Conservapedia:Burning the Evidence
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Sometimes the administrators of Conservapedia become so drunk with power, and so thin-skinned, that they attempt to remove material that they find not to their liking. There are a few things to note about this practice:
- The ability to edit articles in the main page space is the defining aspect of a wiki, and such editing often involves deletion. This is to be expected (though "revert wars" can sometimes be amusing to watch, especially when the participants are doctrinaire morons). However, it is generally considered to be a violation of wiki etiquette to delete material from a talk page. Talk pages are ongoing discussion journals. How offensive such deletions are depends on the context; it is particularly offensive to delete anything from another user's talk page.
- Because of the way wiki software works, especially the MediaWiki software that is used by Wikipedia, Conservapedia, and RationalWiki, mere deletion of material from any page, main space or talk, does not irreversibly remove it from the historical record. To achieve the degree of perfidy of Orwell's Memory Holes, more drastic measures are required. Such activity is called "deep burning". It is frequently practiced on Conservapedia.
The deletion, by person A, of material from person B's talk page, that had been placed there by person C, is a particularly flagrant violation of Wiki etiquette and of common-sense respect for the principles of free speech. And yet, sysops sometimes burn material in other sysops' talk pages. A legendarily flagrant case of this was the deletion, by Conservapedia sysop TK, of an open letter from AmesG (that's right, our User:AmesG!) from sysop SharonS's talk pageimg. Apparently some sysops are "real" and some are just impressionable teenage girls that need to be protected from the real world.
Shallow Burning on Conservapedia[edit]
Because deletion of embarrassing material is so common on Conservapedia, when we at RationalWiki point to foolishness over there (see, for example, all the articles in Conservapedia:What is going on at CP), we routinely point to a "diff" from the CP edit history. Whenever something is "shallow burned", the deletion is visible in the edit history. When you want to cite such a thing in an RW entry, do the following:
- Go to the edit history and look around. It might look, in part, like this:
- (cur) (last) 10:15, 25 October 2007 TK (Talk | contribs) (?Drop outs)
- (cur) (last) 10:13, 25 October 2007 TK (Talk | contribs) (?Not Fond of the Main Page Color)
- (cur) (last) 09:26, 25 October 2007 Maestro (Talk | contribs) m (?Drop outs)
- (cur) (last) 09:26, 25 October 2007 Maestro (Talk | contribs) (?Not Fond of the Main Page Color)
- (cur) (last) 09:17, 25 October 2007 BethanyS (Talk | contribs)
- Clicking on "last" will show the changes between that version and the one before. Clicking on the date and time (e.g. "09:26, 25 October 2007") will show that specific version. Clicking on "contribs" will show what other foolishness that person has been engaged in lately.
If you are writing something for RW or elsewhere, and you want to cite a specific individual version, such that it will not be subject to shallow burning, click on the individual version time/date, and, when that version comes up in your browser, copy and paste the URL from the browser's URL window.
A URL pointing to a specific version in this way is called a "permalink". We use them extensively at RW for our citations of Conservapedia Craziness.
If you want to cite a difference (say, a particularly moronic deletion of embarrassing information), click on the "(last)" link for the change (or use the more sophisticated "Compare selected versions" feature), and when the appropriate "diff" page comes up, copy and paste the URL as before.
As a further precaution, take the permalink and preserve it at archive.is. As of January 2018, there are 995 pages captured there.[note 1]
Deep-burning on Conservapedia[edit]
Particularly embarrassing material is sometimes "deep burned".
Page deletion[edit]
The simplest way that sysops can do this is simply to delete the entire page. Its edit history (or "fossil record", as we say here at RW) goes into the memory hole. A common place that this is done is with personal user pages and user talk pages. New users often ask embarrassing questions (funny how that happens!), and such users are often quickly banned, and turned into "unpersons" by having their user pages and talk pages permanently deleted. Such users are often naïve about this practice, and engage in their embarrassing discussions on their own talk pages.
Savvy operators know about this, and do their work on pages that are far less likely to be deleted, such as the talk pages for important topics such as Talk:Main Page or Talk:Examples of bias in Wikipedia, or on sysops' own personal talk pages, such as User Talk:TK.
However, at other times, even important personal talk pages have been deep burned. On October 27, 2007, Jallen/Niandra burned Andrew Schlafly's own talk page. This was repeated on March 3, 2008 under the Newspeak term "routine cleaning".
Conservative's shout-outs[edit]
In the single biggest page burning event, Conservative deleted his shout out to PZ Myers. To cover up this whole embarrassing incident, he deleted the Atheism talk page, Public Awarness of the Atheism Article, and then, in a blatant act of overreacting, the big pages themselves: Talk:Mainpage and the right and left mainpage templates all without their history.
Fortunately, a piece of censorship this large would not stand, and Philip J. Rayment restored the pages with their history [1] [2] [3] [4].
This event highlighted how far some of the sysops will go to hide their own screw-ups.
Bogus archiving[edit]
The more evil sysops (TK was a particularly egregious practitioner of this) will use MediaWiki's page-move feature to relocate the talk page to an archive, and then delete the archive. Archiving moves the material and its edit history over to another page. Operators who have nothing to hide often use this feature to keep the discussions on talk pages to a manageable length, while moving out-of-date material to another location. But, at Conservapedia, there is a more sinister use.
Because of this, the friendly elves at RationalWiki periodically make copies of vulnerable CP pages.
For example, at 20:31 on 24 October 2007, sysop TK "archived" the talk page for Richard Dawkins, on which there had been some interesting discussion. (Briefly, Andy Schlafly, and the other powers that be, are stark raving nuts. But you could have guessed that.) The edit histories for the archived material involved a lot of Shallow Burning, that permalinks could have shown. Those edits were compressed out, so the archived versions show only the final results. Fortunately, we have saved the version of the page at 09:32 20 Oct 2007 Conservapedia:Burning_the_Evidence/DawkinsTalk0932_20Oct07, although we apologize for the incompleteness of this.
Instant incineration on Conservapedia[edit]
Installed oversight extensions to the Mediawiki software make it possible to obliterate individual edits conveniently, permanently, and in a way that casual observers might not notice, without the inconvenient, heavy-handed, and obvious practice of deep-burning. Individual versions can be expunged from the history. This requires a high level of authority called "oversight" (even higher than "administrator"), and the practice is called "oversighting". Because oversight privileges are so great, very few CP sysops are entrusted with this. The few sysops at CP that have this power are generally among the less psychopathic ones (other than Andy and Karajou). At one time or another, sysops with this awesome and magical wiki-extension enabled have included Andy, PJR, and DeanS, TK, Karajou, Jallen, and CPWebmaster. The full current list is available here. Unlike other forms of burning, oversighting doesn't leave any logs or traces visible to non-oversighters, so it is very hard to see if the above have used their privileges without painstakingly checking diffs.
The practice of instant incineration became widespread at Conservapedia from around 13 March 2009, and was even applied retrospectively to edits that would or could embarrass senior sysops from before that time as well as afterwards. It's worth keeping this in mind when reading a Conservapedia article's history or talk page.
Examples of burning on Conservapedia[edit]
There are quite a number of talk pages of higher-than-average controversy in their content, that Conservapedia folks routinely delete material from. They do this even though wiki tradition holds that this should not be done save for libelous or otherwise legally actionable items, a principle familiar to people living in nations with a tradition of free speech.
For your convenience, we have saved some of them from any future deep burning and presented them in easy-to-peruse format. We have omitted trivial changes and deletions that are justifiable as repair of clear vandalism.
Items that are deep-burned are often harder to track down and present to you, but we do our best. The practice of deep burning on Conservapedia is reserved for the most embarrassing topics, of course.
We have saved some examples of burned material in the next few paragraphs. Some of these have only been shallow-burned at this time, but could be deep-burned at any time. Some items are on the boundary between the two — even though the deceitful archiving has taken place, the original page has not had its history deleted. This means that, with some effort, the burned material can be seen.
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Not surprisingly, issues surrounding the FBI Incident are among the most thoroughly burned. It seems that, at 01:19 on 2 November 2007, TK deleted all the content of the talk page for the FBI itself and then deleted and recreated the page itself. (Deleting the content is shallow, of course. Deleting and recreating the entire page is deep — the edit history disappears.) He then helpfully edited back into the recreated page a small amount of material from the original page, from 6 weeks earlier, that he considered harmless.
Fortunately, we have saved much of the burned material here.
Gun control talk page[edit]
The talk page for gun control was a burn magnet for much of late 2008. Partly because, like so many pages, it's full of garbage, and partly because, well, like the FBI incident, it went viral. In fact, the go-around of December 2008 involved a paragraph being shallow-burned (at last count) 13 times. This is more than the amount of mayhem that got the FBI Incident page started, but that was at a more innocent time.
In any case, Philip J. Rayment appeared poised to archive the talk page, at a moment when the interesting material appeared to be absent. To ameliorate the loss from such an unfortunate occurrence, we saved it here.
Conservapedia commandments talk page[edit]
In late February to early March of 2009, an issue arose on the commandments talk page (don't bother looking) about whether various edits to Conservapedia constitute a violation of 18 USC 1030, the federal law against tampering with ("hacking") computers used in commerce, defense, and government functions. The powers that be insist that editing Conservapedia does indeed fall within the scope of this statute, a claim which apparently rests on whether the CP servers are "protected", which in turn depends on whether they are used in the "communications" industry. Needless to say, there are those who dispute this contention, and, needless to say, the CP sysops were hard at work deleting such expressions. A large deletion took place on 2 March, 2009, just prior to archiving the entire page and then deleting its content. This of course had the effect of making the removed material hard to find, though the talk page itself has not actually been deleted, so this isn't really a "deep burn". Nevertheless, we have saved the page here.
PNAS reply talk page[edit]
The discussion of PNAS's reply to Andy's letter claiming malfeasance in the Lenski study (see Lenski affair) became quite a raucous brawl. The amount of burning that took place is positively legendary. This may be because Andy's claims of expertise were so transparently outlandish, and so his dishonesty, stupidity, hubris, and thin skin were on display in such a big way. The fact that he went public with all this, sending a letter to the editors of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, also helped.
The page at Conservapedia is here. It has not (yet) been deep-burned — one can still see the history. Another fine example of Schalfly's removal of content that pointed out flaws in his statistical reasoning, that would be rather difficult to refute.
Our annotated copy of the page, showing the full extent of the censorship, is here.
Catholic Views on Creation[edit]
Another fine example was on 18 September 2010 when a discussion on the WIGOCP talk page centered around a debate that Philip J. Rayment had with Andrew Schlafly regarding Catholicism and views on creation. Upon reading this, TK deleted the page as "empty"img before bringing it back with the aforementioned discussion scrubbed away.img Luckily for us, Ace and trusty google cache were on the button and the original page can be found here.
Other burned pages that we have saved[edit]
User ForeverPeace was banned, came back as JeremyJCH, was abused further, and left this parting shot. It was deep-burned by Karajou at 23:20, 12 Feb 2009, with the comment "you are censored here, and your demands that we must be tolerant because we are Christian will not work."
Professorship of Dawkins[edit]
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Oxford English[edit]The current entry uses "post" all over the place. It has been established before that at the University of Oxford post is frequently used instead of position. This is what the [ http://www.oup.com/elt/catalogue/teachersites/oald7/lookup?cc=global Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary] has to say on post:
Since this is site with a focus on the US, it might be better to replace it by its synonym position. [[User:Order|Order]] 21:59, 12 October 2007 (EDT)
No they are not synonyms, "post" is much more general. But why then the "quotes" in the entry, if it just means position? If there is is general agreement that he was never elected? I guess no, because we got several notes from the university gazette showing that a board was appointed [ http://www.ox.ac.uk/gazette/1995-6/weekly/091195/acts.htm#4Dec], and that some time later Dawkins was officially granted the title of professor [5]. [[User:Order|Order]] 23:22, 12 October 2007 (EDT)
Aschlafly: Why "presumably Dawkins'"? I notice that you cut short the gazette quote - it does indeed state that "in a small number of cases the precise academic subject area in which the title held is under discussion" however it also states that "any changes will be published separately when agreed." Since there is no record of any published amendment to Dawkins' faculty (and certainly not to his title), there is no doubt that both Dawkins' title and his faculty association still stand. Order is correct that – if you believe Dawkins' title is wrong - the onus is on you to show that the Distinction Committee's award has been revoked. Since it seems clear that you have read at least some of the documentation I've pointed you to, I simply do not understand why the article continues to question Dawkins' professorial title – now largely by referring to a post which Dawkins was awarded prior to his Professorship. Once again, let me be absolutely clear about the errors in the article:
I hope the factual errors in this article can now be corrected OurMike 12:39, 13 October 2007 (EDT)
Positioning of Oxford Post[edit]I propose to move the controversy over his Oxford post to the end of the article. --Ed Poor Talk 19:00, 13 October 2007 (EDT) Reply[edit]I've reviewed the above comments and do not see any errors in the entry. No specific errors have been identified. The claim above is false that "the article is in error when it states that "in fact Dawkins' position is at the Museum of Natural History." Dawkins' position is at the Museum of Natural History. Richard Dawkins relies heavily on his claim of being a professor at Oxford University, and so the placement of the explanation of his "post" at Oxford should remain near the top of the entry. Thanks.--Aschlafly 23:50, 13 October 2007 (EDT)
RD's spokesman wrote:
I guess this means he used to be a university teacher ("[[professor]]") but now enjoys a "[[professorship]]" devoted to PR. --Ed Poor Talk 11:39, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Here's an analogy: many graduate students earn Ph.D. degrees based on original scholarship. Some people get honorary Ph.D. degrees. The academic community makes a distinction between an "earned doctorate" and an honorary doctorate. The latter looks good when you're trying to impress regular folks, but if you want to wield academic clout, nothing beats an earned doctorate. The question of Dawkins centers on whether he is a "real professor". In other words, what does his title mean? What does his post imply? Atheists and materialists (and liberals in general) are fond of citing [[academic authority]] when they want to get political support for their absurd positions. The partisans of the [[global warming theory]] keep talking about peer reviewed articles in Nature and Science as if these were the be-all and end-all of scientific research. But there is plenty of falsehood in academia; see also [[Junk Science]]. --Ed Poor Talk 13:46, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Getting back to peer review for a moment - many people associate it with modern scientific practice of other scientists evaluating and checking a scientific claim. Such practices as running the same experiment in your own lab, to see of the results are reproducible. But "peer review" is often nothing more than a few friends of the journal editor anonymously reading a scientific paper before publication. This is no guarantee of correctness; and rejection during peer review is not always an indication of poor work. Scientists are not saints: they have their prejudices, same as us normal folks. --Ed Poor Talk 14:16, 14 October 2007 (EDT) Ed, you are unaware how the peer review process works with academic journals. Normally, a journal editor receives an article submission and then sends it out (minus identifying information as to the authorship of the piece) to three to five readers who have some expertise regarding the article's subject. --McIntyre 14:30, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Open?[edit]Are we to the point this can/should be re-opened? --sysô?-?K/?????! 14:36, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Big improvement. Please rewrite the whole article! [[User:RSchlafly|RSchlafly]] 15:19, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
So if Dawkins did not go through the peer review process, and this process was required for his professorship, then - Dawkins does not fulfill the requirements of the Simonyi Professorship, which was [ http://www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk/aims/index.shtml "set up with the express intention that its first holder should be Richard Dawkins."] Is that correct? [[User:Feebasfactor|Feebasfactor]] 16:44, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Hi Andy, you frequently asked for a error, and there are many errors. Like that the museum isn't part of the university, like that Dawkins is not the Simonyi professor. You have admitted to have read the document establishing the professorship, and the document granting the title of professor to Dawkins, both legal documents under UK law. You main argument is that you cannot see that the documents contradicts the claim that he isn't a professor, and you have proven this to be true: you really cannot see that this contradicts the claim that he isn't the professor. Of course it is your right to do so. However, this says in the end more about you than about the professorship.[[User:Order|Order]] 20:16, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Reply[edit]Richard Dawkins is not a Simonyi professor unless he passed the peer review election procedure by the board of electors as identified above. No such election by the required board has been published in the Oxford Gazette. Case closed.--Aschlafly 23:56, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
The announcement of the distinction committee, as published in the gazette, is the official announcement that Dawkins holds the title professor legitimately. Indeed that closes the case, unless there is proof that the distinction committee acted illegally. [[User:Order|Order]] 01:28, 15 October 2007 (EDT) Can I propose a simple addition to the text suggested above to close off this particular point?
Reply[edit]The continued, strident refusal by liberals and atheists to accept the plain facts about Richard Dawkins' "post" is remarkable. It demonstrates that atheism is not simply disbelief in the unseen, but also leads to rejection and denial of incontrovertible seen facts that they dislike.--Aschlafly 12:28, 15 October 2007 (EDT)
Summary of Established Evidence[edit]From what I can tell, and as objectively as possible, over the course of the discussion the following have been established:
I hope that all of that information is correct. Please correct me if otherwise. I am working on a rewrite of the "professorship controversy" section, attempting to remain as neutral and as impartial as possible while clearly presenting the facts. [[User:Feebasfactor|Feebasfactor]] 19:49, 15 October 2007 (EDT)
I apologize for leaving out the phrase "Leading universities do not permit the 'buying' of a professorship for someone." Perhaps I should have just instead asked for a source, or reworded to a less assertive or ambiguous stance. However, I'm not entirely clear on why this point is "indisputable"; what, for example, constitutes "leading universities"? Is their policy consistent? What reason do I have to think so? If a source can be found to substantiate this claim, excellent, but otherwise it has little value in its current state. [[User:Feebasfactor|Feebasfactor]] 23:24, 16 October 2007 (EDT)
Well... Wouldn't it be fine? Would there actually be anything wrong with that? Ultimately it's up to the University of Oxford to handle such matters as they see fit. If it was deemed appropriate for a proponent of intelligent design, like Michael Behe or Jonathan Wells, to receive an endowment or to have a professorship donated or "bought" for them or whatever - then, well, what grounds does anyone else have to object? I apologize, I suppose I'm probably "missing the point" again, but I just don't see what's so wrong or unusual about it. I still don't know which are the leading universities that "do not permit the "buying" of a professorship for someone". [[User:Feebasfactor|Feebasfactor]] 18:36, 19 October 2007 (EDT)
Current article[edit]IMVHO, the recent edits (by Conservative, I think) are much better. Still a bit of ad hominem in there but countering his views and writings is a much stronger position than the professorship issue, which is a distraction. Congrats. [[User:Ajkgordon|Ajkgordon]] 10:19, 16 October 2007 (EDT) New Section[edit]Andy, maybe it would help others here if you clarified your position again. Your reply to FeebasFactor above suggests that you accepted that Dawkins is a professor, but that he obtained his professorship through bribery, cronyism, fraud, favoritism, or some combination of those factors. Is that a more or less correct description of your stance?--[[User:Bayes|Bayes]] 00:21, 21 October 2007 (EDT)
A leading Intelligent Design Organization wants to promote this article[edit]A leader of one of the top 5 intelligent design organizations said he wants to promote the conservapedia Richard Dawkins article until it has 1,000,000 views. In addition, a intelligent design advocate is going to ask a investigative journalist to investigate the situation in respect to the peer review process that Andy has been mentioning in respect to Dawkins current position. I am guessing with the overspill into the evolution, intelligent design, atheism and other articles Conservapedia might be able to get way more than 1,000,000 views. I am hoping for 5 to 7 million views. I can also contact the press and I am guessing other conservative websites would promote this as well. Recently, Conservapedia got 60,000 views because one conservative organization linked to us and promoted us in relation to our homosexuality article. An even bigger organization says it also wants to promote our homosexuality article via a joint effort once I complete an article I am working on. I am going to abridge the Richard Dawkins current article until the investigative journalist looks into the aforementioned matter above. [[User:Conservative|Conservative]] 16:15, 21 October 2007 (EDT)
Great, we'll notify Oxford legal counsel.-[[User:Feiner|Feiner]] 16:58, 21 October 2007 (EDT)
Wait, isn't it still there? Has the article been changed? I didn't think a clear consensus had been reached regarding this matter, so what sort of changes could've permissably been made? Sorry, I've been trying to follow and understand this article and its talk page, in the hope of maybe clearing up the issues and reaching an agreement on how to better word the article without compromising its points - but the changes as of late have been very confusing. [[User:Feebasfactor|Feebasfactor]] 20:38, 21 October 2007 (EDT) principles of weighing historical evidence and the Richard Dawkins professorship issue[edit]I believe a main weakness of the debating between the two sides of whether or not Dawkins is a professor approved by peer review is that neither side has appealed to the discipline of historiography (principles of weighing historical evidence). Now there is a Pulitzer prize winning historican by the name of David Hackett Fischer and he is a very logical and astute historian and I think he is a conservative as well (he cited Scripture in one of his works and we all know that conservatives are generally more logical :) ). Here is some background information: Fischer, David Hackett, Historians’ Fallacies: Toward a Logic of Historical Thought (New York: Harper Collins, 1970). In only approximately 300 pages, Fischer surveys an immense amount of background historical literature to point out a comprehensive variety of analytical errors that many, if not most, historians commit. Fischer points out specific examples of faulty or sloppy reasoning in the work of even the most prominent historians, making it a useful book for beginning students of history. While this book presumably did not make Fischer popular with many of his peers, it should be noted that his contributions as a historian have not been limited simply to criticizing the work of others; since 1976, he has published a number of well-received books on other historical topics.[12]
Here is a overview of Fischer's rules taken from [[Josh McDowell]]'s "The New Evidence that Demands a Verdict and please pay attention to the bolded portions below:
(2) Historical evidence must be an answer to the question asked and not to any other question. (3) "An historian must not merely provide good evidence, but the best evidence. And the best evidence, all other things being equal, is the evidence which is most nearly immediate to the event itself." (4) Evidence must always be affirmative. Negative evidence is no evidence at all. In other words, Fischer is saying that an absence of evidence is not necessarily evidence of absence. (5) The meaning of any historical evidence is dependent upon the context from which it is obtained from. (6) "An empirical statement must not be more precise than its evidence warrants." (7) "All inferences from historical evidence are probabilistic." The above rules were taken from Josh McDowell's Evidence that Demands a Verdict, page 674, 1999, Mark MCGarry, Texas Type and Book Works, Dallas, TX, ISBN 0-7852-4219-8))
I think using rules 1,4, and 7 above the issue of whether or not Dawkins is most likely or not most likely a professor is very clear. I will let each side argue their case and afterwords I will offer my verdict on the situation.
I don't know what your investigative journalist is intending to uncover but if he's using those rules than I imagine not a lot. But then that's not what investigative journalists do. [[User:Ajkgordon|Ajkgordon]] 15:52, 22 October 2007 (EDT) Ajkgordon, I would first say that I wanted to correct two things you said. First, I merely said the leader of the intelligent design movement was going to ask a investigative journalist to look into the issue of whether or not the peer review process took place in regards to Dawkins being a professor. There is no guarantee that the investigative journalist will have any interest. Second, there is a historical question here and namely it is did the peer review process take place in regards to Dawkins being a professor. Next, Dawkins makes the assertion that he is a professor and implies the historical assertion that a peer review process took place. Andy makes the assertion that "apparently" no peer review process took place. Now Andy is violating rule number #4 above because just because there is no direct evidence that the peer review took place doesn't it didn't take place (absence of direct evidence is not evidence of absence -rule #4). Also, Andy is not giving us any evidence that it did not take place so he is violating rule #1 by making the assertion that it apparently did not take place. Then applying rule #7 with the fact that the Oxford Gazette called him a professor, which is indirect evidence he is a professor, the probability that the peer review process took place is greater than it did not take place. Lastly, I think our rules of historical evidence should be applied uniformly. Do we have any direct evidence that Dr. [[Gary Habermas]] passed peer review to become a professor or that he obtained his doctorate? If we don't and we apply the same standard of evidence that we are using for Dawkins then rightfully we have to put in the Gary Habermas article that apparently Dr. Habermas did not pass peer review to become a professor and he apparently never obtained his doctorate. I think those two aformentioned assertions regarding Habermas would be unreasonable. [[User:Conservative|Conservative]] 16:16, 22 October 2007 (EDT) I stand corrected. Twice! Thanks.
AjkGordon, I do think that I am acting in the best interest of Conservapedia here. I think that other conservative websites would be more likely to link to this article if the introduction were revised. Given my current contacts I am postive I could get one to two conservative websites with respectable web traffic to link to this article but currently my hands are tied. [[User:Conservative|Conservative]] 16:43, 22 October 2007 (EDT)
I was asked to weigh in this matter. Not sure if makes a difference, but at least I can try.
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PNAS Reply[edit]
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:::Note: this is the PNAS reply talk page. It has undergone an amazing amount of censorship.
Notice: misrepresentations are not going to be allowed on this page. Substantive comments only, please. Initial discussion[edit]In this day and age, scientists have their own agenda and have corrupted science. Just look at global warming or cloning or stem cells as proof. With that said, the only way to get the real truth is by suing in court. Unfortunately, scientists are bound to vast wealth and have the power to defend themselves vigorously. If ever a fund was set up to pay for a suit, I would contribute. It is a classic case whereby the truth be known, the truth will prevail. -- 14px jp 22:14, 12 September 2008 (EDT)
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Proof?Jirby 11:26, 13 September 2008 (EDT)
You mean the notebooks and ect? Jirby 11:32, 13 September 2008 (EDT)
Mr. Schlafly, I have a question BTW. Was this letter received on a paper, or electronically? Because if it was on a paper, perhaps it would be a good idea to scan it, and post it. It would add a lot to the encyclopedic value of the article. Raul 12:26, 13 September 2008 (EDT)
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Honest question, is it against the rules to disagree with Andrew Schlafly or criticize that letter? I just want to know so I don't end up in the same situation as other people who have been censored here.--IanG 17:03, 13 September 2008 (EDT)
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(deleted non-substantive comments). Again, the heading on this page will be enforced: "Substantive comments only, please." If you have a substantive comment about the identified errors and the PNAS's failure to address them, then please comment. Non-substantive comments will be removed. This is an encyclopedic-based search for the truth, not a blog or a place to refuse to contribute in a substantive manner.--Aschlafly 20:29, 14 September 2008 (EDT) Following text was deleted by ASCHLAFLY at 20:29, 14 SEP 2008.
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ASchlafly- you said above, "PNAS can deny its errors all it likes, but that doesn't change the fact they are errors". As you say, in a fair discussion of the merits of two sides of an argument, it's important that both sides take a good, hard look at their own propositions. Since your position is that PNAS has errors on its own side, I'm just curious to know if you are in any way prepared to accept that there might be errors in your own argument, or are you absolutely 100% certain that your position is error-free? I'm wondering if perhaps before submitting this issue to funding authorities, you would be prepared to have an independent statistical expert take a look at your proposal? BenHur 22:17, 14 September 2008 (EDT)
Folks, I've pointed out five very specific statistical (logical) errors. The torrent of nonsense above even includes an absurd demand for me to try to repeat the experiments, as thought that would somehow correct a flawed paper. The math is wrong in the PNAS paper. No one at PNAS is even willing to put his name on a response claiming that the math is correct, because it isn't. I'm not going to allow further nonsensical postings here. If you want to address the statistical (logical) errors in a specific way, fine. If you feel it is beyond your depth to do so, then move on. Thanks and Godspeed.--Aschlafly 22:49, 14 September 2008 (EDT)
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(unindent) No, I do not concede points one and two; I've commented on them on the Talk:Letter to PNAS page. I just don't think that there is any chance that we will agree on those points, so there's little value in rehashing them unless you want to. Similarly, your point four is not something that can be resolved by argument. The only way to prove that the results were due to contamination would be to repeat the experiment with different controls in place and demonstrate different results - which might spur some other labs to run a third or fourth trial to see who was right. It seemed to me that the only points that could be solved by discussion were three and five, since they made statements about the statistical methods that can potentially be resolved through debate. So, once again, what is your response to my questions regarding points three and five?--Brossa 22:34, 15 September 2008 (EDT)
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Improper[edit]I have no knowledge on this branch of science, so I won't comment on whether the results were correct, or if PNAS's letter was unbiased. Then again neither does Schlafly, who, of what info about him is known to the public is not a biologist. I find it somewhat inappropriate for someone with no training on a specifict field to come and tell someone that has actually learned something about that field, and say he hasn't done his job right. It's common sense. Fred1776 14:30, 16 September 2008 (EDT)
KimEide, the experts on Christianity are overwhelmingly in agreement: Jesus rose from the dead. Yet I expect that you don't accept that expert view. Meanwhile, you seem to accept the "expert" view of Lenski about statistics despite his having, as far as I can tell, no expertise in that subject. Those who don't want to think for themselves can return to Wikipedia and other playpens. Those who have substantive insights about the logical and statistical issues here, please do comment.--Aschlafly 16:16, 16 September 2008 (EDT)
(undent)We're not arguing whether the opinion of a majority of biblical scholars is a reliable indicator of whether Jesus rose from the dead or not. We're just arguing what that majority opinion is. It may seem irrelevant, but it is a crucially important to the issue at hand...ummm...somehow. KimEide 18:02, 16 September 2008 (EDT)
in.[15]--Aschlafly 19:26, 16 September 2008 (EDT) Following text was deleted by ASCHLAFLY at 21:54, 16 SEP 2008.
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Perhaps you might care to modify your claims in the light of this....BillK 12:41, 17 September 2008 (EDT)
what if the other two were indeed the type of articles you were asking for? Fred1776 16:02, 17 September 2008 (EDT)
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Statistics examples[edit]I see lots of people are clamoring for some specific statistical data on here, and although I am no expert on statistics, I can give a simple example that demonstrates flaw #5 in the letter to PNAS (that combining different samples is invalid). So lets say I am testing some hypothesis, and I got a 100 samples, of which 48 are "pro" (support) and 52 are "con" (against) the hypothesis. So this doesn't support my hypothesis at all. But just for fun lets do another, smaller, experiment, with just 10 samples. And suppose in this smaller (statistically insignificant by itself) experiment I only used 1- samples, of which 8 were "pro" and 2 were "con." If I combine the 2 experiments, I get a total of 56 "pro" and 54 "con", so more than 50% "pro" (in a large total sample size!), appearing to support the hypothesis, even though that's obviously not the case! --DRamon 14:33, 17 September 2008 (EDT) Point 5 Confirmed[edit]I would like to contribute to this discussion because I have taught statistics to graduate biology students for 16 years. Following text was deleted by ASCHLAFLY at 17:59, 13 OCT 2008.
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The combination of data from several experiments is a specialist and sometimes difficult area of statistical theory but a simple example shows why Aschafly’s concern about combining the results of three different experiments is not justified and why this aspect of his criticism of Lenski’s recent paper in PNAS is not valid. Suppose we want to conduct a test of whether or not men are taller than women on average. For the sake of the example, I generated random heights of people from a population in which men had an average height of 175cm (5’10’) and women of 165cm (5’6”). The standard deviations of height in both sexes were 7cm. I think these numbers are approximately correct for people in the UK but the details aren’t important. Suppose we take 5 samples of 2 men and 2 women. Here are the numbers I generated:
P in the last column is the t-test probability for a one-side test of women being shorter than men. (Formally, it’s the probability of getting a value of t greater than that calculated from the data if women are in fact taller than men on average.) Should the fact that, in the fourth sample, the average height of the women is taller than that of the men make us doubt that men are in fact taller on average? Should we be concerned about the last sample, in which the difference in height of the two sexes is rather small, though in the expected direction? No, in both cases. When we combine the data on all 10 men and all 10 women, we get this:
Clearly, combining the data from several similar experiments strengthens the conclusions considerably, as shown by the fact that P is much smaller for the combined data than for any individual sample. Although the combination of data from several experiments is a specialised area of statistics, I see nothing particularly incorrect about the approach used by Lenski and his colleagues. The general point is that it is valid to combine the results of different experiments if it is scientifically meaningful to do so. (For example: A. Combining the results of five samples of the heights of men and women is clearly valid. B. Combining three samples of heights of men and women with two samples of lengths of male and female squid clearly isn’t.) Generally speaking, the outcome of a combined analysis of several small experiments which all point in the same direction (or at least in a similar direction) will be more significant than that of any one of those experiments, as is shown in the larger table above. I hope this clarifies the extensive discussion on this point and puts Aschafly’s mind at rest on this subject. KennyMac 08:20, 18 September 2008 (EDT)
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It is with great sadness that I note that the author of this - the only significant statistical explanation and discussion in this entire fiasco- has just been blocked for five years. Even his email is blocked, so he can't even appeal the action. I don't see such manouvers as having contributed to the much vaunted "open mind" of which various people here speak. BenHur 10:27, 19 September 2008 (EDT) Following text was deleted by ASCHLAFLY at 19:24, 19 SEP 2008.
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REPLY: I have now reviewed the above analysis, and it supports Point 5 rather than the PNAS paper. Point 5 stated, "The Third Experiment was erroneously combined with the other two experiments based on outcome rather than sample size, thereby yielding a false claim of overall statistical significance." The analysis above does nothing more than reinforce Point 5 by combining experiments based on sample size. In Pavlovian manner, some Lenski types nod their head here in agreement at the above analysis, apparently unaware that it reinforces Point 5. When combining results from samples that are vastly different in sample size, it is necessary to factor in the different sample sizes. Apparently the PNAS paper failed to do that, which helps explain why it refuses to provide a meaningful response to Point 5.--Aschlafly 19:24, 19 September 2008 (EDT) (rants below were deleted for being non-substantive in violation of this page's rules.)--Aschlafly 19:24, 19 September 2008 (EDT)
(unindent)Lenski used the weighted method. See note 49 to the paper and the text around the combination. Of course there is the question of on what basis Lenski weighted the results. Lenski weighted the results on the basis of the Cit+ numbers and we may think it would have been better to weight on the basis of the number of replicates. I have below the calculations (not mine) of combined P-values based on 1) no weighting, 2) weighting on the basis of Cit+ and 3) weighting on the basis of replicates. The weighted Z-transformed = SUM(Weight x Z-score for each run)/SQRT(SUM(Weight^2 for each run))
Applying the formula described above..
So weighting on the basis of the number of replicates considerably increases the P-value. It remains, however, well within the range of statistical significance (0<P<0.05). If we hold that Lenski should have weighted on the basis of replicates then he should have rejected the null hypothesis and reached exactly the same conclusions that he did. The entire paper would have been exactly the same except the sentence “the result is extremely significant (P<0.0001) whether or not….” Would read “the result is significant (P<0.04) whether or not”. Point 5 establishes one number and an “extremely”. Point 5, therefore, has no weight (excuse the pun). --Toffeeman 15:18, 20 September 2008 (EDT)
--Toffeeman 17:13, 20 September 2008 (EDT)
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(unindent)I'm not asking anyone to write a paper or replicate an experiment. I'm asking ASchlafly to support his statement "The results from a very large sample size would not be weighted equally with the results from a small sample size, as you and Lenski have done"(bolding mine). I have stated publicly, subject to challenge by others, that the sample sizes (n) of the three replays are four, five, and eight respectively. Furthermore, using n of 4, 5, and 8 in the weighted Z-method DOES NOT weight all the replay experiments equally - it weights replay 3 twice as much as replay 1 and 8/5 as much as replay 2. Tell you what: I'll drop all my questions about Monte Carlo and the Z-transform, and simply ask ASchlafly one question: what is the sample size, n, of the second replay experiment? He need not even do any calculations - a statement in words that will allow someone else to do the calculation will suffice. This is not a complicated question to answer; the paper states how many replicate cultures there were (340), how many cells there were in each replicate (3.9x10^8), how many replicates gave rise to Cit+ cells (5), and which generations those Cit+ replicates came from (4 from 32,000 and one from 32,500). I will even give my answer: five. Furthermore, I will say why I believe that, using the murderer/age analogy: performing the 340 replicates is the same as interviewing 340 people in order to find out if any of them are convicted murderers. Finding that five replicates gave rise to Cit+ mutants is the same as the survey finding that 5 of those 340 people were convicted murderers. Finding that the Cit+ mutants arose from 4 replicates from generation 32,000 and 1 from generation 32,500 is the same as finding the ages of the murderers. The five data points in the Lenski study allow one to calculate the 'mean generation of clones yielding Cit+': 32,100. This is the same as finding the mean age of the five murderers. If I want to compare this hypothetical murderer age study to some other study of the mean age of murderers, I would weight the studies based on how many murderers were in each study, not on how many non-murderers were included in the initial survey. Surely ASchlafly can say what he thinks the n of the second replay is, even if he won't say why he thinks it. Is it five? 340? The number of replicates times the number of cells per replicate? Something else? No analysis need be performed on the resulting number.--Brossa 15:54, 23 September 2008 (EDT)
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Maybe the Journal of Nature can be your next letter submission source. International Weekly Journal of Science -- 14px jp 21:17, 22 September 2008 (EDT) Following text was deleted by ASCHLAFLY,ASCHLAFLY,BUGLER,ASCHLAFLY, and BUGLER at 22:15, 12 OCT, 17:59, 13 OCT, 16:17, 17 OCT, 22:00, 17 OCT, and 05:14, 18 OCT 2008.
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Point 5 Rejected[edit]Referring to ASchlafly's latest revert: OK, so let's forget about my specialist knowledge of the subject. It really doesn't matter. In science, what matters is what is said, not who says it. Remember that the most outstanding scientific discoveries of the 20th century were made by a patent clerk; the facts that he had no academic position at the time and a rather moderate educational record were irrelevant. So, I repeat: if you don't agree with me, present a reasoned argument against my points and don't just delete my comments (it's not wiki etiquette to delete other people's comments on a Talk page unless they're abusive or obscence). At least you haven't been so feeble as to block me to prevent me from contributing to this page, as you've done to other contributors. So I now repeat once again my cut-and-paste from Longstop's contribution a couple of weeks ago - as I said, if you don't agree with it, present a rational argument against it.
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Refereeing of Scientific Papers[edit]Another point that Aschlafly and others deleted was my explanation of why CP readers shouldn't be concerned about the fact that the Lenski paper was reviewed within 14 days. This is perfectly normal practice for a leading journal. If you're invited to review a paper for a leading journal and they give you 7/10/14/etc days, you only agree to review it if you're sure you're going to have time before the journal's deadline. So there's absolutely no reason to suppose the review wasn't done properly. Again, if you disagree, discuss, don't delete and don't block. DavyJones 20:39, 31 October 2008 (EDT)
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Have we given up?[edit]Not much activity here in the past few weeks. Have we given up on pursuing this matter further? Conservapedia should work on continuing to keep the Lenski study and its flaws in the news. Is there anything else we can do? Perhaps write to local officials about the misuse of public funds for studies like Lenski's, and also to complain about PNAS? --DRamon 16:39, 31 October 2008 (EDT)
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:::Note: this is the version of the commandments talk page just before TK deleted a number of things, including a section that mysteriously didn't make it into the archive that he created. We have flagged the burned material for you.
Archives[edit]
Here is what I added: In addition, Conservapedia's Manual of Style shows new Conservapedia wiki users how to flag an article or section of an article which is uncited. Conservative 19:36, 29 July 2007 (EDT) Please expand on the meaning of "verifiable"[edit]I've encountered many editors who permit references to the bible. While faith is fine, a lot of the bible is unverified. For example, Jesus may have existed however it cannot be verified that he was the son of god. Furthermore, the article on god claims "God exercises eternal and righteous judgment of the wicked in hell, because of an inherent problem in the human heart, namely Sin." After asking the editor for verifiable evidence of this he claimed the bible was a reliable source. If verifiable is defined to include biblical references, so be it. If this is the case a commandment should be made specifying which texts are deemed to be truth and not, as this will resolve much debate. Otherwise commandment #1 should be greatly expanded because observations made from the bible are quite simply not verifiable and many editors seem to believe they are. I should point out this is not an anti-christian statement, this is just not-pro-christian and nothing in the commandments claim this is a christian encyclopedia.Qc 22:20, 17 March 2008 (EDT)
Two questions[edit]I have two questions that I've been wondering about lately. First: what are our (and should we have) guidelines on notability? It seems like we have no real way to judge what should be in the encyclopedia. (For instance, somewhere around here, and I wish I could remember the name now, there's an article about a high school band.) I know we don't like many rules, but guidelines would be very helpful. Suggestions? Next: do we (and should we) have rules on conflict of interest? I think largely you know best about yourself, so it would be wrong to completely ban conflict of interest cases. But how do we know when something has gone too far, or when someone is censoring information about themselves? I don't know if these will or should go on the commandments, but this is probably as good a place as any to discuss. HelpJazz 23:16, 17 March 2008 (EDT)
Celebrating the Death of Inevitability![edit]When Richard Nixon boarded a United States Helicopter on the lawn on the White House on August 9, 1974, America celebrated the end of one of the most difficult periods in U.S. history. Nixon's successor, Gerald Ford, summed up the situation nicely when he said, ""Our long national nightmare is over." And so it was. Now, nearly thirty-four years later, America again has cause to celebrate the end of a political career that would have spelled doom for the nation had that career been allowed to continue.
Not since the days of Richard Nixon has there been an American political figure so utterly despised by so many Americans. It is worth noting that Richard Nixon had to become president in order to attain notoriety as Public Enemy # 1; Hillary Clinton achieved the same distinction by just running. Which is quite understandable, given the fact that seventeen months of campaigning by a feminist socialist like HRC is more disagreeable than five years of abuse from the Nixon administration. All in all, America has much to celebrate, as our "least favorite daughter" no longer poses a threat to the sanity and purity of the White House. One might even say that, with the death of Hillary's fairy tale about inevitability, "Our long national nightmare is over." Long live the death of inevitability! Now, what to do about Barack Obama? Suggestion[edit]That blasphemy be explicitly forbidden in the CC rather than implicitly. Bugler 13:20, 14 June 2008 (EDT)
While we are at it, I think that 'disruptive behaviour' should also be added, whether it is in breach of 90/10 or not. Bugler
The following reply to my question above was moved from my talk page to here to keep the conversation in one place
DannyRedful was a sock of two other users anyway. DanH 14:27, 16 June 2008 (EDT)
Please list banned sites[edit]Apparently mention of at least one other reference site is banned, and leads to automatic reversion of any edits mentioning it. It would be helpful if there was a list of these sites (assuming there are more than one), and perhaps a little explanation of why they are banned. I assume those sites are guilty of something worse than simply disagreeing with Conservapedia's POV. Thanks. --woozle 19:22, 9 July 2008 (EDT)
Respectful disagreement is good. I asked the liberals to help us point out where CP and they disagree, but they refused and left in a huff. They want to dictate what we write, apparently. What a shame that liberals who say they believe in freedom and human dignity refuse to grant the same rights to others that they demand for themselves. --Ed Poor Talk 21:53, 9 July 2008 (EDT)
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Amendment Recommendation[edit]Alright, It's well understood that Wikipedia's chief admins tend to lean way left-of-center. That's fine. Our resentment isn't with the fact that they have a bias; it's that they're arrogant enough to still posture themselves as "neutral" in the process. Hence, Conservapedia's existence--realistically, there wouldn't even be a Conservapedia if there weren't such a left-wing slant in so many of Wikipedia's articles. But just what is the main purpose of Conservapedia supposed to be? I mean, the name suggests that we are not just some philosophically blank community of writers and editors. We have a point of view, and we're not ashamed to put that view right in the very name of our site. Otherwise, why bother naming the site something as direct as "Conservapedia"? That said, what's our purpose? It seems to me that to live true to the name, we should be directing our efforts at collecting information, research, and data that falls in at least one of only two categories: 1) Info that will somehow and in some way help us promote the conservative view, and Any info which lies outside of these two categories may be interesting, and even accurate; but why would it belong in Conservapedia? More to the point, suppose there is a "neutral" topic which describes a dishonorable practice. And in that topic, we catalog all the instances the left have engaged in this dishonorable practice. Suppose further that an obviously left-wing contributor adds info to that article which is intended to bring damage to (and attempts to discredit) the conservative cause. In the interest of "neutrality," I suppose we could simply just leave it there. But then what interest would that serve for our readers? If much of the content we see in the web is already aimed at diminishing the conservative view, what obligates Conservapedia to follow suit in that trend? Perhaps we can amend the Commandments to direct all future efforts to allow only the two categories of info I just mentioned? If there's a third that's equally important, I'd like to hear what that is. I'm open to revisions... Alexander 12:15, 22 October 2008 (EDT)
Comments Section[edit]Just something I noticed: 18 USC § 1030, specifies penalties for fraud, damage, hacking, etc. to government, financial, and medical computers, or those that would cause physical harm to someone if tampered with. However, however important Conservapedia is, it doesn't seem to be included in this? Am I misreading (as I have no legal training, and only skimmed parts of it), or is the section in error? Umlaut 08:55, 28 February 2009 (EST)
I agree with Ed Poor: It's written in legalese which makes it hard for us non-lawyer types to follow. But thanks to Andy for providing a link, so I've now reach much of it for myself. You could, Andy, also help our understanding by pointing out which parts are applicable here. This is what I found:
So the relevant parts seem to be section (a), the offences, section (c) the punishments, and section (e) for defining terms. Section (a) is broken up as follows:
Of these, only (4) and (5) seem like that might be applicable. Subsection (4), however, doesn't apply if the person doesn't obtain anything of value, or the thing obtained is use of the computer and such use is not more than $5,000 worth in any one-year period. So this doesn't seem to apply in Conservapedia's case, at least not for any vandalism that has occurred so far or is likely to occur. Subsection (5) is where it became less clear to me, at least initially. It is divided into two sub-sub-sections. The first (A) specifies what is done and the second (B) specifies what the result is. Sub-sub-section (A), in three different ways, basically says that the law is applicable if someone knowingly/intentionally causes "damage" to a "protected" computer. However, according to section (e), a "protected" computer is one used by or for a financial institution or the government or one that is used on interstate or foreign commerce or communication. Because I can't see how Conservapedia can claim to be a "protected" computer according to section (e), subsection (5) appears to also be inapplicable, in which case, no section of this statute seems applicable. Now, because of the legalese, perhaps I've missed something, in which case I invite Andy to point out what I've understood incorrectly or to point out which section(s), subsection(s), and sub-sub-section(s) are applicable. Philip J. Rayment 22:02, 28 February 2009 (EST)
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Fred Phelps[edit]
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They are not family appropriate, and Conservapedia is not a repository of hate speech. MountainDew 17:04, 16 March 2007 (EDT)
Discussion of subject[edit]I'm going to tentatively leave this in place, although it was intended to make Christians look bad by the original creator, he is a major news figure because of his funeral protests, and his actions have prompted major legislation regarding these (and he is also a major embarrassment to my home state, as well as a DEMOCRAT who actually campaigned for Al Gore in 1988 before he went on his anti-homosexual crusade). Also, I drove by his "church" once and I got a physical chill once I got within two blocks of it. I felt like I was in a place of true evil. Interestingly, the ZIP codes in Topeka, where he lives, all start with 666. MountainDew 03:26, 13 March 2007 (EDT) I just moved it because it was under "Fred phelps," and the lack of proper capitalization was bothering me. I like to copy edit. :-p ColinR 03:29, 13 March 2007 (EDT) If you looked at the original article as it was written, it contained some crude language. But thanks for working on the capitalization. It bothers me as well when articles are started like that. MountainDew 03:30, 13 March 2007 (EDT) I agree with you completely. I didn't want to bother with the article at the time, and I'm glad someone else did. ColinR 03:32, 13 March 2007 (EDT) On a more humorous note, this was taken outside of Vandy when Phelps came to visit. ColinR 03:52, 13 March 2007 (EDT) I saw that picture for sale in a liberal store downtown once. It's so funny. One of Phelps's lackeys told my friend that his hair was too long once. (I live about 25 miles from Topeka, so we get a lot of him.) MountainDew 03:51, 13 March 2007 (EDT)
I know. His speech is beyond reasonable and just disgusting. I would guess that a majority of Kansans would support his execution. And Colin, you may be thinking of Paul :) MountainDew 03:55, 13 March 2007 (EDT) I know the feeling. I'm a huge believer in the importance of the First Amendment, especially free speech, but what he says is just so ridiculous it's hard to believe it's technically allowed. And MD, I was mostly referring to the fact that most men of Jesus' time had "longer" hair. ColinR 04:03, 13 March 2007 (EDT) That's what I thought. I don't like to judge other Christians' salvation, but I have to make an exception here for old Freddie. MountainDew 04:05, 13 March 2007 (EDT)
Liberal Edits by Jack[edit]please push your liberal views in an article about yourself. This article is about Fred Phelps views, not yours. RightWolf2 13:01, 19 March 2007 (EDT)
Landover Baptist[edit]Is Fred Phelps' church the inspiration for the Landover Baptist Church website that mocks Christian Extremism?--Elamdri 15:57, 21 March 2007 (EDT) Yes. MountainDew 17:53, 22 March 2007 (EDT) ?[edit]"Phelps, although outspoken and outlandish, is far less of a hypocrite than other Christian organizations who claim to be able to determine which verses from the Bible are literal from those that are allegorical." Wow. QED. Tmtoulouse 02:19, 25 March 2007 (EDT) With all respect to the fact that it shouldn't be stated on an encyclopedia, Phelps probably is going to Hell. -AmesGyo! 00:42, 31 March 2007 (EDT) Phelps is PRO-FAMILY, not anti-homosexual[edit]There's a reason Dr. Dobson called his institution "Focus on the Family" and not "We Hate Gays". There's a reason that it's called the "Family Research Council". The people who oppose the homosexual agenda are PRO-FAMILY, not anti-anything. Even the mainstream media generally recognizes this fact and ignore the moonbats (just like they ignore the moonbats when the moonbats try to label "PRO-lifers" as "ANTI-choicers"). Even the mainstream media (which has been proven to be overwhelmingly liberal, remember) doesn't call Dr. Dobson a bigot or a homophobe. So why shouldn't Conservapedia, which was created to espouse the CONSERVATIVE point of view, reflect what even liberals acknowledge?--Ashens 02:38, 25 March 2007 (EDT) Phelps isn't a true conservative. He says Bush is going to burn in hell. MountainDew 02:39, 25 March 2007 (EDT)
Being anti-homosexual is not being pro-family. It is being pro-YOUR-idea-of-family, and forcing that idea on the rest of the world. There's a big difference.-AmesGyo! 01:47, 6 April 2007 (EDT) Phelps is not pro-family, he's pro-hate. There's a difference. His websites are not family-friendly, his sermons are not, nor are his "hymns", and neither are his images. --Li?us the Turbogeek(contact me) 11:54, 7 April 2007 (EDT) What does Phelps stand for, _besides_ hating gays? That seems to be his one schtick. And by all accounts, he psychologically and physically abused his OWN family, which doesn't sound too 'pro-family' to me. [18] (Court evidence--not for the weak of stomach.) --Gulik3 07:56, 21 May 2007 (EDT) If what you say is true, then "pro-family" must oppose homosexuals becasue they asume that homosexuals are "anti-family". That is not true, it's not the desire of homosexual people to wreck family, they just want personal freedom to have the kind of living arangement they choose. The only reason they have gathered together is because it's their common cause to get that freedom for themselves. I'm pretty certain that if they had those rights, they would leave everyone else alone. Homosexuals don't suggest that everyone should be homosexual, that would be stupid, they just want the right to live their lives as they want to, not bothering anyone, and not being bothered by anyone. If God (if he exists) dislikes it it's solely up to him to judge, none of us are entitled to do that. --Atkins 23:45, 24 June 2007 (EDT) It seems that whoever said that in the first place was being a parodist. We definitely don't stand for Phelps's hate here in Kansas, or here at Conservapedia. DanH 23:50, 24 June 2007 (EDT) What the #$@%[edit]This page mention nothing about the sick twisted and evil nature of Fred Phelps and his family cult. I don't know how this site can call itself conservative and not utterly denounce someone who celebrates the deaths of our fighting men and women and taunts the families of our brave departed soldiers. I am disgusted that he gets off with one line of criticism. Opcn 01:41, 6 April 2007 (EDT)
Phelps and Religion[edit]"It's hard to be religious when certain people aren't incinerated by bolts of lightning." -- Calvin. --Gulik3 07:46, 21 May 2007 (EDT) disgusting liberal bias[edit]this article is terribly condemning of this man. this is the same kind of p.c. bias crap that made me sick of wikipedia. mr. phelps believes in the same things we all do, so why is this article against hihm? he only believes in the things that jesus taught1!1Manifestdestiny 18:42, 2 June 2007 (EDT)
Exactly. Jesus never specifically mentioned homosexuality in the gospels, but he did do what Karajou mentioned, which would encompass all types of sin, including homosexuality. DanH 15:20, 5 June 2007 (EDT)
God Hates Canada[edit]Didn't Phelps also light a flag on fire in the middle of an airport, thus causing his arrest? Kazumaru 18:44, 13 August 2007 (EDT) I haven't heard about this! Do you have a link? DanH 18:44, 13 August 2007 (EDT) [19] is the best I can find. I was wrong, I guess. Seems he didn't actually get around to torching the flag. Kazumaru 19:03, 13 August 2007 (EDT)
Phelps And The Democratic Party[edit]Can someone please get rid of this header at the bottom of the page? Seems a bit of a stretch to me. --Ouzo 14:35, 11 October 2007 (EDT)
Liberal Activist!???[edit]Last time I checked liberals support gay people and are secular. Calling Fred Phelps a liberal would be akin to calling Osama bin Laden a pacifist. Someone should change this --AllahuAkbarJihad 21:50, 12 October 2007 (EDT) Phelps is not a leftist, he is on the extreme fringes of the religious right, he's an embarrasment to conservatives so he is called a "liberal". I can't believe how biased this website is --AllahuAkbarJihad 21:53, 12 October 2007 (EDT)
--s,y^s^ô?-?K/S.????? 08:41, 13 October 2007 (EDT) Even if Phelps did support the Democrats at one time, that doesn't make him a liberal. Guiliani is a Republican and he is certainly not a Conservative (pro gay marriage, pro abortion). I'd argue that Phelps is delusional rather than liberal or conservative but I think it is terribly biased and incorrect to state that he is a leftist and a liberal. Liberals tend to be secular and pro gay marriage, Phelps does not embrace liberal values --Fredphelpsisamoron 16:17, 14 October 2007 (EDT) I would argue that Phelps is actually a conservative. He is against gay marriage and is very religious, these are two traits of conservatives. --MichaelM 16:44, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Also, there are religious liberals out there. Ever heard of Jimmy Carter? DanH 16:45, 14 October 2007 (EDT) True, but Jimmy Carter is only moderatly oppposed to homosexuality and believes in evolution, he is not the same hate filled bigot that Phelps is. Maybe Phelps isn't conservative, but he certainly isn't liberal either. I think saying Phelps is a leftist is POV pushing. It should be taken out. --MichaelM 16:47, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
Phelps doesn't believe in evolution and he believes in creationism. Creationism, particularly YEC is associated with conservatism. I agree that science shouldn't be politicized but creationists, especially YEC, tend to be conservative while evolutionists tend to be moderate or liberal. --MichaelM 16:53, 14 October 2007 (EDT)
I don't think any of Phelps stances fit liberalism at all. The use of liberal and leftist is misleading and biased --JimmyR 20:29, 14 October 2007 (EDT) Just because he opposes Bush and conservatives doesn't mean that he isn't one of them. Conservatives, like Liberals can have disagreements among one another and are not one monolithic block. Besides Ronald Reagan supported Saddam in the 80s, does that make him a liberal? I think you should take out "leftist" and "liberal activist" it is terribly biased and misleading and just makes Conservapedia look bad --BillCasey 10:19, 16 October 2007 (EDT)
Exactly, Phelps has been criticized across the political spectrum from leftist gay rights groups to conservative Christians, he is neither liberal or conservative, he is just plain nuts --BillCasey 17:55, 16 October 2007 (EDT)
Al Gore is not really a leftist. More a flip-flop, his views swing from liberal to conservative depending on how the political wind blows. Besides supporting Gore doesn't automatically make Phelps a liberal. I'm not saying you should say he is a conservative. But liberals/conservatives calling those who are repugnant to both groups the group they disagree with is wrong and biased. Both liberals and conservatives oppose Phelps so he should be called neither. --BillCasey 18:22, 16 October 2007 (EDT)
No, he's just an extremist. Like the KKK. --BillCasey 18:34, 16 October 2007 (EDT)
If that is the case then I think the word leftist should be taken out, it is misleading and besides Phelps is usually considered part of the Religious Right, whether that is true or not --DanielJamesRideout 12:26, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
The conservatives call him liberal and the liberals call him conservative. He is clearly insane. Liberalism and insanity often go together but here insanity crowds everything else out. SkipJohnson 12:54, 18 October 2007 (EDT) Liberalism and insanity go together, thats a pretty harsh insult for people who you merely have a political disagreement with? Why so much hate? --NathanRodgers 12:57, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
Yes it is true that Phelps was associated with the Democrats but remember that at one time the Democrats were the "Conservative" party. The Democrats are now supportive or at least tolerant of homosexuals and Phelps has referred to his former friend Al Gore as a "Fag-enabler". There aren't too many differences between Republicans and Democrats anyways. I think that leftist and liberal activist should be taken out, other than that the article is fine. --NathanRodgers 14:48, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
Democrat (or at least ex-Democrat), sure. But liberal?[edit]Describing Phelps as a Democrat is justifiable, since he did run as a Democrat, but the first sentence dexcribes him as a "leftist", which I believe is the same as "liberal". This seems flawed. Not all Democrats are liberal and vice versa (anyone remember Zell Miller? Reagan and Thurmond were both Democrats once too). Looking at Conservapedia's own definition of liberal we have the following specific views how many of them apply to Phelps?
So he basically has no discernable liberal traits. This does not make him a conservative, but it really seems he's not a leftist. The only things that point to his leftism are running as a Democrat (who can say why he picked one party over the other? He didn't have much suport from either, it seems) and his support for Gore (dropped when it turned out Gore's views on homosexuality were more liberal than the previously appered). Since Democrat is not the same as liberal, I'm not sure how the latter applies to him. Can anyone justify the inclusion of the term leftist? If someone can point out statements he's made supporting strong environmentalism, opposition to gun rights, disarmament treaties, property rights opposition, or such a case could certainly be made, but right now I'm not seeing any real leftism here. BillyFranco 10:51, 22 October 2007 (EDT)
[unindenting] Well, this very site says the two terms are often used interchangably, and I have no idea what evolution and imposition of morality have to do with anything, so we'll let that bit rest. So I'll ask the questions I'd like to see addressed, and I'll number them to make it easy:
I'll wait for a reply. BillyFranco 00:57, 23 October 2007 (EDT)
* BillyFranco (Talk | contribs | block) (Latest: 04:57, 23 October 2007) (Earliest: 14:51, 22 October 2007) [6] * Briantrust (Talk | contribs | block) (Latest: 20:35, 20 October 2007) (Earliest: 15:54, 19 October 2007) [3] * AuH2O (Talk | contribs | block) (Latest: 16:34, 20 October 2007) (Earliest: 14:59, 20 October 2007) [3] IP: 24.29.72.31 Schenectady, NY,United States Here is yet another shining example of liberal deceit. They cannot even argue honestly. They need socks to hide their dishonesty. Godspeed to you! --s,y^s^o?-?K/S.????? 01:47, 23 October 2007 (EDT)
Liberal Activist? (Edit Break)[edit]I despise Liberals but I have to agree with this loonie leftie this time, Phelps is definetly not a liberal even though he was (or possibly still is) a member of the Democratic Party. Besides what's wrong with protesting homosexuality anyways? I just think he carries it too far thats all --Konservativekanadian 16:22, 22 October 2007 (EDT) ahaha, typical liberal behaviour lol. Still though, I don't think Phelps is a liberal. He certainly isn't conservative either but calling him a liberal when he clearly isn't just makes Conservapedia look bad.--Konservativekanadian 17:59, 23 October 2007 (EDT)
Not yet, I'll take a look at it and make my decision on Phelps' political views then --Konservativekanadian 18:25, 23 October 2007 (EDT) I've taken a look at some of the things Rob has said, Phelps is or was a democrat but he is liberal only in name. His views are not liberal at all. I don't care what he says about homosexuality, it is a sin after all, Phelps just goes a little too nutty over it. My issue with him is the disrespect of American soldiers and his criticism of Bush. Bush is in no way a "fag-enabler" and is quite critical of homosexuality. Phelps is not firing on all cylinders though, thats for sure. --Konservativekanadian 18:40, 23 October 2007 (EDT)
If these watchdog groups are liberal, they will likely just throw Phelps in with conservatives. While I don't think Phelps is a liberal, his anti-war activities and support of Castro make him exempt from being classified as a conservative. I don't think Phelps falls neatly into either category and both liberals and conservatives are accusing him of being in the other camp because nobody wants him --Konservativekanadian 00:05, 24 October 2007 (EDT)
I agree, the media has a terrible liberal bias along with these watchdog groups. Phelps is delusional, he is neither liberal or conservative. I still think we should leave political labels out of the description (other than his support for Al Gore which is documented fact), it will just make Conservapedia look bad and give those whiney liberals something else to complain about --Konservativekanadian 00:12, 24 October 2007 (EDT)
Just because someone is democrat doesn't mean that they are liberal. Bob Novak was a democrat --Konservativekanadian 18:31, 24 October 2007 (EDT)
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JeremyJCH Talk[edit]
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Further help[edit]
You should make use of Internet archive sites. E.g. archive.org currently has copies of Andrew Schlafly's talk page from various points in 2007. However there are two caveats: (1) archiving is sporadic, so they might not have what you want (2) older archives disappear, so if they do have what you want, save a local copy for yourself while you can.