Talk:1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack/Archive 1

message: One weakness of the – otherwise solidly researched – article is that it presents "Osho's followers" as one homogeneous block, using phrases such as "Followers of Osho had hoped to incapacitate the voting population", "Osho's followers sought after two of three county seats (and) they decided to incapacitate voters", "clinical laboratory operated by the Rajneeshee movement", etc. These were not the "actions of the Rajneeshee movement" any more than the Nixon administration's crimes were the "actions of the American people". As in that case, the criminal activities committed were a strongly guarded secret within Rajneeshpuram, and the reason they were kept secret was that the vast majority of residents there (including a recent Indian secretary of state, as well as a chairman of a White House commission) would have had no truck with any of these shenanigans. I would welcome a discussion as to how we could remedy this. -- Jayen466 20:42, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That should be a relatively easy fix, I will try to remedy this shortly.  Cirt (talk) 23:17, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Some actions do apply to all of Osho's followers, such as the "Share-A-Ride" tactic and other tactics, which the entire organization simply must have been aware of.  Others, perhaps they were not all aware of and implicitly involved in, and I will make corrections explicitly to those points.  Cirt (talk) 23:44, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: A number of sannyasins thought the homeless scheme quite barmy; FitzGerald reports that about half the contacts she had made on the Ranch left the Ranch (not the movement, necessarily) before matters came to a head. It is much as with any other policy that your local or national government may pursue; the fact that it happens does not mean thatityou and everyone else in your neighborhood agrees with it, or thinks it's a swell idea. -- Jayen466 00:00, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, made some fixes.  Good suggestion, read a little bit better now.  Cirt (talk) 23:46, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: In any event, I made some adjustments in the article and I think that particular issue reads find now.  Cirt (talk) 00:01, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Still not quite there, IMO. For one, the people in Rajneeshpuram represented a small percentage (about 1 to 5%) of sannyasins. This is based on Carter, p. 122, who gives the resident sannyasin population of Rajneeshpuram (excluding festival visitors) as ranging from 200 to 2500 max.; the Osho movement, at the time, had at least 50,000, probably more like 100,000 members worldwide. By saing "Osho's followers had previously moved ..." etc. it is a little bit like saying, "Muhammad's followers were responsible for 9/11", a statement that is vastly more wrong than it is right. -- Jayen466 22:25, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Osho's followers" 

message: Let's take a look at how other secondary sources refer to the incident, and the group involved:
# U.S. Biodefense and Homeland Security Toward Detection and Attribution - "The Rajneeshee Cult Biological Attacks". - (Bernett)
#The Bioterrorism Threat By Non-State Actors - "The Rajneeshee Cult". (Thompson)
# Bioterrorism and Biocrimes - "The Rajneeshees also tried to contaminate the water system in The Dalles." - (Carus)
#Food Safety: Old Habits, New Perspectives - "Nevertheless, its current low profile as a food-borne pathogen may make B. anthracis a tantalizing tool for bioterrorists who, like the Rajneesh cult, wish to tamper with our food supply." - (Entis)
#Betrayal of Trust: The Collapse of Global Public Health - "And on the eve of the county election, hoping to make hostile voters too ill to go to their polling booths, the Rajneesh followers put the bacteria in dressings at salad bars in the county's ten most popular restaurants." - (Garrett)
#Terrorism on American Soil: A Concise History of Plots and Perpetrators from the Famous to the Forgotten - "The first official use of salmonella by the Rajneeshees occurred on August 29, 1984, when the three sitting Wasco County commissioners came to Rajneeshpuram to collect information about the cult's operation to assist in their decision-making on matters before their board." - (McCann)
#Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War - "The Rajneesh crowd had chosen one of the mildest pathogens and had ignored the airborne delivery of biological agents - the traditional and most effective way of mobilizing microbes for war." - (Miller)
I think we can safely say that this sort of wording is used in reliable secondary sources as well.  Cirt (talk) 06:02, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Examples of wording usage in secondary sources 

message: Sorry, I don't really know how to use this, and I edited the article, so you might want to put it back. But I do think it's based on very faulty claims. As you point out, the original investigators believed that the outbreak was caused by poor food handling. This was largely because there were other outbreaks about the same time in other areas of Oregon and Washington that no one claimed was related to sannyasins. No one has ever been convicted of the crime and no evidence has ever been presented in a court linking the outbreak in The Dalles to the Ranch. So your article as it stands is defamatory to a lot of people. The story of a discovery of the guitly sample, for example, is pure fabrication. I have a copy of the actual police report of the search. The sample was found in the medical lab where it was being used to conduct tests. This was what it was sold for. There was no evidence that salmonella had ever been cultured so it could be used for contamination purposes. Searces were done, powder was scraped off of lab equipment, but no traces of salmonella was ever found. I have those reports too. The story about salmonellla that came through Osho was a report by one woman that she had been asked to contaminate the water supply in The Dalles, but that she didn't do it. Her claim was never verified. (I know her, and she is a bit emotionally challenged.) There were no claims at that point that this was connected to the salad bar contaminations. Those claims didn't arise till two people, David Knapp and Ava (something) turned state's evidence and tried to get off by testifying to what they thought was wanted. Ava, I believe, managed to get off completely, but Knapp still had to serve some time. Given Weaver's insistence that sannayasins were responsible for the poisonings, it's no suprise that these two offered to confess to this very politicized incident. A close examination of the two stories however shows that they both contradict each other and are inconsistent with the evidence. Ava, for example, claimed to have poisoned the milk in a restaurant. The fact that milk had been contaminated had been reported in the press, but Ava got the restaurant wrong. The original investigator said, I believe in the JAMA article, that he wouldn't have believed it if there hadn't been these confessions. But, since these two had a good reason to lie--to get deals with the prosecution--that wasn't a good reason to change his opinion. Their very faulty testimony is the only evidence existing that any intentional contamination occurred. It isn't illegal for a legal medical lab to own an openly purchased sample of salmonella for a strain that had cause recent outbreaks. It would have been negligent for the lab not to have been testing for that strain. Most importantly, these incidents never happened around election time. This was explained by saying they were dry runs, but since they actually worked, why weren't they done around the time of the elections? It is hardly fair to smear an entire community on this kind of nonproof. Two very dishonest people (remember, they were involved in crimnal activity) tried to save themselves by slandering the community they had already betrayed. If you want to write about them, write about them, but don't write about a community whose main activiy was ecological reclamation and an attempt to build something beautiful.SangeetD (talk) 23:03, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I can't resist adding one thing here -- I know it is hopelessly WP:OR -- but the salmonella samples were claimed to have been found in a Rajneeshee laboratory a full year after the poisonings had taken place. Isn't that a little strange? Why would criminals hold on to evidence of their crime for a full year, nurturing this salmonella culture all this time rather than throwing it away, and then escape the scene a year later for fear of being arrested, yet leaving this evidence in plain sight for officials to find?? -- Jayen466 23:18, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Biased? 

message: Please note that Wikipedia is not a discussion forum to discuss personal opinions about articles and historical events.  If you have a specific point about a sentence or source used in the article, by all means, please discuss it on the talk page.  Thanks.  Cirt (talk) 03:11, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[WP:NOT#FORUM]] 

message: This article is a great addition to WP. I think the title should be Rajneeshee bioterror attack (1984), however I've experienced the frustration of articles getting renamed multiple times, so I won't change it myself unless there's a broad consensus. Thanks for adding an important event in Oregon's history to the encyclopedia. -Pete (talk) 19:20, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: On the same topic, I wonder about the use of the word "terrorism." From the lead, it seems that this was an attempt to strategically steal an election which, while repugnant, is not the same thing as terrorism. If the goal of the action was not to strike fear into a population, I don't understand why the title of the article should include "terror." -Pete (talk) 19:25, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The incident has frequently been referred to as the first bioterrorism attack on US soil, so it is not Wikipedia that is inventing that moniker for it. I believe the Rajneeshees are still listed as a terrorist organisation by the US government -- a fact that causes some puzzlement in India, but true nonetheless. -- Jayen466 21:06, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Incidentally, the statement that it was the first bioterrorism attack on American soil is technically incorrect; cf.    and many others.   —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jayen466 (talk • contribs) 23:36, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

text: Yes, many many sources use the word "terrorism" to describe it, one even discusses use of the term, and decided that, because it was an act of violence intended to influence a specific political outcome, it fit the very definition of terrorism.  I will find that specific source for you.  By the way, thanks for the compliments on the article I created.  Cirt (talk) 21:20, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Excellent addition 

message: I am aware that we are currently switching from "Bhagwan (Shree Rajneesh)" to "Osho" and back. We should standardise on one name and use this consistently throughout, except for the intro, where both names should be mentioned. -- Jayen466 11:32, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bhagwan/Osho 

message: *, I request that in the future, your new comments go at the bottom of whatever thread you are posting in.  When you post new comments in between other people's comments, it becomes much more difficult to follow each line of discussion.  Thank you, Cirt (talk) 11:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No problem, my bad. -- Jayen466 11:56, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks.  Cirt (talk) 12:00, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry about messing up the Harvard cites earlier. I haven't been in the habit of using them and only noticed your edit comments just now. -- Jayen466 12:01, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Apology accepted, thanks.  Cirt (talk) 12:03, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Interposing new comments in between others 

message: "According to Deadly Cultures: Biological Weapons Since 1945, these are the only two confirmed uses of biological weapons for terrorist purposes to harm humans."
This sentence is accurate, as per this text from this source:
There have been only two confirmed attempts to use BW for terrorist purposes targeting humans: the 1984 use of Salmonella by the Rajneesh cult in Oregon, and the 1990-1995 attempted use of anthrax and botulinum toxin by the Aum Shinrikyo cult in Tokyo.  A third incident, the alleged use of a variety of infectious diseases against Native Americans in the Amazon basin during the 1950s and 1960s, is probably but not yet firmly established.  A fourth incident, the 2001 anthrax letter attacks in the US, may be bioterrorism or biocriminality, determination of which must await the identification of the perpetrator(s) and motive.
*
Cirt (talk) 12:08, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The book explicitly limits its purview to the period after 1945, it does not cover the entire human history of biological warfare and terrorism; the addition of "in recent history" corrected this, as does, to a slightly lesser extent, the naming of the book's title. (By the way, just in case you weren't sure, the wording "electrical effect" in the earlier edit was not mine, but FitzGerald's.) -- Jayen466 12:28, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the attribution I gave the beginning of the sentence makes it read fine in its present state.  And if you did not create the wording "electrical effect", then it should either have been part of a quotation, or paraphrased.  Cirt (talk) 12:30, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Only two confirmed uses of [[biological weapons]] for terrorist purposes to harm humans 

message: *Do we really need this phrase in the article?  It sounds more like sensationalism than anything else, and it does not contribute any additional factual or specific information.  Cirt (talk) 12:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Electrical effect? 

message: By all accounts, sarin is a chemical weapon (a nerve gas), not a biological weapon; hence I've deleted, for now, the references describing this incident and the Tokyo subway attack as the "only two" bioterror incidents. -- Jayen466 18:10, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sarin 

message: "Osho's followers had previously moved into the city of Antelope, Oregon in Wasco County, and had taken over political control, establishing a main presence at the Big Muddy Ranch, which was legally incorporated as the city of Rajneeshpuram.[6][7] The organization sought to gain political control over the rest of Wasco County by influencing the November 1984 county election." Could you double-check your sources there? This sounds a bit as though Rajneeshees had first moved into Antelope, taken control there, and then moved to the Big Muddy Ranch. What happened was, IIRC, that they bought the Big Muddy Ranch for $6 million, but soon ran into problems with zoning and construction permits, which prevented their erecting buildings on their land. I believe it was at that point that they started buying up empty houses in Antelope, until they actually represented the majority of the (very small, just a few dozen) Antelope population, and started to set up various offices or functions there which they were not permitted to have on their own land. -- Jayen466 23:31, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Planning section 

message: Curt, please have a look at the "Salmonella poisoning" section. I took out a sentence that did not seem to belong there -- you may accidentally have inserted it there when trying to source the preceding sentence. If so, the source needs to be reinserted (at present, the first sentences of the section are unsourced). Thanks. -- Jayen466 13:43, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removed sentence 

message: Bolding is emphasis added to quotes :
#
#:"1985 - Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh deported and fined $400,000"
#
#:"The Bhagwan was indicted on federal immigration charges and deported to India."
#
#:"In 1984, Mr. Greene was detailed to the Portland, Oregon district office to supervise the criminal investigation of the Indian guru, Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, whose cult had taken over a small town in Central Oregon. This investigation, which began in 1981, resulted in the criminal convictions and deportations of the guru and many of his principle followers."
*The very website of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement refers to Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh as being deported from the United States, not "allowed to leave."  Cirt (talk) 20:05, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Government sources also describe Osho (AKA Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh) as "deported" and not simply "allowed to leave" 

message: There is an ambiguity in our sentence, 
He claimed that Sheela said "she had talked with Bhagwan about the plot to decrease voter turnout in The Dalles by making people sick. Sheela said that Bhagwan commented that it was best not to hurt people, but if a few died not to worry."
The ambiguity lies in who said "not to worry", Sheela or Bhagwan. There is another version of these events on page 30 of Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War. This describes that Sheela played doubters a tape to "prove" that Bhagwan would be fine with poisonings:
"If it was necessary to do things to preserve (the Bhagwan's) vision, then do it," KD reported the guru as saying on the muffled tape. Sheela had interpreted this to mean that killing people in the name of the guru was fine. If a few people had to die so that the Bhagwan's message could prevail, the disciples were "not to worry,"  Sheela told doubters at the meeting.
This source clearly attributes the words "not to worry" to Sheela, and not to Bhagwan. I wonder if there is an elegant way we could reflect this in our text, and remove this ambiguity.
We also now have rather a lot of statements that "most sannyasins" believed that Osho knew about or condoned Sheela's actions. I would like to point out that there are equally reputable statements to the contrary in the literature, e.g. FitzGerald, p. 378,
"They (sannyasins) also believed that they themselves would never have done violence to anyone on Sheela's orders. The open question was how many of them would have committed crimes if they thought the guru wanted them to. For most of them this was a nonquestion, as they believed Rajneesh incapable of doing, or willing, violence against another person.
However, rather than adding counterbalancing statements of this sort, I think the article would benefit more from removing some of the srecently added statements to the opposite effect, to restore balance. Would appreciate your thoughts on this. -- Jayen466 21:58, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Not to worry" 

message: Hi, your delinquent GA reviewer here. Perhaps luckily for the article, I was occupied with other duties for too long a time to get to the review in an expedient fashion. I just want to confirm that the RFC truly is agreed to be finished, and that the article is stable enough for review. Please let me know, and I'll get to it right away. Regards, VanTucky talk 20:49, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Confirmation of status for GA review 

message: I removed the italics from the serovar.  Left it when it is used as the specific epithet.  I think this is standard.  (Amaltheus (talk) 05:48, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Serovar 

message: Cirt, if it's of interest to you, Sheela now runs a nursing home in Switzerland: http://www.matrusaden.ch/ Puja I don't know anything about. Jayen466 00:29, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, that has been reported in a couple secondary sources, I'll add it soon.  Cirt (talk) 00:34, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sheela 

message: Some more details on the new-born victim that would be worth including: Carter has "... an infant born two days after his mother's infection survived only after "emergency, continuous and specialized care". He was initially given a 5 percent chance of survival." Jayen466 10:59, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks.  Page number/full cite in case that url doesn't work at some point?  Cirt (talk) 11:03, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Nevermind, it appears to be Page 224 from the (1990) ed., .  Cirt (talk) 11:05, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yep, sorry. Page 224 it is. Jayen466 11:08, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  New-born 

message: The sentence "The Rajneeshees eventually withdrew their candidate from the November 1984 ballot, and the salmonella poisoning did not have the desired effect on the election" does not quite hit the mark. As we state elsewhere in the article, the two poisonings appear to have been test runs (Carter pp. 225–226); as such they were not meant to affect the election, but were meant to establish feasibility. The commune decided on October 25 to boycott the election, following the emergency changes in voter registration (initiated by secretary of state Norma Paulus, according to Carter, p. 220–221) that ensured that the street people would not be certified to vote, rendering the whole issue moot (and probably saving The Dalles from another attack nearer election day). Carter quotes a ranch resident who claimed he ran a computer simulation of the election; even with the street people voting, they thought they would be 700 votes shy of winning; another salmonella attack was considered a potential means to incapacitate the balance (p. 226). Jayen466 13:44, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, will take a look at that.  (There are other sources besides Carter, ya know. :) j/k)  Cirt (talk) 13:47, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The current wording is supported by the WP:RS/WP:V secondary source, cited at the end of the sentence, Terrorism on American Soil, (McCann), Page 156 and Page 158.  Cirt (talk) 13:52, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Great, that's fixed that. Jayen466 13:56, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: , nice.  Cirt (talk) 13:57, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  ... did not have the desired effect on the election 

message: I am not impressed with the Garrett as an encyclopedic source. The narrative seems unreliable; the text states e.g. the salmonella were placed on the eve of the county election (!). That might sound logical, but is not what happened. The cover says, "Reads like a Robert Ludlum thriller" ... Jayen466 18:44, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Charges/allegations: drat it, you're right, I thought so too, but Gordon wrote "charges" and I left it. Better now. Jayen466 01:46, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Is there a specific place where the Garrett source is currently used that you take issue with?  Cirt (talk) 02:43, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Still looking things up, please bear with me. I changed the supply source for the Typhimurium, both Carus and Miller are positive it came from VWR Scientific rather than ATCC. (The 172.159.72.212 edits are mine, WP had logged me out.) Jayen466 15:27, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Garrett 

message: Hi Cirt, re the water system -- Carus (Bioterrorism and Biocrimes) actually describes an attempt that was made (not just planned) to poison the water system: so this was not just planned, but executed (page 57). Flaccus has "The cult members had planned to contaminate The Dalles' water supply." but does not refer to any timing to coincide with Election Day (so then we would run afoul of WP:SYN). Carter has "this technique" (referring to the salmonella poisoning incidents that had occurred) "was to be used if the election appeared to be heading for a close race" as well as a reference to an election "wild card" (p. 225–226). So I think the version I had was accurate. 
Another thing, the wording I found in Phyllis Entis was "turning away a busload of the cult's followers, saying that they would have to return later and submit to an examination of their qualifications to register to vote" (p. 244). I couldn't find the wording "enforcing regulations and requesting that all new voters submit their qualifications to register to vote". Are you sure you have this from Entis? Cheers, Jayen466 23:55, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I will check on this stuff mentioned above.  Would be worthwhile to expand on the attempts to poison the water supply, from info from the above-mentioned sources.  Cirt (talk) 23:59, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

text: Okay, thanks for pointing that out, might be worthwhile to work those cites back in, in other places in the article.  Cirt (talk) 00:03, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: They could also go in Further Reading, if you think they are noteworthy. Doesn't have to be a cite if the existing cite(s) already cover(s) all the sentence content; less superscript numbers looks cleaner and easier to read. Jayen466 00:07, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, I will look into that.  Cirt (talk) 00:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Water system 

message: This type of info is better suited for articles like Rajneeshpuram, or Osho movement, both articles need lots of work, and that info is more relevant to them.  Let's keep any "sociological commentary" to that which directly discusses the bioterror attacks themselves, and their impact on society.  Cirt (talk) 20:46, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, you're right actually; that commentary is more generic. He does not refer to this attack specifically in the book, only to various unspecified criminal actions committed by leaders of the group (with a pointer to other literature). Will keep it earmarked for Rajneeshpuram when that article has matured a bit. Jayen466 21:42, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, well feel free to work on those above 2 articles, they both need lots of work.  Cirt (talk) 21:44, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sociological commentary 

message: No descriptive word is necessary here (, ). That gets into POV interpretation. It is simply enough to present factually what was said by the author. Cirt (talk) 03:21, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Clearly, "Unambiguously" ... 

message: -  has failed to explain why this source does not satisfy WP:RS. This article has been through WP:DYK, reviewed and passed as a  Good Article, had a peer review, and was successfully promoted as a Featured Article. Cirt (talk) 12:51, 16 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Bad cite" ? 

message: - edits like these are inappropriate, and push a POV. Let's just state the facts. Cirt (talk) 12:56, 16 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  "On the other hand" 

message: * 
:Removed, as the source did not appear to add any new info. Cirt (talk) 02:03, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Death in the Pot 

message: = this edit by  is inappropriate, as it removed sourced info and added a cite to the end of a sentence and could lead to the implication that the quoted text was backed up to that cite. Cirt (talk) 13:45, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry if the cite didn't match, but the sentence I removed just seemed repetitive. Rumiton (talk) 14:22, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Not repetitive, one is a source saying something, the other is a quote from one individual that had direct experience related to the incident. Cirt (talk) 14:26, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quote sourced to different cite 

message: But... = this sort of wording change is not NPOV. Best to just keep it to matter-of-fact statements. Cirt (talk) 14:02, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The change was just meant to be grammatical. Quoting one opinion, then an entirely different (opposite) one, is normally separated by "but." I don't think the word gives excess weight to either opinion. Rumiton (talk) 14:25, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The use of "but..." in this fashion is POV. It does indeed appear to give weight to the POV that is presented after the "but..." Cirt (talk) 14:26, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I see you have reverted everything I did. Are the above the only contentious parts? I have no POV about this subject, BTW, I would just like to see a less clumsy and better-written article. (Though it is well written on the whole.) Rumiton (talk) 14:38, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: If you could suggest an alternative way of improving the wording, without simultaneously introducing POV problems, that would be most appreciated. Cirt (talk) 14:41, 4 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Still thinking. Rumiton (talk) 03:43, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: No, that particular subsection is already of an appropriate size length. Cirt (talk) 18:03, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, the size is fine, but interviews by researchers to establish culpability outside of the court process seem out of place in a section called Prosecution. Not a big point. Rumiton (talk) 01:15, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I do not think that one particular paragraph is big enough to warrant its own separate subsection. Cirt (talk) 03:03, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  But... 

message: Where did the search box go?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.171.155.245 (talk) 01:05, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: It is still there. :) -- Cirt (talk) 14:46, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Search box 

message: The first sentence of the third paragraph, section "Salmonella poisoning", says, "Local residents suspected that Rajneesh's followers were behind the poisonings, and turned out in droves on election day to prevent the organization from winning any county positions, thus rendering the terrorist plot unsuccessful." However, the third sentence says, "Only 239 of the commune's 7,000 residents voted." Doesn't it contradict the previous statement? Was it "droves" or "only 239"? — Kpalion(talk) 08:45, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The "droves" (local non-cult residents) and the 239 (Rajneshee commune residents) are two different groups, there is no contradiction 77.247.11.82 (talk) 09:33, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree with above IP assessment. :) -- Cirt (talk) 13:20, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, I must have read the article without enough care. I assumed "commune" referred to a low-level administrative unit within the Wasco County rather than the cult. — Kpalion(talk) 13:45, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah. Nope, it refers to the latter group. :) -- Cirt (talk) 14:21, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Contradiction? 

message: Please note that 
*Scholarly sources and 
*academic sources in published books characterize this historical incident as "bioterror", "bioterrorism", etc.
Here is a sampling of quotations from published books, with bolded emphasis added to relevant portions of the quotes:
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----
Thank you for your time, -- Cirt (talk) 18:20, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Note: Please do not intersperse comments in-between list, above, but rather respond with new posts, below, here. Thank you, -- Cirt (talk) 18:27, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

text: However examples can be found of the use bioattack bioLOGICAL attack, biological assault, thoughthese are not as well researched as CiRT's work it does leave us with a choice. Therefore the impasse can be broken by a vote.--Kitchen Knife (talk) 19:26, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: No. Completely oppose such an addition, which is based on satisfying a disgruntled Wikipedia user's personal opinion. It is also a violation of WP:NOR, especially when viewed in conjunction with multiple cited WP:RS secondary sources, listed above. -- Cirt (talk) 19:27, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Cirt is absolutley right, Replacing reliable secondary sourcing with your own "more accurate evaluation" based on indirectly related sources violates WP:NOR. Weaponbb7 (talk) 19:38, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. Thank you, Weaponbb7, much appreciated. -- Cirt (talk) 19:41, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

text: Actually if you look I have found alternative descriptions of the events, so it is not about satisfying disgruntled me but deciding which of several descriptions best fits. Sveral of the returned in the above searches are from univesities, respected research bodies and the RAND organisation.--Kitchen Knife (talk) 19:44, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, nice. — From your above-listed search results: bioattack (85 results) biological attack (990 results), biological assault (6 results) — versus over 8,000 results for "bioterrorism" and Rajneesh. "Bioterrorism", is clearly the more prominent used term to characterize this historical event. -- Cirt (talk) 19:51, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: We have a choice to make based on Wikipedias various rules and the available evidence. It's not just a matter of counting the refs.--Kitchen Knife (talk) 20:05, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bioterror characterization used in multiple reliable sources 

message: Comment: It appears that despite the helpful clarifying comments from experienced FA contributors including Ling.Nut  and Moni3 , and a report to ANI for issues of comportment during discussion on this page , user  is unwilling to listen to reason or understand Wikipedia policy with regard to this issue. At this point, if desired,  can file a requested move of this page through the appropriate process, and then subsequently that proposal may be discussed here at this talk page, to assess consensus and/or opposition to such a proposal. -- Cirt (talk) 19:13, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You have misrepresented Moni3 contribution, it was considerable more even handed than you imply.--Kitchen Knife (talk) 19:36, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  -- Cirt (talk) 19:37, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: "If there are authoritative sources that say this event was not terrorism--not just that the sources declined to call it terrorism--there is a way to discuss it in the article. However, the sources would have to be viewed with the weight of all the sources that have called it terrorism. They would determine if such a discussion warranted its own section or just a footnote. --Moni3 (talk) 19:10, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: , if you really want to get the page moved to your preferred POV title, the way to go about attempting to do that, is through the WP:REQMOVE process. If you want to rehash and argue about minutiae of other editors' comments from other subsections, please do that above. -- Cirt (talk) 19:44, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Did you major in condescension? I am aware of what needs to be done. I've been editing wikipedia for a long time thanks.--Kitchen Knife (talk) 20:00, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Phase 2 of Suggestion

message: Speaking as someone who had a front-row seat for this bizarre affair, this article omits a few points:
*Why did the Rajneeshees seek to control Wasco county? This arose over a dispute between the Rajneeshees & the local government over their obsessive construction at Rajneeshpuram (now the Great Muddy Ranch). The Rajneeshees were upset over the time it took the county to review & approve their permits, much of which involved Oregon's land use regulations. This latter point is important because, no matter what the local authorities actually felt about the matter -- IIRC, a large number of people in Wasco county have no love for Oregon's land use laws -- they had to enforce them to some degree. Anyway, the Rajneeshee's strategy was to take over the various government levels as they went along: first Antelope, the nearest incorporated town to Rajneeshpuram, which is where the Rajneeshees had to file their paperwork; and next was Wasco county.
* The effect of this on popular opinion Up to this event, the Rajneeshees were considered to be the equivalent of the crazy old man down the block which everyone is a little frightened of, but the general opinion is that he was best dealt with by ignoring him. Even the "Share-a-Home" program was seen as the behavior of a group of eccentrics, rather than a serious attempt to seize power. After the news seeped out about the attack, & people understood just what happened, the Rajneeshees were perceived to be a danger, & the sympathy they had amongst the rest of Oregonians evaporated. 
I know the media of the time expressed these points. It would only take some digging thru the archives of the local newspapers to verify these assertions. -- llywrch (talk) 04:19, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Nod, okay, certainly valid points. I will do some more research, and see about adding a few sentences here and there, thanks! :) -- Cirt (talk) 04:20, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Llywrch's right: though it's a matter of thought as to how much belongs here and how much elsewhere. The place was bought for conversion into a town and was fairly quickly incorporated as a city and included upon the Oregon map. An agreed building programme began, I do not know in what sense it was "obsessive". Amid the construction of a dam, lake, roads and infrastructure, the incorporation was reversed, for reasons I have never discovered. And then Sheela tried to take over Antelope in order to force through the original plan. It's all documented. Redheylin (talk) 12:47, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

text: The above matters are duly logged at the page Rajneeshpuram in an account that has long been tagged unbalanced, though with no comment. It diverges in chronology and tone from the present brief account, I think, sufficiently to be termed a POV fork. So Llywrch might turn his attention to the other account and to balancing and reconciling it with the necessarily briefer account here. Redheylin (talk) 13:11, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Alright, sure, I will take a look at doing some additional research in that particular area. -- Cirt (talk) 17:57, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

text:  Um, I hadn't even thought about the Rajneeshees for several years, & wouldn't have even made those comments had this article not been a featured article on the front page. I'm not intending to read the article on the town soon; I have enough on my plate trying to get Ethiopia-related articles up to snuff. Cirt's response -- to research the points I raised -- was the response I was hoping to get, so as far as I'm concerned, the matter is over. -- llywrch (talk) 23:04, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, will do so, it is on my list. ;) Thanks again, -- Cirt (talk) 02:20, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Omissions in this article 

message: *diff = totally unsourced claims added to article.
*diff = source added to article that does not mention the Rajneeshee bioterror attack
Not appropriate additions. -- Cirt (talk) 19:25, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: That is WP:OR violation, unless you have a secondary source that comes to these conclusions? -- Cirt (talk) 19:28, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Which additions have to be justified?  The 2001 Anthrax attack or the Aum Shinrikyo group? Polyquest (talk) 19:32, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: You see, in this edit, diff, you wrote: "with the possible exception of ...". But those are your words. Those are your conclusions. You have not presented a secondary source that makes those conclusions itself. -- Cirt (talk) 19:34, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: If you check the source currently being used, I believe it justifies my edits.Polyquest (talk) 19:39, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Wrong. Quote from source, Leitenberg 2005, "there is apparently no other “terrorist” group that is known to have successfully cultured any pathogen." -- Cirt (talk) 19:41, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I meant in regard to the Anthrax.  As to the Aum Shinrikyo perhaps this source would be appropriate. Polyquest (talk) 19:46, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The source you suggest fails to mention the Rajneesh group. -- Cirt (talk) 19:46, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: My claim does not regard the Rajneesh group.  It regards other groups that attempted, with limited success, to use pathogens in terrorist attacks. Polyquest (talk) 19:49, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't you see that you are attempting to use other sources to make a claim that you yourself have formed of your own opinion? That is a violation of WP:NOR. -- Cirt (talk) 19:50, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: What I see is that the article makes a claim, "the Rajneesh group was the only known organization to have cultured its own pathogen  for terrorist purposes", that is contradicted by several reliable sources.  Since the 2001 Anthrax attack, and the activities of the Aum Shinrikyo group involved culturing pathogens for use in terrorist acts.Polyquest (talk) 19:56, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I changed it to a direct quote from the cited source. Now it is accurate. :) -- Cirt (talk) 20:02, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: All right, fair enough.Polyquest (talk) 20:06, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you. :) -- Cirt (talk) 20:06, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  "with the possible exception of" 

message: During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!
* http://www.ice.gov/about/leadership/ot_bio/joe_greene.htm
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-05-25 05:10:52, 404 Not Found
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-06-07 04:05:25, 404 Not Found
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-06-24 05:56:31, 404 Not Found
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thread_title:  Dead link 

message: During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!
* http://wweek.com/html/25-1983.html
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-05-25 05:10:52, 404 Not Found
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-06-24 05:56:32, 404 Not Found
--JeffGBot (talk) 05:57, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dead link 2 

message: During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!
* http://www.rand.org/nsrd/terrpanel/terror.pdf
** In Doomsday cult on 2011-03-17 14:35:54, 404 Not Found
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-05-25 05:10:45, 404 Not Found
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-06-24 05:56:53, 404 Not Found
--JeffGBot (talk) 05:57, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dead link 3 

message: During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!
* http://www.wbur.org/special/specialcoverage/feature_bio.asp
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-05-25 05:10:52, 404 Not Found
** In 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on 2011-06-24 05:57:21, 404 Not Found
--JeffGBot (talk) 05:57, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dead link 4 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: From the description in the article there was no intention to terrorize anyone, only to sway the election. By what definition is it appropriate to call this terrorism? As Glenn Greenwald has repeatedly written, the word "terrorism" has become a political term without clear definition.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.211.69.239 (talk) 23:40, 27 August 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Good point-- it isn't right to throw a word around & never think about how you're using it. Thanks for making me think! :) Right now, though, I'm thinking it should be considered terrorism. A biological weapon is still a weapon, and lives were endangered, so this could be considered an act of violence. And this would make it consistent with the Terrorism article's definition: "in its broadest sense, the use or threatened use of violence (terror) in order to achieve a political, religious, or ideological aim." Lusanaherandraton (talk) 20:41, 22 September 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  definition of "terrorist" 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Regarding the aforementioned sentence, which appears at the end of the first paragraph, both sources cited state that this was the first bioterrorism attack in the US carried out at all, and make no distinction regarding Native Americans. I'm fairly certain the segment "...not targeting Native Americans..." ought to be removed, or other sources provided that support this claim.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.14.106.6 (talk) 20:54, 9 January 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  "The incident was the first and is the single largest bioterrorism attack not targeting Native Americans in United States history." 

message: The article on Sheela says 39 months.  Which is it? --142.163.195.93 (talk) 15:22, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  29 or 39 months? 

message: The Wikipedia article on bioterrorism linked to from here currently says in its history section,
"Shortly after the start of World War I, Germany launched a biological sabotage campaign in the United States, Russia, Romania, and France. At that time, Anton Dilger lived in Germany, but in 1915 he was sent to the United States carrying cultures of glanders, a virulent disease of horses and mules. Dilger set up a laboratory in his home in Chevy Chase, Maryland. He used stevedores working the docks in Baltimore to infect horses with glanders while they were waiting to be shipped to Britain."
so the reasoning used above to remove mention of bioterrorism attacks against Native Americans from this article, that no sources contradicted the claim that this is the first bioterrorist attack in U.S. history, appears to be incorrect. One very well-known incident,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Fort_Pitt#Biological_warfare
is also documented in an article and categorized by Wikipedia as a biological warfare incident, like this article. Thank you 73.142.68.213 (talk) 04:30, 29 August 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bioterrorism article lists an attack 70 years earlier in its history section 

message: How in the bloody hell did she walk after only 2 1/2 years after masterminding this and half a dozens other attacks? 200.119.184.108 (talk) 05:57, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ma Anand Sheela prison