Jayjg in action, List of Jewish American journalists Options

[guy]

Jayjg's latest inspiration is that a newspaper columnist cannot be a journalist, and nor can someone who writes funny articles (because he's a humourist):

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=132331234

Maybe he's confusing "journalist" ("a person employed to write for or edit a newspaper or journal") with "reporter". And in a rare slip, here he is soliciting a meat puppet to get the whole article deleted:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=138422149

[papaya]

I think he's just being anal. I put back Martin Agronsky, who's Jewishness is well documented-- he was a Sammy, for crying out loud! It's impossible for me to believe that Jayjg isn't aware Agronsky was Jewish.

This post has been edited by papaya:

[Kato]

Even though I slammed Jayjg for removing Sammy Davis and Oona King from a Jewish list previously, I've written a reply on WikiAbuse that is in some respects a defense of SV and Jayjg on the matter of these damn lists.

There are particular problems with Jewish subjects. One is the [[Wikipedia:Who is a jew|Who is a jew]] factor, which means that people with only the most tenuous connections with Judaism identify as or are identified as Jewish, and there is a lot of dubious labelling. Sourcing needs to be extensive. Another factor is the anti-Semitic "Jews control the ..." stereotype. Jayjg and Slim are very sensitive about the Jewish lists and categories. For a reason. These wikipedia lists can potentially be used ''against'' Jews as evidence of various conspiracy theories. Therefore these lists need to be sensitively handled and strictly monitored. Obviously it would be preferable if these hall monitors were more amenable personalities than SV and Jayjg, but it is a dirty job that someone has to do.

That still doesn't explain why he removed Katie Couric, who is a journo by most standards.

[Somey]

Have they even formalized the criteria for inclusion? I'd have to assume so, but I've always studiously avoided this particular can o' worms, and they don't seem to have it in any of the obvious places...

I mean, I watch "Pardon the Interruption" almost every day, and if Tony Kornheiser says on a fairly regular basis that he's Jewish, and nobody so much as hints that this might not be true, then he's Jewish, right? I don't see why you have to provide a secondary or tertiary source for that - it falls within the realm of "common knowledge." As for whether or not he's a journalist, well yeah, he's more of a "columnist" than a "journalist" now, assuming one must insist on the distinction. But that wasn't always the case, and it seems wrong to "de-classify" someone like that... it's almost like saying that a former President, once his term in office is over, was never "a President" at all.

[guy]

Have they even formalized the criteria for inclusion?

Of course they have. See Talk:List of British Jews

Note that the following criteria for inclusion have been agreed:

1. Someone is Jewish ONLY if there is a reputable source saying explicitly that they are Jews. See Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:Reliable sources.
2. There must be a source saying explicitly that they themselves are Jews.
3. It is not sufficient to cite a source saying they are of "Jewish ancestry".
4. It is not sufficient to cite a source saying a parent or grandparent was Jewish.
5. It is not sufficient to cite popular beliefs or stories (e.g. like belonging to the Kabbalah Centre) that could supposedly "make" anyone Jewish.
6. Anything that does not meet the above criteria most likely violates Wikipedia:No original research or Wikipedia:Verifiability and should be deleted.

In fact, these criteria were only ever "agreed" for that article, in a highly dubious vote that was snowball closed prematurely after a flood of votes by people who had never edited the article, but SV and Jayjg pretend that they are of universal applicability. These are very restrictive; if taken literally, they debar someone "born to Russian-Jewish immigrants" or "born into the Liverpool Jewish community", say. Nevertheless, if there is a reliable source that someone is Jewish, they're Jewish. Full stop. Anything else is original research.

SV did say at one point that if someone is incorrectly labelled as Jewish it could endanger them. (Evidently, she's not worried about the safety of someone correctly labelled as Jewish!) But this doesn't explain her deletion of people long dead, or of people whom everyone already knows they're Jewish, so that's just a cover.

Anyway, that's not the issue here. Jayjg isn't pretending that there's any doubt that Art Buchwald was 100% Jewish; he's just claiming that because he wrote funny articles, he wasn't a journalist.

[Kato]

I think I mentioned this before, but journalist Mark Lawson's tribulations after being wrongly identified by wikipedia as Jewish tells a cautionary tale.

...an anonymous contributor had amended my entry in Wikipedia, the communal online reference source, to advise (or, more sinisterly, warn?) of my "Jewish descent".

The Wikipedia mistake concerns me, not because I would have any objection to the identification - the work of Philip Roth, Jack Rosenthal, Mike Leigh, Arthur Miller, David Mamet, Harold Pinter and others has often made me wish, like a child dreaming of being secretly royal, that there was a mix-up in the maternity ward - but because you wonder why someone would have bothered suddenly to point the religious finger on the internet.

Let's be optimistic and pray that the Wikipedia contributor was pleased by the presence of another Jew in the media and so wished to share the good news. But experience makes me fear another reason.

The majority of the correspondence these misunderstandings prompt has been hostile. At first I wrote jovially back saying that the old Irish priest who sprinkled my head with holy water would have been quite surprised at my involvement in the terrible global media conspiracy the letter-writers alleged. But even angrier replies would arrive, warning that neither irony nor apostasy could allow me to deny what I truly was.

Accidental exposure to these bigots allows me to say what some Jewish commentators fear asserting: that anti-semitism still exists in Britain.

[guy]

That's not terribly relevant. Had he been added to the List of British Jews without a reference, then Runcorn or Brownlee would probably have reverted. (The ironic thing about this mass blockage is that these lists will acquire lots of dud entries because there are now far fewer people to maintain them.) Nobody is patrolling every single article, but again if someone adds something like that without a reference it can be reverted. The only way to stop the Lawson problem completely would be to make "Jewish" a spam word so you can't add it to an article.

[LamontStormstar]

That's not terribly relevant. Had he been added to the List of British Jews without a reference, then Runcorn or Brownlee would probably have reverted. (The ironic thing about this mass blockage is that these lists will acquire lots of dud entries because there are now far fewer people to maintain them.) Nobody is patrolling every single article, but again if someone adds something like that without a reference it can be reverted. The only way to stop the Lawson problem completely would be to make "Jewish" a spam word so you can't add it to an article.

There's synonyms for Jewish, too. Most are racist terms, though.

[Yehudi]

I really can't see the connection between an idiot putting nonsense in one bio and well-informed editors systematically producing a sourced list.

[Chris Croy]

I think the major problem is that there are multiple kinds of Judaism. Someone could be an ethnic Jew without being a religious Jew or someone could be culturally Jewish without being an ethnic Jew. Thus, trying to make a single "List of Jews" is madness. For comparison, check out the various lists of non-believers. Some people might not see much of a difference between 'nontheist' and 'atheist', but such fine distinctions are made because they matter.

Edit: Fixed links.

This post has been edited by Chris Croy:

[GlassBeadGame]

I think the major problem is that there are multiple kinds of Judaism. Someone could be an ethnic Jew without being a religious Jew or someone could be culturally Jewish without being an ethnic Jew. Thus, trying to make a single "List of Jews" is madness. For comparison, check out the various lists of non-believers. Some people might not see much of a difference between 'nontheist' and 'atheist', but such fine distinctions are made because they matter.

Edit: Fixed links.

Maybe. I have always been perplexed by this issue. Many of the generators of lists and the contents of the articles seem in no way to bear any malice or hostility towards people who meet any definition of "Jewish." It seem to me, and I admit to not understanding it, maybe it is in part simply WP:OWNership. Slim, Jayjg & company can simply better control the content of a series of related articles if they can prevent the minimum organization of other editors that is implicit in the ability to compile a list or category.

This post has been edited by GlassBeadGame:

[LamontStormstar]

I think the major problem is that there are multiple kinds of Judaism.

Which kind controls the media?

[guy]

I think the major problem is that there are multiple kinds of Judaism.

That's like saying that there is a problem with making a list of chemists because there are multiple kinds of chemists. If we have a good source that someone is a chemist, nobody would query that he or she belongs in a list of chemists. Why is being Jewish different?

[Poetlister]

I think that the key problem is some people are happy to have lists of French people or African American people but not Jewish ones. Jayjg has clearly identified a kindred spirit. Don't forget - he's not just deleting names from the list, he's trying to get it deleted lock, stock and barrel.

[Chris Croy]

That's like saying that there is a problem with making a list of chemists because there are multiple kinds of chemists. If we have a good source that someone is a chemist, nobody would query that he or she belongs in a list of chemists. Why is being Jewish different?

List of chemists isn't the worst analogy you could use. Would you add everyone that received and used a chemistry set as a kid a chemist? Any sort of list of Jews has more in common with a generic 'List of Scientists'. Sure, you COULD - But why the hell would you? The concept of 'scientist' is so broad it leads to a useless list. The same goes with Jew. This discussion from the now-emptied "List of Jewish scientists and philosophers" aptly sums up what I think of this.

Wow, I had no idea about the debate going on about him until I checked out his article. It seems that when there is that much wrangling over sources and background, one should not be included in categories and lists. Anyways, maybe this should continue on his talk page and if it can be resolved either way, this page can be adjusted accordingly. Thanks, --Tom 13:31, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
I just removed Heinrich Hertz since his father's father converted from Judaism to Lutheranism?? Again, is this a list of Jewish X or a listy of X's of Jewish descent? I would prefer to work this out on the individuals own article space and let that determine this list. Anyways --Tom 16:41, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

No, Hertz's father converted. Since Jews are an ethnicity as well as a religion, we make no distinction between Jews and people of Jewish descent.--Simul8 16:47, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
So his father was born Jewish but converted. So that makes Hertz Jewish? ok, I am done editing here for now. --Tom 16:49, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

[guy]

No, I'd insist that everyone listed in a standard encyclopaedia or other reference work as a chemist was a chemist - that's the correct analogy. It is original research to ask why the reliable source calls them chemists.

The List of Jewish scientists and philosophers is indeed a good example of the problems on lists of Jews. The "debate" refers to Georg Cantor. He is described as Jewish in his only full-length biography in English (written by a non-Jew, E T Bell, before you ask), the Jewish Encyclopedia (published in his lifetime), the Encyclopaedia Judaica (2nd edition 2007), the Jewish Chronicle (both during his lifetime and decades after his death) and the Jewish Year Book (both during his lifetime and decades after his death). So he was Jewish, right? No - someone's dug up an article from the 1970s that says he wasn't! Therefore some editors insist that he wasn't, despite the many references that he was, and indeed an article from the 1990s that rebuts the one from the 1970s. Can you imagine such a dispute about any other fact? It would be laughed out.

And the list wasn't emptied; it was primarily a list of cross-references to the scientist sections of the national lists but for some reason duplicated a few names; these duplicates have now been tidied up.

[Kato]

I think that the key problem is some people are happy to have lists of French people or African American people but not Jewish ones. Jayjg has clearly identified a kindred spirit. Don't forget - he's not just deleting names from the list, he's trying to get it deleted lock, stock and barrel.

That's the thing though isn't it. Being identified as French is a different prospect to being identified as Jewish. Being identified as Jewish or Catholic for that matter is, as Mark Lawson's article describes, a more complex matter containing ambiguities and difficult political issues. "African American" has its own complexities as Barack Obama has discovered. But I believe that few identifiers are more historically problematic than the labelling of Jews. That said, Slim and co were removing people like Nigella Lawson from the British list when a two second google search could locate enough reliable sources.

[guy]

Being identified as French is a different prospect to being identified as Jewish.

I still don't understand. If you have a reliable source that someone is French, they're French. Same with Jewish. Are you saying that the real world consequences are different and therefore we shouldn't identify people as Jewish even if they themselves don't hide it? Nigella Lawson is a good example of someone who is undoubtedly and unashamedly Jewish. The absurdity came when editors were deleting people partly notable because they are Jewish, like Eric Moonman.

[Kato]

Being identified as French is a different prospect to being identified as Jewish.

I still don't understand. If you have a reliable source that someone is French, they're French. Same with Jewish. Are you saying that the real world consequences are different and therefore we shouldn't identify people as Jewish even if they themselves don't hide it? Nigella Lawson is a good example of someone who is undoubtedly and unashamedly Jewish. The absurdity came when editors were deleting people partly notable because they are Jewish, like Eric Moonman.

Yes, removing Eric Moonman is ridiculous. And here is where Jayjg removes our Nigella - as does Slim Virgin. Curiously - and topically - Jayjg removes the controversial Jewish philanthropist Michael Levy, accused of cash for honors, and then tinkers with the entry for Levy's successor Ronald Cohen, also Jewish, also accused of cash for honors, and the latest "middle east envoy" for the Labour government. In this case it seems their zeal has simply pissed off a whole load of people for no reason. A common occurrence it seems.

I think this zeal is in part due to ignorance, which illustrates another problem aspect of all wikipedia; people editing articles on subjects they are largely ignorant about. SV and Jayjg are clearly unaware of who most of these people are. Hence, by rights they should leave the article to the people who do., or at least show some grace towards those more knowledgeable.

But Guy, as the Mark Lawson article illustrates, listing people by religion is far more problematic than listing people by nationality. Nationals have legal citizenship. According to reliable sources, Mark Lawson is not Jewish as claimed but Catholic. In reality he is neither.

[guy]

According to reliable sources, Mark Lawson is not Jewish as claimed but Catholic. In reality he is neither.

If there are no reliable sources that he's Jewish, he shouldn't be listed as Jewish. Simple. "In reality" is a concept alien to Wikipedia - it includes what is verifiable, not what is true.

Oh dear, I'm turning into a Wikipedian. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/ohmy.gif)