Talk:Iraq Body Count project

message: I deleted some of the undercounting examples here. I linked to the article Casualties of the conflict in Iraq since 2003 where there are more examples. --Timeshifter 10:29, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikilink to more undercounting examples 

message: This is to explain to Timeshifter why I removed his references to Lila Guterman articles and a Noam Chomsky book in the Criticism section. He presents these as criticizing media or government willingness to quote IBC, but such criticism is not found. The Guterman article is about the Lancet study and responses to that. IBC is mentioned in passing but not criticized, nor is media coverage of IBC addressed. Neither is this in the Noam Chomsky book cited. Instead of saying "reread the articles" to vaguely imply that this is in the articles, perhaps you could just quote the passages from these sources that you believe is accurately represented by your description of them.74.64.60.148 00:49, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for agreeing to my idea rather than deleting sourced material. I put in a relevant Lila Guterman quote. I deleted all the Noam Chomsky quotes and references. He criticized the media ignoring the Lancet estimate, but he did not say that the media was using the IBC count as a way to ignore the Lancet estimate. I used the Amazon.com search of his book to search for all references to Iraq Body Count. --Timeshifter 08:58, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

text: See reply to the other anonymous editor. Your tone is amusing to me. It is all a great plot isn't it? Everyone is plotting against you. LOL. It is funny. I actually don't like Noam Chomsky's style of writing. Too tedious, ideological, and strained. Like your writing. LOL. We spent weeks arguing in these talk pages, and I was always amused by your straining at gnats. I have no problem deleting Noam Chomsky's stuff. I only put it in because it was in the Dahr Jamail article. Dahr Jamail quoted Noam Chomsky just fine. He let the reader make the inference. But inference alone is not good enough for wikipedia. "Truthshifter", oh that is so clever. For weeks now I let you rant on and make a fool of yourself. Keep it up. I am amused. --Timeshifter 08:58, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Journalist articles/books inaccurately cited 

message: The intro for the IBC page inserts two qualifiers or caveats which do not belong in an introduction and suggest POV influence. The first is describing IBC as using "English language news". This is misleading, particularly for an unqualified intro, because people do not generally know what is or is not available in English. Most will probably assume this means news sources in the USA and the UK. But IBC uses lots of international and Arabic sources. The project's co-founder says that many of these publish in English themselves, and others are translated by various translation organizations which they use. Putting this caveat in the introduction also seems to favor a POV regarding the section that follows about English and Arabic sources, as just having such a formulation in the introduction assumes and implies to readers that this is some crucial caveat, which is to take a side in that debate. The IBC uses news reports. The details about this are explained in the page.
The second problem is the FAQ caveat. This is again explained in the page and has most of the same problems as above. The introduction is not the place for selective POV-driven caveats and qualifiers. The issue of "undercounting" has a whole long section (which is also POV-laden, but that's another story).Seigfried4220 04:00, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Glad to see you back with your new user name, Seigfried4220. All the info you deleted was sourced and not POV. Deletion of sourced info is a violation of wikipedia guidelines. --Timeshifter 05:10, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

text: One halmark of your comments is that you accuse other editors of everything you yourself are guilty of. You've spent the last few days trying to delete whole sections of sourced info from two pages. You got 3RR blocked for doing it in one case, along with getting me blocked for putting your deletions back. Another hallmark of your comments is 'wikilawyering' in which you selectively conscript various guidelines to intimidate other users (while violating all them yourself usually). The info I deleted was POV-laden cherry-picking of sourced material designed to convey a POV. In the case of your beloved "English-language" caveat, it's purpose is to make people think IBC only uses a tiny fraction of the media out there and therefore misses lots of stuff because of this. That is POV-pushing. If you'd like, I can go around and find every quotation or refernce to "uncertainty" etc., wrt Lancet estimates and plaster them on the Lancet introduction, or do the same to the table on the Casualties page. I could also maybe cherry-pick some facts like "recorded 21 deaths" or "629 deaths" and paste that everywhere the Lancet studies are briefly mentioned on wikipedia, as well as in the introduction to the page. Then maybe you'd see how and why doing so is POV-laden, in your case transparently so.Seigfried4220 05:25, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I added "(including Arabic media translated into English)". --Timeshifter 05:48, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why not just say 'news media' then? What exactly is the purpose served by having this (now longer) qualifier in the introduction? Discussion of English and Arabic has a section in the page.Seigfried4220 07:46, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The intro of a wikipedia page is supposed to summarize the main points. The main point of a casualty estimate page is explaining the method used to get the casualty estimate. It only takes a sentence or two to summarize that method. --Timeshifter 08:37, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The fact that IBC only uses english language media is accurate, relevant to the reader and notable-as many criticisms of the project stem from this fact-it is therefore entirely appropriate in the intro.Felix-felix 20:34, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV stuff in intro 

message: The recent edits to the opening description of the Iraq Body Count project have made it an extremely neutral description of this group and thier work. Whether you love them or hate them, they're a quasi-legitimate organization, and I think that's the real truth of the situation. I would add in a "request for cleanup" about some of the controversy, and I would also ask that progressive-minded editor could remove some of the detrius from this talk page. --Torchpratt (talk) 06:23, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Those "drive-by tags" (without any explanation or discussion) don't really help anyone. So, I've removed it; and if the original tagger has any specific issues with this article then he should probably list them here on the talk page first. Frescard (talk) 15:43, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Request to remove the NPOV tag 

message: The graph on the right should obviously updated, as it stops exactly when the surge begins to take effect and casualties drop sharply. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.153.178.142 (talk • contribs) 20:06, 14 January 2008 
:I moved the above comment from the article to here, and added the unsigned comment template to source it. Here is the diff. --Timeshifter (talk) 20:39, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I posted an updated graph, which includes the whole of IBC's range, from Jan '03 to Nov '08. Frescard (talk) 15:43, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Graph 

message: From the intro: "The IBC has a media-centered approach to counting and documenting the deaths. Other sources have provided differing estimates of deaths, some much higher."
Taken together these two statements suggest that what IBC is trying to do is 'estimate' the number of deaths.  I don't believe they have ever claimed that they estimate the total number of civilian deaths.  Besides, it should be obvious given their methodology that this is not what they are doing.  What IBC attempt to provide is a lower bound for the total number of deaths.  That is, outside of specific errors of reporting or recording of incidents, they are trying to show that no less than the figure they give have died.  The actual figure is likely to be much higher (as IBC itself states).  Therefore, saying that IBC provides one (of the lower) 'estimates' is misleading.  They don't.
This mischaracterisation of IBC as an estimate (not a lower-bounds) is common though.  There's one example here http://iraqmortality.org/iraq-mortality, this in this case the article corrects itself after initially claiming IBC is an estimate (many other references IBC don't and just refer to it as an estimate).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.143.69.3 (talk) 11:11, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Misrepresentation of IBC figure as an 'estimate'? 

message: The section called "Undercounting", which is already flagged for objections over neutrality, does some editorializing with brackets in quotations. I removed this here:
The October 2006 Lancet  study[30][31]  states: "Aside from Bosnia, we can find no conflict situation where passive surveillance [as used by the IBC]..."
WLRoss put the editorial interjections back, but they are, first, editorializing by a wikipedia editor so there is no particular cause for them to be there, but second, it is actually a POV interjection as well. 
The bracketed fragment is editorial and it is a POV one. This label is not used by the IBC to describe what it does or uses. It does not seem to appear anywhere on the website, including in the lengthy sections describing the methods they use. Instead, it is a label applied by some IBC critics. Some IBC supporters have rejected the label:
http://www.thecommentfactory.com/passive-death-counts-in-iraq-have-merit-3061/
Among other things, this quotes a peer-reviewed paper about the Lancet study which rejects this this use of that label as false. Thus the idea that this label describes what is "used by the IBC" is an assertion that has been made by some and been rejected by others. The editorial interjection asserting that this label is what is "used by the IBC" is a POV assertion, presenting a disputed assertion from one side as if it were a fact. Thus this is inappropriate. 
Really, this whole section is just POV to begin with. It's like a bunch of cherry-picked references to "undercounting" in various random things where a connection to the IBC is often never drawn at all or just vaguely implied. The whole section just seems like a bunch of POV-pushing to me. But that's another story.Ronaldc0224 (talk) 22:18, 30 November 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Concerning this diff, the added info in brackets is simply explanatory. You, and others, may disagree with the statement, but you don't disagree with it by removing clarifying info. Feel free to add referenced info that disagrees with the statement. --Timeshifter (talk) 03:43, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: They are not "clarifying". They are an editorial assertion of a disputed opinion as fact by a wikipedia editor.Ronaldc0224 (talk) 17:01, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: How is explanatory info in brackets POV? The explanatory info explaining the meaning of the terms could be moved to a sentence following the sentence in question. Please do not edit war. --Timeshifter (talk) 06:48, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

text: It is their meaning for the terms. And that is what counts. Please stop the edit warring. --Timeshifter (talk) 09:56, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Editorial commentary 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: It only takes a few minutes to update the table completely. For more info see: 
*User:Timeshifter/Sandbox106
--Timeshifter (talk) 10:18, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Table updates in a few minutes