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Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Will's latest Holy War seems to be against the Transcendental Meditation movement. I don't know beans about Prem Rawat or TM, but I enjoy watching Will in action. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Transcendental_Meditation_movement/Evidence#POV_Pushing_Teams he is accused of being part of a "POV Pushing Team" -- see him respond with his patented Moi?

Posted by: EricBarbour

No one commented? Hm, i wonder if people are sick of talking about Will....
he is one predictable little man-boy.

The primary discussion is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Transcendental_Meditation_movement/Evidence#POV_Pushing_Team:_WillBeback.2C_Fladrif.2C_KalaBethere....._.28x_.3D_participation_in_noticeboard.2FSPI.29. I just love it when Will makes little
smug pronouncements like.....

Where's the evidence, asshole? Show us.

Posted by: Cla68

From what I see on that evidence page, I would topic ban all of the "pro"-TM editors AND Will Beback. That would put Will at a disadvantage in trying to promote his POV in those articles, because he is an admin he would get in serious trouble if he tried to edit them using a sock. The pro-TM editors, however, can keep coming back again and again with socks since they don't have any formal authority in Wikipedia that they would stand to lose.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

That seems fair, in an oddly asymmetrical way. However, Will has other options, such as meatpuppetry. That is, if his friends, like Georgewilliamherbert or Slim, have enough sheer anal-retentive stick-to-itiveness to go up against the meditators.

Posted by: NotARepublican55

All I know about Rrem Rawat is that a few years back, a former admin Jossi Fresco (a Prem Rawat disciple) was accused of using his authority to push a pro-Prem POV on his article. Jossi's now banned for sockpuppetry.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

He also accuses his opponents of tag-teaming, with no sense of irony.

He has an interesting theory of COI, which is that editors whose edits consistently reflect support for a controversial group have it, whereas editors whose edits consistently reflect opposition to the controversial group do not.

Posted by: Cla68

This is probably a discussion for a separate thread, but it seems that the NPOV policy makes the COI guideline moot. Either someone is complying with NPOV (at least, with the spirit of it) or they aren't.

Posted by: Trick cyclist

Not that Im supporting him or anything, of course not, but opposition to a group that all but a very small minority of people would disagree with is not evidence of COI in my book. To take two popular subjects round here would a strongly anti-pedophile or anti-bestiality editor be accused of COI by most editors here?

Posted by: CharlotteWebb

Ch-ching.

And to think, back home we call that a nap.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

But then again, would support for such a group be evidence of COI, in your book?

Posted by: HRIP7

Good points. How about http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template_talk%3ADid_you_know&action=historysubmit&diff=333525376&oldid=333523900 for http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Maharishi_University_of_Management_stabbing&oldid=333529903?

Will's hook was subject to http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template_talk:Did_you_know&oldid=335063575#Maharishi_University_of_Management_stabbing. Fladrif, also a party in the arbitration (on the anti-TM side, and not normally a presence on the DYK page), had okayed Will's hook, after which Materialscientist, a DYK regular, said,


The article too http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Maharishi_University_of_Management_stabbing&diff=cur&oldid=333529903 in the days following the submission. Information added since includes that the kid had only been at the university for 2 months.

So what's your view? NPOV? Advocacy?

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

That's a lovely example of Will at work. It's a good thing that he's so ineffably neutral, or WP would really be in trouble.

Posted by: Cla68

Did someone submit that as evidence in the ArbCom case? If they didn't, I will. Perhaps, however, it won't be necessary since most, if not all, of the Committee members read WR.

Posted by: HRIP7

I http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Transcendental_Meditation_movement/Evidence&diff=prev&oldid=348180904 add it to the evidence page last night.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Oh, so you're Jayen466! I missed that somehow.

Posted by: Cla68

Will, and I know you're reading this, Wikipedia should not be a place where you pursue a personal agenda against Lyndon LaRouche, these meditationists, or any other political or religious outfit you disapprove of. I know I supported you in your battle with Jossi at Prem Rawat, but that's because your editing was way more even-handed in that case (the "Millenium" article is excellent work) and Jossi was obviously out of control. Will, please choose a subject that you can edit neutrally and stick with it. Otherwise, perhaps another hobby would be more helpful for everyone.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

As he did with the LaRouche articles, WB has now http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Transcendental_Meditation_movement&action=history an http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Transcendental_Meditation_movement about TM and TM-related issues. He has taken care to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maharishi_University_of_Management_stabbing, by making sure that a http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Maharishi_University_of_Management_stabbing&oldid=333400711 to draw attention to it.

Question: shouldn't all this be regarded as a violation of WP:POVFORK?

Posted by: Son of a Yeti

Generally, the whole Wikipedia process seems to be a violation of sanity.

As opposed to the http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alberteins133991.html by Albert Einstein.

Posted by: TungstenCarbide

i love you man

Posted by: Somey

It should probably be noted that this article (Maharishi University of Management stabbing (T-H-L-K-D)) was started well before this thread was started... it may be that Beback has expansion plans, but that one seems to be the only really obvious attack article in the category, at least by title.

FWIW, I've met some former Maharishi University student-cultists personally (Fairfield, IA isn't far from here), and without exception they had nothing but bad things to say about the experience. One thing the Maharishi people do is offer student visas to people in poorer countries as a means of getting their foot in the door for US citizenship. Then they make them sign away their rights to just about anything they might create, invent, write, or whatever during the course of their entire lives, after they've already arrived and settled in and have almost no alternative but to sign. And then they put them to work, basically - they have all sorts of little businesses run by "students," and the vast majority of the revenue goes back to the Maharishi, usually under the table. They even have their own currency, the "RAAM (T-H-L-K-D)," to help facilitate this. Things like this are common among nearly all eastern religious cults in the US, to some degree, but the Maharishi University folks are bigger and more skilled at it than most, if not all, of their competitors.

I guess this is just my way of saying that Beback's opposition to the Maharishi people is more righteous than his opposition to the Larouche people, which at times has been decidedly un-righteous (though I'm not at all happy with the way the Larouche people are treating Pres. Obama these days). I'll admit that I'm saying this mostly to reflect the obvious reflexive counter-criticism, but the fact remains, at least the Larouche people don't claim to be a "religion" or a "charity," and they don't make wacky/outlandish claims of miraculous health benefits that you get just by joining. I suppose they do try to impose control over their members to some extent, but they don't seem to want to do it from cradle to grave like some of these quasi-religious cults do.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Although I am a stalwart defender of the LaRouchistas, I have no interest whatsoever in defending the T-meditators. None the less, given that Wikipedia purports to be an encyclopedia, I should think that it were senseless to have 33 sub-articles on the TM movement. One article should suffice, and if one seeks specialized knowledge on TM, then you would expect to consult specialized sources, not an encyclopedia. The reason WB creates fork after fork is that, by shaping article content, he gets a soapbox.

Posted by: Jon Awbrey

Now there's one thing Wikipediots don't have yet — Do they? I don't really keep up with their antic hay all that much anymore — though I suppose the Undue Weight of Canadians in all their affairs (ahem) would pretty much cinch the name “Loonies” when they do.

Jon

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Can't please everyone -- I imagine that Vic was less than thrilled by the vociferous way that we went after Cheney, or conversely, the way we defended Bill Clinton during the blowjob scandal. To my way of thinking, LaRouche is very consistent, and if on the one hand you find him abrasive, on the other you know you don't have to worry about him selling out.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Well, Will is too clever to advertise his intentions in the titles. He prefers to insinuate the attacks into what appear to be normal articles. And, it looks like Will is about to http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Will_Beback/Scratchpad&oldid=385891618. As you can see by scrolling to the bottom of the page, his basic approach is to assemble all the negative press coverage he can find, and then create the basic article as a Wikipedia:Coatrack.

Posted by: Emperor

Fascinating! This Will Beback stuff is Wikipedia criticism of the highest order. He must be stopped!

Posted by: HRIP7

It seems some editors want to have a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Transcendental_Meditation_2.

Posted by: It's the blimp, Frank

For Will Beback, expressing superiority, ownership and the pushing of incorrect interpretations of policies and guidelines are are a way of life.