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Liberal international order

In international relations, the liberal international order (LIO), also known as rules-based order, describes a set of global, rule-based, structured relationships based on political liberalism, economic liberalism and liberal internationalism since the late 1940s. More specifically, it entails international cooperation through multilateral institutions (like the United Nations, World Trade Organization and International Monetary Fund) and is constituted by human equality (freedom, rule of law and human rights), open markets, security cooperation, promotion of liberal democracy, and monetary cooperation. The order was established in the aftermath of World War II, led in large part by the United States.

The nature of the LIO, as well as its very existence, has been debated by scholars. The LIO has been credited with expanding free trade, increasing capital mobility, spreading democracy, promoting human rights, and collectively defending the West from the Soviet Union. The LIO facilitated unprecedented cooperation among the states of North America, Western Europe and Japan. Over time, the LIO facilitated the spread of economic liberalism to the rest of the world, as well as helped consolidate democracy in formerly fascist or communist countries.

Origins of the LIO have commonly been identified as the 1940s, usually starting in 1945, with some scholars pointing to earlier agreements between the WWII-era Allies such as the Atlantic Charter in 1941. John Mearsheimer has dissented with this view, arguing that the LIO only arose after the end of the Cold War, since in his theory liberal international order is possible only in a unipolar World. Core founding members of the LIO include the states of North America, Western Europe and Japan; these states form a security community. The characteristics of the LIO have varied over time. Some scholars refer to a Cold War variation of the LIO largely limited to the West, and a post-Cold War variation having a more widespread scope and giving international institutions more powers.

Aspects of the LIO are challenged internally within liberal states by populism, protectionism and nativism. Scholars have argued that embedded liberalism (or the logics inherent in the Double Movement) are key to maintaining public support for the planks of the LIO; some scholars have raised questions whether aspects of embedded liberalism have been undermined, thus leading to a backlash against the LIO.

Externally, the LIO is challenged by authoritarian states, illiberal states, and states that are discontented with their roles in world politics. China, Russia, Iran and North Korea have been characterized as prominent challengers to the LIO. Some scholars have argued that the LIO contains self-undermining aspects that could trigger backlash or collapse.

Definition
Minimalist definitions of the LIO characterize it as “open and rules-based international order” while maximalist definitions include liberal social purpose, economic and political rights, and democratic decision-making procedures.

David Lake, Lisa Martin and Thomas Risse define "order" as "patterned or structured relationships among units". Interactions in the LIO are structured by rules, norms and decision-making procedures. They note that the LIO is not synonymous with a "rule-based international order", as non-liberal rule-based orders may exist (such as the Westphalian order). Others refer to the LIO as the rules-based international order (RBIO), or the rules-based order (RBO).

Lake, Martin and Risse define "liberal" as a belief in the universal equality of individuals, as well as individual and collective freedoms. Political liberalism entails the rule of law, and the sovereign equality of states, as well as protections for human rights, political rights and civil liberties. Economic liberalism entails free market-oriented policies. Liberal internationalism entails principled multilateralism and global governance.

Michael Barnett defines an international order as "patterns of relating and acting" derived from and maintained by rules, institutions, law and norms. International orders have both a material and social component. Legitimacy (the generalized perception that actions are desirable, proper or appropriate) is essential to political orders. George Lawson has defined an international order as "regularized practices of exchange among discrete political units that recognize each other to be independent." John Mearsheimer defines an international order as "an organized group of international institutions that help govern the interactions among the member states."

In After Victory (2001), John Ikenberry defines a political order as "the governing arrangements among a group of states, including its fundamental rules, principles and institutions." Political orders are established when the basic organizing arrangements are set up, and they break down when the basic organizing arrangements are overturned, contested or in disarray. He defines a constitutional international order as a political order "organized around agreed-upon legal and political institutions that operate to allocate rights and limit the exercise of power." There are four main core elements of constitutional orders:

In 2018, Ikenberry defined the liberal international order as: "multilayered, multifaceted, and not simply a political formation imposed by the leading state. International order is not “one thing” that states either join or resist. It is an aggregation of various sorts of ordering rules and institutions. There are the deep rules and norms of sovereignty... There is a sprawling array of international institutions, regimes, treaties, agreements, protocols, and so forth. These governing arrangements cut across diverse realms, including security and arms control, the world economy, the environment and global commons, human rights, and political relations. Some of these domains of governance may have rules and institutions that narrowly reflect the interests of the hegemonic state, but most reflect negotiated outcomes based on a much broader set of interests."Charles Glaser has disputed the analytical value of the concept of the LIO, arguing that the concept is so broad and vague that "almost any international situation qualifies as an international order, so long as its members accept the sovereignty norm." Some critics of the LIO, such as John Mearsheimer, have argued that liberal democracy promotion and hyper-globalization are elements of the LIO.
 * 1) Shared agreement about the rules of the game within the order
 * 2) Rules and institutions that bind and limit the exercise of power
 * 3) Institutional autonomy from special interests
 * 4) The entrenchment of these rules and institutions with a broader, immutable political system.

Jeff Colgan has characterized the liberal international order as the theme that unites multiple subsystems in the international system. These subsystems can experience drastic change without fundamentally changing the liberal international order.

Debates
The debate about liberal international order has grown especially prominent in International Relations. Daniel Deudney and John Ikenberry list five components of this international order: security co-binding, in which great powers demonstrate restraint; the open nature of US hegemony and the dominance of reciprocal transnational relations; the presence of self-limiting powers like Germany and Japan; the availability of mutual gains due to "the political foundations of economic openness"; and the role of Western "civil identity." According to Charles Glaser, there are five key mechanisms in the LIO: "democracy, hierarchy built on legitimate authority, institutional binding, economic interdependence, and political convergence."

The more supportive views of scholars such as Ikenberry have drawn criticism from scholars who have examined the imperial and colonial legacies of liberal international institutions. The contributions of non-Western actors to the formation of the liberal international order have also recently gained attention from scholars advancing global International Relations theory. In the case of Latin America, for example, "From as far back as the 1860s, Latin American jurists have made prominent contributions to international jurisprudence, the ‘mortar’ that binds international order. [...] However, in other ways, historically the LIO has been—and remains—superficial in its reach in Latin America." According to Abrahamsen, Andersen, and Sending, the contemporary liberal international order includes the legacy of "southern actors" in Africa and Asia advocating the process of decolonization.

International organizations play a central role in the liberal order. The World Trade Organization, for example, creates and implements free trade agreements, while the World Bank provides aid to developing countries. The order is also premised on the notion that liberal trade and free markets will contribute to global prosperity and peace. Critics argue that free trade has sometimes led to social problems such as inequality and environmental degradation.

Post-Cold War, some consider international agreements on issues such as climate change, nuclear nonproliferation, and upholding initiatives in maritime law (UNCLOS) to constitute elements of the LIO. The European Union is often considered a major example of the liberal international order put into effect in terms of international agreements between the constituent countries.

Others argue that weak states played a central role in shaping the liberal international order. Marcos Tourinho argues that weak states used the three strategies of "resistance", "community" and "norms" to push back on U.S. dominance during the construction of the liberal international order, thus ensuring that the order did not just reflect U.S. interests. Martha Finnemore argues that unipolarity does not just entail a material superiority by the unipole, but also a social structure whereby the unipole maintains its status through legitimation, and institutionalization. In trying to obtain legitimacy from the other actors in the international system, the unipole necessarily gives those actors a degree of power. The unipole also obtains legitimacy and wards off challenges to its power through the creation of institutions, but these institutions also entail a diffusion of power away from the unipole. David Lake has argued along similar lines that legitimacy and authority are key components of international order. Abrahamsen suggested that middle powers also benefit from liberal internationalism. By investing in the maintenance of multilateral institutions, moderate powers can collectively advocate for their self-interest, counterbalancing great power politics. Supporting liberal internationalism is thus a form of realpolitik for middle powers.

Realist critics of the LIO include John Mearsheimer, Patrick Porter and Charles Glaser. Mearsheimer has argued that the LIO is bound to fail due to the pushback it faces internally within liberal states and externally by non-liberal states. Porter has argued that the LIO was actually a coercive order and that it was not liberal. Glaser has argued that the balance of power theory, bargaining theory and neo-institutional theories better explain NATO than mechanisms associated with the LIO.

Aaron McKeil of the London School of Economics finds realist criticism of liberal order insufficient. He argues that the alternative foreign policies offered by realists as "restraint" and "offshore balancing" would be more generative of proxy wars and would fail to offer the level of institutions required for managing great power competition and international challenges.

John Dugard of the Leiden Law School argued that the concept of the rules-based international order (RBO) is often used to serve the interests of the United States, and bypass international law when necessary. Dugard noted that the "rules" defined by the RBO are often vague and undefined, and can be subjected to manipulation and double standards. For instance, the United States is not a party to several international treaties such as United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Protocol I and Protocol II of the Geneva Conventions, and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, and used their own interpretations of international law in cases such as 2003 invasion of Iraq and drone warfare in the War on Terror as allowing for preemptive war as a form of permissible self-defence, a definition that is more contested under international law than the broader rules of the RBO. Dugard concluded that the conflict between adherence to RBO and international law "undermines efforts to agree upon a universal system of international law premised on the same fundamental rules, principles and values".

Relations with individual countries
China and Russia have been characterized as the most threatening states to the LIO.

China
Some see China as a potential challenger to the liberal order. According to Darren Lim and John Ikenberry, China seeks an international order that protects its illiberal domestic political and economic model. Scholars cite initiatives such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and One Belt One Road Initiative as institutions that appear to compete with existing liberal international institutions. Van Niewenhuizen is categorical that Xi Jinping, then General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, seeks to supplant the LIO. According to political scientist Thomas Ambrosio, one aim of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation was to ensure that liberal democracy could not gain ground in these countries, promoting authoritarian norms in Central Asia.

Rühlig asks in his March 2018 paper why China under Xi would seek to change a system by which it earns enormous profit, World Economic Forum fellow Anoushiravan Ehteshami says, "China sees Iran as its Western gateway, where not only is it a big market in itself, but it will also be the gateway to the rest of the Middle East and ultimately to Europe for China." Nisha Mary Mathew remarks that the quest for dominance of the Eurasian land mass in which China finds itself causes Iran to be a favourite. In 2017 alone, the Chinese signed deals for Iranian infrastructure projects worth more than US$15 billion. Joint projects include "high-speed rail lines, upgrades to the nation’s electrical grid, and natural gas pipelines". From 2019 to 2025, the two nations seek to increase bilateral trade to US$600 billion.

Russia
Many scholars agree that the Russian Federation under Vladimir Putin seeks to undermine the liberal international order. Various viewpoints have been developed on the subject. The first is that Russia is a "revanchist power" seeking to completely overturn international diplomacy, the second is that Russia is a "defensive power" that seeks to push incremental change in the existing order, and the third is that Russia is an "aggressive isolationist", with Putin playing a "spoiler role" in international affairs to boost legitimacy domestically.

Political sociologist Larry Diamond argues that Putin's assault on liberal democracy is exemplified by the 2008 military intervention for the enclaves of Abkhazia and South Ossetia against independent Georgia, Russian support for Viktor Yanukovych in Ukraine, and the Russian military intervention in Ukraine by troops without insignia in 2014. Putin has been accused of giving financial support to far-right or national populist parties across Europe. For example, the National Front (now National Rally) obtained a 9 million euro loan from a Russian bank in 2014. Larry Diamond argues this influenced the policy of the National Front such as Marine Le Pen's support for the annexation of Crimea.

The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and a widespread response against the invasion has led to renewed discussion of the liberal international order. Political scientist Lucan Way writes that Putin's invasion has inadvertently strengthened the liberal international order in opposition, with the full-scale Russian invasion being a more conspicuously imperialistic challenge to sovereignty than smaller-scale frozen conflicts and political interferences. Way says that blocs such as the European Union will have more unified action while being currently pillars in the liberal international order. Samir Saran, head of the Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, says that a renewed emphasis in the liberal international order offers new opportunities for the international community, but hopes that the LIO should maintain interest in global issues after the security crisis in Europe. Edward Luce says the invasion is a serious threat to the international order because, "should Putin succeed, it would legitimise the law of the jungle, where large countries can annex smaller ones with impunity." At the same time, Luce suggests different terminology should be used besides "liberal international order" due to what he says is the selective nature of diplomacy. Kori Schake argues that the Russian invasion has provoked a Western response which strengthens the transatlantic alliance, a main component of the LIO, yet has also involved a global response, with the largest partner being Japan. Schake suggests that Ukraine's own defense is a new strengthening element to the LIO, by showing a stark contrast between liberalism and authoritarianism.

John Mearsheimer argues, that the US-lead liberal international order emerged in 1991 after the break-up of the Soviet Union, when the USA became the only superpower in the World. The absence of any other power, capable of challenging the US hegemony, resulted in numerous illiberal activities (e.g. bombing on Yugoslavia in 1999, Afganistan in 2001,  Iraq in 2003-2011 and in 2014,  Libya in 2011 and in 2015–2019) initiated by the United States under false pretences. However, these wars have "failed to spread democracy or produce international stability", and instead they "antagonized the forces of nationalism and realist counter-hegemonic power politics". The Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was notable as perhaps the first time that NATO and its allies failed to achieve their goals, potentially symbolizing the end of the unipolar moment of liberal hegemony and the beginning of a new International order, which may or may not be multipolar.

United States
A frequent view among developing countries interprets the United States as inconsistent when it argues for a rules-based international order while failing to conform to the decisions of international institutions like the United Nations or to accept the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. "The RBO (Rules-Based Order) is something other than international law. It is an alternative regime outside the discipline of international law which inevitably challenges and threatens international law".

title: Liberal international order


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Gunnera

Gunnera is the sole genus of herbaceous flowering plants in the family Gunneraceae, which contains 63 species. Some species in this genus, namely those in the subgenus Panke, have extremely large leaves. Species in the genus are variously native to Latin America, Australia, New Zealand, Papuasia, Hawaii, insular Southeast Asia, Africa, and Madagascar. The stalks of some species are edible.

Taxonomy
Gunnera is the only genus in the family Gunneraceae. The APG II system, of 2003, also recognizes this family and assigns it to the order Gunnerales in the clade core eudicots. The family then consisted of one or two genera, Gunnera and, optionally, Myrothamnus, the latter optionally segregated as a separate family, Myrothamnaceae. This represents a change from the APG system, of 1998, which firmly recognized two separate families, unplaced as to order. The APG III system and APG IV system recognizes the family Gunneraceae and places Myrothamnus in Myrothamnaceae; both families are placed in the order Gunnerales in the core eudicots.

The genus Gunnera was named after the Norwegian botanist Johann Ernst Gunnerus. At first it was assigned to the family Haloragaceae, though that presented difficulties that led to the general recognition of the family Gunneraceae, as had been proposed about the beginning of the 20th century. In the meantime, in many publications it had been referred to as being in the Haloragaceae, variously misspelt (as for example "Halorrhagidaceae". ) Such references still cause difficulties in consulting earlier works. However, currently Gunnera is firmly assigned to the monogeneric family Gunneraceae.

Evolution
Gunnera is thought to be a rather ancient group, with a well-documented fossil history due to the presence of fossilized pollen spores, known by the palynotaxon Tricolpites reticulatus. It is a Gondwanan lineage, having originated in South America during the Cretaceous. The earliest fossilized pollen is known from the Late Cretaceous (Turonian) of Peru, about 90 million years ago, and within the following 10 million years, Gunnera had achieved a worldwide distribution, with fossil pollen grains being found in areas where it is not found today, such as western North America, mainland Australia, and Antarctica. Based on fossil pollen recovered from drilling cores, Gunnera is also known to have inhabited the now-submerged islands of the Ninetyeast Ridge during the Paleocene, likely having dispersed there from either Australasia or the then-emergent Kerguelen Plateau islands.

Due to the widespread distribution of Gunnera during the Cretaceous, it was previously thought that the modern disjunct distribution of the genus was a relic of this period. However, phylogenetic analysis indicates that the majority of Gunnera species, even those found on entirely different continents, diverged from each other during the Cenozoic, indicating that the modern distribution of Gunnera is a consequence of long-distance dispersal from South America to other parts of the world, rather than relics of a former cosmopolitan distribution. The only species that diverged prior to the Cenozoic is Gunnera herteri of southeastern Brazil, which is thought to be the most ancient species of the genus, its lineage having diverged during the Late Cretaceous, roughly concurrent with the oldest Gunnera fossil pollen from Peru. The persistence of the Gunnera crown group since the Cretaceous makes it unique among flowering plants, and may have been facilitated by strong niche conservatism, dispersal ability, and being able to aggressively colonize disturbed land.

Description
The 40–50 species vary enormously in leaf size, with the iconic large-leaved species belonging to the subgenus Panke. The giant rhubarb, or Campos des Loges (Gunnera manicata), native to the Serra do Mar mountains of southeastern Brazil, is perhaps the largest species, with reniform or sub-reniform leaves typically 1.5 to 2.0 m long, not including the thick, succulent petiole which may be up to 2.5 m in length. The width of the leaf blade is typically 2.5 m, but on two occasions cultivated specimens (in Dorset, England in 2011 and at Narrowwater, Ulster, Ireland in 1903) produced leaves fully 3.3 m in width. The seeds germinate best in very moist, but not wet, conditions and temperatures of 22–29 °C.

Only slightly smaller is G. masafuerae of the Juan Fernandez Islands off the Chilean coast. They can have leaves up to 2.9 m in width on stout leaf stalks 1.5 m long and 11 cm thick according to Skottsberg. These leafstalks or petioles are the thickest of any dicot, and probably also the most massive. On nearby Isla Más Afuera, G. peltata frequently has an upright trunk to 5.5 m in height by 25 – thick, bearing leaves up to 2 m wide. The Hoja de Pantano (G. magnifica) of the Colombian Andes bears the largest leaf buds of any plant; up to 60 cm long and 40 cm thick. The succulent leaf stalks are up to 2.7 m long. The massive inflorescence of small, reddish flowers is up to 2.3 m long and weighs about 13 kg. The flowers of Gunnera species are dimerous ( two sepals, two petals (or none) . two stamens (or one), and two carpels. Other giant Gunnera species within the subgenus Panke are found throughout the Neotropics and Hawaii. Gunnera insignis is also known by the name "poor man's umbrella" in Costa Rica.

Outside of the subgenus Panke, most of the more basal Gunnera species have small-to-medium-sized leaves. There are some species with moderately large leaves in Africa (G. perpensa, in the subgenus Perpensum) and Southeast Asia (G. macrophylla, in the subgenus Pseudogunnera), but the majority of more basal species are low-lying, mat-forming plants with small leaves. There are several small species are found in New Zealand, notably G. albocarpa, with leaves only 1–2 cm long, and also in South America, with G. magellanica having leaves 5–9 cm wide on stalks 8–15 cm long. The most basal species in the genus, G. herteri of Brazil, also has small leaves.

Some fossil leaf impressions of Gunnera from the Cretaceous of North America have large leaves akin to those of Panke, and the most basal extant species within Panke (G. mexicana) is the most northern member. For this reason, it has been suggested that Panke originates from South American Gunnera that colonized North America during the Cretaceous and grew into giant forms, with the remaining South American Gunnera evolving into the subgenus Misandra, with a low-lying, matlike growth. During the Cenozoic, the North American Panke would have colonized Hawaii and retreated southwards on the mainland before recolonizing South America. However, more recent phylogenetic evidence suggests that Misandra and Panke diverged only 15 million years ago, much too recent to assign the Cretaceous Gunnera to Panke. Due to this, the large-leaved Cretaceous Gunnera from North America may represent a distinct lineage that convergently evolved giant leaves similar to those of Panke, but did not leave any descendants.

Species
, Plants of the World Online accepts the following species separated by subgenus:

In 2022, it was shown that plants in cultivation under the name Gunnera manicata were actually a hybrid, Gunnera × cryptica.

Cyanobacterial symbiosis
At least some species of Gunnera host endosymbiotic cyanobacteria such as Nostoc punctiforme. The cyanobacteria provide fixed nitrogen to the plant, while the plant provides fixed carbon to the microbe. The bacteria enter the plant via glands found at the base of each leaf stalk and initiate an intracellular symbiosis which is thought to provide the plant with fixed nitrogen in return for fixed carbon for the bacterium. The Nostoc filled symbiotic tissue makes up just a small portion of the plant's total biomass. Gunnera is the only known genus of angiosperms that hosts cyanobacteria, and the only known landplants with intracellular cyanobionts. Although the endosymbionts enters the cell wall, they do not penetrate the cell membrane. This relationship may provide insights to allow the creation of novel symbioses between crop plants and cyanobacteria, allowing growth in areas lacking fixed nitrogen in the soil.

Uses
The stalks of G. tinctoria (nalca), from southern Chile and Argentina, are edible. Their principal use is fresh consumption, after peeling, but also they are prepared in salads, liquor or marmalade. Leaves of this species are used in covering curanto (a traditional Chilean food).

Gunnera perpensa is a source of traditional medicine in southern Africa, both in veterinary and human ailments, largely in obstetric and digestive complaints, but also as a wound dressing. It also is eaten in various ways, largely the petioles, flower stalks and leaves, fresh and raw, preferably with skins and fibre removed, which is said to remove bitterness, but also cooked. The plant also is said to be used in making a beer.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Gunnera


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Talk:Mother Teresa/Archive 5

J'accuse
It's interesting to note that after being asked to do so countless times, Jtdirl still hasn't provided a single coherent criticism of this article and has now instead embarked on a campaign on several user talk pages inviting people for "feedback" (really a transparent attempt to play the nice guy for a while in hope that the other side comes off as the aggressor and will be ostracized). In the past months working on this article, Jtdirl still hasn't made an attempt to cooperate on improving it in mutual consensus. He ignored my peace offers - here, on the mailing list, on his user talk page. He ignored my arguments. He reverted, reverted, reverted without comment. He insulted me here, on user talk pages, on the mailing list, and probably in private e-mail to others. In his edits, he silently removed crucial details (such as the fact that Teresa's order does not separate between curable and incurable patients) and when pushed, said that they were "redundant". He turned image captions into half-sentences while writing paragraph-length captions elsewhere. He has no arguments. None at all.

When he writes about POV, the one thing he will emphasize again and again is how authoritative and indpedendent and unbiased he is, and how many friends and acquaintances in high places he has (Mary Robinson, Bono, Chris Hitchens, I've lost count). I've also lost count of the number of jobs he has claimed to be holding. He accused me - you have to read this twice to believe this - he accused me of "hiding behind a misleading pseudonym" (my real name and link to my homepage are on my user page), but he had probably forgotten that he had earlier admitted that the name "James Duffy" is a pseudonym (and misleading, because it looks like a real one). That alone wouldn't be too bad but now comes the kicker: With all his appeals to authority and claims of being friends to everyone probably including the Pope himself, he says the reason he doesn't want to disclose his identity is that he doesn't want to "create an illusion of hierarchy". If this isn't the pinnacle of audaciousness, I don't know what it is.

James can cooperate with people on minor issues. But when dealing with major ones and someone disagrees with his view, he will go into alpha male mode. He ostracizes the individual who he thinks is causing the problem, tries to single him out. If it's a newbie, they are without hope. Nobody will interecede on the newbie's behalf because they don't want to deal with a guy who's even got fear in his nickname (and you can be fucking certain that this isn't just because it's Irish). A person who will write lengthy, hateful diatribes about them everywhere, try to destroy their credibility, their person, their efforts. If it's a regular, he will start by bullying. Then he tries to start building or utilizing alliances with others, "I rub your back if you rub mine" kind of deals. He writes nice comments on people's talk pages, "Oh I really like what you did here, hey, by the way, I have a problem, could you look at that?" Even people he attacked earlier. He wants to send the message: "I'm the alpha male around here. I'm the expert PR guy with friends in high places. But if you work with me, you get the benefits, too. It doesn't matter if you're a former vandal or a backstabber or a liar. I forgive and forget. Just give me a hand here, will ya?"

All this has nothing, nothing whatsoever to do with facts or arguments or NPOV or anything like that. If you will look through this discussion back to day one you will find that virtually none of the things that have been said about Mother Teresa here had to be retracted, corrected or otherwise dealt with. When Jtdirl is in alpha male mode, the facts have become meaningless. He will even attack statements that he previously defended, or even attack his own work (as he does when he supports Silsor's edits). The only thing he cares about is maintaining the pecking order. He's a skillful manipulator with just one goal in mind: Attaining control of some of the crucial subjects in Wikipedia. And of course one of the primary subjects he writes about is Catholicism. Coincidence? I know one thing for sure: The Church is a multi-billion dollar organization, and if I was in their shoes, I'd be quite willing to fund someone like Jtd to keep an eye on certain articles. He would maintain enough criticism that accusations of bias would be widely rejected as implausible. But he would keep the juicy parts out, the really crucial elements. A sentence here, a sentence there.

Think that's far fetched? Consider this example: Earlier this year the news was broken by CBS and The Observer that a secret Vatican document ordered Catholic priests to remain silent about allegations of child sexual abuse and threatened them with excommunication if they do not. The document in question is called Crimen solliciationis. Jtdirl has called the media reports extremely overblown and claimed that the document was not secret, ignored by the priests (without any evidence other than the usual "I know a priest who says...") etc. The reality is that Cardinal Ratzinger signed a letter in May 2001 informing clerics that the document is still in force. But again, the real kicker is bigger still: Jtdirl has said that the document only refers to crimes taking place in the confessional. The reality is, however, that the document refers specifically and separately to crimes taking part outside the confessional and refers to them as "the worst crime". But that's still not the end of it.

We all know these Catholic codes are open to interpretation, but the Church leaves no doubt when it includes sexual acts with "brute animals" in the list of "worst crimes" (along with sexual abuse of children) that need to be dealt with not by prosecution, but internally and in complete silence to the outside world. When pushed about this ("do brute animals go into the confessional?"), Jtdirl responded: "[W]hile 'brute animals' don't go into the confessional, their owners do; it is talking about the solicitation of owners of animals to allow their animals to be used."

Read that a few times. Really, please do. Now get this: Jtdirl has claimed multiple times that he has been hired as counsel for Catholic church sex abuse victims. Now, does the above statement make sense to you for someone who is supposed to help the victims? Doesn't it sound like there is something really fishy going on here? Now I wouldn't rule out that Jtdirl does in fact do the work he says he's doing. But I doubt he's doing it for the victims. Because the victims want the truth, not ridiculous apologetics like the ones above, the kind of stuff that might appear in official Catholic publications.

Given that Jtdirl has lied about what I have done more times than I can remember (I have pointed out his lies as many times, but as I said often, once a person is sufficiently entrenched it becomes virtually impossible to apply needed disciplinary measures on Wikipedia), given his proven and demonstrable record as a skillful manipulator, given the ridiculous amounts of time he spends on bullying others, given all this, Jtdirl certainly makes a plausible astroturfer. What he does not make is a plausible representative of NPOV on Wikipedia. I have always disclosed my biases, my identity, my work. I have always been willing to work with others to reach acceptable solutions. I have tolerated unhealthy amounts of abusive behavior. In the end, you will have to decide who you find more trustworthy, because I doubt there is going to develop a healthy cooperation between the two of us.—Eloquence 07:51, Dec 7, 2003 (UTC)

 * Your ad hominem argument (which is becoming an argumentum ad nauseam) aside, Jtdirl is not the only user who disagrees with you about whether the page is NPOV. In addition, I added the NPOV banner prior to his requests for independent review. Jtdirl is beside the point.  Daniel Quinlan 17:56, Dec 7, 2003 (UTC)

 * You're in the wrong thread, Daniel. I have already responded to your arguments above. I never suggested or implied that you came here on Jt's invitation.—Eloquence

There are so many falsehood, misrepresentations, myths and garbage in Erik's rant it is hardly worth replying. Suffice to say I am concerned with NPOV, factual accuracy and encyclopædic content. Erik is concerned with hammering home his own agenda and hammering anyone who dares question his attempts to use wikipedia as his pulpit. BTW I did not accuse Erik of hiding behind a false name, I joked that his username, Eloquence was misleading because much of what he wrote in this article would not be described as eloquent!!! As to his statement ''He's a skillful manipulator with just one goal in mind: Attaining control of some of the crucial subjects in Wikipedia. And of course one of the primary subjects he writes about is Catholicism. Coincidence? I know one thing for sure: The Church is a multi-billion dollar organization, and if I was in their shoes, I'd be quite willing to fund someone like Jtd to keep an eye on certain articles'' that is a libellous and totally ficticious claim, but the sort of behaviour that Erik has practiced elsewhere to bully anyone who disagrees with him and his attempts to push his personal agendas.

Erik has stated quite clearly the POV he wants the article to reflect - that she contributed to suffering on a global scale through her tireless anti-abortion and anti-contraception campaigning, through her missionary activity, through her Kevorkian style medical care, through her involvement in financial transactions of a highly dubious nature. He tried to shout down Ed Poor's constructive criticism by calling Ed a defender of MT, told Daniel to "Read the fucking article", called Alexandros a liar, drove Pfortuny away, etc etc. Of the people here questioning aspects of content, the only person (other than a mysterous sock puppet who appeared from nowhere to agree with him) he had not yet verbally abused is Silsor. To get independent viewpoints on the article I asked a number of people to read the article and make observations. A number have indicated that they agree there is a POV problem and disagree with Erik, but have said they won't comment here, not wanting to put themselves in the line of Erik's fire. One said "Commenting on the Mother Teresa article would be like asking for personal attacks to be made against me, which, surprisingly enough, really isn't something I want to do. I saw what happened to Daniel [10] and don't wish to put myself up against such attacks.". It says something about Erik's behaviour that sysops are afraid to come to the page for fear of abuse from Erik. Given that Erik clearly has no wish to work with people, merely abuse everyone, and his behaviour is intimidating people from working here, maybe he should do everyone a favour, leave this page alone and go off and play his POV games somewhere else where standards of NPOV are not required. FearÉIREANN 21:18, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * You specifically used the words "I am the one who has been in articles in ... [insert long appeal to authority], not hiding behind a misleading nickname". If that's a joke you have a very strange sense of humor. Unlike you, I have nothing to hide.

 * Erik has stated quite clearly the POV he wants the article to reflect

 * Actually, I have stated that it is a POV that I want the article to include.

 *  He tried to shout down Ed Poor's constructive criticism

 * He didn't make any.

 * called Alexandros a liar

 * Alexandros lied about the nature of his reverts -- he pretended making content edits (spelling mistakes, section reorgs etc.) while in fact he made major reverts that re-included even ridiculous anti-Teresa POV stuff that I had already removed. Even Adam Carr has stated that this article would be better off without a somewhat misguided teenager who thinks that "1-3 people in the world" didn't like Mother Teresa. As for Daniel, his comments clearly showed that he didn't even read the article he was commenting on, as he didn't understand the meaning of the included pictures. I have always worked with people offering constructive criticism. I have no interest in meaningless, generic POV accusations.—Eloquence 01:49, Dec 8, 2003 (UTC)

If you can't work with people here, then go and find somewhere else to push your agenda. You have threatened, bullied and driven away enough people from this page already. FearÉIREANN 01:52, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * I'll be ready for useful comments whenever you are.—Eloquence

Her beatification
I included some text from Alexandros's revision on her beatification and left out the parts on the controversy around her miracle. However, this article should not shy away from the issue. I need research from primary sources. Talk later, catch bus now. silsor 17:25, Dec 8, 2003 (UTC)

I reworded the reference to the alleged miracle to match more closely what the Time Asia article actually said, not the spin put on it.

I've also removed the following: ''On the day of Teresa's beatification, the rationalist society held protests near Calcutta and mounted an "anti-superstitions awareness program," according to news reports. '' People protect regularly. Whether some 'rationalist society' protested or not is irrelevant in the context of this article, as are any counter-demonstrations. The important facts are the alleged miracle, the views of the woman, her husband and the medical services. FearÉIREANN 21:15, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * If people protested regularly against Mother Teresa that should be noted. These protests were remarkable exactly because of the impression that Alexandros and others have, that only "1-3 people in the world don't like Mother Teresa". They show that MT was not uncontroversial even in Calcutta. Events like this should be reported when they are remarkable and unexpected. This is the case here -- the protests were picked up at least by the German media and probably by US media as well for the very same reason.—Eloquence 21:19, Dec 8, 2003 (UTC)

 * Furthermore: The level of detail of our reporting should be even. That means that if we devote a large portion of the text to explaining the details of the beatification, we should also elaborate on the events surrounding it. Similarly, if we eventually write a larger section about her Nobel Prize speech, we will also want to have details about the campaign that preceded it, criticisms etc. If the beatification section was only one paragraph long, I would agree with you that writing about the protests would probably be out of proportion. But this is not the case here.—Eloquence 21:25, Dec 8, 2003 (UTC)

 * The issue is the alleged miracle, not secondary campaigners mounting campaigns. The only relevant references are the views of those active participants; the woman, husband, MoC and medical services. Secondary self-appointed participants, whether supportive of the alleged miracle or critical of it, are irrelevant and merely padding, particularly when only one set of secondary participants are focused on. That is simply yet more agenda-pushing. FearÉIREANN 21:27, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Not quite. Whether "secondary campaigners" deserve mention or not depends on several factors. One of them is the level of relatedness to the case at hand. In this case, the campaigners clearly referred to the miracle as a "hoax", while applauding Mother Teresa's work. That means that there is a sufficiently strong connection to the case to test further. The second test is the level of detail in the reporting. We report about Besra, her husband (including quotes), the nuns, the doctors - we have set the complete "scene" of the event, so it is only logical to also include the reaction. The last test is whether the event is unusual or to be expected. Many people believe that MT was unequivocally accepted in Calcutta. The protests show that there was at least some level of criticism of the way her work was "presented". They also contribute to the overall scene setting in that they help to dispel some common misconceptions about Calcutta and India in general, for example, that Calcutta is so poor that there is virtually no intellectual community. Aroup Chatterjee criticized that Mother Teresa inadvertently contributed to this image of Calcutta as a hellhole by presenting herself as a helper of the "poorest of the poor". The reality, of course, is that Calcutta is far from the poorest place in the world, and there is quite an active, secular, progressive community.

 * Insofar the protests pass all three tests for inclusion -- they are related, match the level of detail of the section in question, and they are unusual and unexpected. Perhaps they are even the first recorded protests against Mother Teresa in India.—Eloquence 21:40, Dec 8, 2003 (UTC)

 * Your proposed compromise works for me.—Eloquence

Erik, give it a rest. This issue is driving you crazy. Please take a few weeks off from MT and take some long walks in the countryside. --Uncle Ed 21:33, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Do you have anything useful to add, Ed?—Eloquence

 * Yes, on these long walks, please take time to smell the flowers. :-) --Uncle Ed 21:51, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Sentimental fool! ;-)—Eloquence

Suggest "pro-choice" -> "pro-abortion"
Summarized: I suggest "pro-abortion" is simpler for "pro-choice" (and of course the mirror "anti-abortion" for pro-life. But below answers this suggestion: [Followup note: Feel free to delete this whole "choice"->"abortion" suggestion if it is too off-topic]

 * Pro-abortion folks call themselves pro-choice; anti-abortion folks call themselves pro-life. These terms are generally used according to the policy of calling people by their preferred name. silsor 02:03, Dec 11, 2003 (UTC)

Both pro-abortion and anti-abortion fail the POV test because using both involves casting value judgments on both sides. Many of those in the former camp strongly refuse claims that they are pro-abortion, merely that they believe that the pregnant woman should have a choice in the matter of the continuation or termination of a pregnancy. Many of those in the latter camp believe their campaign is not one issue-based but entails a larger philosophical belief in a right to life, and that abortion involves two living entities not one. Using pro-abortion risks saying 'I know what you claim, but we are saying you are pro-abortion'. Similarly using anti-abortion risks saying 'I know you claim a larger philiosophical vision, but we are saying you are simply anti-abortion.' Wikipedia rightly decided not to imply judgments on the campaigners on both sides, but simply to use the terms each side uses to describe themselves, allowing the reader, not the writer, to reach opinions on what the words mean. FearÉIREANN 22:11, 11 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Split article ?
I'd like to split this article and take all the criticism paragraphs in a "Criticism against Mother Teresa", so maybe we will be able to delete the annoying POV header. If no objections, I'll try this this week. gbog 03:36, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Gbog, I'm not sure if you are aware that this has been tried before. You might want to read Talk:Criticisms of Mother Teresa and some of the talk archives of this page first to see what the reaction was last time. Angela. 03:48, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Sorry, I didn't know.

 * (another newbie): This talk archive has a lot of ad hominem attacks. The original article seems much better, after comparing it with the talk archive, which is a difficult and rather tedious read. The fact that this talk archive has many paragraphs of someone named Eloquence expositing his ad hominem attacks against someone named jtd (who doesn't even seem to appear) in eloquent detail is likely to be a disincentive for any new blood, I suspect; certainly I'm disincensed to contribute anything. I don't know or care who those two people are, but with so much ad hominem flame war, I'm uninterested in finding out.

 * This would give undue exposure to positive claims about MT, and reduce exposure of negative claims, and is therefore POV and unacceptable.—Eloquence 04:05, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * Imo the actual MT article has biais. I would do two things: remove all pictures but the first one. Shorten criticism to one paragraph.

 * Please read our NPOV policy, as you are clearly unaware of its meaning.—Eloquence 04:19, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * As I am "clearly unaware of NPOV policy" and many other things, I need your explanations: why the hell I do read "The neutrality of this article is disputed" in the very first line of the article ??? (Other silly question: This talk page is very long, takes hours to come to my screen, is it possible to archive part of it?) gbog

 * 75kb was a bit excessive! I've moved 55kb off to archive 3. Hope no-one minds. gbog, I've replied at your talk page too. Angela. 04:40, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * The NPOV dispute tag on this page was not added in consensus, and I do not agree with it.

 * Are those two statements linked or separated?

 * They are linked, of course.—Eloquence

 * Are there many other people thinking like you that this POV header is wrong? If so, why is it there?

 * There are two principal people in this dispute, me and Jt. Jt thinks the header belongs here, I think it doesn't. There are people with less involvement on both sides of the issue.—Eloquence 05:52, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * Reading the discussions, I have the feeling that more than a few wikipedians claim that those photos are pov. Do you need a list? gbog 08:14, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * A list might be useful, but only if it goes back to the very first discussions we've had about this. In any case, you won't find answers by counting heads, given MT's amazing popularity, just like you won't find answers about the historicity of Jesus by asking the people who believe in him.—Eloquence 08:20, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * There can only be a dispute if there is an exchange of arguments, and there are none -- just "I think this is biased" type expressions of emotions. These are to be expected as the article contradicts mainstream perceptions of Mother Teresa.

 * I personnally have no "perceptions" on MT, nor on the Pope or John Lennon. Take JL: what would you say if one third of John Lennon explains that he is evil and why?

 * If there are people who have made this argument, the argument is logically consistent and on-topic, then it should of course be included.—Eloquence

 * Yes they are people making strange arguments. For example, sme said, standing on heavy proofs, that Paul McCartney is dead a long time ago. Should that idea be written on a serious encyclopedia?

 * It is: Paul is dead. But since it is logically inconsistent and easily refuted, it is proper to have it on a separate page. This is not the case for the MT criticisms.—Eloquence

 * Most of criticism argument are easily refuted, see http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1434 and answers. gbog

 * You're being ridiculous. The author confirms most of what Hitchens and other critics have said and then apologizes for it. Apologies such as the claim that people shouldn't get worked up about secret baptisms if they don't believe in them, a grossly offensive statement. Finally, Hitchens has written a detailed response which the author has again responded to with little more than hand waving. Still, if you want to include these "arguments" in the article, feel free to do so (we already link to them), I personally think it only makes MT's defenders look like complete idiots.—Eloquence 06:29, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * I'm "ridiculous" and I look like "complete idiot"... It's quite a pleasure to chat with you, thanks a lot. About the "grossly offensive statement" you argued, would you tell me that anybody praying for people that don't share their beliefs deserve attacks like the ones against MT? And, by the way, do you believe that baptism is much more than a prayer? gbog

 * If you seriously contend that being secretly baptised before your death, without your consent, by a Catholic nun is equivalent to praying for a non-Christian, then yes, that doesn't make you look very informed about the religious sensibilities involved. But as I said, feel free to add this "rebuttal" to the article.—Eloquence 08:20, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * It is now me that is wondering if or not you now what is a NPOV. Do you really think articles should be filled with arguments and rebuttals and counter-rebuttals and so on...? gbog 15:02, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Yes, that's the whole point. If it becomes clear that one position is not tenable, it can be shortened, but generally, we make no claims as to which side is holding the key to the absolute truth. Look, I know you're trying to help, but please familiarize yourself with our basic policies before suggesting sweeping changes to an article about a complex subject. Furthermore, if you have not already done so, please read the whole article, and at least parts of Chatterjee's book, which is available in full text online.—Eloquence 15:26, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * Certainly it is ridiculous in terms of NPOV to propose "shortening the criticism to one paragraph" or "remove all the pictures but the first one".

 * I have read arguments saying that pictures were giving contextual unexplicit biais (or something like that, i don't remember the mane) and I do agree: showing her with bad people she met is heavily biaised. Would you like to see on John Lennon a picture of him visually explaining how "happyness is a warm gun?" :)

 * Bogus example. These pictures show historical events that are relevant to the life and work of MT.—Eloquence

 * Well, what if I think taking drugs or having black mass is relevant to the life and music of JL ?...

 * If you are a published journalist or another authority on JL, if you make a logically consistent argument, and if your opinion is taken seriously by some people, then yes, it merits inclusion. There are much sillier notions which we have articles about, such as the Virgin birth.—Eloquence

 * The opinion that Paul MacCartney is dead (or that the King is still alive) are taken seriously by some people, no?

 * Yes, but they are easily refuted, and as such they have been relegated to separate pages.—Eloquence

 * Yes, it is OK to archive talk pages when they get too long. Just create a new page Talk:Mother Teresa/Archive 3 and cut & paste old discussions into it.—Eloquence 04:41, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

Why is there a POV header?
Eloquence, I try to summarise a little bit our discussion. First, I think we both (and all others) share the same tiny little goal: be able to remove the POV header, that has nothing to do in an "NPOV" encyclopedia.

My simple idea to be able to reach npov would be to shorten the criticism section to one paragraph. Now, it take half the article, which is much. Some parts in her biography (health problems) should be also shortened, as I don't know what for they are here. In my idea, this article should state mainly what she did that made her so well-known, with basic biography one want to know on any celebrities. Even if you don't like her, what nobody care of, the reason there is an article about MT is its celebrity, and the reason of its celebrity is what she made for the poors in India, to say it quickly. If there is debate about some bad things she made, this is interesting and should be noted somewhere, but not in so deep details (not because they are true or false, but because it is not in the intent of any biographical article to describe so deeply any bad things that one might have made).

I read again the article, as you asked me. It's the fourth time I read it and I still feel that it's strangely pointing out some things made by MT that one might not like, exactly as if in John Lennon half of the article were pointing out that he was a crasy megalomaniac, had relationships with bad guys, and proselyted heavily the use of drugs, not counting how awfull is its music :). And, even after discussing the topic with you, I feel that the photos are insidiously advocating the same thing (how nasty she was). Stated frankly, Whaaoo Woonderful Wikipedia doesn't deserve such an article, even if MT herself deserved it. (Even Mao Zedong is less accusing... and I hope you will not claim that you prefer him...)

I am sure you already have many balanced and polite answers to my simple tiny little ideas, and I will read them again, but I would like you to answer also this one silly question: If you are so sure that the actual article is NPOV, why the hell did you accept that ugly POV header? gbog 16:44, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Sorry, it is impossible to have a reasonable discussion if you make preposterous suggestions like "shorten the criticism section to one paragraph". Such a selective removal of facts is the very opposite of NPOV, and can never be the basis for any meaningful or fruitful cooperation. If you did this, you would be no better than any vandal. Furthermore, you offer no factual criticism whatsoever -- you only provided a link to a rebuttal that is so silly, devoid of facts and apologetic that even a devout follower of MT should be embarrassed by it. The fact that you consider this piece of garbage a rebuttal makes me question your own objectivity. In addition to that, the only substantial logical criticism in the two letters, namely that MT probably had to be persuaded to accept sophisticated medical help for herself, refers to a criticism that is not even included in the article!

 * So we have established securely that you don't have any facts to back up your opinion.

 * I do really love this sentence :)) Are you backed by a college of specialists that are allowing you to speak in their name?gbog 18:04, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Prove me wrong. Give me facts.—Eloquence

 * None. You share the understanding, extremely naive at best and malicious at worst, that unconsensual baptisms before death are equivalent to secret praying.

 * Yes, I'm really naive. As I don't believe in God for now, I do think that baptism is any kind of injuring activity that could heart someone. I don't believe in prayers for rain neither... gbog

 * The problem is that the people that were baptised were usually not non-religious. They had a different religion. If you think it is not extremely offensive to a Hindu that one of their loved ones has been secretly baptised as a Catholic shortly before their death, then you know nothing about religion. In the arrogancy that we have come to expect from Catholicism, the nuns declared Hinduism to be little more than heresy, to be replaced by the one true faith.—Eloquence

 * You work on the basis of assumptions what biographical articles should or should not be that are nowhere reflected in Wikipedia's policy. Should we write a whole article about Hitler's love of dogs and great paintings, "but don't mention the war" because it's such a negative thing to be associated with?

 * Maybe you didn't read me as carefully as you should, or maybe I explained myself badly. I think any biographical artical on a given celebrity should explain his/her life and why he/she is well-known. (BTW, please, leave Hitler where he is.)

 * You brought up Mao Zedong, so I'm free to bring up Hitler. The facts in the article are of course useful to explain Mother Teresa's life, but it depends on your perspective. If you disagree with the criticisms, you might find them useless. That's what NPOV is for.

 * It is not the job of an encyclopedia to report only things that are "well known". When we write about Albert Einstein, we don't just write about the theory of relativity just because that's what everyone knows. When we write about Noam Chomsky, we don't just mention his political activism simply because he is most famous for that. It is the job of an encyclopedia to educate and inform, even about little known details of a person's life. Otherwise you might as well stick to the tabloids.—Eloquence

 * You are right, there is maybe no wikipedia policy on biographies, as anyone can open a dictionnary and get the idea.gbog

 * Obviously you can't. Biography: "An account of a person's life written, composed, or produced by another" (American Heritage Dictionary). Nothing about "well known".—Eloquence

 * Of course a biography should contain all relevant criticisms of that person that have been made, the more factual the better. Mao Zedong is not "less accusing", but the negative aspects of his life are more generally accepted, so you don't need a large criticism section but can simply write "Mao's policy XY killed 10 million people".

 * I didn't find this statement...

 * "This, along with severe droughts, caused the Great Leap to fail to meet its goals and resulted in widespread famines in which millions of Chinese died." No attribution.—Eloquence

 * If we wrote "Mother Teresa provided insufficient medical help", however, that would be (rightly) considered POV because there are people who disagree with that statement.

 * Yes, and then the simple solution is to write "Some criticism claim that Mother Teresa provided insufficient medical help" and its fine.

 * And that's exactly what we do, with correct grammar.—Eloquence

 * So this article is in fact less accusing than those about questionable political figures, because it attributes all claims to those who make them.

 * The problem is that these claims take half the article, as I said.

 * I'm sorry Mother Teresa fucked up so badly. But why are you complaining to me about it?—Eloquence

 * The reason I did not remove the NPOV dispute header is that Jtdirl threatened to engage in a long edit war if I did and frankly, I don't care enough about a little tagline to do so.

 * Yes, because you don't seem to care so much on NPOV policies, sorry to be so dense... I do care myself because no articles should have this tagline, I would prefer no articles at all gbog

 * You care about taglines. I care about policy.—Eloquence

 * However, if no real factual criticism of this article is offered within the next week or so, I will remove it.—Eloquence 17:13, Dec 15, 2003 (UTC)

 * I gave factual criticism on this article, and, as Archives show enough, I am far from alone to think so.gbog 18:04, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Yes, you are far from alone to think you have given factual criticism. You are far from alone in being wrong.—Eloquence

The reason, Gbog, that the disputed line is in is because there is a dispute. On the one side is Eloquence, with his personal agenda and determined to force his opinions on everyone as fact. On the other side is Wik, Daniel Quinlan, Pfortuny, Ed Poor, Alexandros, John Kenney, Angela, Alexandros myself, others and now you, all pointing out the glaring flaws in the article but abused, called "rapid MT apologists", in the pay of the Catholic Church, Catholic apologists and the sort of abuse you have now experienced. Eloquence knows little about biographical writing, has a superficial understanding of Catholicism and a personal detestation of MT and her opinions. But he defends his version like Stalin. And insists that everyone else is wrong, and he the only person who is neutral. Everyone else finds it bizarre. But then he does this on many pages touching religious topics. FearÉIREANN 19:49, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Please, no personal attacks. JT paints a wrong picture of the dispute: The facts are not contested. The dispute is whether certain facts should or should not be included in the article. --snoyes 19:59, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Let's see:
 * Alexandros: Thinks "1-3 people in the world" don't like Mother Teresa. Has tried to remove the entire cricisism section and engaged in edit wars while I wasn't even involved in the article, driving away Adam Carr and others.
 * Pfortuny: MT admirer, driven away by arguments
 * Ed Poor: Rev Moon's Unification Church, a religious fundamentalist cult
 * Angela: not involved
 * John Kenney: not involved

So we have 3 people who are clearly partisans. As for yourself, I have already explained where your bias lies. I have always declared my own anti-religious bias.—Eloquence

More Eloquence dubious spinning of 'facts' FearÉIREANN 21:51, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)
 * Alexandros: made mistakes in how he handled the article at the beginning. Left the page after verbal abuse and threats of banning by Eloquence.
 * Pfortuny: one of the most polite and honest wikipedians who never hid his religious beliefs but tried to build a cross community consensus but was driven away by Eloquence's abuse and insults.
 * Ed Poor: one of the most widely respected people on wikipedia, subjected to abuse by Eloquence when he as a professional wikipedian suggested there was a problem with the article's bias and loaded Eloquence-created agenda.
 * Daniel Quinlan: screamed at by Eloquence who told him to "read the fucking article".
 * Wik: someone who shares Eloquence's negative view of religion but who nevertheless said the article was unbalanced.
 * Angela: Another respected wikipedian who agreed that there was a problem with the article but declined to comment on the page, saying she had no wish to step into Eric's firing line, having seen his treatment of Daniel.

 * Alexandros did not just make mistakes in the beginning, he made mistakes until the end (when he engaged in an edit war to restore a version which included even gross anti-Teresa POV). Ironically, when you noticed an edit war on MT, you felt obliged to jump right in, and made the same reverts, restoring anti-Teresa POV in the process. Pfortuny was not driven by abuse, but by my unwillingness to make "compromises" if they are not supported by facts, that is, I won't agree to major changes to the article just to get "peace". Ed is a nice guy, but he is clearly biased (and has said so), and his criticism had no factual substance whatsoever. That's all I've said to him, and it's true. I've apologized to Daniel for not assuming good faith, and we both made some useful NPOV edits to the article.

 * I have explained several times already that many people who do not know much about MT beyond the mainstream image will find this article unbalanced because it gives so much new information. That doesn't mean it actually is unbalanced or POV, of course, and nobody has made a logical argument that it is. Lastly, this present article is the result of work by several contributors, including Adam and yourself, and many have expressed agreement (here and elsewhere) that it is close to being perfectly NPOV. As usual, you are picking the opinions you like and ignoring the ones you don't. As usual, you don't even care if the users in question have made useful contributions to the article or have made major POV edits -- it's all about ostracizing and attacking a single person whom you perceive to be an obstacle in gaining control over this article.—Eloquence 04:58, Dec 16, 2003 (UTC)

many have expressed agreement (here and elsewhere) that it is close to being perfectly NPOV - OK we now have our Ludicrous Claim of the Year on Wikipedia!!! Jeez, talk about blindness. People have been queuing to rubbish the article as flawed, POV-ridden and OTT. I know Erik is determined to wage a war to force his opinion but to dismiss everyone else's opinion, ignore all the criticism, swear at people, threaten bans, and then imagine that the article is "close to being perfectly NPOV" is bizarre in the extreme. If nothing else his attempts at biographical writing here form an almost perfect example how not to write a biographical article. But then in true Eloquent style he will probably interpret the above as meaning that he is in line to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. FearÉIREANN

---

title: Talk:Mother Teresa/Archive 5


text:
Talk:Elk Grove, Wisconsin

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Lucky Jim

Lucky Jim is a novel by Kingsley Amis, first published in 1954 by Victor Gollancz. It was Amis's first novel and won the 1955 Somerset Maugham Award for fiction. The novel follows the academic and romantic tribulations of the eponymous James (Jim) Dixon, a reluctant history lecturer at an unnamed provincial English university.

Amis arrived at Dixon's surname from 12 Dixon Drive, Leicester, the address of Philip Larkin from 1948 to 1950, while he was a librarian at the university there. Lucky Jim is dedicated to Larkin, who helped to inspire the main character and contributed significantly to the structure of the novel.

Time magazine included Lucky Jim in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.

Plot
Jim Dixon is a lecturer in medieval history at a red brick university in the English Midlands. He has made an unsure start and, towards the end of the academic year, is concerned about losing his probationary position in the department. In his attempt to be awarded a permanent post he tries to maintain a good relationship with his absent-minded head of department, Professor Welch. To establish his credentials he must also ensure the publication of his first scholarly article, but he eventually discovers that the editor to whom he submitted it has translated it into Italian and passed it off as his own.

Dixon struggles with an on-again off-again "girlfriend", Margaret Peel, a fellow lecturer who is recovering from a suicide attempt in the wake of a broken relationship with another man and implies she might make another attempt if Dixon left her. Margaret employs emotional blackmail to appeal to Dixon's sense of duty and pity while keeping him in an ambiguous and sexless limbo. While she is staying with Professor Welch, he holds a musical weekend that seems to offer an opportunity for Dixon to advance his standing among his colleagues. The attempt goes wrong, however, and the drunken Dixon drops a lighted cigarette on the bed, burning a hole in the sheets.

During the same weekend Dixon meets Christine Callaghan, a young Londoner and the latest girlfriend of Professor Welch's son, Bertrand, an amateur painter whose affectedness particularly infuriates Dixon. After a bad start Dixon realises that he is attracted to Christine, who is far less pretentious than she initially appears.

Dixon's growing closeness to Christine upsets Bertrand, who is using her to reach her well-connected Scottish uncle, Julius Gore-Urquhart, and get a job from him. Then Dixon rescues Christine from the university's annual dance after Bertrand treats her offhandedly, and takes her home in a taxi. The pair kiss and make a date for later, but Christine admits that she feels guilty about seeing Dixon behind Bertrand's back and about Dixon's supposed relationship with Margaret. The two decide not to see each other again, but when Bertrand calls on Dixon to "warn him off the grass" he cannot resist the temptation to quarrel with Bertrand, until they fight.

The novel reaches its climax during Dixon's public lecture on "Merrie England". Having attempted to calm his nerves by drinking too much, partially at the urging of Gore-Urquhart, he caps his uncertain performance by angrily mocking and denouncing the university culture of arty pretentiousness and passes out. Welch lets Dixon know privately that his employment will not be extended, but Gore-Urquhart offers Dixon the coveted job of assisting him in London. Later Dixon meets Margaret's ex-boyfriend, who reveals that he had not been her fiancé, as she had claimed. Comparing notes, the two realise that the suicide attempt was faked as a piece of neurotic emotional blackmail.

Feeling free of Margaret at last, Dixon responds to Christine's phoned request to see her off as she leaves for London. There he learns from her that she is leaving Bertrand after being told that he was having an affair with the wife of one of Dixon's former colleagues. They decide to leave for London together and then walk off arm in arm, outraging the Welches as they pass on the street.

Literary significance and legacy
When originally published, Lucky Jim received enthusiastic reviews. In the New Statesman, Walter Allen wrote, "Mr Amis has an unwaveringly merciless eye for the bogus: some aspects of provincial culture – the madrigals and recorders of Professor Welch, for instance – are pinned down as accurately as they have ever been; and he has, too, an eye for character – the female lecturer Margaret, who battens neurotically on Jim's pity, is quite horribly well done. Mr Amis is a novelist of formidable and uncomfortable talent."

W. Somerset Maugham praised Amis' writing while disdaining the new generation he represented: "Mr. Kingsley Amis is so talented, his observation is so keen, that you cannot fail to be convinced that the young men he so brilliantly describes truly represent the class with which his novel is concerned... They have no manners, and are woefully unable to deal with any social predicament. Their idea of a celebration is to go to a public bar and drink six beers. They are mean, malicious and envious... They are scum."

In response to Maugham's criticism of the new generation, the New Statesman and The Nation held contests to get readers to respond to Maugham in the voice of Jim Dixon.

Retrospective reviews have solidified its legacy as one of Amis' finest novels. Christopher Hitchens described it as the funniest book of the second half of the 20th century, writing: "Lucky Jim illustrates a crucial human difference between the little guy and the small man. And Dixon, like his creator, was no clown but a man of feeling after all."

Olivia Laing, writing in The Guardian: "Remarkable for its relentless skewering of artifice and pretension, Lucky Jim also contains some of the finest comic set pieces in the language."

Margaret Drabble, although defending Monica Jones, Philip Larkin's paramour, against Amis's caricature of her in Lucky Jim, wrote in the New Statesman that "Monica as Margaret Peel, a needy, dowdy academic spinster, was the version that first lodged in my consciousness, as a scarecrow alarming enough to warn any woman off the academic life".

Adam Gopnik, writing in The New Yorker, wrote that the vacant Professor Welch was at least partially modeled on Oxford professor J. R. R. Tolkien, who his students, Amis and Larkin, had found to be tedious and almost unintelligible.

Film and television adaptations
In the 1957 British film adaptation, Jim Dixon was played by Ian Carmichael. Keith Barron starred in Further Adventures of Lucky Jim, a 1967 seven-episode BBC TV series based on the character and set in the "swinging London" of 1967. This was followed by The Further Adventures of Lucky Jim in 1982, but with Enn Reitel as Jim. In 2003, ITV aired a remake of Lucky Jim with Stephen Tompkinson playing the central character.

title: Lucky Jim


text:
User:Brent Gulanowski/Categorization

Introduction
I propose a self-organizing system, using contributors as the agents of course, which would work similarly to the Colon or UDC but with some variations to take advantage of the computerized storage and retrieval. The idea is to find a relationship between pages that is more fundamental than simple links, which are fragile and somewhat incidental, and very chaotic. Their nature as a network is exceptionally powerful, but too disorganized to be used as a basis for classification.

Motivations
The inadequacy of links for organizing articles is the motivation for categorization of some kind. So the first instinct is to emulate a library. But if pages are categorized according to a proper tree-like structure, as implicit in LC or DDS, the problem is how to choose which branch to place them on when they could qualify for multiple branches. Well, why not put them on multiple branches? Further, many classification systems are top-down. I propose a more organic approach, combining top-down and bottom-up.

The primary reason for proposing this system is to ensure that a user of the wikipedia can see, at a glance, all pages which relate to a particular page that they are reading or a topic that they are interested in. Users should be spared the necessity of following links or performing fruitless searches in the cases where their unfamiliarity with a subject means they do not even know the terms for which they are searching.

Requirements
Ideally you would like a classification system which would allow the insertion of an article on any subject at any level of detail. Both of these qualities are entirely relative -- especially detail level. Although users and contributors will bring their own sense of subjects and level of detail, it might be nice to try to keep the wikipedia articles organized as much as possible only in relation to one another, and less to inferred external repositories. In which case, a classification algorithm would be advised to relate pages, as much as possible, explicitly to other pages. As the system grows, re-organization can be expected to naturally shape the graph according to user and contributor expectations anyway.

Starting Point
Of course, there is already a framework, because there is already a set of classification-related pages, starting with the main page. The main page is the root of the classification tree. By definition it encompasses all pages and all categories, and so it will change if any second-level categories are created or destroyed, but there will always and forever only be one main category page. Ideally the main page will be the pre-eminent example of a special page: a pure category page, which has no information about anything except the categories beneath it, and any other useful meta-data that should be placed there. In the case of the main page, meta-data includes links to the whole set of wiki meta pages: FAQs, welcome, community, etc.

The algorithm

 * 1) The repository begins with a single category: the main category. In a theoretical model, this category starts with one page. The main category has a pure category page called "all" and this page refers only to itself. The "category: all" page is simultaneously a member of the set called "category", in which all subsequent category pages will also be placed. All category pages have a list of links to content pages which are top-level members of that category proper, as well as a link to the category pages immediately above it, and to all proper sub-categories below it.
 * 2) *It is a debatable question whether one should inter-mingle category and content information on the same page. A strict system would separate them, but there is no problem with combining them.
 * 3) As pages are written, they will always be added to one or more categories, either directly, by selecting an existing category, or indirectly, by explicit association with an existing page. If the associated page belongs to multiple categories, the new page can either be a member of one, some, or all of those categories. Categories can always be changed later, but it might make sense to make the initially selected category permanently recorded. It might also be useful to define a default or primary category which is also more sticky than others, to help avoid pages getting lost. Some facility for such categorization will be necessary: menus, text field entry, or the like. (Some user interface expert would determine that.)
 * 4) *Pages which are members of multiple categories will implicitly define intersection sets of those categories, which one might term cross categories or something similar. It would be beneficial to define these in a manner similar to that of proper sub-categories (with a unique ID), as described below, but not strictly necessary. More thought is needed.
 * 5) As categories grow in size (that is, as the number of members, in the set which describes the category, grows), it will be sensible to introduce proper sub-categories for sets of related pages of some specialization. Each new sub-category will be given a permanent unique identifier, used by the system, and a name, given by the contributor who defines the category, subject to editorial change later, as with title of any page. The sub-category will be automatically provided a category page and the parent category page will be updated to reflect the new sub-category: member page links will be removed and replaced with a link to the sub-category. However, links on other category pages will be unchanged. Re-categorization of a page in a proper sub-category might be restricted to pages which had initially had the parent category as their primary category, if such is implemented.
 * 6) *If a page is added to the wiki without being assigned a category (unlikely, but it should be an option), then it will get appended to a default category, to avoid having the main page filled up with "orphan" pages. It seems likely that active users will quickly sort these orphans into suitable homes.

Related Links

 * Library classification
 * Graph theory
 * Set theory
 * Ordered tree data structure

I have added significant explanatory and discussion material to the talk page, under the heading "addenda to the proposal". Please see that material for implications, extrapolations, and altogether more stuff, which may be partly redundant but attempts to be much more detailed for the sake of having arguments and determing how to (or how not to) actually implement a category scheme.

Brent Gulanowski 00:10, 17 Dec 2003 (UTC)

title: User:Brent Gulanowski/Categorization


text:
Abdul Majid

ʻAbd al-Majīd (ALA-LC romanization of عبد المجيد, ), also spelled as Abd ul Majid, Abd ul-Majid, Abd ol Majid, Abd ol-Majid, and Abdolmajid, is a Muslim male given name and, in modern usage, surname. It is built from the Arabic words ʻabd and al-Majīd, one of the names of God in the Qur'an, which give rise to the Muslim theophoric names. It means "servant of the All-glorious". It is rendered in Turkish as Abdülmecid.

There is a distinct but closely related name, ʻAbd al-Mājid (عبد الماجد), with a similar meaning, formed on the Qur'anic name al-Mājid. Some of the names below are instance of the latter one.

'Abd al-Majid may refer to:

Given name

 * Abdülmecid I (1823–1861), Sultan of the Ottoman Empire
 * Abdülmecid II (1868–1944), Head of the Ottoman Imperial House and the final Ottoman Caliph
 * Abdul Madzhid (Dagestan rebel) (died 2008), leader in the Second Chechen War
 * Abdul Majeed (cricketer, born 1993), Pakistani cricketer
 * Abdul Majeed (Kalat cricketer), Pakistani cricketer
 * Abdul Majid (physicist), Pakistani astrophysicist
 * Abdel Meguid Amir (born 1961), Egyptian basketball player
 * Abdelmajid Benjelloun (1919–1981), Moroccan novelist, journalist and ambassador
 * Abdelmajid Benjelloun (historian) (born 1944), Moroccan author, historian and poet
 * Abdelmajid Bourebbou (born 1951), Algerian footballer
 * Abdelmajid Bouyboud (born 1966), Moroccan footballer
 * Abdelmajid Chetali (born 1939), Tunisian footballer
 * Abdelmajid Dahoumane (born 1967), Algerian alleged terrorist
 * Abdul Majid Daryabadi (1892–1977), Indian Muslim writer and exegete of the Qur'an
 * Abdul Majeed Didi (1873–1952), Sultan of the Maldives
 * Abdelmajid Dolmy (born 1953), Moroccan footballer
 * Abdulmajid Dostiev, Tajik diplomat
 * Abdelmajid Eddine (born 1979), Moroccan footballer
 * Abdul Majid Giaka (born 1960), Libyan double-agent for the CIA
 * Abdul Majid Hassan (ca. 1380–1408), Sultan of Brunei
 * Abd el-Majid Hidr, original name of Amos Yarkoni (1920–1991), Israeli Arab soldier
 * Abdul Majid Khan (born 1953), Afghan held in Bagram
 * Abdul-Majid al-Khoei (1962–2003), Iraqi Twelver cleric
 * Abdul Majeed Khwaja (1885–1962), Indian lawyer, educationist, social reformer and freedom fighter
 * Abdul Majid Kubar (born 1909), Libyan politician
 * Abdelmadjid Mada (born 1953), Algerian runner
 * Abdul Majid Mahmoud (born 1979), Pakistani held in Guantanamo
 * Abdol Majid Majidi (1928–2014), Iranian politician
 * Abdol Majid Mirza (1845–1927), Qajar prince and Prime Minister of Iran
 * Abdul Majid Muhammed (born 1978), Iranian held in Guantanamo
 * Abdelmajid Oulmers (born 1978), Moroccan footballer
 * Abdul Majid al-Qa′ud (born 1943), Libyan politician
 * Abdul Majid Rouzi, Afghan soldier
 * Abdelmajid Saleh, Lebanese politician
 * Abdul Majid Samim, Afghan politician
 * Abdul Majeed bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (1942–2007), Saudi prince
 * Abdelmadjid Tahraoui (born 1981), Algerian footballer
 * Abdol Majid Taleqani (c. 1737/8–1771/2), Iranian calligrapher
 * Abdelmadjid Tebboune, President of Algeria
 * Abdul Majid Zabuli (1896–1998), Afghan banker
 * 'Abd al-Majid Nimer Zaghmout (died 2000), Palestinian imprisoned in Syria
 * Abdul Majeed al-Zindani (born 1942), Yemeni academic and politician

Surname

 * Ahmed Asmat Abdel-Meguid (born 1923), Egyptian diplomat
 * Ali Hassan Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti, or just Ali Hassan al-Majid (1941–2010), Iraqi politician
 * Atif Abdelmageed
 * Bassam Abdel Majeed (born 1950), Syrian politician
 * Chaudhry Abdul Majeed (died 2006), Pakistani nuclear physicist
 * Chaudhry Abdul Majid, Pakistani Kashmiri politician
 * Hussein 'Abd al-Majid (disappeared 1936), Iraqi, Saddam Hussein's father
 * Khalid ‘Abd al-Majid, Palestinian politician
 * M. N. Abdul Majeed (born 1957), Sri Lankan politician
 * Munshi Abdul Majid (born 1952), Afghan politician
 * Qazi Abdul Majeed Abid, Pakistani politician
 * S. M. Abdul Majid, Indian politician
 * Shah Abdul Majid Qureshi, Bangladeshi restaurateur and social reformer
 * Syed Abdul Majid (1872–1922), Bengali lawyer, politician and entrepreneur
 * Tun Habib Abdul Majid (1637–1697), Bendahara of the Johor Sultanate
 * Tunku Abdul Majid (born 1970), Tunku Bendahara of Johor

Females

 * Iman Mohamed Abdulmajid, or Iman (model), (born 1955), Somali-American model, actress and entrepreneur
 * Asia Abdelmajid, Sudanese actress

title: Abdul Majid


text:
99 Flake

A 99 Flake, 99 or ninety-nine is an ice cream cone with a Cadbury Flake inserted in the ice cream. The term can also refer to the half-sized Cadbury-produced Flake bar, itself specially made for such ice cream cones, and to a wrapped product marketed by Cadbury “for ice cream and culinary use”.

Created at the Cadbury's factory in Birmingham, England, the flake was originally designed to be a cuboid and to fit into a wafer. By 1930, Cadbury's was selling half-length Flake "99s" specifically for serving in an ice cream cone.

'99' ice cream

A 99 Flake is an ice cream cone, usually made with soft serve ice cream, into which a Flake bar has been inserted. The ice cream is usually vanilla flavoured. They are sold by ice cream vans and parlours. Variations include a 99 with two flakes – often referred to as a "double 99" or "bunny's ears" – and a 99 with strawberry or raspberry syrup on top, sometimes known as "monkey's blood".

Cadbury 99 Flake bar
The Flake chocolate bar manufactured and marketed by Cadbury was first developed in the UK in 1920. An employee of Cadbury's noted that when the excess chocolate from the moulds used to create other chocolate bars was drained off, it fell off in a stream and created folded chocolate with flaking properties.

The early "99 Flake" was a wafer "sandwich", not a flake bar inserted into a cone of ice cream. It consisted of a small chocolate flake inserted between two servings of ice cream and placed between two wafer biscuits.

In 1930, Cadbury started producing a smaller version of the standard Flake bar especially for use with ice cream cones. These were marketed under the name 99 Flake and sold loose in boxes rather than individually wrapped like the traditional Flake.

Name
The origins of the name are uncertain. One claim is that it was coined in Portobello, Scotland, where Stefano Arcari who had opened a shop in 1922 at 99 Portobello High Street – would break a large "Flake" in half and stick it in an ice cream. The name derived from the shop's address. A Cadbury representative took the naming idea to his company. Another address-based claim for the "99" is made by the Dunkerleys in Gorton, Manchester, who operated a sweet shop at 99 Wellington Street.

Another naming possibility is that it was named by immigrant Italian ice-cream sellers, many of whom were from the mountainous areas in Veneto, especially in the Bellunes Alps, Trentino, and Friuli. The name was in honour of the final wave of Italian First World War conscripts, born in 1899 and referred to as "i Ragazzi del 99" ("the Boys of '99"). In Italy they were held in such high esteem that some streets were named in their honour. The chocolate flake may have reminded the ice cream sellers of the long dark feather cocked at an angle in the conscripts' Alpini Regiment hats.

The Cadbury website says that the reason behind the Flake being called a "99" has been "lost in the mists of time". However, the website also references an article from an old Cadbury works paper, which states that the name came from the guard of the Italian king, which consisted of 99 men and thus "anything really special or first class was known as 99."

title: 99 Flake