology by dividing cosmic evolution into two parts: the pre-Christian, which was really a preparation, and the Christian, which is the fulfillment. Here, the concept that the divine is revealed through Christ, "in the fullness of time," must play a major role. Only then will we go on to the Gospels. Until then, to the extent that we need stories to explain the concepts of angel, archangel, and time spirit, we will use the Old Testament. For example, we can use the Old Testament story of what appeared before Moses to explain to the children the appearance of a new time spirit, in contrast to the previous one before the revelation to Moses. We can then also explain that a new time spirit entered during the sixth century B.C. Thus, we first use the Old Testament. When we then go on to Christology, having presented it as being preceded by a long period of preparation, we can go on to the Gospels. We can attempt to present the individual parts and show that the fourfoldedness of the Gospels is something natural by saying that just as a tree needs to be photographed from four sides for everything to be properly seen, in the same way the four Gospels present four points of view. You take the Gospel of Matthew and then Mark, Luke, and John and emphasize them such that the children will always feel that. Always place the main emphasis upon the differences in feeling.

Thus, we now have the teaching content of the second stage. The general tenor of the first stage is to bring to developing human beings everything that the wisdom of the divine in nature can provide. In the second stage, the human being no longer recognizes the divine through wisdom, but through the effects of love. That is the tenor, the leitmotif in both stages. This is the story of Moses and the Burning Bush."

It's pretty clear here that Steiner's intention is to teach Anthroposophy directly to students in exactly the way all subjects are taught in Waldorf. There should be NO doubt after reading this that Anthroposophy is taught in schools, that Steiner intended to teach Anthroposophy in schools and that Steiner intended for Waldorf teachers to deny this. --Pete K 02:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC) --Pete K 14:42, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

As told at http://www.waldorfanswers.org/Resources.htm all lectures and Faculty discussions with Steiner on Waldorf education are accessible for free online at http://steinerbooks.org/research/archive.php#waldorf Better than to quote immense parts of lectures or faculty discussions here at the Talks page is to give a link to the published work that everyone can read for themselves, refer to specific pages, and tell in short what they say and your view of it. Spamming these Talks pages makes them even more unreadable than they are now. --Thebee 15:00, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I think you may be confused about what "Spamming" is. Quoting someone is not spamming. Repeatedly linking to your own original research website for no reason, however, IS spamming. It is pretty clear here what you are doing Sune. I think you are making a case against yourself that everyone here can see - you want to link to your website in the article and in these discussion pages in order to promote YOUR PERSONAL position and opinions on the topics here. I would like the administrators to please review this activity and to take appropriate action. You link to your website countless times in these discussions as a reaction to it being deemed unsuitable in the article itself. This self-promoting behavior clearly demonstrates exactly why your websites should not be referenced anywhere here. It is indeed SPAM. --Pete K 15:59, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I guess I'll have to stress this more strongly than before. I have checked the passage quoted above against the actual published book. There is almost no justification for using this text to support the argument that Steiner intended to teach his own religion and deceive the public to thinking otherwise.

• It's only the theoretical interpretation to a passage of text made by a single editor, a theory that doesn't fit well to other facts in the book
• The discussion given in this text was quite specific, as is obvious in its context within the book itself. This in particular was the curriculum Steiner designed for the anthroposophical "independent" religion class, and the passage above is labeled "lesson plan for the independent anthroposophical religious instruction for children". It was a real class, like music, gymnastics, or French, with a special teacher, originally scheduled for 4-5 pm except the Catholic and Protestant teachers weren't available at that time, so the time was changed. Steiner advised limiting the class to 2 sessions a week, 45 minutes each. All three religion classes were held at the same time. The independent class was added to the courses offered list because there were anthroposophist families who requested the class. All the students who were enrolled in the class were placed there at the request of the parents and students. "We now need to speak a little bit about the independent religious instruction. You need to tell the children that if they want the independent religions instruction, they must choose it. Thus, the independent religious instruction will simply be a third class alongside the other two. In any case, we may not have any unclear mixing of things." This class was divided into two groups, a younger group and an older. Of the 60 children signed up for the class, 56 came from anthroposophist families. There were a total of 256 students in the school then, so roughly 200 of them did not have this instruction, they were instead enrolled in either the Catholic or Protestant classes. All students were required by the governing education laws to take religion in school in Stuttgart in 1919, and even today in many parts of Germany students are required in public schools to either enroll in a religion course or a special "ethics" class for those who want to opt out of the religious instruction.

So either this quoted text was deliberately cherry-picked to give a misleading interpretation, or the 'out-of-context' misinterpretation was inadvertent. But the only proper way this text should be used as a reference for this article is to support a description of the curriculum of the first independent anthroposophical religious class. Is this class still taught in Waldorf schools? If yes, then maybe this text could be used as a reference to describe it also. But it does not support the statement that Steiner intended to teach religion secretly. Ibyrnison 17:10, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, without quoting the entire book here, we won't resolve this I suppose, but I believe the length of the quote above pretty much excludes it from being "cherry-picked" and out of context. You make a strong case, above, for the claim that Anthroposophy IS a religion, however. Very interesting. So leaving aside, for the moment, my claim that Anthroposophy is intentionally taught to children and that Steiner intended this (and I promise we will get back to it) how do we resolve the issue of Anthroposophy being a religion? If indeed as you claim, Anthroposophist's children were given religious instruction in Anthroposophy - does this not prove that Anthroposophy is a religion? And so when we claim in the article that Waldorf is non-denominational, are we not being dishonest?

There is an anthroposophical approach to anything. To education, to art, etc.; this was Steiner's whole intention, to show how a renewal of culture could arise by looking at the essence of what it is to be human. You can teach anything out of anthroposophy - including religion. That doesn't mean that anthroposophy is a religion, only that it can transform religious outlooks, just as the existence of anthroposophic art doesn't mean that anthroposophy is an art. Hgilbert 10:51, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Now, getting back to the teaching of Anthroposophy itself, we can certainly start by looking at the make-up of the Waldorf curriculum and see how much emphasis is being placed on mythology, especially creation myths. Why, I wonder, do Waldorf schools soften up children's minds to many, many possibilities of creation? The answer is obvious, to me, that by taking young children in so many directions regarding the creation of the world, it prepares them to receive their instruction in Anthroposophy which relies on one of the most obscene creation myths of all - one that suggests we evolved on Saturn, on the Sun, on the Moon all before we arrived on Earth. This is, of course, just a starting point for the fertile young minds Waldorf has to work with. The entire curriculum is designed to lead kids "naturally" into Anthroposophy, and Steiner himself intended this. Again, when we discuss Eurythmy, this was/is a spiritual exercise - the embodiment of Anthroposophy. Eurythmy is REQUIRED for ALL Waldorf students in EVERY grade. It is very much like a spiritual communion. And anyone who has asked about Eurythmy in a Waldorf school has been told it is a "dance form" or an "art form" or a way of creating "speech through movement". They are NEVER told the spiritual significance and the strong connection to Anthroposophy. It's this dishonesty that is prevalent in Waldorf that I am interested in exploring here - so that this article doesn't become even more of a farce than it already is. People are discovering the truth about Waldorf, and part of that truth is that Anthroposophy is a religion and it is being secretly taught to children - and that Steiner intended this. --Pete K 22:10, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

This isn't a trial. And it is also not a personal blog. We are all prevented from behaving like "Woodward and Bernstein" while contributing to these articles for wikipedia. Even they would have to live with the same rules we do. Do your research, and publish your findings the old fashioned way, in newspapers, books, and academic journals. Then, and only then, can wikipedia's editors comment on such findings here in the articles. If this particular interpretation is published in newspapers, books, or journals, it can be mentioned in the article, (so long as it relates to Waldorf education). Otherwise don't blog about it here in the talk pages. Ibyrnison 22:54, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Waldorf, Anthroposophy, and the Religious Teachings of Steiner

Hgilbert -- We use words to describe things and communicate with one another. Words must have distinct meanings that are commonly understood by everyone and those meanings are found in a dictionary. Webster Dictionary says something is "religious" if it is: 1 : relating to or manifesting faithful devotion to an acknowledged ultimate reality or deity <a religious person> <religious attitudes> 2 : of, relating to, or devoted to religious beliefs or observances 3 a : scrupulously and conscientiously faithful

Anthroposophy meets every one of the aforementioned criteria. They study and STRICTLY adhere to the RELIGIOUS teachings of Steiner. Let me give you one example: Both Waldorf schools and Anthroposophists celebrate "Michaelmas." Here is Dr. Erst Katz on Steiner and his relationship to St. Michael at the American Anthroposophical Society's Annual General Meeting in 2004" “In this essay I want to give a personal description, not very scholarly, of the mission of Rudolf Steiner. What was this mission? We have no direct mission statement from his own hand. We have of course all that found external expression of his mission, all the practical applications of anthroposophy, in education, in medicine, in agriculture, in the arts, in the architecture of the Goetheanum and of many other buildings, in poetry and in drama, in jewelry making, and especially in eurythmy, but also in philosophy and in the guidance of inner development, and more. But to find what his mission actually was we should realize that it was a spiritual mission, an esoteric mission, which we can only find by contemplating what may be called his “esoteric biography.” There one finds revealed how Rudolf Steiner's life was guided and inspired by a lofty spiritual being, the world encompassing spirit of our time. In Western esotericism this being bears the name St. Michael. Rudolf Steiner can be seen as the human, earthly, Ambassador of St. Michael, who is the spiritual Ambassador of the divine Christ Being.” http://www.rsarchive.org/RelAuthors/KatzErnst/AGM_Address.php — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.129.127.170 (talk • contribs)

The Californian legal system isn't in charge of defining what is and isn't a religion. Jefffire 13:43, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Jeffire -- NOTE: The california courts never ruled on this case on it merits, it was thrown out for technical reasons.

It was thrown out because the plaintiffs were able to supply no admissible evidence whatsoever.

To join the Anthroposophical Society, one must agree to no dogmas, go through no rituals, attend no Waldorf school. Anthroposophists and Waldorf schools in Christian areas often celebrate the traditional Christian festivals (Michaelmas is an older Christian festival, not an anthroposophic invention). In Islamic or Buddhist or Jewish countries, the local festivals there are celebrated. This very adaptation illustrates anthroposophy's lack of a specifically religious element; it encourages all religions. Waldorf schools teach about the Books of Moses, the Hindu sacred scriptures, Buddha, Christ, etc.

There are no observances, required beliefs, or deities in anthroposophy. There is no faith to be faithful to. Hgilbert 18:58, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Hgilbert -- Your not being intelectually honest. YES, Waldorf schools do the things you mention, but they are ALL still "steiner teachings" and when they do mention other religions it is not because they are being multicultural, its because it is Steiner's theory of how other religios mythology fits into christian mythology or Aryan history (aka anthroposophy). As for not being a religion, why is it that anthroposophists believe that high fevers and childhood illness are necessary for child development? Is it "scientific" to believe that high fevers (to the point of going into seizures) "burn-off" the child-parent "heredity" and allows the child's REINCARNATED spirit to successfully emerge? Is it "scientific" to believe that childhood diseases should NOT be prevent with immunizations because the exerocise evil personality attributes? Further: Is it "scientific" that anthroposophists believe that children should only play with wooden toys, because nonwood toys and electronic devices are inhabited by Ahriman, the god of darkness? Is it "scientific" that cancer be treated by eating misteltoe, wrapping oneself in silk, and doing eurythmic dance? Is it "scientific" that diabetes be treated by boosting one self esteem? Is it "scientific" that the Earth is only 30-40,000 years old and that the darwinian evolution is false? Is it "scientific" to believe that Steiner learned -- through clairvoyance -- that Aryans are descendents of Atlantis? Is it "scientific" that blacks have dark skin because they suck up all the light around them? Is it "scientific" that "knowing" something = scientific reasearch? The answer is no. That is religous faith that something is true. You may like to pride yourself that you are part of some great, "philosophy," but the truth is that you are just another religious fanatic.

Waldorf schools include all religions because Steiner, and Waldorf teachers generally, believe that all of these are interrelated and important. I don't know what Aryan history is. Not all anthroposophists believe that high fevers and childhood illnesses are important, but anthroposophic medicine sees these as developmental stages or crises that need to be accompanied carefully and healed properly, not simply suppressed. Too high fevers or fevers that last too long are brought down using conventional means. The debate about immunization is active within and without the anthroposophic community, and there are many solutions (most anthroposophists' children that I know of have at least some immunizations). Natural materials are encouraged for young children as being more stimulated to the senses and providing a connection to nature. Mistletoe is actually rather established as a therapy; in Europe it is accepted by conventional medicine and is slowly building a reputation in the USA; see the Talk:Anthroposophy page for citations from a host of respected medical journals. I wouldn't wrap myself in silk to cure cancer, not sure what you are referring to here. Modern medicine cannot cure diabetes; perhaps self-esteem would help...I'm not an expert here. Steiner spoke of Atlantis; so did Plato; modern geology speaks of lost continents as well. Why do the peoples of hot, sunny Africa have darker skin, anyway...is dark skin (or any dark surface) not connected with the absorption of sunlight? Knowing is not research, but research can bring you to know something.

Fanaticism is a dangerous thing; we should all be wary of it, don't you think? Hgilbert 03:15, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Cancer and diabetes cures... http://skepdic.com/anthroposophicmedicine.html

If these allegation are true please verify them with reliable sources. Jefffire 13:12, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Jeffire -- I'll be glad to provide sources:

Anthroposophic Medicine ENCOURAGES High Fevers in Children http://www.waldorfinthehome.org/childhood_fevers.html

This article says the exact opposite: that fevers can get too high and one should avoid this. It encourages using 'nonsuppressant therapies' to drive fevers down, and allowing mild fevers to run their course. It mentions the danger of febrile convulsions and states that these need to be avoided.

"Waldorf Teachers are required to study Waldorf for a year of their two-year training program" Salon: http://dir.salon.com/story/mwt/feature/2004/05/26/waldorf/index.html

Well, yes, they would do.

"Steiner did not believe in biological evolution" http://www.skepticreport.com/mystics/steiner.htm

Steiner praised Haeckel (one of the earliest writers on biological evolution) and spoke of the importance of the principle of biological evolution frequently. (See for example Steiner: GA262, p. 49)

"Humans, he taught, began as spirit forms and progressed through various stages to reach today's form. Humanity, Steiner said, is currently living in the Post-Atlantis Period, which began with the gradual sinking of Atlantis in 7227 BC" http://skepdic.com/steiner.html

The date given here is an invention, but Steiner did believe that there had been other continents. Geologists accept this today.

"According to Steiner Blacks absorb the light and heat from the Sun and process it in their "well developed afterbrain," from there it goes down the spine, where the Black's inner organs are cooked by the solar energy, which explains why the Black's metabolism and his instinctual life is so "hot." If the Black goes to the West, where is less Sun, he becomes an Amerind and his skin turns red, because the Reds are forced to radiate back some of the light and heat, and because of this energy discharge the Amerinds will die out. In contrast to this the Aryans are not dependent on external energy but are self-reliant. With their big forebrain they are capable of developing the spirit and, thus, only they are human beings in strict terms (8, 9)."http://www.w-reich.de/hdoeng11.htm

The w-reich website is a hodgepodge of misquotes. The skepdic website is much better, but has errors as well. Please give original quotations from Steiner; his complete works can be searched at the Rudolf Steiner Archiv (that's German, not a mis-spelling).Hgilbert 03:15, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

"Please give original quotations from Steiner" OK, here you go...

"These blacks in Africa characteristically suck in, absorb, all light and all heat from the cosmos. And, humans being humans, this light and this heat from the cosmos cannot pass through the entire body. It does not flow through the entire body, but it stops at the skin. In this way, the complexion itself becomes black. Consequently, a black in Africa is a human who absorbs and assimilates as much light and heat from the cosmos as possible. As he does this, the forces of the cosmos work throughout that human. Everywhere, he absorbs light and heat, really everywhere. He assimilates them within himself. There really must be something which helps him in this assimilation. That something is mainly the cerebellum. This is why a Negro has an especially well developed cerebellum. This is linked to the spinal marrow; and they can assimilate all light and heat which a human contains. As a consequence, especially the aspects which pertain to the body and to metabolism are strongly developed in a Negro. He has a strong sexual urge -as people call it-, strong instincts. And as, with him, all which comes from the sun -light and heat- really is at the skin's surface, all of his metabolism works as if the sun itself is boiling in his inside. This causes his passions. Within a Negro, cooking is going on all the time; and the cerebellum kindles the fire. (...) And we, Europeans, we poor Europeans, we have the thinking life, which resides in the head. (...) Therefore, Europe has always been the starting point of everything which develops the human entity in such a way that at the same time a relationship with the outside world arises. (...)

"When Negroes go to the west, they cannot absorb as much light and heat any more as they were used to in their Africa. (...) That is why they turn copper red, they become Indians. That is because they are forced to reflect a part of the light and heat. They turn shiny copper red. They cannot keep up this copper red shining. That is why the Indians die out in the West, they die because of their own nature which does not get enough light and heat, they die because of the earthly factor.(...)

"Really, it is the whites who develop the human factor within themselves. Therefore they have to rely on themselves. When whites do emigrate, they partly take on the characteristics of other areas, but they die more as individuals than as a race. The white race is the race of the future, the race that is working creatively with the spirit."

--Pete K 15:35, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

recent additions:North American Waldorf Schools Connection to Christianity

Added recently:

AWSNA, the organization that certifies all schools in North America with the trademarked name "Waldorf," says that to be certified it is "essential" that schools have a "strong foundation" in a religious system developed by Rudolf Steiner

AWSNA did not use the term 'religious system'. This is misleading.

, called Anthroposophy. (AWSNA) Anthroposophy is a form of Christian mysticism

Steiner connected with many streams: Christian mysticism, Theosophy, natural science, Goethe, Fichte, and so on. Anthroposophy is not a form of Christian mysticism, however.

, where Christ remains the central figure, but other religions and philosophies are incorporated as well. (Steiner, 1914) Most private Waldorf schools

in Christian countries

celebrate Christian-based holidays, with an Anthroposophic interpretation, including the four seasonal festivals of Michaelmas (fall), Christmas (winter), Easter (spring), and St. John (summer), as well as Martinmas and the Advent Spiral or Garden. Most Waldorf schools also have other Anthroposophic

or non-anthroposophic: Hannukah, so far as I know, is not an anthroposophic festival

celebrations and festivals throughout the school year that are not Christian holidays, but the vast majority are Christian-based.

in Christian countries

I am removing the tendentious and in large part factually untrue section.

Link removal

See here for discussion of including a link to the PLANS web-site in this article. Hgilbert 04:27, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

It would be helpful if links to PLANS and other websites critical of Waldorf, my own site - WaldorfQuestions for example, could remain. People looking for information on Waldorf are not necessarily always looking for information that supports Waldorf. By removing links to critical sites Waldorf supporters are ensuring that they do not get the information they are looking for. This ultimately hurts Waldorf when parents enroll only to find the schools objectionable. Whoever is continually removing the links to critical sites should refrain from doing so.Pete K 08:45, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

See http://en.wikipedia.org/User_talk:Pete_K --Thebee 18:33, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

This website does not qualify as a suitable reference at wikipedia. Blogs or message boards are interesting to read but they are not legitimate references suitable for research. This is the rule throughout the wikipedia. There is no reason to make a special exception for your own personal message board. The wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a community bulletin board or the yellow pages. 67.166.154.140 16:37, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

So links to WaldorfAnswers and Americans For Waldorf Education should also be removed under this guideline. Pete K 12:03, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Unless I hear an objection - I will be removing links to Waldorf Answers and Americans for Waldorf Education under the guidline cited above. --Pete K 18:01, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

The comment by 67.166.154.140 refers to the WC-site. Approximately 99% of the site consists of archives of a mailing list, comparable to a message board. http://www.waldorfanswers.org and http://www.americans4waldorf.org are not blogs or message boards, but just normal web sites, and the argument therefore does not apply to them. --Thebee 20:11, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

You keep making this 99% claim, but this makes no sense. Yes, part of the site functions as a list archive, but it is not a discussion list, nor is discussion carried on there. The PLANS site is a "normal" website that has dozens of contributions, articles and links to various studies. Additionally it has a link to a discussion list. Many websites have links to discussion lists associated with them. The links here are not to the discussion list, they are to the website. Waldorfanswers and Americans4Waldorf are both original source sites and MOST of the information contained on them is by a single author - YOU. There is, indeed, good reason to exclude both these sites for this very reason. Can you support that the bulk of the material at WaldorfAnswers and AWE is not original source material? If not, I'll remove the links. --Pete K 22:06, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

On "You keep making this 99% claim, but this makes no sense." Of course it makes sense. The 99% of the site that republish a mailing list is used at the site as "source material" and "Education of the public about Waldorf education", and is continually added to - in chronological revers order - characteristic of blogs. You argued yesterday, that the guideline "Blogs or message boards are interesting to read but they are not legitimate references suitable for research." should be used to remove links to http://www.waldorfanswers.org and http://www.americans4waldorf.org and disregard that the argument by 67.166.154.140 refers to the WC-site. Then you remove the two links, to which the guideline does not apply, but reinstates the specific site the argument refers to and applies to.

Maybe some others here have some comments on the logic of this line of argumentation and action? --Thebee 10:47, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, time's up Sune. You continually remove the links in the Critical Review section. Now I'm removing AWE and WA links because they are original research. If I see them back again, I'll remove them... and we can continue this game forever. I never get tired of this. In fact, let's just get more people involved. You can pull Linda and Deborah off their duty babysitting Mothering.com and I'll alert a few people from PLANS, and we can keep the page in a 24 hour editing cycle. How's that? Why don't you just stop removing critical commentary and information and links without justification? Before adding your links back, you need to make a case that they aren't original research. Good luck!!! --Pete K 23:43, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

After I have pointed out that the Misplaced Pages guideline you refer to as argument that http://www.waldorfanswers.org and http://www.americans4waldorf.org should be removed does not apply to them, you remove them anyhow, and reinstate the one site discussed (the WC-site) to which it DOES apply, and tell that you never will get tired of this violation by you of the Misplaced Pages guidelines.

Original research

On the "original research" argument:

http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:No_original_research#Citing_oneself writes:

"No original research" does not prohibit experts on a specific topic from adding their knowledge to Misplaced Pages. On the contrary, Misplaced Pages welcomes the contributions of experts, as long as their knowledge is verifiable. We assume, however, that someone is an expert not only because of their personal and direct knowledge of a topic, but also because of their knowledge of published sources on a topic. This policy prohibits expert editors from drawing on their personal and direct knowledge if such knowledge is unverifiable.

I have a professional Waldorf teacher training, and have worked with anthroposophy for 35 years and written articles related to it. I consider myself to be a reasonable expert on anthroposophy. I have also participated on the WC-mailing list for a number of years and contributed with some 1,000+ postings on the list. In addition to that, I have continued to follow what has been written on it by different people and checked up on a number of the sources discussed on it. The other main editor of the http://www.waldorfanswers.org site is a professional Waldorf teacher with many years of experience of teaching at different Waldorf schools. I consider this to represent expert knowledge of the subject. The sites demonstrate and reflect expert knowledge of the verifiable published sources in the field of Waldorf Education, including the defamation published by the WC-site. Misplaced Pages recommends using such expert knowledge of published sources as basis for writing articles, and does not consider this to be something that violates the "No original research" rule, as everything (as far as I'm aware of) is based on, quote, link to and reflect the verifiable published sources on the topic of Waldorf education, WCriticism, and anthroposophy.

Your second "argument" for deleting the links to the two sites http://www.waldorfanswers.org and http://www.americans4waldorf.org does not hold, as little as your first argument, based on a guideline that applies to the WC-site, and giving ONE of many reasons that including it in the article violates Misplaced Pages guidelines, that you in spite of this repeatedly reinstate, in violation of also other Misplaced Pages guidelines, and have argued that it applies to the two sites, to which it explicitly NOT applies.

One and half an hour after you have told that you don't agree with the argument against your first argument for deleting them, you then delete them with reference to another guideline, that also does not apply to the two sites.

You also warn that you will get a number of other people involved in your repeated violations of Misplaced Pages guidelines and standards, if they are now allowed.

Do you consider that to be responsible work and argumentation as editor of the article?

Again, I'd be interested in comments by other editors on this.

--Thebee 10:47, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Sune, please be clear that your "expert" status, despite your claims, is dubious because anyone reading your site will see you have a fanatical viewpoint. Someone who washes their hands a hundred times a day may be an expert in hand-washing, but they may also have serious mental problems. Your actions, continually babysitting this site, removing ALL critical material that is posted regarding Waldorf, and your insistance in reverting all edits that don't meet with YOUR approval, show evidence of mental instability. Your site is replete with lies, half-truths, twisted agruments, mis-quotes and character assinations. I have demonstrated this publicly several times, the last being on Mothering.com. I will happily demonstrate it here once again if need be. Let's start with Steiner's racist remarks that you call his "sense of humor" - shall we? As you can see, I really don't assign your "expert" status any worth. I am just as much an expert on Waldorf education as you are - only my perspective is from a parent's point of view. I understand THROUGH EXPERIENCE what it means to be lied to, slandered and have your children threatened and abused by WALDORF TEACHERS. So you're barking up the wrong tree when you tell me what you write represents "expert" opinion. What you write is dishonest and that dishonesty is representative of many Waldorf teachers. Every week, I breakfast with experienced Waldorf teachers - some with names you would recognize - and we discuss Waldorf education. All are conviced your website does Waldorf more harm than good and that your actions represent the very worst of Waldorf teachers. Your self-proclaimed "expertise" is based on fanaticism and a vendetta. So, let's leave the self-inflated "expert" status aside and see your work at both Waldorf Answers and Americans for Waldorf Education for what it truly is, original research, extremely biased, not based in fact, slanderous, fanatical and certainly not worthy of inclusion here under the "expert" status guideline you claim.

You wrote: "Your second "argument" for deleting the links to the two sites http://www.waldorfanswers.org and http://www.americans4waldorf.org does not hold, as little as your first argument, based on a guideline that applies to the WC-site, and giving ONE of many reasons that including it in the article violates Misplaced Pages guidelines, that you in spite of this repeatedly reinstate, in violation of also other Misplaced Pages guidelines, and have argued that it applies to the two sites, to which it explicitly NOT applies."

I'm not quite sure that was in comprehendable English, but I understand that you, one of the "Americans" for Waldorf Education is indeed a Swede, so I'll try to make sense of what you are stating. You are either saying that violation of one guideline isn't enough to exclude your two original research sites, or that the original research guideline does not apply in this case because of your "expert" status. I think we have established that your "expert" status doesn't hold water (see above), and so, of course, the original research guideline is all that's left. If your "expert" status is in question, and I would like that question to be answered by an INDEPENDENT participant representing Misplaced Pages, then the original research violation applies.

Here's what I would agree to in the mean time, in the interest of halting the link-editing wars. Why don't you replace one of the two links - since they are essentially the same website - i.e. they contain essentially the same information, pending review of the original research question. Leave the links critical of Waldorf alone as it has been agreed that both the PLANS link and the two other "foreign" links belong there. Let's ask for an INDEPENDENT review of Waldorf Answers and Americans for Waldorf Education - to see if the information contained at those sites is original research or not and if it mis-represents the facts or not. If it is not original research, and if it represents GOOD research, then they should be included. If it is found otherwise, those links should be excluded. --Pete K 15:40, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Let me just add one more thing here... the Americans for Waldorf Education site, you and four other people, have throughout Misplaced Pages made claims that the Waldorf critcal group PLANS is tantamount to a "hate group". I will be removing these statements wherever I find them for your own good. It displays your dishonest intention to discredit all critical review of Waldorf. You really should be ashamed of yourself for these actions, but I am certain you aren't. --Pete K 15:48, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Sune, I see you are continuing your tactic of removing the Critical Review section of the links and the link to PLANS. Please stop this. There has been no concensus opinion that this is a valid edit - that I know of. I'm sure it upsets you not to have complete control over this page, but unfortunately, continually editing out the links to critical sites and removing information critical of Waldorf is not productive. There is a re-write underway for the entire article and it would be wise, I think, if you stop this behavior while the re-write is going on.

On 28 August 2006, 11:22, HGilbert wrote:

"Let's agree here either to include both AWE and PLANS, or neither; both are web-sites, not published works. This either/or edit war is pointless. I hope it is clear that either both qualify or neither; it just remains to work out which we'd like to agree on. Let's go on to more productive work than reverts!!! (Get a life!!!) ;) Hgilbert 11:22, 28 August 2006 (UTC)"

On 28 August, 15:55 you answered (see http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Waldorf_education#Unified_standards_for_citations):

"I have agreed, as HGilbert has suggested, that either the AWE or WaldorfAnswers (as it's essentially the same site) and PLANS sites remain. I'm just as comfortable removing ALL the links until a review has been conducted by the project team who I anticipate will be unbiased. Nobody wants these edit wars to stop any more than I do. --Pete K 15:55, 28 August 2006 (UTC)"

After that, you have violated this consensus agreement -- including you -- a number of times, when it has been implemented, and returned to the edit war, about which you also wrote, AFTER arguing against the AWE site above (15:40, 28 August 2006 and 15:48, 28 August 2006):

Nobody wants these edit wars to stop any more than I do.

Please stop doing it, and stay with your agreed to consensus on having both links, until another consensus agreement is reached. --Thebee 01:29, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Sune (Thebee) you seem to misunderstand the agreement and continue to push this issue based on your misunderstanding. Here's what it says: "I have agreed, as HGilbert has suggested, that either the AWE or WaldorfAnswers (as it's essentially the same site) and PLANS sites remain. I'm just as comfortable removing ALL the links until a review has been conducted by the project team who I anticipate will be unbiased. Nobody wants these edit wars to stop any more than I do." (Emphasis was in the original message)

This is NOT an agreement that states a "critique" of the critical site PLANS is available to you as your link. This is NOT an agreement to remove both PLANS and WA/AWE links - but ALL links - until the dispute is settled. This is NOT an agreement to remove the Critical Review category as you have done several times a day since it was put up there. Please read the agreement carefully. If you want to add a link for AWE OR WA (one of the two) to the Waldorf Resources section, go ahead, be my guest. Or let's remove ALL the links including ALL Waldorf Resources links completely and we, the edit team, can review each one and decide which ones belong there. If you want to go that route, we can do this and I will recommend to the edit team that we make links our next priority. I'd recommend leaving the links alone and adding a link to one of your two original research sites. I suspect the edit team will want to review all the links eventually anyway, but for now, adding your link to the resources section or removing ALL the links including the resources links are the only things we have agreement on. I'm sorry that this is causing you such frustration. --Pete K 02:18, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I have re-added a link to Waldorf Answers in the Waldorf Resources section. Who has agreed with you that Waldorf Answers and Americans for Waldorf Education are basically identical and clones of each other? Nobody. VERY little of what is found at Waldorf Answers is found at Americans for Waldorf Education, and Americans for Waldorf Education has very little of what is found at Waldorf Answers and a large section on PLANS, of which nothing is found at Waldorf Answers. --Thebee 20:28, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I have removed the link to Waldorf Answers in the Waldorf Resources section. I really don't care whether they are identical or not - (they were the last time I looked at them) - at issue is they are both original research sites and don't belong here. We have agreed to allow one of the two links - I don't care which one you choose, Sune, but linking both sites is unacceptable as really, neither site should be allowed. Pick one or the other. --Pete K 03:00, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Links have been removed to trial transcripts located on the Waldorf Answers site. These are uncommented transcripts, and the links could be replaced to the same thing on another site, but not simply removed.

Another link was removed to Waldorf answers' material on festivals. This material is neutral and accurate. Hgilbert 15:29, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Waldorfanswers is not neutral - nor is it accurate. I agree the transcripts should be linked, but once you link someone to this original research website, they are likely to browse around that site. This is unacceptable as the warehousing of good information on an original research site serves to divert the user to the opinions posted on that website. If another site is available for the transcript information, it should indeed be linked. Linking to the very opinionated and defammatory Waldorfanswers or AWE sites for this information is not an option here. It would be better if Misplaced Pages had a neutral place to store this type of information - maybe a sub-page off the PLANS page would be OK. --Pete K 01:16, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

• The relevant guideline is Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources--Golden Wattle 01:29, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

List of famous alumni

The link to a list of famous alumni has been removed (by Fergie). I notice that Montessori method, for example, even has such a list embedded in the article. I find that a bit much, but is there any reason not to have a link to a list? Or should we remove such lists wherever they are found? Hgilbert 13:44, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Eurythmy Addition

I have added to the formerly minimal topic of Eurythmy. I have included quotes directly from Steiner and have addressed questions that many people have about Eurythmy. I have avoided the temptation to note that Eurythmy was an attempt by Von Sivers to spiritually negate the dances of "negro savages". Also, I have avoided including comments by sports teachers who claim Waldorf kids are among the most physically uncoordinated kids they have run across and attribute this, in part, to Eurythmy's lack of jumping movements. If others think that information would be helpful, we can add it in. --Pete K 16:12, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Sune, please discuss wholesale edits before making them. I have reverted the Eurythmy page to its condition. If you would like to discuss how the content is argumentative, we can do this here and agree on what the content should say. --Pete K 17:59, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

A reminder: editorializing is not appropriate here. Quoting or summarizing sources is preferred; people can then make their own judgments about the ideas expressed. See WP:Citing sources for details.

Incidentally, excuse me for citing guidelines constantly, but in working with new users who may or appear to be unfamiliar with these, it seems vital, so that we all understand the standard we are working towards. Hgilbert 18:34, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the standard you are working towards is deleting any critical viewpoint. I'm quite aware of who you are and what you are trying to do.--Pete K 19:20, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

My "editorializing" as you call it, is supported DIRECTLY by Steiner's own quotes. If you would care to discuss how Eurythmy ISN'T Anthroposophy, please do so here before editing the article again. If you would like to discuss how parents are informed about Eurythmy's spiritual nature, and how it is thought to be so powerful an activity that it can correct crooked teeth, then please discuss it here before making any changes to the article. I completely understand that what I have added is not what you would like the article to say, but it is the truth and belongs where it is. If you want to work collectively on wording that we can both agree on, then let's please do that rather than waste each other's time in constant editing. Again, I want to assure you I have endless energy in this type of thing. It behooves us to work together instead of in opposition. Please don't edit the article again without discussing this HERE. --Pete K 19:28, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Earlier today you edited the section on Eurythmy in the article and made it into a POV argumentation without asking here about it first, and only told you had done it after you did it. When your argumentative POV was edited to make it NPOV, you have reverted this to your original argumentative POV, and ask here that your original argumentative POV edit, made without discussing it here first, be left as it is, and that any further edits of your argumentative POV edit be discussed here BEFORE making them. Do you find your request to be consistent with your own action? --Thebee 20:22, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I have reverted to the section on Eurythmy to the original, pending discussion of it here. --Thebee 20:55, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

No, your statement above is not true. I discussed it here - but there wasn't a Eurythmy section on this discussion page until I made one after adding to the section. My comment is in another section, I don't know where at the moment. I waited a couple of days before including the information in the Eurythmy section. If you believe you have provided a NPOV, you are quite mistaken. Please read my comments above again. If you would like to work together on a NPOV version, I'd be happy to do this with you or with Harlan. I really, really get that you guys don't think it's important to discuss the dirty little secrets of Waldorf, but they are certainly worth discussing. Eurythmy is REQUIRED at ALL Waldorf schools. I can dig up the quote in Confereneces with Waldorf Teachers for you that has Steiner saying exactly this. So please don't say "many" when the truth is "all". It isn't dance, it's spiritual activity. People who describe it as dance are being dishonest - just like it would be dishonest to describe Tai Chi as dance. So a NPOV would require honest about the issue. BTW, I don't necessarily see any reason to update the Eurythmy article that someone was kind enough to link today, because it is the way Eurythmy relates to Waldorf that is at issue here. Eurythmy is a REQUIRED SPIRITUAL activity in ALL Waldorf schools and Steiner was adamant about this, and the quotes I provided confirm this. If you want to sugarcoat this with Waldorf-ism's about dance and art form, please save that for Waldorf literature. This is, hopefully, a place for truth. I will therefore revert the page back. --Pete K 21:07, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I wrote: "I have reverted to the section on Eurythmy to the original, pending discussion of it here." --Thebee 20:55, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

To this you answer: "your statement above is not true. I discussed it here - but there wasn't a Eurythmy section on this discussion page until I made one after adding to the section. My comment is in another section, I don't know where at the moment."

Can you please search for it with your browser here at the page, and tell where I can find it? --Thebee 21:21, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Sure. It's in the Science section. Here's the comment: "What I would like to see some discussion about (and what I mean by "deviates") is stuff like Eurythmy, which is REQUIRED for every student from 1st grade through 12th grade. In other words, it's a big deal. It is a deeply spiritual exercise that I think we should take a few sentences to talk about here. --Pete K 22:44, 25 August 2006 (UTC)" Nobody objected to this, so I added to the almost blank section on Eurythmy with information supported by quotes from Steiner. Then I created a Eurythmy section here for further discussion.--Pete K 22:05, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Criteria for inclusion

From Misplaced Pages:Verifiability

• As a rule of thumb, sources of dubious reliability should only be used in articles about themselves

Self-published and dubious sources in articles about themselves

Material from self-published sources, and other published sources of dubious reliability, may be used as sources of information about themselves in articles about themselves, so long as:

• It is relevant to the person's or organization's notability;
• It is not contentious;
• It is not unduly self-serving;
• It does not involve claims about third parties, or about events not directly related to the subject;
• There is no reasonable doubt about who wrote it.

This seems pretty clear. How many more guidelines does the PLANS site have to fail to meet to convince you? Hgilbert 14:08, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

All the material that claims this is a dubious site comes from within the Anthroposophy movement. Please cite an independent opinion. A groups Website cannot fall under the heading 'self published'. Every corporate site would fall under this. This heading is clearly intended to prevent original researchers citing themselves. PLANS is a public actor on a public stage in a public debate and must e included in a list of critical opinion on Waldorf education. Lumos3 14:46, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

The site of 'OpenWaldorf' is a one-man completely self published site. As such it does not qualify as a general linked to source on Waldorf Education. --Thebee 11:50, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

The criteria say that a group's website can be used as a reliable source in an article about that group. (See added emphasis, above). There is no way of ensuring that it is a reliable source about other things. When it has a tendentious and aggressive style, and involves claims about third parties (see above) it is problematic. Hgilbert 15:25, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

archive and special page

I have archived all material pre-2006 (see top of talk page for a link to the archive) Hgilbert 19:35, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I have moved two huge discussions, one about the PLANS web-site generally and one about linking to that site from this article, to a special page for this subject only; this brings the two together and allows this talk page to regain a sense of proportion. I hope that all can see the sense of this (I am not trying to cut off discussion, which can continue on that page). Hgilbert 04:22, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, and you have also "moved" or rather removed my comment *on this action*. Lumos comments on it below but you have simply eliminated my comment on this censorship. It is not at this page now or at the subpage you created, as far as I can see. If that isn't vandalism, I don't know what is. You are simply removing comments that reflect others' views not only on anthroposophy but on how you handle the discussion. I am still investigating but it must surely be against Misplaced Pages policies to tamper with the Discussion page.DianaW 11:47, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Diana writes 5 minutes later: I was mistaken - see that it is still there - just moved to a far less prominent and visible location.

I didn't move it at all. Look at the history; it is exactly where you put it. In any case, personal accusations are to be avoided on Misplaced Pages; please see the guidelines WP:Civil and WP:Assume good faith. Hgilbert 14:58, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Hgilbert, it is not going to be helpful for you to go on pointing out my supposed violations of protocol. Little scoldings do not deter me. There is no "personal accusation" from me. All my comments refer to the material. I assume good faith until good faith is violated. You violated good faith here pretty early on. The reasons you moved all that material are transparent.

I recognized and acknowledged my mistake in saying that the material had been deleted, within moments, you might note. That is an example of "good faith." I didn't just delete my own mistake, or move it somewhere else hoping people wouldn't notice.DianaW 15:55, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

You recognized your mistake...but continued to claim it was moved.

Hgilbert writes: "I have moved two huge discussions, one about the PLANS web-site generally and one about linking to that site from this article." This makes it sound like these are just two issues . . . and like there are so many other issues that the page can now "get back to," as byrnison also puts it, "let's get back to working on the article." Guys - newsflash: there isn't any *other* issue to discuss, in terms of improving this article. The inclusion of critical material is *the* issue. Everything else looks hunky-dory. There aren't any spelling mistakes or typos that I have noticed. The issue is whether the Misplaced Pages entry on Waldorf should be, as lumos notes, a sales brochure for Waldorf schools, or an article giving enough perspective on differing views of Waldorf that an uninformed person can begin to understand what the issues might be. Nobody is objecting to all the brochure copy you've pasted in on eurythmy or pentatonic recorders or the head, the heart and the hands. What we are asking is that the downsides of all this blinding beauty and wonder also be accessible. - And without resort to preposterous and slanderous revenge tactics such as labeling critics of your movement a "hate group."

This slanderous action - the labeling of the organization PLANS as a "hate group" in the absence of any evidence of this is also a topic I see you would rather not be highlighted on this discussion page. Again, my debunking of the ludicrous old "PLANS alleges witchcraft" discussion was dismissed by Sune Nordwall with a few quick phrases, oh, there was an article in the Sacramento Bee, well that settles it. Comments clearly showing the editorial to have been unreliable don't get a reply. Your response is to kinda shove the discussion to a less visible place on this site. It is quite obvious that the mere existence of the preposterous "hate group" discussion is something you would rather not be so readily readable by interested parties. You hope for the casual denunciation of the main body of organized critics as a "hate group" to have its impact on the casual reader of the article, while discussion of the origin and motivation for this outrageous claim is not readily accessible.DianaW 12:05, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

I refer you to WP:Assume good faith again. First of all, the discussion has achieved such monumental proportions that it deserves its own page; this is normal Misplaced Pages policy with specialized parts of articles that become overwhelmingly long. Second of all, I'm afraid that there are many aspects of Waldorf education, and this one link remains a highly specialized question, whatever its dominance in any individual's or group's thinking. Filling out and improving the actual description itself are also important tasks. There are now four links to the page in question, one at the very top of the page for quick access. Please be WP:Civil; this is not optional behavior at Misplaced Pages, but is "official policy and is considered a standard that all users should follow". Hgilbert 05:57, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I have created a second archive for most of the oldest discussions Ibyrnison 16:12, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Length and spam

Hey folks, according to Misplaced Pages: "an edit warning is displayed when a page exceeds 32 KB of text in total, to act as a reminder that the page may be starting to get too long" This page is over 112 kb long - it is RIDICULOUSLY long.

The constant allusions to anthroposophy have made this article completely useless as a basic encyclopedia reference article on WALDORF ED. There is another article on anthroposophy, and another on Steiner. Link to them.

As a Waldorf educator for over 6 years, I am almost offended by the length - it makes it impossible for a person who just wants to Waldorf to go to the encyclopedia, read a brief description, and understand the basics. After receiving a note from someone who was perplexed after reading this article, I propose 2 things:

1) We remove all anthroposophical info to the anthroposophy page - and place a reference that Waldorf teaching is based in an anthroposophical view of the child - with a link to "anthroposophy."

2) Speaking of links - we have so much overlap that it is ridiculous.

1) The homeschool section has recently picked up links from curriculum sellers - not non-profit guides to curriculum, but direct sellers. This is just plain dangerous as there are over 30 sources of Waldorf-inspired curriculum for homeschooler - hmmm, are we going to provide links for all. There were already links to 3 sources that together, list them all, review them all, and then provide additional resources for special needs children.

2) In one place there is a link to a list of all Waldorf schools and training centers, yet then there's a list where only a few training centers are linked to directly - I say remove that list.

3) Go through and remove all other duplicated links.

I will wait 72 hours before changing anything, and I invite conversation on this. As I received an email from a prospective Waldorf family who got SO perplexed after reading this article last week, I feel that an overhaul is in order.

Reminder - this is an encyclopedia article about Waldorf Education. It isn't anyone's boxing ring, free ad space for their business (no matter how wonderful that business might be), or soapbox. Wonderactivist 13:06, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Separating the topic of Anthroposophy from Waldorf Schools is one of the main criticisms of Waldorf education. It's not a good idea to prune Anthroposophical references from this article. Links to critical websites should be included as part of this article, as well as critical viewpoints. Pete K - Waldorf parent and critic.

Dear Pete, I'm not talking about separating anthro from Waldorf or hiding anything - I'm talking about making Waldorf the focus of this article and anthro the focus of the anthro article - and for that matter, Steiner should be the focus of the Steiner article, not this one. It is a simple reflection of the past conflicts here that you allude to "links to critical websites" when it was never suggested that we prune links to critical websites - only spam.

There is too much water under the bridge of this article. For a change, someone needs to look at this article from the perspective of making it a better article for the READER, not by how it represents the various factions surrounding Waldorf ed.Wonderactivist 14:27, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Wonderactivist: these are some good suggestions. I think that the page is full of solid information, but it is very long. Perhaps some of the material warrants a separate topic page, or relocation to more appropriate existing topics. This might reduce the size of reference lists, since some links will be move with the associated material to wherever it is relocated. And commercial links aren't allowed. Professor marginalia 15:44, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup

After going for a walk, I have decided to submit this article for Misplaced Pages clean-up. That means their experts will help us to make this a better article - and I suggest that all interested parties put opinions here. The fact is that no matter how passionate someone is about Waldorf, some browsers will just cut this article off because of the length - and I'm not sure I should edit it as surely I would upset someone. This way an unbiased person can help us first and then the unending evolution of the article can continue.

I will wait 24 hours in case someone would like to suggest otherwise. Wonderactivist 14:27, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Much of the bulk and unevenness has come from people who desperately needed to see references to some particular detail or another of the education that they had encountered (Advent Garden, gnomes, etc.) and rather than have endless edit wars, the editors have padded the article. This has made it very imbalanced. May I suggest we try to create a trimmed version here, with non-essential material (Administration of schools?) in linked articles, first? This could be done as a draft on a separate page accessible to all, and then, when it seems satisfactory, moved into the current article space. 24.190.149.18 20:25, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Dear 24..., I think your idea is great and quite a lot of info could be moved to other pages, but the problem here is the constant environment of conflict and 'tit for tat.' I really think a fresh eye would be best - someone who hasn't been involved in Waldorf...I don't think Misplaced Pages is repesented well here. As you say, the editors are not at fault - just attempting to keep the peace...and maybe if the Cleanup Squad cannot take it on, we could do the separate page thing. Wonderactivist 21:55, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

The clean-up list is has huge backlogs. The wikipedia position on long articles is "This category is for pages which exceed a size of 100 Kilobytes. Pages of this size are hard to load for viewing, tax a user's attention-span, and even harder to edit. If you can, please see if the page can be reduced to a more manageable size by archiving, or split into multiple articles."

It would be best to form some concensus here, but if that isn't possible, add it to the clean-up queue. It does look like much of the conflict on the discussion pages has violated the spirit and policies at wikipedia, and wikipedia is not represented well by the flame wars. Regardless who revises the page here, those rules need to be kept in mind or the mess will continue. One of the official rules that seems to have been ignored here is the rule to "assume the good faith" of other editors; questioning each other's motives isn't the way editors are invited to contribute around here. Professor marginalia 23:45, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi Professor, I think that Clean-up being busy is not enough reason to forego their much-needed service. My fear is very valid considering that 23 edits were made on this page in less than 30 hours. In its history there are also multiple reverts and referrals to "outsiders" which show an utter disregard for the very spirit of Misplaced Pages - an open encyclopedia.

Since I am also not wanting to overwhelm cleanup, I have asked an administrator for an opinion on the next best step.

To Anonymous: Many of these edits were taken correcting some of the problems on the page. The size has been much reduced, only 55 K now, to help address the problem of length. Commercial sites and duplicates in the external links have also been removed, and the reverts don't seem directed at any of those edits. I just wanted to give kudos to those editors whose constructive efforts are among those edits. Professor marginalia 00:10, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Comments

I have never looked at this article before today but came here from a talk page. I don't know anything about Waldorf education, and I am not an expert in the field of chilren's education / school-age learning.

This article is too long to be easily read on-line. Many of the sections within it are complete enough to form their own article.

For example, Waldorf education#Social mission should be a two to three line paragraph with a link to a main Social mission of Waldorf education article. Simlarly, the educational model should be moved to it's own article with only a brief summary included in this artice. (perhaps, the lead paragraph of the Pedagogy section only should remain the rest should be moved).

Under the External Links section there is a section "Finding a Waldorf School". In a Misplaced Pages article, such a heading should be a discussion about how to systematically compare schools which each offer Waldorf education. That list looks like spam to me.

If Rudolf Steiner is so important to Waldorf education then he is probably a notable individual (he already has an article). The extensive bibliography belongs on that article.

Other than the Notes and References there is very little need for all the list of information about works regarding Waldorf education.

This is the only article I have seen on Misplaced Pages which (other than for footnoting purposes and Table of Contents) refers one section back to another section within the same article. That is a clear indication the two sections should be in different articles, each of which is referenced from this main article.

While all of this is only my opinion I hope the opinion of someone who is disinterested in this article and the subject itself can lead to improvements in this work.

I really don't want to become engaged in ongoing debate about what should be "in" and "out" of the article. But the conduct of editors on this talk page is not conducive to reaching concensus. Garrie

Thank you Garrie for sharing an unbiased opinion. The Talk page he is referring to must be that opf the administrator I wrote - and it says on that page that he is quite busy and it may take a couple of days for a response. In the meantime, I would like to suggest three changes that we could make quite quickly to deal with the length issue (again, let's wait 24 hours for discussion and comment)

Libel and loose slander

Pete, you wrote here on 26 August 2006: "Waldorf Answers and Americans for Waldorf Education site owner, Sune Nordwall, once voted one of the 250 craziest people on the internet, is known among critics for his dishonest portrayal of Waldorf education..."

The first part of the sentence is untrue. I don't own the domains you mention

The third part of the sentence looks like unsubstantiated POV "original research" among those that constitute the core WC-group.

The middle part is yet another untruth by you (the third in two days: 25-26 Aug), maybe written by you as alleged support for your view that AWE represents a group of 'Lunatics', and in this case constitutes libel in the sense of a published, defamatory and verifiably untrue statement for the following reason:

What you refer to probably is the fact that one individual in Australia, critical of Alternative medicine, in 2002 put a link to my main personal site at the time on a page at his personal site, where he lists a number of sites on the internet that he characterizes as pages by 'Loons'. It was his own personal view, and he has not at any time referred to any form of vote by some group of people as basis for putting me on his personal list of sites, that he finds amusing.

The reason for this, that he gives is his description of the site, is:

"I have mentioned before that I like a good synthesis. Nothing gets my heart beating faster than a good dose of synthesis (except for a lump of conspiracy, of course), so I was pleased to find this site where physics, astronomy, biology, religion, politics and the nature of man are all rolled up into a neat package that anyone can absorb in an afternoon."

Except for the overview of research on and a discussion of some basic issues with regard to homeopathy at my site, that probably was what caught his attention in the first place, it contains a paper on the concept of science, an article on the pattern of the development of the EC/EU, and a page on the pattern of the cell cycle of eucharyote cells.

The paper on the concept of science was an academic paper that I wrote 26 years ago, as part of academic studies of Philosophy of Science at the time. It is a short paper, that discusses the different historical origins of the tradition of Spiritual Science, as represented by Anthroposophy, and "Natural Science", and the relation between them from an ontological and epistemological perspective. The Professor I had, one of the probably only two in Sweden on that specific subject at the time gave it "Excellent" marks. Since I published it at my site in 1998, the page has had about 80,000 visits.

The paper on the development of the EC/EU-process from the middle of the 1980's and onwards seems to be something one of the few macro historians in the world, a Prof. Nikolai Rozov at the University of Novosibirsk considers serious enough to link to it from his site at the university, that also lists a number of other papers on macrohistorical problems.

The paper on the pattern of the stages of the cell cycle of eucharyote cells was written as the result of an academic study of biology at the end of the 1980s'. It is listed and linked to from a number of professional sites on cell biology on the internet, and has had about 50,000 visits since I published it in 1998.

Do they the papers and pages mentioned, and the judgment of them by professional people and sites in the field they discuss document that I am, as you write "one of the 250 craziest people on the internet"? Well, I leave that to the reader of this comment to judge.

--Thebee 14:49, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, in my opinion, you are the Number 1 craziest person on the internet... but that's just my opinion. Your objection to my statement seems to revolve around the word I used, "craziest" - when the reference I was jokingly referring to said "looniest". My point is well taken, however, that a tiny group of "crazies" or "loonies" or "fanatics" or whatever you want to call yourselves, doesn't make for a professional opinion. I don't really care if you're the next Nobel prize winner, Sune, you're not allowed to come here and lie about people. That's libel on YOUR part. Your assertions about "hate groups" and crap like that is just a lie that you yourself generated and hope to make stick by repeating it. I really DO hope readers judge your actions here - and my comments below. I think you will find that most people will agree with the "looney" label that you claim you were not awarded. --Pete K 17:07, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Libel consists in using words to make defamatory untrue statements about people.

You write:

"you're not allowed to come here and lie about people"

If you consider anything I write to constitute libel, quote it and prove it is not true, as I have with your personal libel. My judgment that PLANS publishes argumentation characteristic of hate groups is based on almost ten years of experience of the group, summarized - now at another page - here in the discussion, and the description of hate groups here at wikipedia. For another summary of the basis of the statement, see here.

You also write

- I think you will find that most people will agree with the "looney" label that you claim you were not awarded. And

- Your objection to my statement seems to revolve around the word I used, "craziest" - when the reference I was jokingly referring to said "looniest".

Wrong again Pete, on both points. You're careless with words.

I have never - as you state - claimed that I have not been labeled 'Loon' by someone, in this case by one individual at his personal site in Australia or NZ, who is a secular skeptic activist and who seems to have taken my site to his heart for some reason, describing it in friendly terms, quoted above, and adding some also more ironic words at his site.

What I have explained to you is that your statement that I have been

"voted one of the 250 craziest people on the internet" as a "fact"

constitutes libel in a legal sense, as what you refer to is just the expressed free personal opinion of one individual, and giving a motivation of his listing of my site at his site in the friendly terms quoted above. Try reading this and thinking two times about it. It really is not difficult to understand the difference between an expressed free personal opinion - as he did - and stating something untrue and defamatory as a fact - as you did.

You still have not retracted your libel. The same is the case with your statement

"Not surprisingly 'Americans for Waldorf Education' and sister site 'Waldorf Answers' are considered by Waldorf critics and Waldorf supporters alike to be comprised of fanatical Waldorf supporters.".

You have still not, neither substantiated it with regard to 'Waldorf supporters alike', meaning some noticable group of waldorf supporters, nor retracted it. This makes into still published slander by you. --Thebee 18:10, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

(or Is it Slander when someone makes a false claim of Slander)

Of course, I didn't attach any of this to the article. If you will read my comments above, I describe the comments as tongue-in-cheek. But your characterization of them typifies the way you take comments out of context and then produce a diatribe (as you have above) to discredit what someone hasn't really said. This is why it is, IMO, dangerous to have you here making edits and linking to your websites. There is little of value at all in them and they contain mostly ravings like the one above - again often about a sentence that you have misinterpreted or taken out of context, as you have above. If it were up to me to choose words to describe you, words like "crazy" and "lunatic" wouldn't be discarded so offhandedly... but then that's just me (and most of the Waldorf world) --Pete K 19:57, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

You write: "If you will read my comments above, I describe the comments as tongue-in-cheek. But your characterization of them typifies the way you take comments out of context and then produce a diatribe... ".

I did not characterize what you wrote. I quoted you.

Your documented libel on this public discussion page on the internet constitutes as much libel as it would be if it was published in the article. Or you actually have another source than what I describe above on what you have written as "... Sune Nordwall, once voted one of the 250 craziest people on the internet ..."?

Otherwise, it is actual libel, you know that?

On 26 Aug, you also wrote: "Not surprisingly 'Americans for Waldorf Education' and sister site 'Waldorf Answers' are considered by Waldorf critics and Waldorf supporters alike to be comprised of fanatical Waldorf supporters." (This is not a characterization either, but a quote.)

So, who are the supporters of Waldorf Education, who consider http://www.americans4waldorf.org and http://www.waldorfanswers.org to be comprised of what you call "fanatical Waldorf supporters"? --Thebee 20:29, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

You say "I did not characterize what you wrote. I quoted you." Well, then you characterized whether you felt each part of what I said was true or untrue and why. I don't need another source or, for that matter, any source to make a comment that I describe as tongue-in-cheek. The fact that you WERE described in this way, however, is enough. When you and your four teammates continually attach a label to PLANS that says "Americans for Waldorf Education says PLANS uses language characteristic of a hate group" - you are being less honest than what I wrote above about you - because in my case, what I said jokingly about how somebody characterized you was accurate. As to whether I have committed libel with my statement, this serves to further demonstrate how irresponsible you are with labels about people. Nobody could mistake what I said as libelous, but you're welcome to try to make that charge stick. Regarding the "Waldorf Supporters" you mention above and wish to have me name, I'm not about to do that here - but if you decide to take this case to court, and I invite you to try, I'll be happy to name them there. BTW, this discussion seems to have nothing at all to do with Misplaced Pages, and if you think you are somehow clearing your good name with threats of libel, if I can stop laughing long enough to catch my breath, I'll suggest that you are gravely mistaken. --Pete K 22:18, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

I did not characterize what I felt about the three parts of your sentence. I told what was the factual case, and gave verifiable references that showed that what you wrote was untrue.

You also write: "The fact that you WERE described in this way, however, is enough." Described by whom as source, except by you as untruthful libel? And enough for what?

On "what I said jokingly about how somebody characterized you was accurate.": It is not interesting if someone has characterized me the way you wrote here. What is interesting is that YOU published the defamatory statement here and that is was untrue. You can't make others responsible for what you write here. YOU make the untrue statements here, and are responsible for making them here, not the people you refer to as alleged source.

You also write: "When you and your four teammates continually attach a label to PLANS that says "Americans for Waldorf Education says PLANS uses language characteristic of a hate group" - you are being less honest than what I wrote above about you ..."

The description is based on the description of the argumentation by hate groups, given in the article on the issue here at Misplaced Pages, and what I have summarized here regarding what is published by Mr. Dugan at his WC-site, showing in what way what is found at the WC-site as postings and articles corresponds to the description in the Misplaced Pages article of the argumentation that characterizes hate groups.

It does not. Nothing in your summary "corresponds to the description in the Misplaced Pages article of the argumentation that characterizes hate groups." Let's just get this straight, in case you think I'm not listening anymore or that you can revert to "hate group" talk when I'm busy somewhere. Your summary shows not one action or statement on the part of PLANS that is even *remotely* similar to the language or actions of a hate group . Despite being asked repeatedly you have produced no material of this nature whatsoever.DianaW 14:33, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

But 'argumentation similar to hate groups' may be slightly closer description of the truth than 'argumentation characteristic of hate groups'. What do you find to be untruthful in the extensively referenced summary?

On "Nobody could mistake what I said as libelous, but you're welcome to try to make that charge stick." What you wrote was untruthful and defamatory. The publication of defamatory and untrue statements about a living person is what defines libel. Disagree? Nothing in what you wrote indicated that it was a joke. On the contrary it gave the impression of beig a quite upset statement. meant to be understood as truthful.

On "Regarding the "Waldorf Supporters" you mention above and wish to have me name, I'm not about to do that here." If you can't document that what you write is true, what you write is "original non-verifiable research" and you can't publish it here at Misplaced Pages, as you did 23:13, 26 August 2006 in the PLANS article.

A simple question then: Do you refer to anything more and else than Keith's joking comment on the WC-list, as "Waldorf supporters" who agree alike with WCs that, as you write http://www.americans4waldorf.org and http://www.waldorfanswers.org are comprised of "fanatical Waldorf supporters"? Just no, or yes and a link to where on the internet the statements are found.

This is Misplaced Pages, not a forum for loose, unverified or unverifiable slander, Pete.

If you can't answer that simple question regarding a denigrating statement that you have published in an article here at Misplaced Pages, why should anyone here believe anything you write here? --Thebee 23:53, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

This coming from the person who has devoted an entire website to defaming Dan Dugan and Peter Staudenmaier. I won't qualify any of your ravings with a comment tonight. I will answer you tomorrow. If you think you have a case for libel with what I have said above, you are welcome to bring it - in fact I invite you to bring it. You and your defaming friends are on notice - you are going to be exposed for exactly what you are doing. I'll answer your ravings in detail tomorrow. I don't have time for this nonsense now. --Pete K 03:13, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Sune, in your latest message, you wrote:

"I did not characterize what I felt about the three parts of your sentence. I told what was the factual case, and gave verifiable references that showed that what you wrote was untrue."

So what? It was intended as an example to demonstrate what YOU have been doing with this "hate group" language you and your team has been spouting. I never claimed it was true, only an example of the type of language you are using and the flimsy sources you are justifying it with.

"You also write: "The fact that you WERE described in this way, however, is enough." Described by whom as source, except by you as untruthful libel? And enough for what?"

You were described in this way on a list of craziest people on the internet. But that's completely besides the point here, the point is exactly what I have said above, your tactics at defamation of people you don't like. Now you make a ridiculous clame of libel against me in an attempt to defame me. I've been around your type of Waldorf teachers before - threats don't scare me. As I said above, if you have a claim against me here or anywhere, avail yourself of the legal channels available to you.

"On "what I said jokingly about how somebody characterized you was accurate.": It is not interesting if someone has characterized me the way you wrote here. What is interesting is that YOU published the defamatory statement here and that is was untrue." No, it wasn't untrue. I saw the website where you were listed. It may or may not be the one you are talking about, I don't remember the name of it, but I saw it with my own eyes. Again, my comment was a demonstration of the flimsy logic you use in your defamation campaign. This is very much like YOU using a statement where PLANS complains that YOU have called them a hate group - to support the claim that they have been called a hate group. Again, this is evidence of your own twisted hatred for people who criticize Waldorf and the extents you will go to in order to defame them.

"You can't make others responsible for what you write here. YOU make the untrue statements here, and are responsible for making them here, not the people you refer to as alleged source."

I didn't make any untrue statements here. The only untrue statements here are coming from you. Go back and re-read what I wrote originally, that you are taking out of context, and re-think what you are saying here. My credibility is unshakeable. I've never, ever lied about anything having to do with Waldorf. Your credibility is highly suspect, however.

"You also write: 'When you and your four teammates continually attach a label to PLANS that says "Americans for Waldorf Education says PLANS uses language characteristic of a hate group" - you are being less honest than what I wrote above about you ...'

The description is based on the description of the argumentation by hate groups, given in the article on the issue here at Misplaced Pages, and what I have summarized here regarding what is published by Mr. Dugan at his WC-site, showing in what way what is found at the WC-site as postings and articles corresponds to the description in the Misplaced Pages article of the argumentation that characterizes hate groups. But 'argumentation similar to hate groups' may be slightly closer description of the truth than 'argumentation characteristic of hate groups'. What do you find to be untruthful in the extensively referenced summary?"

Um... other than it is YOUR OWN group who paints this untruthful picture of PLANS - and no support for this claim can be found anywhere outside of your group of five people? Well, I demonstrated by my tongue-in-cheek comment above how easy it would be to produce this kind of nonsense here on Misplaced Pages and within Misplaced Pages's guidelines. I can document that people have called Americans for Waldorf Education a lot of things, including fanatics. I can even document people saying THEY are a hate group. All I have to do is get a few of my friends to say this publicly. You already saw how relatively easy it was to do this - in one case. The tactics you are using here are underhanded, dishonest and shameful. They might be fine for your own websites, but they are not OK here.

"On "Nobody could mistake what I said as libelous, but you're welcome to try to make that charge stick." What you wrote was untruthful and defamatory."

Yep. It was intended to be. It was intended to demonstrate the tactics you use. Because you were able to identify it as such, it seems my point got through to you.

"The publication of defamatory and untrue statements about a living person is what defines libel. Disagree? Nothing in what you wrote indicated that it was a joke. On the contrary it gave the impression of beig a quite upset statement. meant to be understood as truthful."

Tell it to the judge Sune. My words are clear, so you don't scare me with these threats. My intention was made obvious and your apparent inability to understand simple English is probably at the root of your problems here. It's great that you are turning this into a flame war. You should be proud of yourself at wasting even more internet bandwidth than your own websites are already wasting.

"On "Regarding the "Waldorf Supporters" you mention above and wish to have me name, I'm not about to do that here." If you can't document that what you write is true, what you write is "original non-verifiable research" and you can't publish it here at Misplaced Pages, as you did 23:13, 26 August 2006 in the PLANS article."

I'm not publishing anything. This is the discussion page, not the article. This is a forum for discussion about the article. If you think everything here is worthy of publishing, you're quite mistaken. If you want to discuss the PLANS article, let's not waste this space with that. I'll be happy to discuss it in the PLANS article discussion section.

"A simple question then: Do you refer to anything more and else than Keith's joking comment on the WC-list, as "Waldorf supporters" who agree alike with WCs that, as you write http://www.americans4waldorf.org and http://www.waldorfanswers.org are comprised of "fanatical Waldorf supporters"? Just no, or yes and a link to where on the internet the statements are found."

Sure. I've made the comment myself as a matter of fact - and I'm a Waldorf supporter... Yeah, really Sune... I support the good parts of Waldorf, I support my kid's school, and I support good Waldorf teachers. Ask anyone who knows me personally. I've always said people like you hurt Waldorf much more than they help. It's the dishonest elements of Waldorf I don't support. Do you want a link to my own website where I made the comment? This example is exactly as stupid as you linking Americans for Waldorf Education with a weak comment about PLANS being a "hate group".

"This is Misplaced Pages, not a forum for loose, unverified or unverifiable slander, Pete."

Can you support the claim of "slander" Sune? If you can, I'd like to see you do that. Otherwise, please retract this claim.

"If you can't answer that simple question regarding a denigrating statement that you have published in an article here at Misplaced Pages, why should anyone here believe anything you write here? --Thebee 23:53, 28 August 2006 (UTC)"

Yeah, start the defamation campaign on me now Sune. You don't have a leg to stand on trying to defame me. You've got nothing - but don't let that stop you. I'm a disgruntled Waldorf parent, so you think I need to be discredited. It doesn't matter if what you are saying is true - your misunderstandings about what you read are good enough. Why don't you stop wasting everyone's time here and find another place to play. This site is for serious work. --Pete K 05:48, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

There is NO extensively referenced summary of "argumentation characteristic of hate groups" (or, excuse me, now you've changed it to "similar to" hate groups). We could give you the benefit of the doubt that you do not know what a hate group is, but then you need to learn. This charade is offensive to victims of *real* hate groups. You have NEVER ONCE presented a summary of ANYTHING that shows hate speech or actions (or anything "similar") coming from PLANS. The material DOES NOT EXIST. You've ignored my questions regarding your "summary" on the discussion page for the PLANS article, no? Where you claim you've got "newspaper articles from 1997," depositions, press releases, all kinds of official-sounding things that you claim will document that PLANS is a hate group, yet you don't post it. Yes, you have given repeated links to your own multiple web sites MAKING THIS CLAIM, with long, unreadable tangled wads of prose supposedly "summarizing" all this - but that is not the same thing as providing a summary of evidence showing PLANS to be a hate group.DianaW 04:06, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

If you don't understand my English, and don't know how to follow the links given in the mentioned overview to find the original published sources it is based on and refers to, mostly published on the internet, there's not much I can do to help you. --Thebee 08:35, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Not a chance, buddy. The link above AGAIN goes to your own web site. I understand English very nicely. NOT ONE of the items cited in

your "summary" shows PLANS to be a hate group. NOT ONE ITEM in the ENTIRE list presents evidence, quotes, actions etc. that suggest the behavior of speech of a hate group. There isn't anything in anything you have posted yet that provides this. Your links are to things like, some Waldorf group's policy on immunization. We could discuss that if you like, but nothing there is even relevant to PLANS. It doesn't *mention* PLANS, let alone document or reflect anything anyone at big bad ol' PLANS supposedly did to hurt somebody.

As always, what you are trying to say is that people writing on PLANS' mailing list have *criticized* practices and experiences in Waldorf schools, in this case in relation to finding vaccination of their children discouraged. You are linking to things that will show that your critics have a *difference of opinion* with you on this question. Nobody bashed you, nobody set your house on fire, nobody threatened you, nobody urged violence against you or mocked you or harassed you or said you are ugly, nobody even said anything nasty to you, other than the occasional exchange of childish insults. You consider a *discussion of issues* in which other people disagree with you to be an attack. You like to say critics "demonize" you etc. but anyone reading the discussion quickly sees you just hope that your own inflammatory language will reflect poorly on other people, when it merely reflects poorly on *you*. (And embarrasses the whole Waldorf movement.) You couldn't get away with calling your goofy "summary" a "source" or "documentation" for a claim that an organization is a "hate group" even if you were in maybe fifth grade. It isn't stuff like, "So-and-so doesn't like me." The teacher would have to keep patiently explaining to you what it means to "document" something - and that personally getting your feathers ruffled doesn't mean somebody "hates" you and you ought to call the police or something. Your behavior is very childish.DianaW 11:41, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Gee. I wonder where Harlan Gilbert's musings about who has got custody of their children, on *these pages*, falls in this realm of "original research" versus documented claims? (He quickly quit trying to document it, and just dashed back putting X's in to replace the names of people he had slandered.) "You can't publish it here at Misplaced Pages." Hm.DianaW 04:06, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I wrote "This is Misplaced Pages, not a forum for loose, unverified or unverifiable slander, Pete."

On this, you comment, Pete:

Can you support the claim of "slander" Sune? If you can, I'd like to see you do that. Otherwise, please retract this claim."

If you can't and don't document which "supporters" you refer to with "Not surprisingly 'Americans for Waldorf Education' and sister site 'Waldorf Answers' are considered by Waldorf critics and Waldorf supporters alike to be comprised of fanatical Waldorf supporters.", except yourself, that you describe as a "waldorf supporter" above:

"I've made the comment myself as a matter of fact - and I'm a Waldorf supporter"

I would tend to stick with my characterization.

I somewhat doubt that most, who read what you write, would understand you to in general be a supporter of Waldorf education.

My question concerns the extent of the "waldorf supporters" you refer to in your statement. If you can't give anyone else than yourself as reference, in terms of a noticeable group of Waldorf supporters, that would correspond to what you write, I'd consider your statement to be unverified slander. If you document any noticeable group of Waldorf supporters, that corresponds to what you write, I'll retract my characterization of it as unverified slander. So far you haven't. --Thebee 07:57, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Personally, YOUR characterization of me is of no interest to me - so characterize me however you like. If you think you have a case of slander (it would be libel in any case) bring me to court. As I said, I don't frighten that easy. In my opinion, you're a raving lunatic with nothing better to do than to defame people. I'm actually honored to be among the people you choose to defame. It means I'm doing some good in the area of Waldorf reform. As to naming Waldorf supporters who describe your site in a certain way, I'm not about to do that publicly because AWSNA, apparently, still supports your activity. I'll hopefully have the opportunity to talk with their representatives about you and your actions this year when they visit my local school. While you have the support of AWSNA and the Waldorf community, I'm not about to dole out names of Waldorf supporters who speak out against you. We all know what happens in Waldorf environments when someone steps out of line - they are removed from their positions. There is no room in Waldorf for reformists, you're either a supporter or a critic - and that you have gone to great lengths to paint critical viewpoints intolerable and dishonest notwithstanding, many Waldorf supporters understand and appreciate critical review of Waldorf. If you need me to name names of people who have referred to you as I claim ON THIS DISCUSSION PAGE, I'll present them in court - not before. If you continue to call me a slanderer without support for this claim, you may find yourself having to support THAT claim. --Pete K 14:58, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

You write, Pete:

This is very much like YOU using a statement where PLANS complains that YOU have called them a hate group - to support the claim that they have been called a hate group.

Again, this is another untruth. I have not done that. What you refer to is a comment by someone else. --Thebee 08:17, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Are you suggesting YOU are not one of the five members of Americans for Waldorf Education? Are you suggesting that the reference to PLANS being tantamount to a "hate group" wasn't planted here several times by YOU? It's easy enough to prove. --Pete K 14:58, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to see an answer to Pete's question above: are you suggesting, Sune, that you are not one of the five members of Americans for Waldorf Education? Then how come the web site says you are? Are you suggesting you didn't plant the hate group reference here several times?DianaW 14:33, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I have not (in the discussion here) used a statement by PLANS, complaining that I have called them a hate group, to support the claim that they have been called a hate group. That has been done by someone else here at this page. --Thebee 15:12, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that was Lbyrnison.DianaW 14:33, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

You write, Pete: "If you continue to call me a slanderer without support for this claim, you may find yourself having to support THAT claim."

I do not characterize you as a slanderer as some general unsubstantiated slander of you.

I have just asked your for substantiation of one claim by you, with regard to the Waldorf supporters you refer to in your statement: "Not surprisingly 'Americans for Waldorf Education' and sister site 'Waldorf Answers' are considered by Waldorf critics and Waldorf supporters alike to be comprised of fanatical Waldorf supporters.". You have not provided any such substantiation. You also say that you will not do it if I don't sue you for libel first.

That's putting the burden of proof in the wrong place. YOU need to show that what you write with regard to Waldorf supporters is true and not slander. You have not and refuse to refer to anyone else than yourself as Waldorf supporter, as substantiation of what you write.

As you refuse to substantiate what you write in ANY other way, even when I explicitly ask you to, your statement remains a loose, unsubstantiated statement, that has the character of slander. If you prove me wrong, I'll immediately retract my expressed view of it. So far, you have not. Instead you complain that I ask you for substantiation, and have changed the title of this section, trying to imply that characterizing something you write as slander, as you you refuse to substantiate it, constitutes slander ... Sounds like strange logic to me. Why not stop writing what you can't substantiate in the first place instead? --Thebee 16:06, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

You have pruned the full context of my original statement in this section so that you can attack me. I wonder why? This is typical of the nonsense you and your ilk continually try to do to discredit people critical of Waldorf. Not interested in pursuing this further with you Sune. You've got nothing here and I'm not going to play this game with you. I've got work to do correcting many Anthroposophically biased articles here. I can't waste my time with this. There is NO question about whether I can substantiate my claim, if I need to. I don't need to substantiate it here because it was made in a context that doesn't require substantiation. Give it up... you're looking like a fool again. --Pete K 16:47, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Would you care to answer the questions I posed to you above? --Pete K 15:33, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Maybe you're having trouble finding the questions I've asked you to answer, above. Here they are again: Are you suggesting YOU are not one of the five members of Americans for Waldorf Education? Are you suggesting that the reference to PLANS being tantamount to a "hate group" wasn't planted here several times by YOU? --Pete K 02:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Project Clean-up Notice

Please note that this page is currently undergoing a clean-up in a community effort to improve its quality. Please read the clean-up section below before editing and place comments on this page to correspond with the edits. Perhaps take a moment to read over

For best results, place your edit ideas on this page 24 hours before making any additions.

If you wold like to join a project to completely overhaul this page, please leave a note on my Talk page.Wonderactivist 16:17, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

I have written each person who expressed interest in the project and am now waiting for word from the Alt Ed project as to whether they want us to be a sub-project or independent. I believe it would be for the benefit of this page to make it a sub-project with many more unbiased editors to consult. I will set up project pages upon their response. I appreciate the input from Longhair (on my Talk page) and Garrie. They are both experienced Wikipedians with no bias on this issue. Wonderactivist 15:37, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

P.S. please let me know if you wold like to join the project on my Talk page.

Unified standards for citations

Let's agree here either to include both AWE and PLANS, or neither; both are web-sites, not published works. This either/or edit war is pointless. I hope it is clear that either both qualify or neither; it just remains to work out which we'd like to agree on. Let's go on to more productive work than reverts!!! (Get a life!!!) ;) Hgilbert 11:22, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Dear Hgilbert, I would vote for no outside links at all on this page until after the project is completed. The links have been a major component in the ongoing edit wars - which are not in the best interests of the reader or Misplaced Pages. Most other pages do not have so many and there are multiple cases where the pages restrict outside links for such reasons. But then, maybe let's let the project make the final decision - by consensus. Wonderactivist 15:37, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

I would also draw Hgilbert's attention to wikipedia's civility policy. Comments such as "get a life" don't do us any good. Jefffire 15:42, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Jefffire: Sorry, that was a joke, not an insult. I don't know if you're American; it is a pet phrase here.

Rather amusing to have a comment on this and not on the extensive personal comments made earlier in this discussion... Perhaps you've come in late. Hgilbert 11:46, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, well I wish I would have read this before commenting above to Sune (theBee). I have agreed, as HGilbert has suggested, that either the AWE or WaldorfAnswers (as it's essentially the same site) and PLANS sites remain. I'm just as comfortable removing ALL the links until a review has been conducted by the project team who I anticipate will be unbiased. Nobody wants these edit wars to stop any more than I do. --Pete K 15:55, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

HGilbert writes: "Rather amusing to have a comment on this and not on the extensive personal comments made earlier in this discussion... Perhaps you've come in late." Maybe Jefffire HAS a life. Glad you are amused so easily Harlan. --Pete K 15:02, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Eurythmy

Misplaced Pages policy states that there should be no Original research, meaning you can't just write what you think about a subject. In addition, there is a separate Eurythmy article for a detailed analysis of this; if we have five paragraphs about every subject taught in a Waldorf school, the article will swell beyond belief. Please help create a readable article. Hgilbert 11:44, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi, I would agree and that's just the type of thing we can do with this project. The eurythmy could be two lines with the second one linking to the Wiki page on eurythmy. On that page, there can then be a link to a scholarly article, a literary reference (or 2) and maybe two or three external links. Wonderactivist 13:25, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Eurythmy is unspectacular in and of itself EXCEPT that it is a spiritual exercise revered by Steiner and Anthroposophists and underhandedly taught to Waldorf students. I'll replace the full out of context quote from Steiner without my own commentary. Shortening the quote and taking it out of context is not good policy. There is not justification to hide its spiritual nature on the Waldorf page. Also, the typeface previous to my edit was odd. --Pete K 14:30, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Normally, the aspects of eurythmy special to Waldorf schools, its pedagogical nature, would be presented in an article that is actually about Waldorf education; general information about eurythmy itself belongs in the eurythmy article. The quote is rather long considering it is about eurythmy generally, and not speaking about the educational uses particularly. I know you consider it vital information relevant to the education... Hgilbert 20:31, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

It's not such a long quote at all. Additionally, the Eurythmy article here talks more of performance art. This is not why or how Eurythmy is used for children. No sense in pretending you don't know this. Eurythmy is a spiritual activity in Waldorf. It makes no sense to hide this fact - and it IS a fact. --Pete K 20:41, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

All the more reason to add more pedagogical material to the Eurythmy article. I am ok with leaving the quote in at the moment; no one is hiding a fact, and putting material in linked articles on subsidiary topics is hardly hiding it, when it is Misplaced Pages policy anyway to do so and include a brief summary.

BTW, if you want to save space, why not consider moving the ridiculous study that says kids who go to Waldorf are healthier than other kids - as if Waldorf education contributed to this. People who like to live healthier are attracted to Waldorf's brochures. The study has little, if anything, to do with Waldorf and it's just there to make yet another fantastic and controversial claim. Why not free up that space to talk about things the kids are required to do every day by Waldorf schools? --Pete K 20:49, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

We could consider putting the study in a subsidiary article on the health-giving effects of Waldorf education and an anthroposophical lifestyle (the study actually confirmed the latter as well); could you help us gather more material for this to make it worthwhile to make the move? :> Hgilbert 01:09, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, the "health-giving" change certainly helped the appearance on this page. Thanks Harlan. I'm not sure the study deserves its own article, but I'm not going into that here. I like the addition of the information about Eurythmy performances. Good job!--Pete K 05:05, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Project Update

I have written now to two more members of the Alt Ed project team. Since my note has been on their project page for several days now, I hope to get this project set up today whether I hear back or not - their page is asking for someone to take on Waldorf, so I simply will set it up as part of the project with all of the team members who have volunteered. Also Hgilbert, did you know that you are listed on that project? Perhaps as a member of that team you can approve our being part of it. I am so looking forward to working with everyone on this. I think it would be great if each person who is involved - or just interested in becoming involved - created a general idea of what parts they would like to work on. I will write again this afternoon.

In the meantime, I do suggest that we all look over the community pages in Wiki, so that we have a good idea of all of the fabulous resources at our disposal. Longhair is one administrator in particular who has offered to help us on this project - as an unbiased consultant when needed. Let's not overwhelm him, but feel free to ask him questions as we progress...and also let's utilize the other folks in the Alt Ed project. So get some ideas churning while I set up the pages - if that's OK with everyone? Wonderactivist 13:25, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Our main project page is located at the Waldorf Project Team Page please sign up and feel free to begin discussion of the introduction. Wonderactivist 13:47, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I have taken the liberty of moving the newly created Waldorf project page away from the main encyclopedia namespace, as this namespace is to be used for encyclopedia articles only. The project is now located at a temporary location of User:Wonderactivist/Waldorf Project Team Page. If there's a more suitable place for this project to be located please let me know and I'll move it to a more suitable home. If there's any other way I can be of assistance please feel free to drop me a note on my talk page. Thanks. -- Longhair 01:34, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Which wikipedia editors are responsible for which external websites?

For the benefit of Misplaced Pages, could we list up which individuals are associated with which external websites? I guess Thebee is responsible for www.thebee.se, but I have the impression that there are other wikipedia users who are linking to their own sites. This list will help neutral users takle the ongoing original research problem- please add to the list as you see fit.

Is there some reason why Sune(Thebee) needs to characterize my website? Or describe how many editors are on his websites? The question was "For the benefit of Misplaced Pages, could we list up which individuals are associated with which external websites?" - nobody asked for characterizations about the links. It sounds to me like Sune is getting ready to use this innocent question as his next battleground. --Pete K 19:04, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

There's an ongoing problem with original research linked in this article. Personal webpages and private or public member email lists don't belong here, nor websites filled with material with unknown or unidentified authorship. There are also a lot of clearinghouse resource websites, which I don't see the purpose for in any article in wikipedia. Ibyrnison 19:27, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

For the record, my website is not linked to the article. Waldorf Answers is linked many times as the source for material that can be found elsewhere on the web. It is an original research site that should not be used as a link anywhere in the article. Same applies to Americans for Waldorf Education. Once someone clicks on a link to a topic in the article, they are brought to the original research site and then get an earfull of nonsense. It would be better if links taking us to Waldorf Answers be changed to direct the reader to the sites on the web where this material is originally published.--Pete K 21:48, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Question to Admins

http://www.waldorfanswers.com and http://www.americans4waldorf.org are not my websites. I don't own them and in both cases, I'm just one of member in the two respective teams that are responsible for them. Most of what is found at http://www.waldorfanswers.com is not found at http://www.americans4waldorf.org and http://www.americans4waldorf.org has one large section on the WC (http://www.americans4waldorf.org/OnPLANS.html) not found at http://www.waldorfanswers.com

On "Is there some reason why Sune(Thebee) needs to characterize my website?"

Just for clarification for the benefit of Misplaced Pages readers and editors. Mailing list archives of a personal mailing list at the site of a public mailing list provider are normally not characterized as personal websites.

Also, who owns or is related to which website in some way has nothing as such to do with the question of if what is found at it constitutes original research. The issue it has to do with is if it can be called a self-published site or not. The site of OpenWaldorf, that I think you repeatedly add as link(?) is a completely self-published personal one man site. This is also the case with a site that you insist on adding as external link, a self published site by one person, critical of the Camphill.

As for the WC-site, that you repeatedly add as link, Pete, appr. 99% of it consists of archives of the personal anti-Waldorf mailing list of the secretary or the site, where numerous postings are made by anonymous posters, and much of it can be characterized as "original research".

While you give "no original research" as expressed argument for deleting links to http://www.waldorfanswers.com and http://www.americans4waldorf.org you repeatedly reinstate the link the WC-site that probably publishes most "original research" all categories on the net with regard to Waldorf education, much of it completely unverified, in violation of the same argument, that you use to repeatedly delete links to WaldorfAnswers and Americans for Waldorf Education.

Maybe the admins looking at the article can take a look at this? --Thebee 19:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Waldorfanswers ans americans4waldorf are both sites that defame individual critics of Waldorf and contain little if any material that can be supported by anyone but the participants on those sites.

Re: Characterizing my website - There is no reason for anyone to do so. I am not linking it to anything. I put it in the links at one time and when it was removed as original research, I left it off. Someone asked if I have a site and I listed mine.

That the PLANS site has a vault of archived material as a service to people (i.e. the search engine is better than the one offered on their discussion list that I DON'T link) - doesn't mean anything. Your 99% number is irrelevant. It's an archive - a back-up of discussion list material. The discussion takes place elsewhere. The only reason I have deleted the links you post is that you continually want to link to your critique of PLANS and your defamation of the persons there. We've had this discussion before and I have agreed to not touch your link to either one or the other of your two sites (since they are clones, there's no need to stack the deck) - as long as you put them in the Waldorf Resources section. Critics have only been allowed ONE link here by the Anthroposophists babysitting this site. All other links have been removed. To suggest that an original research critique of that one critical site is appropriate is preposterous --Pete K 22:00, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

On "Waldorfanswers ans americans4waldorf are both sites that defame individual critics of Waldorf and contain little if any material that can be supported by anyone but the participants on those sites."

This is contradicted by the many links and references to articles published in Newspaper journals, documentation published at the WC-site, publicly accessible legal documentation, specific discussions on the WC-list published at the WC-site, by among other things giving specific dates for different discussions, referred to, and published research on Waldorf education, linked to.

On "The only reason I have deleted the links you post is that you continually want to link to your critique of PLANS and your defamation of the persons there."

And you don't think the WC-site - that you repeatedly insist on inserting as link - publishes defamation of individuals, critical of the WC, and groups of people, like Waldorf teachers in general, "anthroposophists" and others?

On "I have agreed to not touch your link to either one or the other of your two sites ..."

What links to include or not is to be regulated by Misplaced Pages guidelines, not whether one likes or dislikes it, or an argument of the type "I'll allow your link if you allow mine". That policy, that you appeal to, is a completely subjective anti-Misplaced Pages policy.

On "... (since they are clones, there's no need to stack the deck) - as long as you put them in the Waldorf Resources section."

As can be seen when looking at http://www.waldorfanswers.com and http://www.americans4waldorf.org the main part of what is found at either site is not found at the other site. Your description of them as clones therefore - like your advocacy of editing based on subjective anti-Misplaced Pages policies - stands out as a purely subjective description.

On "Critics have only been allowed ONE link here by the Anthroposophists babysitting this site. All other links have been removed."

All links that have been removed - except by you - have been removed on the basis of Misplaced Pages guidelines. You don't seem to approve of that, as little as you approve on judging the appropriateness of the WC-link on the basis of basic Misplaced Pages guidlines. That - again - constitutes advocacy of pure subjective anti-Misplaced Pages editing.

On "To suggest that an original research critique of that one critical site is appropriate is preposterous."

The greatest part of the WC-site that you insist on linking to in the article constitutes "original", much unverified "research". To disapprove of another site, that you consider to be "original research" is inconsistent argumentation.

--Thebee 23:03, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

"http://www.waldorfanswers.com and http://www.americans4waldorf.org are not my websites. I don't own them and in both cases, I'm just one of member in the two respective teams that are responsible for them. Most of what is found at http://www.waldorfanswers.com is not found at http://www.americans4waldorf.org and http://www.americans4waldorf.org has one large section on the WC (http://www.americans4waldorf.org/OnPLANS.html) not found at http://www.waldorfanswers.com"

So you are saying one is a sub-set of the other except for one section and otherwise they are essentially clones - containing the same information for the majority of their material. I agree - they are clones.

"On "Is there some reason why Sune(Thebee) needs to characterize my website?"

Just for clarification for the benefit of Misplaced Pages readers and editors. Mailing list archives of a personal mailing list at the site of a public mailing list provider are normally not characterized as personal websites."

Nobody asked for clarification - only who belongs to which links. Anyone can certainly follow the links and see where they lead.

"Also, who owns or is related to which website in some way has nothing as such to do with the question of if what is found at it constitutes original research. The issue it has to do with is if it can be called a self-published site or not. The site of OpenWaldorf, that I think you repeatedly add as link(?) is a completely self-published personal one man site. This is also the case with a site that you insist on adding as external link, a self published site by one person, critical of the Camphill."

I haven't repeatedly added OpenWaldorf. I have added it once based on discussion here that agreed that it should be added. I look at it as a Waldorf resource and it has lots of links to the same sites you have added as Waldorf resources. I have no feelings at all about whether it stays or goes. I thought it would be a helpful link for people. I've had other people ask me if they could put their sites up here. I have responded by saying "I'll try and we'll see if they stick" - You guys are doing a great job of evaluating websites and removing everything critical, so I figured if they don't meet with YOUR criteria, they would be gone quickly - and they were. You, on the other hand, have been busily removing the Critical Review section and burying the ONE critical site in with a bunch of other sites. You have been doing this DAILY, sometimes several times a day.

":This is contradicted by the many links and references to articles published in Newspaper journals, documentation published at the WC-site, publicly accessible legal documentation, specific discussions on the WC-list published at the WC-site, by among other things giving specific dates for different discussions, referred to, and published research on Waldorf education, linked to."

The above is confusion writ large. What's a "Newspaper journal" anyway? If the question is whether "WaldorfAnwswers" publishes "original research," then obviously it does if the waldorfcritics web site does so. You can't reply that you cite "specific discussions on the WC-list published at the WC-site, by among other things giving specific dates for different discussions" and then say that the postings themselves aren't citable. It's like, you can cite yourself citing them, as "documenting" whatever it is you you bizarrely claim they "document" . . . but no one else can cite them, because then suddenly wikipedia guidelines go into effect and because they're postings on a mailing list, they're not citable . . . this is Kafka-esque.DianaW 14:41, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

No it isn't. Both sites are sites created for the sole purpose of defamation of critics. The only thing your "documentation" does is provide loosly interpreted (by you) material that you think is grounds for the defamation of individuals. I would like to invite adminstrators here to visit these two sites and see what goes on there. It's a mockery of good journalism, IMO.

":And you don't think the WC-site - that you repeatedly insist on inserting as link - publishes defamation of individuals, critical of the WC, and groups of people, like Waldorf teachers in general, "anthroposophists" and others?"

No, I absolutely DON'T think the PLANS site defames individuals. BTW, you keep confusing the WC (Waldorf Critics) list which I do not link here with the official PLANS website to which I link. That isn't to say that the WC (open discussion) list defames anyone, we have strict rules there, as you know, about keeping the discussion to the issues and not about individuals. The WC list could not, by its very nature, defame anyone. Such would be considered "ad hominem" attacks and are forbidden. In fact, you were suspended from the WC list for that very reason.

":What links to include or not is to be regulated by Misplaced Pages guidelines, not whether one likes or dislikes it, or an argument of the type "I'll allow your link if you allow mine". That policy, that you appeal to, is a completely subjective anti-Misplaced Pages policy."

No, you have misunderstood yet again. The intention with this was to call a truce and put an end to the link editing wars while the overhaul edit of the article was in progress. We understand that this is not the usual policy, but pending a review of these links and who has been removing them and replacing them and whether those edits are justified or are tantamount to abuse and harassment, this was what we came up with in the interim as a compromise.

":As can be seen when looking at http://www.waldorfanswers.com and http://www.americans4waldorf.org the main part of what is found at either site is not found at the other site. Your description of them as clones therefore - like your advocacy of editing based on subjective anti-Misplaced Pages policies - stands out as a purely subjective description."

They are what they are. Again, I suggest a thorough review of both sites by Misplaced Pages administrators. And, again, this is a temporary, interim agreement. If Waldorf supporters don't like it, they should keep adding their sites, and I'll keep deleting them - just like they have been deleting and reverting the links and edits I have been making here.

":All links that have been removed - except by you - have been removed on the basis of Misplaced Pages guidelines. You don't seem to approve of that, as little as you approve on judging the appropriateness of the WC-link on the basis of basic Misplaced Pages guidlines. That - again - constitutes advocacy of pure subjective anti-Misplaced Pages editing."

Until someone here at Misplaced Pages tells me that NPOV guidelines have been suspended for this article that is basically a Waldorf promotional brochure, I'll continue to try to balance the one-sided content. I don't agree with your assessment above.

":The greatest part of the WC-site that you insist on linking to in the article constitutes "original", much unverified "research". To disapprove of another site, that you consider to be "original research" is inconsistent argumentation."

Unverified by WHO? Some people's actions here demonstrate that they don't believe ANYTHING critical of Waldorf is possible. I can personally verify much of what is researched there because many of the things that are described there have also happened to me personally. I have documented my own experiences in Waldorf for years. I have letters directly from the school my kids attend, in which the school lies directly to parents, and subsequent letters confessing that they have lied. So how about if I post those here - would that be considered verified research? The problem here is some people don't like hearing what ACTUALLY goes on in Waldorf schools. And so they feel that by hiding the truth (and many Waldorf teachers do this) they can keep up the charade. I've been in Waldorf for 15 years - I really know how this works. The material on the Waldorf Critics list is EXACTLY accurate - according to my personal experience, and that is why I am supporting that this perspective should be included here. --Pete K 07:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Critical Views - another still unsubstantiated claim

Another edit war is beginning over the Critical Views section. Are the Waldorf supporters going to be the ones to express the critical viewpoint or should this be left up to the critics? Specifically, the criticism is that Waldorf schools teach Anthroposophy indirectly, not as a subject but as part of the entire education process. That many, many critics feel this way is easily documented and this is the view that needs to be represented in this section. Anthroposophist's opinion about whether this is "true" or not, or whether it belongs here or not shouldn't matter. The section is intended to describe the "Critical View". I have replaced the wording in the article for this reason.

I also intend to support the claim (currently called anecdotal by the person who removed it) that Waldorf schools are not forthcoming about Anthroposophy. I feel this support can be satisfied by linking to many Waldorf school websites that don't mention Anthroposophy, some don't even mention Steiner. I'd like to have a discussion here about these issues before people re-edit the article. --Pete K 15:05, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like you need to find a publisher and pitch your argument, and write a paper presenting your evidence, research findings, and conclusions. After you do so, then the issue could be described here, and your article would be identified as an academic reference for it. However, you cannot simply present the argument here, absent any publication by a bona fide publisher. Ibyrnison 20:33, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

If Pete can support his claim by linking to or listing a good number of school websites that are missing this reference, then it deserves to appear in a neutral tone: he could say that many W.school websites do not mention anthroposophy. It would be OriginalReserach or editorializing to claim that this is a cover-up or that the schools are not forthcoming, however. Misplaced Pages practice is to present the facts and allow the readers to draw their own conclusions. Hgilbert 20:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

http://www.americans4waldorf.org/Links.html lists about 125 websites of North American Waldorf schools, maybe a place to start. Check the links at the sites too. --Thebee 21:14, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

"Are the Waldorf supporters going to be the ones to express the critical viewpoint or should this be left up to the critics?"

Critical viewpoints includes also Critical viewpoints with regard to Waldorf Critics. Misplaced Pages requires both sides of issues to be presented. What would you suggest? A special section on Criticism of Waldorf critics? --Thebee 21:25, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Ibryrnison, my book is in the works. In the mean time, the critical viewpoint is published at sites like PLANS on a daily basis. There are dozens if not hundreds of contributors to those pages. It is the warehouse for critical review of Waldorf, and in my opinion, should be considered a source for critical review and presentation of the critical viewpoint. I will lobby for this with unbiased Misplaced Pages personnel. There are dozens of claims made here by Waldorf supporters that cannot be supported - the number of Waldorf schools is a recent example found to be in error. I'll just occupy my time pulling out all those claims without consulting anyone if that's what you folks want to get into. Every sentence about Rudolf Steiner, for example, will require documentation that supports it. You guys are going to be pretty busy, believe me. Do you really want this to turn into the Scientology page? The Critical Views section is for critical "views". If you want a new section called Critical Publications, you should start it yourself. --Pete K 21:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Harlan, yes, I can support my claim by linking to Waldorf schools who don't mention Anthroposophy or Steiner. More important, however, is WHY they don't mention Anthroposophy, and WHY they claim it isn't in the curriculum (when it is). Now they have learned to say "it isn't taught" but then really that's how Waldorf education works - nothing is really taught in the early grades, it is absorbed. Subjects like "spirit beings" aren't taught in Waldorf, but from day one, children learn about spirit beings. The deception about what is being taught is really something that hurts Waldorf.

Only verifiable information can be included here. So if you link to three schools, you can only say "some schools" or "at least three schools".

The problem is that this argument will cut both ways. If Pete can't claim anything based on what he can read at the web sites of three Waldorf schools, then . . . what is the entire article based on? You are all Waldorf teachers and/or Waldorf enthusiasts, I know. How many schools have you personally either taught at, visited, studied their practices in depth, documented classroom activities etc.? You may tell us it is more than three. What is the magic number? And how are your own experiences and observations not "original research"? I'm certain you think you know what you think you know. But on what are statements such as: "Steiner developed a 3-stage pedagogical model of child development that is utilised in Waldorf education" based? How do we know for sure that this 3-stage pedagogical model is used at all or even most Waldorf schools? The article describes activities in such as cooking in the kindergarten. How many kindergartens have you stood there and watched the cooking in? Is this "original research" you are publishing in the Misplaced Pages, then? Would you like to see this argument applied consistently? We'd have to delete most of the article.DianaW 14:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

There is a bibliography at the end. Much of the information not otherwise referenced can be found in these texts. We don't need to prove that the model is used in all schools; we only need to show that it is the model authors about Waldorf speak of. Kindergarten texts describe cooking as a recommended activity, there are books of recipes for the kindergarten, and so on. This is exactly the point; such things are verifiable by Misplaced Pages standards and according to the usual practice here. Claims about the numbers of existing Waldorf schools can be supported by documents supporting this. Claims about numbers of schools that don't mention anthroposophy need to have comparable support, or they appear to be pulled out of the air or Original Research.

In general, Misplaced Pages suggests that things which are "common knowledge" do not need special referencing/footnoting. Things which a reader might question should be footnoted. I suggest that you don't seriously doubt whether cooking takes place in most Waldorf kindergartens - on the one hand - and that it is easily sourced to published material - on the other. A mutually respectful approach would only question areas that are legitimately unclear; where there is real doubt whether it is 1) true, and 2) verifiable. What areas of the article do you see problems with (please be specific)? Hgilbert 00:45, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Harlan wrote: The WHY also needs to be verifiable, not merely an editor's ideas; is there a published comment by someone about this? Then it can be attributed to that person (but not expressed as a general truth if it is disputed by others). See WP:NPOV.

Okay Harlan. Then please delete this statement from the article: "The curriculum is highly challenging, structured, and creative." There is no published comment by someone cited to support it. I'm sure you'll have no trouble quoting a Waldorf or anthroposophical source saying that the Waldorf curriculum is the greatest thing since sliced bread, but you are going to have to re-write the statement to attribute it to that person, rather than expressing it as a "general truth" that the Waldorf curriculum is "highly challenging" and "creative." It is a statement that is disputed by others; me for instance.DianaW 15:38, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

It is possible to include information about many aspects of the curriciulum and didactic approach here so as to overcome any misinformation or lack of information that may be present; people are misinformed or underinformed about many subjects, and part of the mission of an encyclopedia is to make people more and better informed. Hgilbert 10:43, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Okay then you'd better get busy documenting all of these aspects of the curriculum and didactic approach without reference to your own "original research." Presumably you base much of what is written in the article overall on what *you* have done in *your* classrooms; and I'd be willing to wager you did it because, in your training and mentoring from more experienced Waldorf teachers, you were told this is the way it is done in Waldorf. The "original research" thing is being misused. The whole article is "original research" in that it attempts to paint a glowing and rosy picture of how wonderful Waldorf education is, and this is, at best, your own "original research" based on working in Waldorf schools. If you had to write it up for a scholarly journal it would be at most a sort of anecdotal report. Most of the article is actually worse than that, it is basically ad copy.DianaW 14:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I know you guys don't like that I am bringing this stuff here, but it has to be brought out into the open. I'll be doing a lot of editing over the weekend, so we have another day of discussion before that takes place. How about working in earnest to clean up this Waldorf brochure of an article, instead of giving up our weekends editing this back and forth. Again, the critical view must be heard here. --Pete K 21:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Sune, none of your criticisms are supportable so don't even start. Yours are the ravings of a lunatic. I think it's good for ordinary people to get a peek at what some Waldorf teachers are like. If you guys hadn't made this article into a puff piece for Waldorf already, it would be just fine with me to hear critique of the critics. But as it stands, the article is slanted WAY in one direction. Maybe after the edit team gets through with it, and we will hopefully have a balanced article, we should consider linking to your wackiness. --Pete K 21:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

When three school websites are found which do not say "anthroposophy" anyplace, all that can be said is "three school websites do not identify anthroposophy on their website". This is not proof that "Waldorf schools are not forthcoming about Anthroposophy", or even those three schools. Lets not fill the article with conjecture and trivia. It had already grown too large. Ibyrnison 13:40, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Ibyrnison, I suspect you do not want to see this criterion applied consistently. Consider the following paragraph from the article:

'The curriculum is highly challenging, structured, and creative. In Waldorf schools, one teacher often aims to stay with a class as it advances from its first year all the way through to year eight, teaching the main subject lessons. Specialist teachers are utilized for subjects such as foreign languages, handwork and crafts, singing, orchestra (every Waldorf pupil learns to play an orchestral instrument), movement (eurythmy), games and gymnastics, and so on. Academic instruction is integrated with arts, craft, music and movement. As Steiner stated in The Education of the Child in the Light of Anthroposophy, "...the child should be laying up in his memory the treasures of thought on which mankind has pondered...".'

What is that paragraph if not "conjecture" and "original research"? It is quite clearly a matter of opinion that the curriculum is "highly challenging, structured, and creative." To many people with experience in these schools, this description is a bitter joke. "Structured" it would be hard to argue with, but many Waldorf customers have not found their children challenged at all, you could as easily find numerous parents to call the curriculum "stifling," and many families certainly haven't found the force-feeding of Steiner lore about ancient Atlantis, for instance, that often passes for a history curriculum to be "creative." In many people's opinion the curriculum and teaching methods are the opposite of creative, relying heavily on rote copying, memorization of verses and mantras that the child does not understand the meaning of and is not permitted to question, chanting, and mind-numbing bordeom - kindergarteners required to paint using one color for weeks on end, and not permitted to create any image at all, merely swirl the paint around on the paper (just one example). The main lesson books that the article describes are resembling "illuminated manuscripts" are often composed by copying exactly what the teacher writes on the board. The claim that "one teacher often aims to stay with a class" blah-blah could as easily be rewritten, "Schools may claim one teacher will stay with the class for x number of years but in practice in many cases the teacher does not fulfill this promise; or worse, parents end up wishing she wouldn't."

To state that "every Waldorf pupil learns to play an orchestral instrument" is totally ludicrous; just ask around, and you can find many Waldorf students who never learned to play any orchestral instrument.

The point I am making here, really, is that critics are not asking you to delete or revise all the unbelievable glossy nonsense that the article consists of almost in its entirety. We'd have to tear the thing to shreds to do that. I just took one paragraph and found it dripping with smarm that represents Waldorf enthusiasts' personal viewpoints and "original research." But we have mainly restricted ourselves to insisting that critical viewpoints be made readily available to the reader of the article as well, and combatting the sleights of hand in the editing process with which you attempt to make this impossible.

So get real. If you want "conjecture," "original research" and the like to be eliminated from the article, you are going to have to start over completely.DianaW 15:11, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Let me be clear that what I am saying is, Play fair. Two (or more) can play this game of "Well that is original research" etc and continually discredit each other's edits. I am suggesting that you *not* request that this criterion be applied to critics and not to yourselves, because it's fighting dirty. Critics can fight back, and as you saw with the "hate group" battle, we can win, because the facts are on our side. If your criteria are applied to your own article here, it will end up being dismantled, claim by claim, and fairly easily. I merely selected a paragraph. Naturally, we don't want to do this, we have lives, and jobs, and this is basically time consuming lunacy to even spend time here. We are not unreasonable people. So think this through. If you want to claim "Every waldorf pupil learns to play an orchestral instrument," think about what is going to be involved in documenting that claim; perhaps every pupil at *your* waldorf school learned to play an instrument, but in scholarly terms, that is your personal observation, equivalent to perhaps one case study if publishable at all. How are you going to show that this is the case worldwide, at 900 schools? It's going to be quite a data collection job for you, isn't it? Assertions like "Every Waldorf pupil . . ." are going to have to go. Alternatively, give up fighting dirty this way. Allow critical links and opinions to be represented, drop slander tactics to discredit us, and critics will allow to stand your article that is really just brochure copy and shamelessly inaccurate in countless ways in our opinion.DianaW`

The school I'm associated with has a turnover of 25% of students EACH YEAR - as reported by the board of directors in an open meeting. That Waldorf is misrepreseting itself is not conjecture and trivia - it is a problem that is evident in Waldorf and discussed by Waldorf critics and supporters alike. Hopefully, efforts like mine have helped many schools update their websites. However, I can assure you that taking into considerion the role that Anthroposophy plays in Waldorf (it IS Waldorf education) the mentions on many Waldorf school websites, even when they occur, are buried. I would need an entire article to demonstrate where and why this is happening - and perhaps I will create one in the near future. In the mean time, perhaps I'll just provide links to your own guy - former Master Waldorf teacher Eugene Schwartz, who acknowledges that Waldorf is a religious school and that it misrepresents itself. Will that satisfy you that this is a real problem? --Pete K 14:33, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

For a description of what Eugene Schwart actually said during his speech that you refer to, see here. It tells that the reason he has his daughter in a Waldorf schools not is that she shall have an experience of anthroposophy as a "religion". It shows that he has his daughter in a Waldorf school, so that she will get a good Jewish education.

It also shows how upset he is that at public waldorf methods schools, "God" has been taken out of the morning verse, to avoid violation of the U.S. Constitution.

This speech is then on the one hand misused by the WC to falsely argue, that anthroposophy is a "religion", taught at the schools.

On the other hand it is falsely used by the WC as implied support for its view that public waldorf methods schools - about which Schwartz is upset that they are not any longer religious the way he wants Waldorf schools to be to give his daugther a good Jewish education - are "religious".

One may compare this twofold way the WC untruthfully misuses the speech by Eugene Schwartz, with its way of depicting itself as a group that is "honest" and "tells the truth" about Waldorf education and Waldorf methods education.

For a comment on this, see here. --Thebee 18:12, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, so you have no objection to posting the entire discussion by Eugene Schwartz - right? Are you going to want to publish a rebuttal to an article that you say supports your view? --Pete K 18:43, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

You describe two false conclusions of what I write. --Thebee 19:09, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I apologize if this is a personal issue to you and the school you're affiliated with. But individual cases do not "make a rule", and personal reports cannot be used to substantiate the claim you wished to make. It's a jump to take a handful of schools giving "no mention on a website" and say there's some widespread conspiracy of "keeping it from parents". Instead of focusing on the "you guys" and the "your guy" and these "critics" you seem to speak for, all editors have to follow the same rules--qualified and published sources. And provided this article doesn't completely come apart at the seams, the relationship between anthroposophy and Waldorf education has been well described here, and hopefully it will stay that way. Ibyrnison 15:39, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Ibyrnison, I see we will need to go over some of these points very carefully. You write: "cases do not "make a rule", and personal reports cannot be used to substantiate the claim you wished to make," and you request "qualified and published statements." Okay, are you ready? I've selected some more material from the article that you will need to work on to find all those published, qualified sources to support. I have deliberately selected both material that is controversial, where critics clearly have a very different opinion than you have, and other pieces of information that are not usually controversial, but nevertheless, don't seem to actually be documented. A couple of examples:

"In both the elementary school and secondary school, most academic subjects are taught in blocks. For these blocks, instead of using commercial textbooks each pupil writes and illustrates a "main lesson book", a self-created 'textbook' based upon the content learned. Scope for independent creativity in these books progresses rapidly through the elementary years."

Where is the evidence that scope for independent creativity progresses through the elementary schools in Waldorf children's lesson books? This is original research, editorializing, and biased POV writing. The article, thus far, lacks *any* academic citation showing such a thing as, "scope for independent creativity" increases at certain times in Waldorf. It may be *your experience* that "scope for creativity progressed" in a particular Waldorf school, or in a handful of Waldorf schools, but "cases do not make a rule," and "personal reports cannot be used to substantiate the claims you wished to make."

Quoting the article again:

"Most Waldorf schools begin teaching two foreign languages from first grade/ class 1 (age six-seven) on. Foreign language instruction in the first years is purely oral; by the end of class 3 , (beginning of fourth grade), the written forms of the languages are introduced. When the pupils are about sixteen-years old, exchanges with schools in other countries are encouraged; after such an exchange, a very high level of fluency has usually been reached."

Documentation, please, that sixteen year Waldorf pupils, on returning from an exchange program, have a "very high level of fluency"? It may be your experience that this true, you may know countless 16 year old Waldorf pupils who are very fluent in various languages. It may be your opinion that this is due to their Waldorf education. The article, however, merely asserts this; there is no documentation for the claim. Do you know of studies assessing Waldorf pupils' foreign language fluency? If so, please add this material, so we can see who did the assessment, who the students were compared to, and what measures were used for assessing fluency. "Cases do not make a rule" and "personal reports cannot be used to substantiate the claims you wished to make."

"They also have weekly singing lessons with a specialized music teacher beginning at an early age and continuing as choral instruction through to age 18."

Really? At every Waldorf school in the world, students have weekly singing lessons with a specialized music teacher beginning at an early age? Who has documented this, and in what scholarly journal were the findings published? You may have personally taught at or had your children at a school that did this, and the music instruction may have been great. But "cases do not make a rule" and "personal reports cannot be used to substantiate the claims you wished to make." Are you starting to see the problem we have here?

continuing from the article:

"Transferring between Waldorf and non-Waldorf schools

Jump to: navigation, search Main article: Waldorf education This article summarizes experiences of those transferring to or from Waldorf schools."

This "article" does nothing of the sort - "summarize experiences" of those transferring to or from Waldorf. It is completely written by AWSNA - the major Waldorf advocacy group in the US. It is promotional copy. Nobody's experiences are summarized there - this is merely what AWSNA wants prospective parents to think. You could not possibly claim that *in an academic publication* the promotional web sites of the advocacy group can be cited neutrally to demonstrate the experiences of families that try to transfer their children to or from these schools.

Where are the academic studies, the "qualified and published" sources, that describe families' experiences transferring to/from Waldorf? There aren't any such studies, are there? This is personal opinion, editorializing on the part of AWSNA, or at best, AWSNA's "original research." Not published anywhere.

Is the magnitude of the problem you are going to have here, if you insist on playing dirty with critics this way, beginning to dawn on you?DianaW 18:31, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

No, I don't think the relationship between Waldorf and Anthroposophy has been well described here at all. It has been glossed over, IMO, and efforts like putting Steiner's OWN words on this site to demonstrate Anthroposophy's role in Waldorf have been resisted - as with the Eurythmy section. Saying stuff like "Anthroposophy is never taught in the school" is extremely misleading - and efforts to reword it to include "as a subject, but it extablishes the way teachers interact with, view, judge and discipline children" (or something to that effect that I added) have been swiftly deleted - even though THAT'S what is happening and THAT is what Steiner intended. This is, again, supportable in HIS own words - if you will take the trouble to read "Faculty Meetings" you will discover this for yourself, if you don't already know this. I can go to the trouble of posting this again and reference the material, but until Waldorf supporters get it out of their mind that this article is intended to "support" Waldorf rather than to "describe" Waldorf, there is little point. And this applies to over a dozen articles here on Misplaced Pages that are lobbied by Waldorf supporters. The page on Steiner has had all references of racism removed. Yet there is an separate article about Steiner's racism that is basically excusing it, based on the findings of ANTHROPOSOPHISTS. Not one quote displaying Steiner's racism has been allowed to stay on Misplaced Pages - anywhere INCLUDING the page on Steiner's racism. Is this what you believe represents a NPOV? Why not let Steiner's own words and views stand or fall on their own merit? Is it because Steiner is "difficult"? --Pete K 16:19, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I think this discussion page should stay focused on "Waldorf education", not Steiner. Discuss Steiner on the Steiner article talk page, and Waldorf education on this page. I agree that there is a lot of text that needs to be tightened up here, and that there are places that aren't NPOV as they should be. My concern is that some editors are simply trying to replace it with their own personal POV, which will make problems even worse. Ibyrnison 16:37, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Dear Ibyrnison, the trouble is that you are editorializing right there when you assert that it is appropriate to "Discuss Steiner on the Steiner article talk page, and Waldorf education on this page." This reflects your biased agenda to distract parents from understanding the relevance and full role of Steiner in Waldorf education. Others think the opposite of what you think: Others think that very meaty information about Steiner belongs on the Waldorf page. Can you support with unbiased, published, qualified sources the notion that it is unreasonable to discuss Steiner on the Waldorf page, or does this perhaps reflect your original research?DianaW 18:31, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't think bifurcating the discussion is helpful since the same editors are doing the same things on a dozen articles. Let's get to the issue right here shall we? It is an effort by the same people to block critical review of the topics related to Steiner, Anthroposophy, Waldorf, Biodynamics, Anthroposophical Medicine, Eurythmy, Steiner's racism, and so forth. When I present a critical point of view, it represents many thousands of hours of discussion with parents and teachers (and children) who have been abused by the Waldorf system. Yes, it will be difficult (impossible) to find language that will please everyone. But please know that for every famous Waldorf parent or graduate you can provide in a list on this article, I can provide a famous parent who has left Waldorf in disgust or a child who has been pulled out half way through and had their education stifled by Waldorf. So rather than make the problems worse, let's loosen up our grip of the article a little and allow both points of view. I'm quite happy to leave in studies that say kids are healthier simply by attending Waldorf, because anyone reading that will immediately see that sort of thing for what it is. Nobody is trying to make this into a critical article, only an article reflective of a completely NPOV or both POV's. And if we ever get to the point where we agree, and we publish a NPOV article, what happens next? Do we have any assurances that the same editors won't revert the article to their POV? I think it's best to work together and not against each other in this. Even the critics of Waldorf have some things they like about it. Let's try working in good faith instead of scratching at old wounds. --Pete K 18:38, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

This discussion is becoming totally confusing, so please add new comments at the bottom of its particular section! An editors remarks can easily become overlooked or misunderstood when comments aren't kept intact. Also, if you wish to raise new issues, it's best to put them in separate new sections. One more time: if there is a challenge to particular claims or statements here, those claims or statements must be sourced. Any of them. This page is not a play toy, and one unsupported statement can't be traded for another one, nor can we bargain over how many unsupported statements any editor will be allowed to put in to balance someone else's unsupported statements. If the entire page is unsubstantiatable, then the entire page will have to be revised. But the rule still holds. No original research is allowed.Ibyrnison 19:27, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

IByrnison, I find this sort of reply less than helpful. Where are your responses to the issues raised? I am sorry you are feeling confused, but somehow, I don't think that's all there is to this. In my opinion, the people who think it is their job to continually scold other people for supposedly violating a thousand petty rules are the ones who are not operating "in good faith" or in the spirit of wikipedia. Your intention to scorn and deride other users away from participating in a substantive manner is clear. Comments are sometimes not "kept intact" because it is desirable to reply to certain comments specifically, rather than wade to the bottom of a long paragraph to reply, at which point the reader will not know exactly which point is being addressed, and the reply will not make sense. The indents show that speakers are alternating. I haven't gotten this system down perfectly yet, I admit, but I don't think I'm confusing anyone.

I'm ambivalent about the "improvement project" personally, because it looks to me like one more way to make *this discussion* less visible, happening in some back room rather than on the page where *most wikipedia users* know to look to find out if an article is disputed in some way. *So* many tricks have been tried now. Separate out controversial issues into separate articles, so that in the *main* article, where *most* wiki users are going to look, the issue is downplayed ("But there's a link" - yeah, but how many people are going to follow the link? Far fewer than if the material were in the article). That's one ploy. It also of course increases the number of entries on wikipedia that pertain to the topic, and that can be found by a search engine. Clever! Then, turning the discussion pages into a maze; quickly "archiving" discussions that are only a few hours old, and putting long discussions about minor issues at the top of the page and moving things you really don't want people to read to the bottom, or under nondescript headings; creating sub pages and sub-sub pages and "working groups" that imply to the uninitiated that there is some kind of application or approval process etc. Suddenly we have to "sign up" to improve the article, or "join the team" to work on the article? I do not think so. Anyone can work on improving an article at wikipedia.DianaW 20:58, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, so I guess I have my weekend's work cut out for me - eliminating all the unsubstantiated claims in the article. It's going to be pretty bare when I'm done with it. As Diana pointed out - almost everything in the article is unsubstantiated, origial research information. Is that where the edit wars are headed? This is how Waldorf supporters have been handling claims they feel are unsubstantiated - no discussion, just delete the claims. We can look at words like "creative" and decide that's an unsubstantiated, subjective claim based on original research and delete it. Is that what you are suggestion Ibyrnison? Or is there some middle ground for reasonable claims that are unsubstantiated? This will be a very long process if we don't agree to let some reasonable claims go unchallenged. --Pete K 20:11, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

My recommendation is that those particular areas which are disputed are posted first, prior to removal, to allow editors opportunity to provide references when available. This will help reduce a lot of unnecessary work. I also recommend that the disputes raised are genuinely made in good faith. It is inappropriate to raise disputes disingenuously, simply to barter with opponents, or to harass editors trying to faithfully adhere to wikipedia's standards. Many of us are working to improve the structure and content of the page, so offers to cause trouble for trouble's sake aren't appreciated. Ibyrnison 20:52, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

This is the sort of thing I mean. Are you not yourself violating "assume good faith" by continually questioning other people's? You seem prone to post these sorts of comments and ignore substantive issues raised about the material.

I think you are, in your oblique way, replying to my comments requesting Waldorf supporters here play fair, and noting that if the criteria you yourself have posted were applied uniformly - everything must be from qualified and published sources, must avoid "conjecture" and editorializing, must avoid "original research" etc. - the article would end up being either completely rewritten or removed. Nobody is trying to "barter" with you, or suggesting "You can have this unattributed claim if I can have that one." Certainly, critics would be happier to see an article critical of Waldorf than the polyanna puff piece that we've got now. What I have been saying is very simple - We are not asking you for something so difficult for you to accept. We are asking you to back off removing critical points of view, because we will have no choice but to apply the same standards to the rest of the article and we will end by leaving it tatters.

You are the one, Ibyrnison, who with a straight face suggested that the claim "PLANS is a hate group" could be substantiated WITH THE GROUP'S OWN PRESS RELEASE - implied it showed PLANS *admitting* they were a hate group (when of course the press release said nothing of the sort, and nothing in the press release could be interpreted as showing them a hate group). The circular reasoning ("It shows that 'some people say' they're a hate group; they've admitted that themselves") was absolutely fiendishly dishonest, a textbook example of academic lack of good faith, leaving you in no position to scold others to "faithfully adhere to wikipedia's standards."DianaW 21:11, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

One thing that will help us concentrate on the "substantive issues raised about the material" would be if we'd each restrict ourselves to limiting the discussion on these pages to that, and stop filling it with nonsubstantive issues. On the project page I've attempted to gather together the article's statements which have been disputed today. Those that can't be validated against proper sources should be either rewritten to be more accurate or removed. Anticipating the predictable accusations that there's something underhanded about my doing this, this wasn't done with the intention of "hiding" the disputes, but the opposite, to help us resolve them in a structured fashion. Ideally someone will be interested in structuring this talk page better, because it is very long and it's not easy to follow outstanding issues. Ibyrnison 21:46, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Followup: Most of the fact challenges I found raised here today have been verified to published sources, which have been identified on the project page. For those challenges that have been missed or any that others would like raised now, it will be best to follow the wikipedia's recommended procedure calling for cite checks so the concerns raised don't accidently get lost in here on the talk page. Ibyrnison 00:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I have added and tags where necessary. Please read these keeping the thought in mind that they are intended to address the brochure tone of the entire article. Most of these broad, sweeping statements cannot be verified and represent original research on the part of the writers. --75.31.78.190 16:46, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Um... the above statement was made by me... --Pete K 17:43, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

No personal attacks - comment on content not contributers

On what you write as "Yours are the ravings of a lunatic", Pete:

Is that to be understood as a statement by you that I am a lunatic? You really sure you want to violate the Misplaced Pages guidelines against such statements - again? --Thebee 23:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm just going to sit back and be satisfied with the fact that you put it in very large type. LOL!--Pete K 06:27, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

• All editors are requested to abide by WP:NPA - comment on content not contributors. The comments referred to here which had been made by Pete K breached that policy. Further breaches of the policy may result in blocking.--Arktos 08:19, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

How about the same comment by Pete K above, that you have not commented on, 14:58, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

"In my opinion, you're a raving lunatic with nothing better to do than to defame people."

And:

"You have pruned the full context of my original statement in this section so that you can attack me. I wonder why? This is typical of the nonsense you and your ilk continually try to do to discredit people critical of Waldorf." --Pete K 14:43, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

And, including me as one of the editors of the two sites "Waldorf Answers" and "Americans for Waldorf Education":

"Not surprisingly 'Americans for Waldorf Education' and sister site 'Waldorf Answers' are considered by Waldorf critics and Waldorf supporters alike to be comprised of fanatical Waldorf supporters." Pete K 01:45, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

And the untrue (and demonstrably libelous) statement by Pete K in the same posting:

Sune Nordwall, once voted one of the 250 craziest people on the internet ..."

Thanks, --Thebee 08:52, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Talk pages are intended only to discuss changes to the relevant article it relates to. Please do not use a talk page to compile evidence against a user you are currently in dispute with. User:Pete K has received warnings for breaches of the policy on No personal attacks which he has acknowledged, and until such time as he makes another, all you're doing is adding more clutter to a talk page that is overly long and hard enough to read as is. You are welcome to use your own personal userspace to compile evidence on abusive behaviour, but please, keep this talk page discussion relevant to the contents of the Waldorf education article itself. Once again, if you wish to report offensive behaviour, or behaviour against Misplaced Pages policy, I'm happy to act on them if diffs are provided clearly showing the offensive edits concerned. -- Longhair 09:44, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I endorse Longhair's comments. I also am happy to act on any reported future incidents (with diffs provided please). However, this is not the place to collect them.--Arktos 10:03, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I was just wondering about and tried to become clear about where the acceptible Misplaced Pages limit is for number of personal attacks. Thanks for telling! --Thebee 10:51, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Plethora of cite tags

An anonymous editor has left over a hundred cite tags in this article, sometimes six or seven in a single sentence. I don't know this person is brand new to wikipedia, or if this isn't an act of retaliation, which seemed to be hinted earlier in the talk page. I don't know that editors should put much time into these hundreds of tags left anonymously. It doesn't seem likely to me that the concern is a genuine one at this point. There are real Waldorf schools, real sources are used below, this is not a hoax article. Ibyrnison 17:01, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Nope, that was ME. It took so long to produce the tags that my signature had timed-out. Not an act of vandalism or retaliation, but rather showing how much unsupported original research is in this article. You cannot say "All students learn to play instruments" - they don't. The entire article has to be carefully examined for exactly this kind of illogical and ridiculous commentary. --Pete K 17:53, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

References have been cited for the passage you claim is "unsupported original research", which you have already seen on the project page. You need to be much more judicious with the tags because if your real objection is to the wording in places rather than the content, there's no point in wasting editors time asking them to identify fact references. Six tags per sentence is overkill, and leaves other editors a lot of unnecessary work to clean up. I will change the wording in the above passage since the essence of information has been verified, which will alleviate any concerns about the exceptions, students who don't actually learn to play the instrument. Ibyrnison 18:13, 2 September 2006 (UTC) **note, another editor has clarified the statement Ibyrnison 18:21, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Let me just add, saying things like "Its curriculum focuses on the arts, social skills, spiritual values as well as practical and integrated learning." has several things within the statement that need verification. I dont' believe the curriculum focuses on social skills at all. In fact most Waldorf graduates I know have little or no social skills outside of a Waldorf environment - and that's because they have been socializing with a very small group of classmates their whole lives. "Spirital values" needs a source as well. First, what ARE spiritual values? And if you can figure out what they are, then maybe describe how Waldorf focuses on them. "practical and integrated learning" needs a source too. There's nothing practical about much of the curriculum - mostly mythology and creation myths, spiritual dancing (eurythmy) and stuff like that. There is certainly no "focus" on practical and integrated learning - at all. This is why many sentences have several cite requests added to them. --Pete K 18:02, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I suggested it might be a lot cleaner just to remove everthing that was original research. --Pete K 18:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

When there are citations, the material is not original research. Hgilbert 18:14, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but when the citations to original research sites they are indeed original research. --Pete K 18:32, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

The "No Original Research" policy at wikipedia says, "This policy in a nutshell: Articles may not contain any previously unpublished arguments, concepts, data, ideas, statements, or theories. Moreover, articles may not contain any new analysis or synthesis of: published arguments, concepts, data, ideas, or statements — that serves to advance a position. " If it's independently published, it's not violation of wikipedia's "original research" policy to source to it. Ibyrnison 18:51, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

This is EXACTLY what your claimed sources are doing. Independently published by the author is the definition of original research. --Pete K 18:57, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not convinced you understand what the "no original research" policy defines as original research. Independently published books, papers, research, etc., can contain original research, obviously. That's exactly typically how some of the finest academic resources are written, via original research rather than derivative repeats of existing research, and those references are permitted at wikipedia. You planted throughout the article over a hundred cite tags, and you keep rejecting perfectly legitimate reference sources by misapplying the "no original research" policy, so the best solution is to revert to eliminate the tags before new edits make them more difficult to remove. Ibyrnison 19:48, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

No, where I'm claiming the "original research" policy is links to Waldorf Answers which I have removed completely. The site is original research and even if it is a warehouse location for other published articles, it lands the user in an original research site replete with defamation and non-verifyable (outright lies) information. Maybe it would be helpful if you tell me exactly which citations you object to and we can review them on a case by case basis. BTW, I tried adding in edits and have spent a week now revising the article only to see my edits deleted immediately for frivilous reasons - sometimes for NO reason. I've followed the procedure and put citation requests where they need to be. It took me a couple of hours this morning. I've just spoken with another editor who will also be adding citations to mine, just in case I missed some. If you don't like the way the article looks, why not start addressing them individually instead of arguing with me about the validity of adding ANY of them. This puff-piece for Waldorf has been up here long enough, and we have all agreed to take a good look at it. Let's do that and quit whining about it. --Pete K 20:31, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

User:PeteK has been blocked for 24 hours for edit warring and a violation of the three revert rule. Upon his return, please attempt to identify the issues with this article at the talk page or newly created project page thanks, not the main article space. Further edit warring will not be tolerated and blocks will he handed out accordingly if this behaviour persists. -- Longhair 21:37, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

User:Wonderactivist/Waldorf Project Team Page

I would like to again invite everyone to drop this ongoing edit war and please, instead, come and join a calm, civil, Wiki community project to improve this page. Please go to the link above and add your name if you would like to be involved in this process. Thank you, Wonderactivist 02:10, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Some Project Progress

I would like to report that the Wiki Project is under way and that we have begun what I see as an initial stage - work on the introduction and page structure. Again, I invite everyone who wishes to take part to come join the project.

Consultation Stage

We are currently in a stage of consulting with unbiased Wiki administrators about project management and plan to proceed with our next steps in 2 or3 days.

At that point we will also surely have final project pages set up outside of my user. Wonderactivist 04:43, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Article is now protected

I've protected this article, something I never wanted to do, but felt it was the only option remaining. It appears edit warring here is not going to stop unless the issues under contention are resolved. This article is the subject of much controversy, and edit wars are occuring on many different fronts. For now, please discuss the article contents via the relevant discussion pages and reach consensus before requesting unprotection. -- Longhair 01:31, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you Longhair. The issue here is NOT the information that is being linked to. Everyone agrees that the court transcripts should be available. At issue is the location of the link - a website that is replete with defamatory remarks and extremist positions. Per Misplaced Pages guidelines:

Partisan, religious and extremist websites

The websites and publications of political parties and religious groups should be treated with caution, although neither political affiliation nor religious belief are in themselves reasons not to use a source.

Widely acknowledged extremist or even terrorist groups, whether of a political, religious, racist, or other character, should never be used as sources for Misplaced Pages, except as primary sources, that is to say they may be used in articles discussing the opinions of that organization. Even then they should be used with great caution, and should be supported by other sources.

I believe the solution should be to create a sub-page, I'm suggesting it should be connected to the PLANS article, and post the court transcripts there. This would avoid directing people to the problematic website and still allow access to the useful information.

Thank you again for intervening - and my apologies for my part in this. --Pete K 01:48, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Apology accepted. Nobody needs further blocks here, as I can see you're all working towards a good article on Waldorf education, but the edit warring must stop. I'd rather not get involved with the debate as such (I'm still reading content from weeks ago, and having trouble keeping up sorry), and am only here to oversee the contributions continue in accordance with Misplaced Pages policies. Another administrator has suggested placing the court documents at WikiSource which I think is worth considering. If I can be of further help in any way, feel free to approach me via my talk page. Take some time off, cool that head down, and come back with a clearer view on the issues here, and I'll consider unprotecting the article once issues have been thrashed out and an agreement reached. That may take some time, but I'm sure you're all keen to work it through to an agreeable version. -- Longhair 02:27, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

As a neutral observer and occasional editor, it is quite obvious to me that these websites should not be linked to. They, and the manner in which they are inserted, break so many wikipedia guidelines that I do not know where to start. If we cannot sort out this 'controversy' then I have little faith that we will ever be able to produce an acceptable wikipedia article.--Fergie 08:36, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I've unprotected the article, as it's been protected for near 3 weeks now. Let's see how things fare this time around. -- Longhair\ 12:04, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Waldorf Answers

Pete, you write 01:16, 8 September 2006 (UTC) that http://www.waldorfanswers.org is not accurate. 01:48, 8 September 2006 you write that you think it is replete with extremist positions and defamatory remarks, and that this constitutes a reason not to link to legal documents concerning a lawsuit against two public school districts in California since eight years, pursued by a WC-group, published at the site. The legal documents are found at a special page at the site http://www.waldorfanswers.com/Lawsuit.html that publishes all relevant documents that have been made available in the case.

Can you tell more specifically on what point you think the site is not accurate, and some of the what you call extremist positions and defamatory remarks, that you write that it is replete with? Thanks, --Thebee 06:48, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, it doesn't matter (although I went through the exercise you suggest above on Mothering.com last year). Both sites (Waldorfanswers and Americans4waldorfeducation) are original research and that's enough to disqualify them as sources. A solution has been found - that being that the court transcripts and legal documents can be placed on Wikisource and linked there so people aren't drawn to those original research sites.

We have been discussing two sites, both of which are accused of violating various Misplaced Pages guidelines:

• The Waldorf critics' organization PLANS' website
• A Waldorf supporters' website, Waldorf answers

I would like to ask people involved with neither site to compare the two and evaluate both of their suitability; if one is found suitable and not the other, to explain the justification for such a distinction. Hgilbert 13:44, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Both sites are unsuitable for inclusion as sources or citations for a variety of reasons (POV, OR, etc.). There really should be no debate about this.--Fergie 20:14, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

So both should come out? Can we find consensus on this? Hgilbert 00:04, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

The distinction is that the PLANS site is not being linked except in the discussion of the PLANS site - unlike Waldorfanswers which is linked multiple times (everywhere possible) in the article. The only link to PLANS that I am aware of that is not an example of the PLANS site itself is the lecture by Eugene Schwartz - and we could, I'm sure, put this lecture in Wikisource as well. That would, hopefully, satisfy everyone here who doesn't have an interest in promoting their own viewpoint. Fair enough? --Pete K 15:42, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

It is fair, and in line with Wikidia policy, to have links to PLANS sites in the PLANS article, where discussion of PLANS belongs. Not on this article. Hgilbert 12:40, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Neither website is a properly published source for an encyclopedia (except in the most limited sense). Openwaldorf, Bob and Nancy's Website, and Waldorfworld are also self published. Which them are more "accurate" overall is not a judgement wikipedia's editors are qualified or need to make. None of those sites I just listed are independently published so they should all come out. But the authenticity of the court documents in the middle of this latest edit war doesn't seem to be in dispute, so I don't know why there is a fight to remove the links to copies of them unless there is some kind of worry about some private benefit for editors to post links to documents on their own websites. If the documents are not copyrighted, why can't someone add them to the wikisource library?

I also think the mudslinging is getting way out of hand.Ibyrnison 15:58, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, you have identified EXACTLY the issue here - the "private benefit for editors to post links to documents on their own websites" - which is why this issue was raised in the first place. The Wikisource would be the best place for these documents - so people are not directed to "mudslinging" sites. --Pete K 18:25, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

The central Misplaced Pages policy, one of the three content-governing policies, http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:No_original_research#Citing_oneself describes an exception from the No original research guideline, and encourages writing Misplaced Pages articles based on expert knowledge of published verifiable sources:

"No original research" does not prohibit experts on a specific topic from adding their knowledge to Misplaced Pages. It does, however, prohibit expert editors from drawing on their personal and direct knowledge if such knowledge is unverifiable. Misplaced Pages welcomes the contributions of experts, as long as these contributions come from verifiable (i.e. published) sources. Thus, if an editor has published the results of his or her research elsewhere, in a reputable publication, then the editor may cite that source while writing in the third person and complying with our NPOV policy. We further hope expert editors will draw on their knowledge of other published sources to enrich our articles. While specialists do not occupy a privileged position within Misplaced Pages, they are often familiar with and have access to a wider range of verifiable sources and can thus be of special assistance in verifying or citing sources.

Waldorf Answers, Americans for Waldorf Education, and probably Bob and Nancy's Website and Waldorfworld are all based on expert knowledge of the published verifiable sources upon which they are based. Neither Waldorf Answers nor Americans for Waldorf Education are even used as basis for what is found in the article, or quoted in the article. The links to published legal documents published at Waldorf Answers and a widely published Waldorf FAQ republished at Waldorf Answers do not violate the No original research guideline. Neither does just linking to all four sites as external links for further exploration of the subjects they describe. Repeated deletion of direct links to published sources at Waldorf Answers based on false allegations constitutes pure edit warring.

The only links to Waldorf Answers found in the article that I am the originator of, are the direct links - now removed - to published legal documents found at a page http://www.waldorfanswers.com/Lawsuit.html that lists all relevant and accessible legal documents in a case by WC against two public school districts in CA for supporting the use of Waldorf methods at two public schools, and http://www.waldorfanswers.org/Studies.htm (an overview of published studies on Waldorf education). The other links to Waldorf Answers - http://www.waldorfanswers.org/WaldorfFAQ.htm#10a (Widely published WaldorfFAQ), http://www.waldorfanswers.org/Injunction (quote from published source), and http://www.waldorfanswers.org in the Waldorf resources link section have been put in by others --Thebee 08:50, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

You have written two comments here after I asked you the question above, Pete. I still await an answer to my question regarding your allegations 01:16, 8 September 2006 and 01:48, 8 September 2006 that http://www.waldorfanswers.org is replete with extremist positions and defamatory remarks. If you can't substantiate that, I'd be grateful if you retract those statements, as they otherwise stand out as untrue and unfounded defamation. Thanks, --Thebee 20:17, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not accepting homework assignments from you Sune. I've got better things to do. Anyone and everyone is free to view the sites and decide for themselves if I am characterizing them correctly or not. I stand by my characterization of your websites - and that you only a couple of weeks ago used your AWE site as a "source" to justify characterizing PLANS as a "hate group" should be evidence enough to anyone who is interested in following this defamation issue and your part in it.--Pete K 20:31, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not asking you to do any extra homework. You argued regarding http://www.waldorfanswers.org -- not http://www.americans4waldorf.org -- as if you already knew what I'm asking you about, and I just ask you to document here what you were referring to. If you don't document any subtance of your allegations about http://www.waldorfanswers.org -- not http://www.americans4waldorf.org -- I'm sorry that I again will need to characterize what you wrote as unfounded slander, and your continued edit warring, now with regard to the legal documents and the widely published Waldorf FAQ at the site as unfounded. --Thebee 21:28, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

ROFL... So now I've committed "slander" against a website? Wow! I didn't know you could do that. Thanks for the laugh Sune... --Pete K 03:03, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Edit warring against site and giving untrue allegations as basis for this, getting this article blocked against further editing because of this, then Rolling On The Floor Laughing. Noted, Pete. --Thebee 03:41, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

The edits are halted and the site is locked until a resolution can be arrived at. We have arrived at a resolution that allows the documents in question to be stored at Wiki-source and not on your personal site. That's a resonable solution. Why is this not acceptable to you? --Pete K 17:15, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

You mean that your edit warring regarding this article, giving false allegations as reason for the removal of links to published legal documents, as you don't like the site where they are published, and Rolling on the Floor Laughing, when the further editing of the article was blocked because of this, has stopped for the time being.

http://www.waldorfanswers.org is not my personal site. http://www.thebee.se is. Anyone can store public domain documents where they like. Who said - as you write - that this is not acceptible to me?

It would not change the fact that the primary reason for this would be obvious false allegations by one user as part of his edit war, and the acceptance of this to restore some calm here. --Thebee 07:52, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Sune, I'm not responsible for what goes through your mind (thank God). You may (and do) think whatever you like. You may even write and self-publish whatever you like. Everyone here is free to look at your site and determine its validity for themselves - I'm sure they won't have trouble finding a link to it in these discussions. The point is - it's ORIGINAL RESEARCH and linking to it in this article is unacceptable. I honestly believe - and I say this with all sincerity, that intelligent people who look at your site and your "research" will dismiss it completely as nonsense - so linking to your site doesn't, in my mind, serves to discredit you. However, that is not the point. The point is that warehousing of good information at your site and linking to it leads people to your original-research discussion and, indeed, a better solution is available - Wiki-source. As far as "restoring some calm here" - I would suggest to you that you should self-evaluate your own role in these edit wars and consider to what degree you yourself are responsible for them. When you realize that you are not the only person allowed to edit the content of this and other articles here that you have a personal interest in, the edit wars will stop. I encourage you to cooperate with ALL the editors here who are trying to restore some balance to these articles, most of which you have personally written or contributed to in large part. --Pete K 14:16, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Wrong again, Pete. You write: "I encourage you to cooperate with ALL the editors here who are trying to restore some balance to these articles, most of which you have personally written or contributed to in large part."

The only article I have made some noticeable contribution to is the page on the WC, that I have some knowledge of with regard to what is published at its site since eight years, and some quotes to the article on RS' views on race and ethnicity page. After you started spamming the main page on RS with quotes, belonging in the article on RS' views on race and ethnicity, I have added some quotes there too, to balance what you have added to it. But the whole discussion really belongs in the mentioned other article, where it is represented extensively, and your spamming of the main page on RS with quotes that belong in the special article violates Misplaced Pages standard of putting discussions of subjects in existing articles dedicated to them, not in other articles.

With regard to the article discussed here, I'm not aware that I have written one existing word in it, nor in any other article here at Misplaced Pages, except for some contributions with some links. You know, to original legal documents from both parties involved in the lawsuit the WC so far -- after eight years -- has lost, and an overview of research on Waldorf education ... That's all.

On my part in what you refer to as edit wars here: The only point I have tried to argue for is that the link to the WC in the article does not meet up to Misplaced Pages requirements, based on what is published at its site, as described at among other places here and here:

"In general, some of the discontent that comes to expression at the site of PLANS and the two mailing lists related to it stands out as valid and understandable and can be seen as partly rooted in a too rapid growth of the Waldorf movement in US, resulting in partly immature schools and (like at most schools) at times not fully competent teachers and administrators.

Another part is understandable as an expression of a clash between a purely rationalist view of the purpose of education and an effort in Waldorf education to do a more balanced justice to not only the intellectual, but also the emotional, social and action oriented needs of growing children, and integrate also earlier perspectives and stages of the cultural evolution of mankind than the present in the Waldorf curriculum, in building an understanding of the pupils for their background and place in the world, not primarily as members of any specific nation or race, but as members of humanity and world citizens.

The third main part of the argumentation uses the first two parts as a basis and implied support for demonizing defamation, smearing of and witch hunting against Waldorf education, anthroposophy, the anthroposophical movement and Rudolf Steiner as the main originator of both anthroposophy and Waldorf education, as part of the mainly secular humanist rhetoric of the originator of the site of PLANS.

Except for the myths mentioned above, the main tools used in this part of the argumentation are the cultivation respectively support by the secretary, president and vice president of PLANS of allegations on the WC-list, then republished as "archives" at the site of PLANS, that Rudolf Steiner was schizophrenic, megalomaniac and a drug addict, that he probably practiced sex magic, and that elements in Waldorf education extensively are used as ritual magic, like eurythmy, or used to make "magical talismans" (wet-on-wet water-color paintings), and with the secretary of PLANS regularly, like in recent discussions, comparing Steiner to Hitler.

For an actual comparison of Steiner to Hitler, see here.

And except, of course, on the WC-list publishing insinuations that it is a common habit of Waldorf teachers to sexually assault Waldorf pupils, to then republish it as "archives" of the list at the site of PLANS." (Some years ago you in a public internet discussion alleged something similar; that in your view, Waldorf pupils have been sexually assulted at approximately 10% of all waldorf schools. Or do I remember incorrectly?)

As a number of supporters of the WC did not like what is revealed in the second link above, describing the third part of the argumentation by the WC, and none of them probably wanted to be associated with the reality I document in the second link, all of it verifiable in a way that is traceable to sources in different forms, published by others than me, they -- well one or ... one -- got the hickups, and started commenting in a way she herself describes as "I ranted and raved, and then I ranted and raved. I ranted and raved systematically, every 2 hours or oftener ...".

For a short overview of some of your achievements so far, getting one warning after 10 days of false accusations, libel, unfounded slander and five personal attacks, and starting with repeated spamming of the article with numerous and duplicate links to the WC in different sections, see http://en.wikipedia.org/User:Thebee/WikiViolationsByPK

Also, that appr. 99% of the WC site consists of personal "original research", most of it non-verifiable and not obviously based on expert knowledge of published sources, published as +140MB of archives from 10 years of an anti-Waldorf mailing list is another main factor that I think disqualifies it from linking to, something you -- for some reason -- have written that you find uninteresting, while you -- for some other mysterious? reason reason -- try to argue for that the site of http://www.waldorfanswers.org constitutes "original research" NOT based on expert knowledge of published and verifiable sources (which it is) ..., and that it therefore -- in contrast to the WC, should NOT be linked ... Thebee 16:46, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Sune, you should save your breath... I'm not interested in this nonsense. --Pete K 21:26, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

You and I are just two people here discussing the article and different arguments for and against different actions to take regarding it, for example regarding links to Waldorf Answers and WC. I assume you're not against other readers than you taking part in the arguments. --Thebee 21:36, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, other readers who have the energy should, of course, be encouraged to wind you up so you can play the same song and dance you always play. After seeing it a dozen times in these discussion pages, I personally find it boring. As for your "associations" - again, I find it interesting that you associate people in the first place. The "hate group" label you and four friends decided to "associate" to PLANS was not only dishonest and underhanded, but defamatory. Users who want to see how you repeatedly revised your "association" when challenged on this malicious misuse of Misplaced Pages can look through the history on the PLANS page. --Pete K 13:21, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

PLANS is not to be used as a fact reference of any kind for "Waldorf education" in this article.

Maybe it should be linked in the external links section, but only because it is a party mentioned in the article involved in a lawsuit against two Waldorf methods schools. The lawsuit was not against Waldorf education or any of the 900 affiliated Waldorf schools. The lawsuit was against two particular public school districts. Those public school districts are not named or linked. Their position is not represented at all in this article. There is the imbalance.

The constant personal infighting on this talk page needs to stop. Ibyrnison 14:45, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Why shouldn't PLANS be linked here? You seem to have no problem linking to the Waldorf sources in support of the claims in the article. As I have said below, people don't generally publish their horrible experiences with Waldorf, but indeed, on the PLANS page, there are many articles from people who have had direct experiences with Waldorf. And those experiences are at many of the 900 independent Waldorf schools. If the article can talk about the experiences of children in Waldorf in a positive way, why shouldn't the negative experiences be available here? --Pete K 17:26, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Site suitability

There has been a suggestion by Fergie that both the PLANS and Waldorf Answers sites are unsuitable for inclusion here. I support this; both have been creating massive edit wars for this very reason. Can we gather consensus on this? Hgilbert 12:38, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Just for the record: what I (and wikipedia) really mean is

1) That these websites should not be used as sources

2) That they should not be inserted into the article by people connected to them

3) That these websites should not be linked to in either a predjudiced or biased manner. (ie not included under a 'criticism', 'outsider' or 'advocacy' section). They can only be included as neutral links to illustrate that these organisations exist. Categorised linking simply injects POV into proceedings.

Also for the record: I do not have a strong objection to third parties adding these links as references simply to illustrate that these organisations exist. --Fergie 13:18, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

This seems more proper to me also. Is it standard procedure to add the linking to the name where it's used in the article itself, or does it belong in the external link section? There are other websites that need to come out because they aren't discussed at all in the article. Ibyrnison 14:19, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

External links need not be discussed in the article; they may be relevant and useful possibilities to find further information.

Fergie: as a neutral party, can you edit the article so that it conforms to your suggested usage above? Hgilbert 23:05, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Only administrators can edit the article whilst it is protected. I'm happy to do that if you'll let me know once you've all agreed on the suitability of content and where it should be inserted. -- Longhair 08:03, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Openwaldorf, Bob and Nancy , and Waldorfworld are three that I mean. They are self-published websites and should be excluded on that basis. Ibyrnison 02:31, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

You forgot to add Waldorfanswers, of course. --Pete K 14:21, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

You forgot the question mark. Ibyrnison does not stand out as someone who normally forgets things. --Thebee 18:28, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Just for the record again, I have not written one word in the existing article and I'm not the originator of any link to Waldorf Answers in the article as it stands, except for two: A link to a comprehensive overview of research on Waldorf education, the probably most extensive on the net, and two links - now removed - to public legal documents probably not found anywhere else on the net to make it possible for people to read for themselves the argumentation of the parties involved. There are no other links to Waldorf Answers, that I am the originator of. I don't intend to put in one either in the future.

With regard to the substance of the argument that direct links to Waldorf Answers and the WC would need to be put in to document that they exist: the WC is mentioned twice in the article, telling that it exists and with a short mentioning of its views, and with direct links to the Misplaced Pages article on the group, that documents its nature, argumentation, history and actions. This - as far as I understand - in full fulfills a need to document that the group exists, without the addition of any more links in the article to document this.

Adding yet another, direct, link to the group in this article (found extensively in the special Wiki article on the group) - as it seems to me - can only be defended out of a personal wish to specifically promote the group as such, based on a personal bias against Waldorf education and a wish to promote argumentation and defamation of it. I still have some belief that decisions regarding how to edit the article will be based on facts and well reasoned and penetrated argumentation in relation to the basic Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines. But I'm beginning to understand that that probably is a dream, and that there are other more basic factors that in the end will play a more important role. --Thebee 09:54, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't think the WC List should be linked at all here. I think there should, of course, be a link to PLANS as it is mentioned in the article. If, however, editors would allow criticism of Waldorf in the article equivalent to the same amount as the support of Waldorf, then there would be no need for a link to PLANS. If the article would fairly represent the critique of Waldorf, this would indeed be a good article. 25% of kids are removed from my local Waldorf school EVERY YEAR. There's something wrong with these numbers and critique of Waldorf is necessary. It's not the great place the article claims it to be. --Pete K 13:34, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages's policies are clear on this: it is inappropriate to reserve equal coverage to positive and critical in articles on the pretext of providing "balance". We need to focus the energy toward NPOV, which is not achieved simply by letting advocates to balance positive with critical opinions. PLANS cannot be linked as a reference just because it's critical, any more than an unqualified website should be linked just because it's supportive.

In another article here on public education, high drop out rate is reported (criticism), but reference cited for that data is a qualified, published source. Editors aren't basing such statements on their own personal experience, but actual published sources. That's what's needed in this article also. Ibyrnison 15:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

I have no problem sticking to published sources - as long as they are neutral and not Anthroposophical sources. A source that has a bias toward one point of view cannot be a reasonable support for claims that cannot find support outside of sources with that particular bias. Many of the claims made in the article are only supportable by Anthroposophical sources - and, as I've said before, it's like asking Christians to testify on behalf of Christ. An NPOV article requires NPOV sources to support the claims.--Pete K 02:10, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

This isn't a court trial, but even if it was, Christians are allowed to testify. This is an encyclopedia article about Waldorf education, and one expects to find Waldorf educators used as sources for the information. Attitude toward anthroposophy cannot alone be used as some kind of a litmus test in qualifying sources. To provide balance, simply present other important qualified sources you think offer a perspective not yet represented. Ibyrnison 03:53, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

No, you're right, this isn't a court trial. This isn't a place for giving testimony. It's an encyclopedia - where people expect to find facts, so the testimony of people whose livelihood is benefitted by the success of this article should not be masqueraded as fact. People who benefit financially from Waldorf write lots of stuff about Waldorf. People who have had their lives torn apart by Waldorf education don't generally choose to relive that experience by writing about it. --Pete K 17:21, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

You told us earlier that you were writing a book about this yourself, so this objection isn't convincing. Doctors make money writing medical books. You call it "bias". Some think of it as "expertise". Ibyrnison 17:53, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I'm writing a book - but then I have more tenacity than most - that's why I said "don't generally" above. And no, it's not expertise when people "see" and describe things that have no support in the world outside of Waldorf. Waldorf teachers are not experts in education (many haven't been to college and most haven't taught outside of Waldorf) - so claiming children learn better in Waldorf, or that children develop in seven year stages and then supporting these claims with Waldorf sources is not expertise, it's biased opinion. Oh, I'm quite sure Waldorf teachers "see" these things happening right before their eyes, but that nobody else does is evidence that these things are illusions. And then, of course, we have people who have disingenuously linked Piaget's research to Steiner's in this article (it is not) - which is another attempt at sleight-of-hand to legitimize Steiner's ideas. This article is a Waldorf snow-job and legitimate sources MUST be cited if this is going to be anything more than another Waldorf brochure. --Pete K 20:26, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Conflict and consensus

There is obviously some conflict, some of it based in the content of the article, but some of it interpersonal, it seems. Misplaced Pages has much experience in/of conflict and dispute resolution - if, for example, a request for comment doesn't work, there may be a need or desire to move to mediation. If the WikiProject can help with that process, that would be great - though, have all interested parties decided to work there? (I read one comment that indicated doubt about that WikiProject.) In any case, I think people need to (to rehash the cliché) take a deep breath, and try to listen to the other parties' perspectives, and work towards a common consensus ground. If people here can commit to doing that, and leave interpersonal differences aside, you will end up with an excellent article (which is, in my opinion, pretty good, and possibly only needing slight restructuring). If there are claims of the benefits of Waldorf education, these need to be cited (well) - and the same goes for criticisms. The rest should be pretty straightforward (again, in my naive opinion) - ie. the principles, practice and pedagogy of Waldorf education. But hey, you all know your stuff better than me, so I'll let you get on with it :-). Cormaggio 11:06, 11 September 2006 (UTC) Crossposted to Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Waldorf Project

I think the problem is that we all have different ideas of what the "perfect article" might look like. To me, astonishing claims supported by sources that are directly connected to Anthroposophy (i.e. Anthroposophists) don't belong in an article. Claims that are supported by sources OUTSIDE Anthroposophy should indeed be made here. --Pete K 13:26, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

According to WP:No personal attacks#Examples of personal attacks WP policy, "Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views — regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream or extreme." qualifies as a personal attack. Hgilbert 16:23, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

There is no personal attack in pointing out that the claims made in the article are supported by publications with a baised view. --Pete K 02:18, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Your statement evidences a basic misconception of neutrality of point of view. Misplaced Pages policy states that "NPOV requires views to be represented without bias. A bias is a prejudice in a general or specific sense, usually in the sense of having a predilection for one particular point of view or ideology." For Misplaced Pages, bias lies in the editor's preference for (or exclusion of) certain points of view. You are evidencing this bias here. It is incredibly naive to assume that one's own point of view is unbiased. It is in the inclusive balance of points of view that neutrality is found.

That balance needs to be supported by established authorities, not by editor's personal views. Established authorities will largely be found in those who work within a field or have had a close connection to it. In a study of the law, excluding the work and ideas of all with a law degree or who work in legal fields as biased would be foolish. Hgilbert 09:19, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

It would be an obvious and gross violation of the neutral point of view stance to exclude sources on the basis of their author's affiliations.

Suggestion for resolution of the existing conflicts:

• remove all links to self-published sites (Waldorf Answers, PLANS, Bob and Nancy, etc.)
• upload the trial transcripts to Wikisource and link to them there
• copy the overview of research on Waldorf education to a Misplaced Pages article: Research on Waldorf education (assuming we have copyright permissions here).
• Retain the link to the PLANS article in the section on the California trial. An editor raised the question of whether this section belongs in a general article, given its specially US connection. I suspect suggestions that we remove it would result in further extreme emotional responses. Unless someone can defuse these, I don't see how the question can even be dealt with objectively at this point.
• (Withdrawn in accordance with comments)

In the perhaps premature hope that this is a reasonable list for consensus, I'll ask that those who agree sign below: Hgilbert 13:37, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

• Hgilbert

"remove all links to self-published sites (Waldorf Answers, PLANS, Bob and Nancy, etc.)" Could you be more complete in the listing to make it more clear?

Any self-published site, i.e. a site with which the editor who added the link is directly affiliated or for which s/he is an editor. I don't know exactly which sites meet this criterion.

"Allow neutral editors to replace links as they see fit (preferably no one who has been involved in edit wars over them previously, which is a broad range of editors)." You mean also those links that have been removed, based on the specific argument that they link to self-published sites, and without regard to what other Misplaced Pages guidelines that might apply to new additions? --Thebee 13:50, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Those websites are self-published, and consist largely of 'original research'. That's problem one. Problem two are sources or links which are sometimes added here by the party that wrote or owns them, and there's a policy against here, it turns out. Ibyrnison 16:06, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Fergie indicated above she would be open to such sites being re-added by neutral editors where there was valuable information. I wrote this above in an attempt to include her suggestion. We would need to be clear about Misplaced Pages standards; original research would be inappropriate and people could not add sites with which they were directly affiliated or (co-)authored. It's a highly problematic area and perhaps we need to avoid controversial sites here to go forward; I am willing to withdraw that item if it aids consensus. Hgilbert 16:15, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

What I actually said (or at least tried to say) was that these links can only be included to illustrate that an entity exists. So in other words- if we mention an organisation called PLANS, then it might be appropriate to link to a home page such as www.planshomepage.org. This has nothing to do with valuable information which is a meaningless concept in this context, since the websites in question are so subjective/contentious. Your interpretation of wikipedia standards is correct and I support their implementation in this instance--Fergie 09:49, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

On "Any self-published site, i.e. a site with which the editor who added the link is directly affiliated or for which s/he is an editor.": "Self-published" does not refer to who adds a link to an article. It refers to the relation between a site, the author of the site, and others knowledgeable in the field of what is found at the site. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Self-published_sources

"A self-published source is a published source that has not been subject to any form of independent fact-checking, or where no one stands between the writer and the act of publication."

With regard to "Waldorf Answers", a number of people in the Waldorf Community looked at it before it was published, and noone had any objection to it, except maybe two on two smaller points, as far as I remember. One possibility to get a formal peer-review comment would be to write to two expert parties in the field of Waldorf education, AWSNA and ECSWE, and get their stated view on the site.

On the "Original research" argument as criterion, I have made some comments about it above: http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Waldorf_education#Original_research Golden Wattle, at the end of the section, you refer to http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources as the relevant guideline to apply with regard to Waldorf Answers. Can you tell how you judge a link to http://www.waldorfanswers.org as separate External link in the links section based on that guideline?

On "Fergie indicated above she would be open to such sites being re-added by neutral editors where there was valuable information." I know that. But you can't apply one criterion for removing a number of links first, and then disregard that same criterion for the same links, if they are added again. Either the criterion ("self published") holds in both instances, or in none. Also, can you be more complete in your suggestion about which sites that you suggest are to be removed applying the criterion?

I have removed this item of the list in accordance with Fergie's clarification. In answer to your second question, I don't know of any other sites (than the ones mentioned in the above discussions) that would fall away. Hgilbert 13:24, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Not trying to make things too complicated, just trying to find consistent criteria for handling links, independently of who adds them. With regard to Bob and Nancy and Waldorf World, has anyone connected to the two sites added them, or someone else? Thanks, --Thebee 18:39, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

I was going to weigh in on this, but it looks like even the suggestion itself is being hotly debated. I'll wait until we have an answer that satisfies Thebee - and vote on that. --Pete K 02:18, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Do weigh in. All truthfully described facts and logical arguments based on this and relevant, understood, existing and applicable Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines are important.

I think HGilbert's suggestion basically is a good one. It only needs to be more specific and based on a consistent application of Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines to avoid problems when then applied. -- Thebee 09:16, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Proposal to unblock

I suggest that we agree to avoid edit wars by resolving questions here on the talk page. I have uploaded the trial transcript to Wikisource:Waldorf public school trial transcript and this link can be inserted in the text. Self-published sites should be dropped from citation and we should commit to referencing authoritative sources according to Misplaced Pages standards and following the WP:NPOV policy in this regard. The overview of research on Waldorf education should be copied to a Misplaced Pages sub-article: Research on Waldorf education.

Can everyone agree to this? Hgilbert 13:50, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Respectfully, I don't think unblocking will help anything at this point - see below. Wonderactivist

Are you all interested in NPOV or links?

Actually, NPOV is achieved through an article not links. Here is a link to the first step on the Misplaced Pages tutorial on NPOV: Misplaced Pages:NPOV_tutorial#First:_Negotiating_neutrality_with_others

It seems that most of the people debating here have not joined the project - is it structure or lack of faith?

If you are truly interested in creating an article that is based in NPOV, I invite you to join the project here: Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Waldorf Project

and read the first proposal on how to run the project, which is based in the NPOV tutorial above and the history of edit wars on this page: Misplaced Pages:WikiProject_Waldorf_Project_Proposals If you disagree with the proposal, make suggestions to change it. Wonderactivist 14:13, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with keeping the article locked until the project is completed. --Pete K 17:11, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I think most actually have joined the project. It's something of a miracle, but I think we've reached consensus over these links. However, it might help editors reach consensus on the rest of the article if the article is kept locked. Ibyrnison 17:31, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I have not been able to follow that today, but have some suggestions regarding the links, that I think are reasonable. Can you give the specific link to where they are discussed? Thanks, --Thebee 17:43, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Hey I'm all for recognizing miracles where they occur - could someone finalize the links as you have agreed upon them here and list them as a proposal on the project page - then we can all vote upon them in an organized fashion and it becomes part of the project.

While I don't wish to block unlocking necessarily, I do think that if the article is unblocked before a consensus is reached, then the edit wars will ensue, taking focus off of the project where we need to be working - under whatever structure we agree upon - for consensus. Wonderactivist 17:50, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

If anyone would like for me to set up a "link discussion" page within the project - or any other page - I am also happy to do so. I am just trying to start this thing in a civil, orderly fashion - not to control it. I do hope I haven't given that impression.

It's just necessary to agree upon groundrules to make this do-able. Two users in this group have either been restricted or threatened to be restricted over recent discussion here on this page. In such an environment, it really becomes necessary to set up a format where anyone can coment - without having to read extremely long commentary. Essentially the length and the severity of the conflict make it difficult for other, less biased folks to join in. We wish to make this an open discussion where all can join in.

Wonderactivist 18:14, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I have listed here the issues in the resolution as I understand it was agreed to by most who weighed in so far. Please feel free to move it wherever it might better belong. Ibyrnison 18:40, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

While a good step, I'd suggest "self published" is not the only criterion for removal of external links, but that a similarly central criterion is "original research". While I think "self published" in the sense described by Misplaced Pages does not fully apply to Waldorf Answers, and have a hunch AWSNA and ECSWE would disagree, Waldorf Answers does contain what may be described as "original research", though most or all of it can be verified through published sources, and it is based on expert knowledge of the published sources that have been used in building the site. Basically probably around 100% of what is found at the site of the WC can probably be characterized as "original research" in the Misplaced Pages sense. Appr. 99% of it consists of archives of a mailing list, comparable to a blog. That could make both sites ineligible as external links, based on http://en.wikipedia.org/WP:EL#Links_normally_to_be_avoided (though nobody yet has pointed to one single point on which Waldorf Answers publishes factually inaccurate material or unverified original research).

The listing of links to remove is also incomplete and lacks specification of the arguments regarding the specific sites. P.K. would for example probably tell you how surprised he is that you do not list http://www.americans4waldorf.org as unacceptable external link, though most or all of it there too is verifiable, while some of it may stand out as "original research" in the Misplaced Pages sense.

Your proposal does not say that links that have been removed once on the basis of specific criteria cannot be added again, after they have been removed, as that would contradict the application of the specified criterion or criteria in the first instance.

You suggest adding a Wikilink to the article on the WC, where it is mentioned in the article. There already are two ...

With regard to http://www.waldorfanswers.org/Studies.htm you suggest that it simply be copied to a page at Misplaced Pages. There are also other options, and I'd like to discuss this and the copyright issue with Robert, who is the other webmaster of Waldorf Answers.

Well, some comments. --Thebee 20:03, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

You're getting to know me pretty well Sune - I absolutely would object to the original research site AWE being included while others are removed. But I suspect it was just an honest mistake - as everyone has been working late nights trying to resolve these issues - a nocturnal omission, perhaps. --Pete K 20:10, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for the comments. I will revise the list. Do we need a straw poll to see how everyone stands on this? Ibyrnison 21:13, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

http://www.waldorfanswers.org/Studies.htm

• There would certainly be copyright issues with copying the list at http://www.waldorfanswers.org/Studies.htm . See Misplaced Pages:Copyright problems/2006 February 4

Under US case law, e.g. Eckes v. Card Prices Update, lists of items that are created entirely or primarily as a result of editorial opinion are subject to copyright protection. This explicitly excludes lists which are derived solely from facts, statistics, or polling data, as only opinion based lists are considered by the courts to have the requisite creativity required for copyright protection under US law.

Consequently, the inclusion of the entirety of such a list solely for the purposes of adding it to Misplaced Pages will generally constitute a copyright infringment. Excerpts of such lists can be used in Misplaced Pages under the doctrine of fair use when they are associated with meaningful discussion of the contents of the list, but under typical circumstances, one should never reproduce the entirety of such a list.

Note also Misplaced Pages is not a mirror or a repository of links, images, or media files - I would extend that exclusion to a list of academic studies on Waldorf education. In my opinion, such a list has no place on wikipedia. If such studies are used as references in articles then they can indeed be used as references, eg JW Schneider said in 1952 that .... ref link to Schneider J W: Die Rudolf Steinerschule, ihre theoretische Begründung und praktische Gestaltung. Phil. Diss. Kiel (The Rudolf Steiner school, its theoretical foundation and practice. Dissertation, University of Kiel, 1952.).--Golden Wattle 21:40, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I think at issue here are court transcripts which are warehoused at waldorfanswers.org. There is, perhaps a question as to whether these court transcripts are available elsewhere online. I wonder, in the event that PLANS wins the court case in appeals court and proves that public Waldorf schools should not get public funding, will the very biased waldorfanswers.org publish those court transcripts as well? --Pete K 22:37, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

as advised previously, court transcripts are fine and can be placed at Wikisource :-)--Golden Wattle 22:42, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I have already uploaded the trial transcript to Wikisource:Waldorf public school trial transcript. We may be able to get copyright permission for the research list; there is no reason why this shouldn't appear as an article, as many other lists do. Hgilbert 10:58, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Ibyrnison, that is just perfect, I just shifted it to the top of the proposal page, and there's plenty of room on the discussion page for a healthy debate. Thank you for taking the time to put it together! So the formal link proposal is here everyone: Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Waldorf Project Proposals

Wonderactivist 01:19, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Point of view

Is this a valid point of view on Waldorf education? --Fasten 08:34, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

If it is your point of view then it is a valid point of view! :-) Personally, I think that this is a nice summing up of Waldorf Schools. In particular, you touch on the subject of economic elitism endemic to any form of private education which the wikipedia article, as it stands, largely ignores. You also raise the issue of social polarisation, which is similarly skirted over in the current version of the article. It can be seen that many individuals within the Waldorf system have a negative view of state education and what they see as 'conformist society', just as individuals from the outside may be skeptical to anthroposophy, or other aspects of Waldorf education.--Fergie 11:07, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't recognize it as a valid point of view. There is some elitism as Waldorf schools, especially in the US, are expensive - so you don't often get a good cross-section of the community attending. Some Waldorf schools try to put together some type of tuition assistance program but generally, this type of assistance goes to families of an Anthroposophical bent that can't afford the tuition - and of course to the children of teachers. So achieving a racially, culturally and socioeconomically diverse student body is not necessarily the focus of such programs. --Pete K 02:12, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

What do you call expensive? In Germany the average school fee for a Waldorf school is € 125 per month. --Fasten 14:43, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

In the US, tuition is between $8,000 and $10,000 per year - PER CHILD. So for a family with three kids, tuition can easily be 1/3 of the yearly income. --Pete K 23:25, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Do these schools receive a government budget? In Germany the school fee of Waldorf schools varies and depends on the income of the parents but the schools receive a regular budget from the state like any other school. --Fasten 10:30, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

No, the schools I'm talking about are private schools. They receive tax-exempt status from the government, but they are not subsidized by the government. The Waldorf Charter schools ARE fully funded by the government - i.e. parents dont' have to pay anything to enroll their children in them. The Waldorf Charters are the schools that are the subject of the legal challenge to the establishment clause - separation of church and state.--Pete K 20:37, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Nothing Happening Here

There seems to be nothing happening here. The Waldorf Education page is in need of a re-write and the Waldorf Project Team effort is apparently stalled. Meanwhile, a Waldorf brochure continues to represent Misplaced Pages's view on Waldorf education. How convenient for Waldorf supporters. --Pete K 15:31, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the project team has passed two proposals and is working on two more. 68.97.192.23 11:56, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm on the project team and I never heard about them. Well, I guess I'm not interested in participating in the project anymore. This has gotten too silly. I don't understand why there can't be a single project page for this project. There are back-pages of proposals going on all over the place and proposals are getting passed on the back pages of the project without notification to the project team. There are only 5 of us. How hard would it be to let everyone know that there's a proposal on the table and provide a link to it? I guess the Waldorf supporters will just do their thing and the critics will edit the finished product (again). --Pete K 02:11, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Project Update

Here are the updates I just sent to the project team - everyone is welcome to join the . Wonderactivist 12:45, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Hello Waldorf Project Team Members, I just wanted to let you know that two proposals have passed on the Waldorf project and two more - one based on Fergie's starting place - have been set out for discussion here. Feedback has been given that the project has been going slow. I apologize as I had hand surgery a week ago, but truly nothing should wait for one person. If we each check in once or twice a week, we should be able to get through the article in a month or two. I would appreciate your valuable insights on the proposals and timing. Wonderactivist 12:11, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Waldorf Edits In clicking around to user pages to send the note, I have seen that the edit wars are truly still raging - they just have moved from the Waldrof page to user pages. As a result, I do not advise speeding up this project - time will be well-spent hashing out the disagreements civilly, with the result being a better page for Misplaced Pages and its readers. The problem with this page, overall, has been each person's need to push their own agenda without taking time to consider other viewpoints. Please do not resume your edit wars on the page. Wonderactivist 12:25, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Waldorf_Project"

I have removed my name from the project. I don't see any value in delaying the editing of this Waldorf brochure except perhaps for people who enjoy having a Waldorf brochure masquerading as a Misplaced Pages article. I will discuss reasonable edits here before editing the article. This seems like a reasonable approach to this task. This discussion page is where discussion should occur, not in some distant galaxy far, far away. There is really no expectation on my part that the pro-Waldorf people controlling the project will produce anything less than another promotion of Waldorf. They have, through their edits on this and other pages, (Steiner, Anthroposophy - over 20 different articles all saying the same thing) made their agenda quite clear - to flood Misplaced Pages with their ideology. Addressing this requires significant effort that should not be hamstrung by project teams dragging their feet in considering reasonable edits. --Pete K 15:02, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Dear Pete, I am sorry that you are not interested in a positive and stable solution for this page. I'm not sure I see the logic in a team democratically reaching consensus...and then asking you for permission to post our changes. Hmmm. The project has one front page on which all proposals are listed and accessible in the index - and have been fully visible all along. Also, you received two notes from me on your user page the day before you posted your note saying you knew nothing about it. Once again, you are welcome to join the project, but if you choose not to, we will not feel any obligation to conduct a second discussion of each issue with you here. That is not the way the Wiki process works. Wonderactivist 17:18, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

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