I don't know anything about the guy but the first few sentences normally summarize the article and that article has an entire section "Views on Jews" and "Third Reich" so putting the antisemite in the first paragraph at least is not that far fetched. From a neutral, never before heard of this guy, point of view.
Yeah, that dude is deeeefinitely deserving of having antisemitism mentioned in the first sentence.
My problem with Wikipedia is that some articles are fiercely gatekept by individuals who have clear bias and the community does little about it. A great example of this would be the Alcoholics Anonymous page.
Any time someone tries to add information about the ineffectiveness of AA's all-or-nothing treatment of substance abuse, the abuse/harassment that goes on in groups, the documentary that revealed said abuse and harassment - one of a small handful of accounts, who rarely participate on any other page, immediately revert the edit with a gish-gallop of claimed wikipedia violations.
Now, aside from the fact that reverting edits is supposed to be something of last resort - the reasons they cite for removing stuff strain credulity all the time. For example, they dismiss the documentary because it apparently wasn't screened in enough festivals and theatres. Which...might be a thing (it really isn't), if one were trying to cite it as a source...but you can't even mention the existence of the documentary, a demonstrable fact, without that being shot down as well due to the documentary not meeting their standards for a documentary.
I believe they also cited a wikipedia rule that says that "both sides" type coverage of a subject needs to be proportionate to how mainstream/fringe each "side" is. So by their reasoning: because there aren't many people talking about the problems with AA, the AA article shouldn't have any mention of the problems with AA.
They justify all this by claiming the AA is under "attack" and they are "defending" AA from the evil people (did I mention that AA is closely tied to Christianity?)
Wikipedia is controlled by a very small number of people who use an exhaustive policy manual to justify whatever actions they want to take, defend viewpoints they like and attack those they don't. It's sort of like how US federal and state laws are extensive that just walking to your mailbox, you probably break some sort of law and could be detained by police for it.
That's the core problem. Wikipedia isn't governed by the truth or fact, but by who knows the policy manual best.
"BRD" is not at all a recommended approach to editing, it really is more of a last resort. You're very much expected to propose non-trivial improvements to the article on the talk page before you make them, and then respond to any actionable feedback; at which point anyone who reverts you after the fact is acting against established consensus. Being "BOLD" is okay for simple copyedits but not for much else nowadays.
> Consider reverting only when necessary. BRD does not encourage reverting
It's bizarre that you think it "puts reverting at the center of the recommended approach to editing" when the policy specifically says it doesn't even encourage reverting.
It's an "explanatory supplement" to the Consensus policy. The problem with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines is that arguably there are so many of them that you can almost always find one that says what you want it to say. :)
And if not, WP:IAR will do the trick. That, too, is policy:
If we're being fair, the deletion log mentions the exact reason: it wasn't an article that was deleted; it was a (cross-namespace) redirect. The actual article could've been some user's sandbox page or something. If a page is a sandbox (not complete), there shouldn't be redirects to it. When the page is complete enough, then it can be moved to the main namespace.
Yes and no. It’s just that no one has bothered to make the page for one; you’re free to do so. Your accusation of deletion implies that there was a page that was deleted. That would be a bias, but it wasn’t the case. The page was a redirect that violated the rules.
In other words, there’s a bias in the editors to not make it, but there’s no malicious bias that deleting an actual article would imply.
Seriously? How can you have a 'neutral take' on Julius Evola? Do you want Wikipedia to make a neutral take on the literary merit of the Turner Diaries?
Some things cannot be expressed or explained without political language or terminology because they are inherently political. For what it's worth I think Wikipedia did a great job with that article.
After having read the article, I concur that it does not warrant such a prominent place. There's a paragraph dedicated to his views on Jews, and they're not particularly antisemitic, and it certainly doesn't seem to be a feature of the core of his thinking, merely a (convenient?) derivative of it. Mentioning his rejection of values he associated with Jews in the second paragraph would have been more consistent. There's more in that introduction that shouldn't be there, e.g. the phrase about admiring Himmler.
> There's a paragraph dedicated to his views on Jews, and they're not particularly antisemitic
Are we reading the same article? It says 'Evola viewed Jews as corrosive' and that he believed the Protocols of the Elders of Zion were broadly accurate even if they were fake.
I doubt that scanning a Wikipedia article is sufficient qualification to announce that someone has been confirmed an antisemite or not, but I'm sure victims of antisemitism are grateful for your judgement.
Maybe a more apt comparison is between Louis Farrakhan and David Duke? Both are featured as "Prominent Figures" section of the Antisemitism sidebar but only one has "antisemitic" in the lead.
Yes. The old lets the reader to decide for him/herself whether he was antisemitic or not. Does not obstruct information about his views yet does not devolve into name calling in the first sentence.
I'm not trying to underplay what he is saying, but dismissing him in the first sentence on a supposedly neutral article really rubs me the wrong way.
There is no question that he was an antisemite if you read the
sources provided on the very same page. He was objectively an antisemite there is no room for interpretation or your definition of the word differs from the one of the general public.
Would you have an issue if we put "suspected paedophile and open paedophile apologist" in the opening lines for philosophers like Foucault, Sarte and gore vidal? Those are also objective facts.
I would rather have dinner with a antisemite than a paedophile.
> Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (19 May 1898 – 11 June 1974), better known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher, poet, and painter whose esoteric worldview featured antisemitic conspiracy theories and the occult. He has been described as a "fascist intellectual", a "radical traditionalist", "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular", and as "the leading philosopher of Europe's neofascist movement".
It does not appear to portray antisemitic beliefs as "the single most important or relevant fact about him". It presents them as an important fact, just as Washington's intro includes slaveholding before moving on to the table of contents.
I didn't mean to claim that the examples are comparable, just provide an example to highlight that there degrees to which you can highlight such views.
Realistically, only a small proportion read entire Wikipedia articles of such length. Most users would scan the introduction of the old version and come away with the belief he was some sort of noble hero, rather than a crackpot.
If many reputable people say he's an antisemite, which is the case here, it belongs in the intro. The first sentence may be a bit too much in this case.
Those two versions seem like two extremes. I would say his antisemitism belongs in the intro (the bit before the first paragraph header), but not in the first sentence. The style of the older version of the intro is definitely better and more neutral. Then again, I only read the intro and scanned the rest of the article.
Playbook slippery slope, first minor remarks here and there, then clearly labelling someone as "the enemy", or perhaps complete erasure from the website if it suits the purpose.
Any more defensible examples?