Ghostofnemo

“Another hurdle was to figure out how to rein in the bad actors so that they did not ruin the project for everyone else. Unfortunately, we never did come up with a good solution for that one. Wikipedia is a broken system as a result.” Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger https://150sec.com/wikipedia-is-a-broken-system-says-co-founder-larry-sanger/11453/

"People using CIA and FBI computers have edited entries in the online encyclopedia Wikipedia on topics including the Iraq war and the Guantanamo prison, according to a new tracing program. " https://www.reuters.com/article/us-security-wikipedia/cia-fbi-computers-used-for-wikipedia-edits-idUSN1642896020070816

"An anonymous Wikipedia user from an IP address that is registered to United States Senate has tried, and failed, to remove a phrase with the word "torture" from the website's article on the Senate Intelligence Committee's blockbuster CIA torture report.... In both instances the anonymous editor explained that he or she was "removing bias" from the article." https://mashable.com/2014/12/10/senate-wikipedia-torture-report/

"There are a few firms out there who can take care of Wikipedia problems discretely. I won’t recommend any, but they are out there." https://fortune.com/2012/08/14/how-to-solve-your-wikipedia-problem-yes-you-have-one/

"Wikipedia has sent a cease-and-desist letter to a Texas PR company that offers to help clients by editing entries on the online encyclopaedia in their favour. It follows an investigation lasting more than a year by Wikipedia's own volunteer editors, which suggested that Wiki-PR, based in Austin, Texas, had created more than 300 "sockpuppet" accounts – fake profiles set up by people and companies – to edit entries about clients." https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/nov/21/wikipedia-cease-and-desist-pr-firm-offering-paid-edits

After other editors repeatedly deleted several of my relevant, NPOV, and reliably-sourced contributions from articles, I started making a list of what I thought were questionable deletions on my userpage. But that list was deleted by Wikipedia administrators. Then I put a link to the history of my userpage, showing the deletion of the list of questionable deletions, and they even deleted the deletion of the deleted list from my userpage history, like something out of Orwell's "1984":

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Ghostofnemo&oldid=370598551

Whoops, that page has been deleted! You can't even go back now and see what I was complaining about, or judge for yourself if anything suspicious is going on here, or see my contributions and the reliable sources I cited prior to their deletion. Why would this need to be hidden? Was it really because my documentation of questionable deletions was offensive to other editors, or was this an effort by editors with an agenda to cover their tracks?

Here's the debate over whether my entire user page should be completely blanked (as it was repeatedly by individual editors), or if only my list of questionable deletions should be blanked: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/User:Ghostofnemo

If you want a taste of what it's like to edit controversial articles on Wikipedia, you can check out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Pete_Bethune/Archive_2#Hood_round_two_.2Ading.2A or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Tokyo_Two

And the "Illogical policies" discussion is here now:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:No_original_research/Archive_52#Questionable_interpretations_of_SYNTH

There was a brief period when Wikipedia was the encyclopedia anyone could edit, but no longer. The rules never meant anything much - the censors are not protecting Pete Bethune over the fact(?) that the Japanese hooded him, nor are they much protecting the Japanese police and judicial system. They're protecting their own prejudices and making sure you don't add anything. There are other places where you can share the information which was deleted from your UserPage. 86.178.248.115 (talk) 21:14, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

It could be bloated egos, but there seems to be a clear pattern to the deletions - information about controversial topics sensitive to the U.S. or its allies. But the editors involved seem a bit too clever and well organized to be random ditto-heads. They don't just delete stuff, they make ridiculous wikilawyering arguments to justify themselves or use clever ploys to avoid resolution. If you read this [Keeping News of Kidnapping Off Wikipedia] you'll see that Wikipedia involvement isn't in the realm of the impossible. Ghostofnemo (talk) 16:04, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Here are some examples of what I'm talking about from the 9/11 conspiracy theories article. Please note the references cited, and that all of this reliably sourced, neutral point of view material has been completely deleted from the article:

Another example from a different article (there seems to be a pattern). First, instead of correcting a supposedly minor point, they delete the entire entry and all the supporting references: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2005_YU55&diff=464350072&oldid=464349260

Then, instead of discussing it on the article talk page, they post a note on YOUR talk page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ghostofnemo#Re:_2005_YU55

Then, when you make the correction they claimed they wanted but didn't make, and you think you've responded to their objection, they delete it again or delete your reliable sources or in someway tamper with your contribution in a way that seems illogical or goes against Wikipedia policy: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2005_YU55&diff=464359186&oldid=464353720

After a bit of discussion in which they argue that sources like the BBC and The Washington Post are unreliable, that it's actually ok to rely only on primary (government) sources, and claim that this is Wikipedia policy, they threaten to report you for... trying to follow the rules! You can point out that the policies they are quoting don't say what they claim they say, but that doesn't help. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:2005_YU55#Strange.2FPuzzling_structures

After which they once again delete the reliable sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2005_YU55&diff=465285428&oldid=465241886

Just a little suspicious, eh?

Another example of neutral, reliably sourced, relevant information being deleted from articles, again from the 9/11 conspiracy theories article, this time regarding the Able Danger program. Please note the long list of reliable sources cited: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=9/11_conspiracy_theories&diff=482102967&oldid=482101670

And another Wikipedia disconnect from reality: Ronald Reagan was never widely known as "Ronald Raygun": http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_nicknames_of_United_States_presidents&diff=487201463&oldid=487199503

And why is it a problem to note Noble Peace Prize recipients who met untimely deaths?

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_Nobel_Peace_Prize_laureates&diff=402708554&oldid=402693059

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_Nobel_Peace_Prize_laureates&diff=402383748&oldid=402346713

Here we go again: the U.S. government claimed it had no prior knowledge of the 9/11 attacks, but FBI director Robert Mueller testified that the FBI was warned by one of its agents that an al-Queda suspect might be planning to fly a plane into the World Trade Center. This information, which appears in a referenced CNN article, has been repeatedly deleted from the September 11 attacks advance-knowledge conspiracy theories article: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=September_11_attacks_advance-knowledge_conspiracy_theories&diff=529672499&oldid=529654789. One of the deletors claims I'm doing original research! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:September_11_attacks_advance-knowledge_conspiracy_theories#Questionable_deletion_of_FBI_prior_knowledge_info

Entire section of Police state deleted as....original research. Note the references! https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Police_state&diff=578931729&oldid=578657087 Note also that the editor who deleted this is not only claiming that only scholarly sources are acceptable on Wikipedia, but also did not, as an alternative, find sources he or she felt were better quality. I just get the impression that someone doesn't want a factual yardstick of what a police state is available to people interested in objectively evaluating governments. Ghostofnemo (talk) 06:50, 29 October 2013 (UTC) First it was "original research". Now it's "lack of consensus". I've seen this in enough articles to know that no matter what, some things just won't be allowed to appear in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Police_state&diff=582770964&oldid=582765017 Here is a deletion of freedom rankings by various reliable sources - note in this version of the article, in the "History of Usage" section, the completely unsourced assertion that "Because there are different political perspectives as to what an appropriate balance is between individual freedom and national security, there are no definitive objective standards to determine whether the term "police state" applies to a particular nation at any given point in time." https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Police_state&diff=601352639&oldid=601352523 You just have to wonder why this kind of statement is allowed to stand, but a reliably sourced, neutrally worded list of objective criteria as to whether or not a state is a police state must be immediately deleted. Ghostofnemo (talk) 05:47, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

Did you know that Winston Churchill co-ordered the dropping of the atomic bombs? Me either. My contribution to this article was that it was Truman who gave the orders (before my edit, there was nothing in the article about who actually ordered the dropping of the bombs), and I finally had six supporting references, because it kept getting deleted. But even with six reliable sources that said it was Truman who gave the orders to drop the bombs, my contribution was deleted, and replaced by the interesting hypothesis that Churchill co-authorized the bombings. However, not a single reference was supplied to support this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#Harry_Truman And here is the diff of the deletion: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki&diff=582340538&oldid=582337369 Ghostofnemo (talk) 12:23, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Three reliable sources pointing to CIA involvement in the arrest of Nelson Mandela, but deleted by an editor without a user page: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nelson_Mandela&diff=585300836&oldid=585294103 Ghostofnemo (talk) 23:40, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

I spent a lot of time trying to convince editors at Police state that when Freedom House uses the term "unfree states" it is a polite, academic way of saying "police states". They disagreed (!), but this meant that the Freedom House map, which shows "free" and "unfree" states, and which has been in the article for a long time, needed to be deleted from the article. And it was. Note the reason for deletion: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Police_state&diff=583771857&oldid=583771693 Ghostofnemo (talk) 23:51, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

How Wikipedia actually works: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research/Noticeboard/Archive_27#Police_state This discussion is closed, and if I go to another venue, I'm guilty of "forum shopping". Catch-22, and the deletions stand I guess. Note that there is a consensus (except for me) that the terms "police state" and "unfree state" are clearly, obviously, unquestionably NOT synonymous! Ghostofnemo (talk) 13:26, 11 December 2013 (UTC)

Former CIA director says Edward Snowden should be hung, not pardoned. Can't have that in the Edward Snowden article: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Edward_Snowden&diff=586586181&oldid=586584708 Some countries won't extradite you if you face the death penalty.... Ghostofnemo (talk) 11:14, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I proposed that deleting reliably sourced, relevant, neutral material from articles be forbidden as a form of "reverse original research". Of course that wasn't going to happen. Interesting discussion though, but I was unable to reply before the discussion was cut off. One participant claimed that I try to push conspiracy theories, without noting that the edits he mentioned were to conspiracy theory articles! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:No_original_research/Archive_59#Reverse_original_research Ghostofnemo (talk) 03:40, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

We can't have any eyewitness reports of encounters with extraterrestrial life, even if they have been covered by the mainstream press, in the article about extraterrestrial life. Not even if 20 former government and military personnel come forward at a press conference: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Extraterrestrial_life&diff=625211231&oldid=625204360 Ghostofnemo (talk) 12:04, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

Deleted from the article Minerva, from the section entitled "Use by societies and governments": https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Minerva&diff=625231857&oldid=625022758 Ghostofnemo (talk) 05:05, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Deleted from the article Tokyo Two, which is about two anti-whaling activists arrested for trying to expose corruption in Japan's "scientific" whaling program: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tokyo_Two&curid=27706054&diff=635213097&oldid=635097146 Ghostofnemo (talk) 05:01, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Repeatedly deleted from the article 2014 NYPD officer killings: There is info about protests in the article, but info about police counter-protests has been deleted, with one editor claiming it is "false NPOV" to mention both! https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2014_NYPD_officer_killings&diff=639832373&oldid=639797640 and the fact that teh protests were also about Tamir Rice https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2014_NYPD_officer_killings&diff=639988649&oldid=639985106 Ghostofnemo (talk) 01:54, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Repeatedly deleted from American Left - the Green Party of the United States is not part of the American left?: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=American_Left&diff=641098677&oldid=641029922 Ghostofnemo (talk) 07:47, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Greece's SYRIZA party is not a Marxist party, no matter who says otherwise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Coalition_of_the_Radical_Left#Most_party_members_are_Marxists.2C_thus_a_Marxist_party Ghostofnemo (talk) 02:39, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Deleted twice from the article Chris Kyle, regarding reports that he bragged about shooting looters in New Orleans: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Chris_Kyle&diff=642740239&oldid=642739533 the "owners" of the article will not even let another editor put a WP:POV tag on the article! Ghostofnemo (talk) 02:39, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Information about Bernie Sanders has been deleted multiple times from the article American Left because he is not a notable person! https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=American_Left&diff=644246310&oldid=644217497 Ghostofnemo (talk) 14:04, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

Deletion of well sourced information from the article Police state without discussion on article talk page. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Police_state&diff=719748738&oldid=719724654 Ghostofnemo (talk) 01:48, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

Mass deletion of entire "Civil liberties" section of Militarization of police article. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Militarization_of_police&diff=768340612&oldid=768206442 Ghostofnemo (talk) 01:31, 7 May 2017 (UTC)

Tried to clean up the hit job biographical article on Erich von Däniken here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Erich_von_D%C3%A4niken#Repeated_deletion_of_relevant_material. When that failed, I reported the article to the Biographies of living persons noticeboard, but my complaint was archived without any comment or action: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard/Archive279#Erich_von_D%C3%A4niken This is apparently the third time the article has been reported: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=erich+von+daniken&prefix=Wikipedia%3ABiographies+of+living+persons%2FNoticeboard%2F&fulltext=Search&fulltext=Search Ghostofnemo (talk) 03:35, 10 March 2019 (UTC)

My article on the History Channel series "Breaking Mysterious", which has been broadcast around the world, and featured interviews with NSA whistleblower Thomas A. Drake and former JFK Secret Service agent Abraham Bolden, and investigated CIA mind-control experiments, some of which focused on programming people to carry out assassinations, has been deleted because the program is not notable. WP:Articles_for_deletion/Breaking_Mysterious Ghostofnemo (talk) 05:52, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

You can view the deleted article here: User:Ghostofnemo/Breaking_Mysterious. If you know of any reviews of this program, please let me know. It seems strange that no publication anywhere has ever reviewed this controversial program about historical events in the United States, except for foreign TV websites. Ghostofnemo (talk) 06:00, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Deleted from the article Media coverage of Bernie Sanders was a quote from a study by the Harvard/Kennedy School Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy stating that Bernie Sanders received 2/3rds the primary news coverage of Hillary Clinton. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Media_coverage_of_Bernie_Sanders&oldid=prev&diff=942395442 Ghostofnemo (talk) 13:06, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Apparently 'The Onion' is not a reliable source of political satire. "Bernie Sanders loses to Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg in key battle for second and third place." https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Media_coverage_of_Bernie_Sanders&diff=942404812&oldid=942402313

And this is just straight-up vandalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Media_coverage_of_Bernie_Sanders&diff=942405881&oldid=942404812 Ghostofnemo (talk) 15:09, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Another questionable deletion from the same article https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Media_coverage_of_Bernie_Sanders&diff=944070335&oldid=944051977 Ghostofnemo (talk) 06:40, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia's 'deletion of documented facts' problem makes the national news. “At least one highly dedicated Wikipedia user has been scrubbing controversial aspects of (Kamala) Harris’s 'tough-on-crime' record from her Wikipedia page, her decision not to prosecute Steve Mnuchin for mortgage fraud-related crimes, her strong support of prosecutors in Orange County who engaged in rampant misconduct, and other tidbits — such as her previous assertion that 'it is not progressive to be soft on crime' — that could prove unflattering to Harris as the public first gets to know her on the national stage.” https://theintercept.com/2020/07/02/kamala-harris-wikipedia/ Wikipedia doesn’t consider removing factual, neutral, relevant material from articles to be vandalism, for some reason that I am unable to understand. And there are hordes of insincere editors with agendas who are vandalizing articles this way.Ghostofnemo (talk) 01:01, 5 July 2020 (UTC)