Talk:History of human rights

message: This is a spin-out from Human rights, covering the historical antecedents to the modern human rights movement. Phyesalis (talk) 15:11, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: New article

message: All sources listed in the footnotes need to be cited in full, not just given abbreviated citations.  The source cited "Ball, Gready 2007" needs to be cited as "Ball and Gready, 2007"; the way it's currently cited would be appropriate for a book authored by someone named Gready Ball, but not for one written by two authors named Olivia Ball and Paul Gready. Christopher Powell (talk) 17:41, 3 May 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Citing Sources

message: In the last revision I edited, I found duplicate named references, i.e. references sharing the same name, but not having the same content. Please check them, as I am not able to fix them automatically :) 
* "LewisNYRB" :
** Lewis (1998)
** 
DumZiBoT (talk) 12:52, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bot report : Found duplicate references ! 

message: The article too often speaks of human rights as if they were a given, that they were created out of the blue. In fact, this was one of the main reasons human rights had to wait until 1948 to be universally accepted. Before 1948, human rights were ideologically associated with the French revolution and the rights of man, and any social group who had historically opposed the French revolution in any minor or major way was suspected of being against human rights. For instance, during the Dreyfus affair, supporters of human rights were said to be pro-Dreyfus, while anti-Dreyfus people were said to be against human rights. It was a very complicated business until the 1948 charter. 69.157.229.153 (talk) 00:54, 3 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: You're begging the question here, denying the fact that there is a continuing debate among political theorists as to there ARE given rights or not. The whole thesis of Thomas Paine - who as an atheist was NOT appealing to God given rights - was that there were certain 'given' rights. Ender's Shadow Snr (talk) 08:11, 24 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title: Opposition

message: Cyrus cylinder should not be included in this article. Due to its persian name ("cylinder of human rights"), and strong Shah propaganda, most iranians believe what is currently written in this article, although reading the text of the cylinder provides an answer: there is no mention of human rights there.
One should remove it from the article, and then, most importantly, remove all the vandalism from Iranian computers which will happen quite often (from people who are sincerly convinced what they write is true).
I redirect people to former discussions (on the "human rights" page) for more information.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hehiheho (talk • contribs) 20:45, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: As the poster above says, read the talk page archives. You will find that this has been discussed many times in the past. It's pseudohistorical nonsense. Prioryman (talk) 01:41, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: What are you talking about?   What talk page archives?  The section has a lot sources from historians.  Stop pushing your Point Of View (POV)! Jdravan (talk) 02:07, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree with Prioryman. The Cyrus Cylinder stuff is Pahlavi-era pseudoscience and pseudohistory. We have been over this a million times. Athenean (talk) 02:48, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

text: Hello!!!! What are you talking about?  Whose we and when have you been over this? that section has a bunch of good sources!  None of them have to do with Pahlavi.  This is ridiculous. Jdravan (talk) 02:52, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Jdravan is right--the solid RS that endorse Cyrus have nothing to do with modern Iranian POV,   and the critics have not given one source that denigrates CyrusRjensen (talk) 04:45, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Cyrus is well-established in the scholarly RS. For examples, see Damien Kingsbury. Human rights in Asia: a reassessment of the Asian values debate (Macmillan 2008)  - Page 21; Sabine C. Carey, The Politics of Human Rights: The Quest for Dignity (2010) p 19; Paul Gordon Lauren, The evolution of international human rights (2003) Page 11; Willem Adriaan Veenhoven, Case studies on human rights and fundamental freedoms: a world survey: Volume 1 (1975) Page 244; etc. Rjensen (talk) 04:53, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: If you look at what actual historians say, they explicitly reject the claim. See Cyrus Cylinder#Human rights. The claim is one that was promoted by the late Shah of Iran as part of his regime's propaganda and was subsequently picked up by non-historians and Iranian nationalists (note that none of the sources you cite are historians). When it comes to historical matters, we should defer to what the professional historians say, rather than promoting nationalist pseudohistory. -- Prioryman (talk) 08:40, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You seem to be making bold assertions Prioryman: "Actual historians" do NOT explicitly reject the claim.  The late of Shah of Iran's endorsement neither supports or negates the extant research that indicates that reliable sources do believe that Cyrus Cylinder is a charter/declaration of human rights.  Calling points "nationalist pseudohistory" doesn't make it so, nor does your wholesale erasure of an entire, well sourced section really help with the fixing the article.  Bear in mind that the section discusses a lot more than just the cylinder.  As a result of 1) JdRavans and Jensens (especially since he supports his points), and 2) Athenean and Prioryman sweeping edits and full erasure of the section...I will be reverting the article to its original state.  GoetheFromm (talk) 09:16, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks like the action has already been done, lol.  GoetheFromm (talk) 09:19, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: What should be done is to edit section in questions, but definitely not its entire erasure. GoetheFromm (talk) 10:11, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

text: And you could easily have tweaked it just a tiny bit to make it less POV. A matter of less than a minute. Dougweller (talk) 19:14, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Also, let's give people a chance too.  GoetheFromm (talk) 19:29, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

text: Hey! Please don't tell me what I can or cannot do, I'm trying my best.  I'm not as good as you.  GoetheFromm (talk) 19:25, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You could have doesn't mean me telling you what you can do (there's a subtle distinction), but yes, I'm fast. :-). But tiny tweaks really don't take much time and can make a big difference. Dougweller (talk) 20:11, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting point.  GoetheFromm (talk) 14:42, 19 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: As far as I'm concerned the principal purpose of the article should be to be informative. At the moment this section is not informative. It's just a set of assertions and counter-assertions. What we neede is an explanation of what in the document leads it to be proclaimed a charter of rights and why it has been denied that status. At the moment we just get "oh yet it is; oh no it's not" at useless length. I'd suggest a shorter section saying something like: "The Cyrus cylinder is a proclamation of Cyrus's policies after his capture of Babylon. He mentions liberating captured peoples and returning the statues of gods to their sanctuaries. Since he calls himself to be a "universal ruler" this document has been portrayed as a declaration of univeral rights. Scholars of ancient Babylonian culture assert that it is a programme of reforms, fairly typical of the type of proclamations of piety and justice made by new monarchs." Paul B (talk) 03:07, 20 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Paul Barlow, I really like what you wrote above, I support it.  GoetheFromm (talk) 23:23, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

text: "Think of as 'democracy?'" You seem to be confusing several related concepts. Democracy has nothing to do with human rights; it is a system of government where enfranchised citizens have representative power. Athens was actually one of few true democracies, since all of those land-owning men actually voted directly (as opposed to electing representatives and pretending that it's the same as voting). If you "think of" democracy another way, it's because you are confusing "democratic" with "egalitarian." The United States, for example, has always been a modern democracy, despite having disenfranchised various people in many ways. 184.99.164.203 (talk) 10:35, 14 May 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cyrus Cylinder 

message: Maybe it's a bad phrase if it's used more than once. :-) Dougweller (talk) 19:13, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The article is generally plagued by a lot of naive boosterism. The first paragraph of the Maurya section is entirely unsourced, and contains a lot of booster-ish language. Ditto the Islami section. I suspect these sections were added or greatly expanded by Jagged85, a notorious booster whose edits are subject to a wikipedia-wide cleanup operation. I will check. Athenean (talk) 19:24, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree, Athenean, this is a problem throughout the article.  The topic itself lends itself to boosterism.  GoetheFromm (talk) 19:27, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I have removed the unsourced superlative stuff about the Mauryas. The Islamic section is more complicated. I've tagged it for now, but my inclination, based on my experience with the editor who added it (see this RfC ), is to remove it entirely. Athenean (talk) 01:33, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: none of this is relevant. All it does is establish that the notion of ethics or being nice to your fellow man predates the actual human rights movement. However, this article is about the actual human rights movement, not the anthropological roots of ethical behaviour. Take it to Evolution of morality, where Cyrus and Islam will not be "early" examples, but very late examples in a process that has started about seven million years ago. --dab (𒁳) 13:00, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  How many unprecedented principles of human rights were there? 

message: There are editors on the History of Human Rights page (see edit history) indicating that the word "some" is weasel? Many is a judgment of quantity, which is not appropriate for encyclopedic material.  Moreover, "some" entails "many" and where as "many" does not entail "some." Thus the word "some" is more appropriate in article.  In addition, on this specific issue regarding the human rights questions, some has been advocated as the correct usage by editors.  The talk and edit record indicates this.  Lastly, wouldn't a reference be needed to indicate from a reliable source that "many" believe in order for the word "many" to be included?  It feels like POV pushing to put "many."    Feedback on this issue?  Thanks.  GoetheFromm (talk) 20:26, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Not that anyone needs this, but I refer you to WP:WEASEL, in which the unsupported use of "most" (ie, many) is considered weasel.  Yes, the word "some" can also be considered weasel, but the word "some" is only weasel if there is not a reliable source indicating that there is at least one reliable individual that believes it.  The burden for the word "many" requires a source to indicate that it is the majority or prevalent view.  GoetheFromm (talk) 20:45, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some vs. Many 

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thread_title: File:Cyrus cilinder.jpg Nominated for Deletion

message: who may ever believe if Cyrus had any thing to do with human rights unless if he is decieved by propaganda and ignorance?
just see what Greek references say about ways and methods of Persians: greedy, bloody, treacherous, swingers, pederasts......
such people could be any thing but human rights keepers!
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Greek sources? Oh, I don't know. Let's take for example the fact that the only extant source that we have on the Ionian revolt is Herodotus, a Greek (or Greek-speaker, rather) who famously and perhaps not surprisingly was shown to have a heavy anti-Persian bias and exaggerated many accounts of destruction amongst other dubious "facts", such as his unforgettable and in the context of modern archaeological studies, utterly laughable allegation that the Giza Pyramids were constructed by 100,000 "slaves" - who we now know were in fact paid laborers. In fact, it was the European Greeks who held slaves, not those "barbarian" orientals.
And the fact that many Greeks who lived during the period of Persian domination would malign Persians is not shocking in the slightest. Xenophon's "Cyropaedia" however, is a document written by a Greek of that period with a favorable view. In it, he describes the life of Cyrus for the purposes of examining him as the "ideal ruler". Not at all surprising, given that many Greek cities in Ionia who assented to Persian rule were patronized heavily, such as Ephesus, where Achaemenid rulers financed the lavish Temple of Artemis for the Ephesians and their support. And many sources note that Greeks, among many other peoples such as Egyptians and men of the "Phoenician" cities served in the Persian military. That's right, Greeks fighting under the banner of those alleged barbarians who want nothing more than to reach into the future, eat your white, Christian children and force them to wear hejabs and destroy baseball, apple pie and democracy while they're at it. Yes, that evil barbarian empire, fighting against the Greeks who gave birth to everything of worth in our modern world, from whose very rectums freedom and justice for all sprung.
Let us not forget, it was the people of Athens who decided to have Socrates executed.
Let us not forget, it was Alexander who ended Athenian democracy for good.
History does not function in black and white, in "good" and "evil". It merely is, with the same individuals and nations contributing tremendously beautiful and useful ideas, concepts and inventions (yes, even democracy..) and also committing horrible atrocities.
You, though, I suppose you're getting your historical knowledge from the movie "300" and poorly-written Western-Civ high school textbooks.
Oh, and I've got a revelation for you on the pederasty front that you mentioned the Persians as engaging in. Those dastardly Pers...er I mean, classical Greeks??! Enjoy!:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pederasty_in_ancient_Greece
Kitrino (talk) 21:56, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: "utterly laughable allegation that the Giza Pyramids were constructed by 100,000 "slaves" - who we now know were in fact paid laborers."  -- yeah but they were "paid" in onions - and the Pharaohs didn't give them any legal choice in the matter! Til Eulenspiegel /talk/ 23:17, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: More on Antiquity

message: I copy-pasted the Early Islamic Caliphate section in an application counting the number of characters of a text. It has more characters than "Early Modern period and Age of Enlightenment", "19th century to World War I" and "Between World War I and World War II" combined. I am not a specialist of the topic, so I am unsure to be qualified for editing and shortening the text. Although, it appears clearly that an undue weight is given to this section. I hence label the section with an appropriate tag. I actually suspect additionally boosterism. (Hehiheho (talk) 17:39, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Early Islamic Caliphate: Undue Weight 

message: I did a Teaching Company course entitled "The Rights of Man" by Paul Gordon Lauren about a month ago, and the framework plus information would be well suited for this article. Since the information is on CD-audios from a local library, it is difficult to offer inline easy-to-check references; so I am wondering whether anybody might object in advance before I comb through the course and pick out specific points, as well as possibly adapt his time frame with major events? There is another book by the same author here which probably has much of the same material. And, looking above in the talk page, I remember PGL mentioning Cyrus as important.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 00:04, 27 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems to be admissible as a source, but using the book instead of the CD is to be preferred as it is much easier for others to check. However though admissible in general and probably an authoritative on (modern) human rights in general Gordon doesn't strike me as good source for claims regarding ancient history since he doesn't seem to have a background for that (see his website).--Kmhkmh (talk) 00:19, 27 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Noted, and thank you for your comment. I'll try to use the book more than the CD-audios if I add information; with luck, much of the material will be the same. My sense is that Paul Gordon Lauren is an excellent source for the overall framework of human rights -- that is it might be helpful overall for this article if we develop sections somewhat along the lines of PGL's time frame. My sense was that PGL was somewhat POV-ish in the more recent material, since he had somewhat of a left-leaning perspective (and misses one of the other sides regarding human rights) but I think I can counterbalance stuff if necessary from other sources.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 00:27, 27 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible source for a revamp 

message: I've removed an old neutrality tag from this page that appears to have no active discussion per the instructions at Template:POV:
::This template is not meant to be a permanent resident on any article. Remove this template whenever:
::#There is consensus on the talkpage or the NPOV Noticeboard that the issue has been resolved
::#It is not clear what the neutrality issue is, and no satisfactory explanation has been given
::#In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant.
Since there's no evidence of ongoing discussion, I'm removing the tag for now. If discussion is continuing and I've failed to see it, however, please feel free to restore the template and continue to address the issues. Thanks to everybody working on this one! -- Khazar2 (talk) 00:56, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  removing POV tag with no active discussion per [[Template:POV]] 

message: The Twelve Articles written and published during the German Peasants' War of 1525 deserve to be mentioned in my opinion, maybe alongside the Laws of Burgos (1511). --217.224.88.177 (talk) 14:29, 7 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Twelve Articles (Memmingen, 1525) are missing 

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