Talk:Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident/Archive 1

message: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Falun Dafa Information Center
January 23, 2001
http://www.clearwisdom.net/eng/2001/jan/23/vsf012301_3.html
This so-called suicide attempt on Tiananmen Square has nothing to do with Falun Gong practitioners because the teachings of Falun Gong prohibit any form of killing. Mr. Li Hongzhi, the founder of the practice, has explicitly stated that suicide is a sin.
Epochtimes Interviewed Falun Gong Spokesperson, Zhang Erping, Concerning the Self-Immolation Incident at Tiananmen Square
http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2001/1/28/4943.html
Master Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Gong, has always explained to us that it is absolutely forbidden to take a life and this includes taking your own. Therefore the people who did the supposed self- immolation could not have even been remotely connected to Falun Gong.
"I strongly suspect that this was staged entirely for the tricking of CNN and outside media"
Clearwisdom.net
January 24, 2001
http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2001/1/24/zip.html#0
""I strongly suspect that this was staged entirely for the tricking of CNN and outside media""
:Companion article: http://search.minghui.org/mh/articles/2001/1/24/7148.html (Chinese)
I am going to join you guys here, I will write something up. --Samuel Luo 07:19, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Falun Gong response

message: Good job, Samuel. We can then start citing stuff and expand. --Yenchin 13:54, 6 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Next Step

message: This article seems to very one sided. Many of the statements would benefit from rewording to sound more neutral. Wikipedia is not a place to profess beliefs, for either side. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 157.174.221.169 (talk) 20:47, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Neutrality 

message: Instead of deleting, can we copy the section from Suppression of Falun Gong and then summarize the incident on the Suppression page? The Supression article is 51kb long right now and could use shortening. If the self-immolation incident is indeed notable, then I don't see any problem with keeping that article, albeit with the content from the main page. - Zepheus <ゼィフィアス> 23:27, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'll do it later today. - Zepheus <ゼィフィアス> 18:06, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Prod 

message: I deleted this phrase from the first paragraph:
:The incident has mostly been dismissed as a hoax and staged event created by the Communist Party of China  Since the event, Falun Gong's reputation has been severely damaged.Benson, Michael. Whitcomb, Vanessa, Lide. [2002] (2002). The Complete Idiot's Guide to Modern China. 
without reading this Talk page. I apologize for that. HappyInGeneral reverted my change. I would like to discuss this matter here now.
I feel that this phrase is not a fair summary of the rest of the article. It's better to have the reader just read the rest of article. The second paragraph is more fair and makes the above sentences redundant anyway. Kent Wang 14:04, 17 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The debated source is this pdf. All the other sources are pretty much secondary in the discussion. The statement you mentioned above is the one in dispute. Yenchin has expressed some opinions about it. I have proposed that the sentence be rephrased to make this source fit. "The incident has mostly been dismissed as a hoax and staged event created by the Communist Party of China according to a report published by FG in conjunction with the UN. Though the UN was mostly involved through the human rights investigation, and has not made a direct claim against the CCP." As I mentioned earlier, I think this sounds fair. Benjwong 16:57, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

text: Yenchin, I just told you that the PDF is a compilation of several portions of different UN reports. How to check it, well I just showed you. You can take a unique sentence of the PDF, one that is part of the report itself, google it and see where it shows up. It will show up on one of the UN's websites. This should be quite an enough prof. —Preceding unsigned comment added by HappyInGeneral (talk • contribs)  --15:21, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

text: There is really no point in that search. Google will come up with all Falun gong websites, because that is exactly what they are trying to tell you. Is like doing a search on "Falun gong is a cult" and that return a ton of hits from Communist-beijing-owned websites.  Searching for the preferred opinion of a particular group is not going to help.  The big question is..... why should we only accept communist-owned-publications? Even if I agree the pdf has 0% association with the UN, it still shouldn't be denied.  I have already asked Yenchin to rephrase the sentence multiple times to make the source fit.  If you guys can't figure out how to make it fit, then we definitely need Wikipedia:Resolving_disputes#Discuss_with_third_parties.     Benjwong 05:40, 19 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removal of unfair summary in first paragraph 

message: As with other articles in the FG group which I have worked on, I have largely rewritten the article with a large number of commented edits. I have also added from sources already cited in the article, and reduced the reliance of block quotes which were close to violating WP:COPYVIO. Ohconfucius 09:53, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would leave copyright issues out.  We are at most working with a few sentences in the entire pdf file.  Benjwong 14:43, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

text: Good job. I have skimmed over it and it looks fair and reasonable. I still want to remove "A report released through the United Nations in 2004" as I am claiming above in Talk that there is no independent corroboration that this report was ever issued by IED through the UN. The explanation in the footnotes are insufficient as to have the phrase in the article is rather deceptive. Kent Wang 15:33, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

text: I went ahead and deleted that sentence. Take a look and see. I think it still preserves the aspect that third-party commentators have criticized it, while removing the suspect PDF cite. If you disagree, you can revert and we can discuss it here. Kent Wang 15:37, 22 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I have requested page protection until RFC arbitrators have at least arrived.  Benjwong 16:16, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

text: I'm not sure you understand how RfC works. All the new editors here have already arrived through the RfC invite. The majority of them are in favor of removal. RfC is not arbitration, it is a request for comment. If you want, you can escalate this to mediation. At the moment, the majority is for removal, so I think it is fair to remove it and only add it back in if you can win at the mediation. I will not ask for mediation, but you should if you disagree with the majority here. Ohconfucius, as you rewrote this, what do you think about this? Kent Wang 19:06, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

text: Hey sorry about the protection there.  I jumped the gun thinking an arbitrator was supposed to show up. I should have gotten the protection moved.  Benjwong 23:43, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't worry.  I won't take it personally as I try to approach many articles with this level of detail.  In fact, if I was afraid to be challenged, I would have started my own website instead of throwing my comments wide open on wiki. Benjwong 03:14, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Rewrite of 22/8/07

message: In order to make this more fair, there should be third-party commentary supporting the government's claims, or otherwise responding to the criticism from Falun Gong. Currently there is only third-party criticism. I will do some research into this later, but would appreciate help. Kent Wang 10:38, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Third-party support, or response to criticism 

message: I am not surprised you did not turn up anything with a detailed analysis of the video which showed any more than that it was a hoax. Think about it, if it was Falun Gong doing it in protest, why would everyone be denying it even now? If it weren't against what Falun Gong is about and what it stands for, why would Falun Gong deny they were practitioners? Isn't it obvious? Furthermore, even if it was done in protest, let's pretend--what would they be protesting about? Does that mean you acknowledge the persecution?
Anyway, here are some more sources which will be added in due course. I think all these except one will be traceable back to the original location, and only one of them is Falun Gong-linked, and can still be used anyway:
http://faluninfo.net/DisplayAnArticle.asp?ID=3222
http://www.faluninfo.net/displayAnArticle.asp?ID=3381
http://faluninfo.net/DisplayAnArticle.asp?ID=7394
http://www.mediachannel.org/views/dissector/falungong2.shtml
http://web.amnesty.org/802568F7005C4453/0/881234C280E6469B802568B00057ED13?Open&Highlight=2,falun
http://www.faluninfo.net/mediacontrol/IED_UN_Statement.htm
But if it's a video you're after, you could see www.falsefire.com, where I got most of those sources. Might be a good idea to watch the video and take notes, too, to report what the video reports in this article in a concise way.--Asdfg12345 15:49, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  more sources 

message: *I have to ask if anyone knows whether Chandra D Smith is a respected academic? Ohconfucius 04:46, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chrandra Smith 

message: Ohconfucius, Asdfg12345 and I (Kent Wang) all have varying opinions on this paragraph about Liu Chunling. My version is below:
:Liu Chunling's neighbours in Kaicheng established that she was not a native of the area, she was deeply troubled. A Washington Post journalist could not locate anyone that had ever seen her practicing Falun Gong. However, a Xinhua article reports that Huo Xiuzhen, Liu's adoptive mother, spoke of her daughter's "obsession with Falun Gong", her "worshipping of Li Hongzhi", and how she would teach her daughter to practice Falun Gong.Xinhua General News Service. "Families of Falun Gong Victims After Tragedy", 1 February 2001.
Ohconfucius:
:Liu Chunling's neighbours in Kaicheng established that she was not a native of the area, she was deeply troubled. She had apparently never been seen her practicing Falun Gong. However, a Xinhua article reports that Huo Xiuzhen, Liu's adoptive mother, spoke of her daughter's "obsession with Falun Gong", her "worshipping of Li Hongzhi", and how she would teach her daughter to practice Falun Gong.Xinhua General News Service. "Families of Falun Gong Victims After Tragedy", 1 February 2001.
Asdfg12345 version:
:While a Xinhua article reports that Huo Xiuzhen, Liu's adoptive mother, spoke of her daughter's "obsession with Falun Gong", her "worshipping of Li Hongzhi", and how she would teach her daughter to practice Falun Gong,Xinhua General News Service. "Families of Falun Gong Victims After Tragedy", 1 February 2001. it was established that Liu Chunling was not a native of Kaicheng, and was deeply troubled. Further, she had apparently never been seen practicing Falun Gong.
"It was established" is a weasel phrase. This comes only from one source, the Washington Post article by Pan. It would be better to state that specifically that Pan could not find any evidence. "Established" implies there is a broad consensus on this. Please discuss. Kent Wang 16:15, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah good point, I don't think phrases should be used which allude to more than the source itself actually says. But also, flg sources have some claims to make that she is not a genuine practitioner... just thinking, I looked at the page now. I think it might be a good idea to move those two final paragraphs which appear in "the act", move them to reporting and analysis. These are not strictly descriptions of what happened on that day, but are claims about the participants. I think this should be moved. The other thing which may make things easier, is that there are a number of points of contention across the whole incident. One is for example, Liu Chunling's relation to Falun Gong. So that point should get it's own paragraph, and there should be CCP view, Falun Gong view, third party views. Then the next point of contention, say, I'm not sure what, but the next thing. The point is that on any item there appears all possible viewpoints, and that they are clearly signified as xinhua, falun gong, X third party. But actually, it should be stated that Pan talked to the neighbours who said xyz, not just that he could find no evidence. The suggestion is further, that he found negative evidence. It could be at least interpreted that way, but the fact that he refers to what neighbours said needs to be mentioned. Yeah but move those two sections and we can squabble over the technicalities later. What do you think? --Asdfg12345 00:54, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

text: Yeah I think that's not too bad. The title is a bit mediocre though, I'll have to agree with that. I changed it to "nature of the victims", but this is probably still not the best. Feel free to change it. I'll think on it. I also took out one sentence from 'the act', the ccp claim they were avid practitioners. I took this out because it is a claim of a different nature than 'they did this, then they did that, then this'. I don't know about disputes for those kinds of claims, so I guess xinhua can just say xyz as it wishes. I think it is just better to, whenever stating an opinion, to state other opinions too. If it is just reporting physical events that took place like x met y then that is of a different character. Do you know what I'm saying?--Asdfg12345 08:09, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Liu Chunling 

message: Editors often make the mistake of thinking that if A is published by a reliable source, and B is published by a reliable source, then A and B can be joined together in an article to advance position C. However, this would be an example of a new synthesis of published material serving to advance a position, and as such it would constitute original research.Mr. Wales disapproves of synthesized historical theories and states: "Some who completely understand why Wikipedia ought not create novel theories of physics by citing the results of experiments and so on and synthesizing them into something new, may fail to see how the same thing applies to history." (Wales, Jimmy. "Original research", December 6, 2004) "A and B, therefore C" is acceptable only if a reliable source has published this argument in relation to the topic of the article. 
Here is an example from a Wikipedia article, with the names changed. The article was about Jones:
Smith says that Jones committed plagiarism by copying references from another book. Jones denies this, and says it's acceptable scholarly practice to use other people's books to find new references.
That much is fine. Now comes the unpublished synthesis of published material. The following material was added to that same Wikipedia article just after the above two sentences:
If Jones's claim that he consulted the original sources is false, this would be contrary to the practice recommended in the Chicago Manual of Style, which requires citation of the source actually consulted. The Chicago Manual of Style does not call violating this rule "plagiarism." Instead, plagiarism is defined as using a source's information, ideas, words, or structure without citing them.
This entire paragraph is original research, because it expresses the editor's opinion that, given the Chicago Manual of Style's definition of plagiarism, Jones did not commit it. To make the paragraph consistent with this policy, a reliable source is needed that specifically comments on the Smith and Jones dispute and makes the same point about the Chicago Manual of Style and plagiarism. In other words, that precise analysis must have been published by a reliable source in relation to the topic before it can be published in Wikipedia.
*********
This is really clear. It is saying if you synthesise two arguments to make a new unique argument. It says nothing about just stating two arguments. I never tried to say "therefore she isn't a practitioner", I just presented the two relevant pieces of information. Honestly, that is completely okay. Judging by this logic, all the stuff about the CCP saying practitioners did Falun Gong this or that, said dafa hao, or did the exercises smoothly, that is all in the same category. It is just information relevant to the incident that can be used to evaluate the situation. it is of the same nature as everything else. Definitely does not qualify for the above. Cmon. I won't reinstate it now because I have to eat some noodles now and go to sleep. You could do so yourself as a sign of goodwill. I think there was something else you did that I didn't feel right about. Anyway, we'll chat about it later. Thanks for being fairly reasonable in communication etc.--Asdfg12345 13:54, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  If the communist party was allowed to say someone was obsessed with FG.  Then FG should equally be allowed to say the wannabe practitioner was beating kids and violating FG practices.  Both should appear in the article for fairness.  This is the original problem I had with these discussions.  It always come down to who should be allowed to talk.  Benjwong 20:45, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

text: *Now that is better - At least we have a source! It troubles me somewhat that the [FG] source, in the attempt to distance itself from her and her actions, attempts to smear a poor troubled woman who was merely trying to make ends meet. It is clear that "evidence" is circumstantial and not anecdotal (same as saying that FG prohibits suicide, ergo cannot be FG practitioners). FG is so desperate to distance themselves from this imperfect specimen of a human being that its behaviour is questionable ("不善?"). Two wrongs don't make a right. Ohconfucius 01:53, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

text: Sorry I am trying hard to leave these type of discussion, but can't help myself but to make another comment.  Psychological instability of victims is always one of the major item presented in court cases.  This is not a court of law, but if it was... it would almost undoubtedly go in as the first exhibit. Benjwong 12:38, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

text: But isn't FG all about consummation and about eschewing the 'Adversarial' style [of courts]? Ohconfucius 02:57, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not sure what you mean by that.  I was implying that in a normal international court, this would be basic presentable evidence.  This is obviously not something that can ever be presented in a state-run People's court.  But here at least on wikipedia it is new information.  New enough that I have never heard of it.  I think other readers will benefit from having it on the article.  Yes this one comes directly out of FG.  But if you are waiting for a state-sponsored doctor that presents a medical report showing the immolator was unstable, good luck.  Benjwong 05:01, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

text: *I think we are talking cross purposes. I was merely speaking about how FG lives by its own philosophies, nothing more. Ohconfucius 08:50, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Synthesis of published material serving to advance a position

message: *Please see WP:OR. Kent Wang 21:54, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This is not going into the articles. Just some basic data for anyone interested in the science aspect.  Benjwong 22:07, 9 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Just because I am not adding anything.  Does not mean someone else won't find the data useful.  Sorry but blocking weather data goes alittle to far to protect your POV.  I have said 2 things, and I am not spamming.  This is hardly a violation of any wikipedia forum policy. If you can only reference politics, then this entire section is not for you. Benjwong 13:47, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

text:  You are violating WP:NOT#PUBLISHER, WP:FORUM#FORUM and WP:COPYVIO (Copying and pasting the weather data). Please read these rules pages before you respond. You have consistently shown a lack of understanding of Wikipedia policy, especially during the previous RfC dispute. If you revert again, I will request another RfC, both on the article and on you specifically for user conduct. Kent Wang 17:07, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

text: Filing Rfc and complaints is not what I do.  I am too busy with too many articles.  I swung by to drop off a little data, not to debate some more.  Had I known people will accuse me of all these offences I would not have even bothered.  Benjwong 20:35, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

text: You also said CNN didn't "give a damn" and still made the report public after being detained.  To be honest I am not sure what opinion you have of CNN. I can only agree that so far there is no data on where the camera was positioned exactly. Benjwong 01:09, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

text: I find it funny you picked CNN to prove the event happened, when just a few paragraphs ago you tried to discredit them.  Benjwong 14:01, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You are entitled your opinion.  If anything I'd been told the opposite in the past for reading too deep into things. Benjwong 17:48, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

text: CNN don't play by mainland rules. CNN bad reporters.  Thats what I got out of your message.  I believe I am entitled my opinions too.  Benjwong 20:56, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Weather data for January 23, 2001 in Beijing

message: I've added a bunch of stuff from this schechter book, as well as information from a falun gong press release about how xinhua's reports were taken up by the western media. Please, no one delete these.--Asdfg12345 16:30, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd like to reword some of it so that it incorporates better. I'm also going to check the sources in detail. Will do so soon. Kent Wang 17:18, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

text: *I think the Schechter stuff needs to be used with care. Simply comparing the Philip Pan article with Schechter's paraphrasing of him reveals a "ramping up" of arguments and allegations concerning Liu Chunling'. She is described by Schechter as "depressed and mentally unstable" while what Pan actually said was that Li "a woman who  led a troubled life" and also quotes a neighbour saying "There was something wrong with her," Ohconfucius 10:10, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Schechter, FLG press release

message: Comment to Asdfg: I note that the background section has grwon while I slept, and is now beginning to resemble the Persecution of Falun Gong article. Are you going to suggest merging this article into the abovementioned? If not, I think expansion should stop. From this background, a reader may be mistaken for concluding that some FG practitioners were indeed responsible for torching themselves, as there were no other means of peaceful protest. Ohconfucius 04:15, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Background