Talk:John F. Kennedy/Archive 1

message: There's been widespread allegations of vote fraud in Kennedy's election, and many historians think he didn't actually win except for ballot-stuffing by union-controlled political machines in a few states.  Any info on this? --Delirium 19:41, Sep 12, 2004 (UTC)
:Firstly, unions and political machines are/were not at all the same thing.  The Daley machine in Chicago probably committed some fraud on Kennedy's behalf, but there is generally thought to have been offsetting corruption on the part of Republican machines in southern Illinois, so it's a wash.  And Kennedy won Illinois by a decent margin.  Even if he'd lost Illinois, he'd still have won, in any case. john k 01:58, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vote fraud? 

message: For those who have been following the revert-edit war apparently caused by SNIyer1, please visit and leave comments at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/SNIyer1.  Nothing personal against this user, but they have been making POV changes and reverts for the last several months, refusing to discuss the changes either here or on his/her talk page.  As a regular contributor to Wikipedia, I feel this has now led to an RFC situation. -Husnock 15:12, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: And he has done this on other articles as well. If anyone would like to check out Death and state funeral of Pierre Trudeau or Death and state funeral of Ronald Reagan, you will see similar behavior. --Woohookitty 19:34, 25 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: RFC page opened

message: The Wikipedia article on conspiracy theories says the following:
:Colloquially, a "conspiracy theory" is any non-mainstream theory about current or historical events, often with the connotation that the theory is unfounded, outlandish, or irrational or in some way unworthy of serious consideration.
So it is clearly non-NPOV to use the term unless the theory in question is only believed by a few crackpots. However, in the case of the Kennedy assasination, some of the alternative theories are taken quite seriously, and the official theory isn't entirely believed by a very significant proportion of the population. Cadr 22:11, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: They are conspiracy theories.  The vast majority of them allege a conspiracy, for one thing, and for another, alternative theories of the JFK assassination are pretty much the definition of conspiracy theories.  JFK assassination research is the wellspring of modern conspiracy theorizing. Gamaliel 22:35, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: But are they all "unfounded, outlandish, or irrational or in some way unworthy of serious consideration"? I think not. At least, no more so than the official version, which as I pointed out isn't very widely believed.  Sorry about the comment on my revert, I hadn't seen your edit here when I made it. Cadr 22:37, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  We don't decide history by polling people.  Just because a lot of people believe something doesn't make it rational.  Creationism is widely believed, but that doesn't make it any less unfounded, outlandish, or irrational.  Evolution is universally believed where it matters, in the relvant fields of science.  In this case, the vast majority of serious historians do not hold to these theories, most of which are quite outlandish when you look closely at them.  Gamaliel 22:44, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, widespread belief doesn't imply rational belief, but it doesn't imply irrational belief either! The Wikipedia article on creationsim doesn't flat out call it irrational (although for the record I think that it is). "Serious historians" is hard to define in an NPOV way, and there have been some pretty prominent intellectuals and politicians who haven't believed the official account, even if they didn't have their own pet theory (e.g. Richard Nixon, Bertrand Russell). We're not in the business here of saying what's true and rational and what isn't. It's clearly POV to connotate that a theory is irrational and outlandish — even when it's reasonably widely believed — just because it's contrary to an official theory, which is hardly guaranteed to be true or rational. What harm could it possibly do to replace "conspiracy theory" with "alternative theory"? People can see for themselves the progeny of the alternative theories, and make their own decisions regarding their plausibility. Note that the main article on Kennedy assasination theories only says that they are "often called conspiracy theories". Cadr 22:53, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm certainly not going to advocate we call these beliefs outlandish and irrational, though they certainly are.  I admit that the phrase "conspiracy theory" often has negative connotations, but in this particular case it is the most accurate term.  These alternative theories  all allege a conspiracy to kill JFK.   We shouldn't be indirect and inaccurate. Gamaliel 23:01, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: But we could just use the phrase "alternative theories" and avoid these negative connotations. Is it really so important to specify that the theories generally involve the cooperation of several invididuals? It's hardly surprising that more than one person should be involved in the assasination of a president, nor is it surprising if some of them are polticians or other powerful people. These things don't really need to be mentioned in the label we choose for the theories. Cadr 23:05, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't see why its so important to whitewash this for fear that someone might read a negative connotation in this turn of phrase. I think it's important to call something what it actually is. Gamaliel 23:08, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It's important because NPOV requires that we describe things in neutral language, without adding positive or negative connotations where this is easily avoided. It's disengenuous to suggest that someone might see negative connotations in "conspiracy theory". They almost certainly will. Cadr 23:13, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Note on "conspiracy theory"