Talk:Hawaiian Independence Movement

message: The evolution of this article is taking a problematic direction. First, it is not fully clear why a separate article was created in the present sketchy and incomplete form. Every fact that could be mentioned here could also properly belong in the Hawaiian sovereignty or the history section of the Hawaii article. The article is a subset of the historical facts about Hawaii. How is one to decide which facts to put in the subset and how to organize them?
The article might be justified if it would be reorganized to catalog more clearly and succinctly the arguments made by those who favor Hawaiian independence and those opposing it. However, even the historical basis of this topic has become part of an emergent political controversy that is unfolding even as we wiki. Thus a high-quality analysis might very well run afoul of the Wikipedia rule against "original research". In any case it is very difficult to handle the topic in a neutral, encyclopedic way.
In its present form the article does not clearly lay out and identify pro and con arguments. It is in danger of turning into an edit battle between contributors who support Hawaiian independence and those who oppose it. "Pro" user A mentions fact(oid) X while omitting fact(oid) Y. "Anti" user B inserts fact(oid) Y but neglects to mention fact(oid) Z. "Pro" user inserts fact(oid) Z etc.
Recent edits demonstrate the problem. By adding the reference to (Y) the case of Texas, an anonymous contributor presumably was seeking to balance the pro-independence argument that (X) the annexation is void due to the lack of a treaty as prescribed by the U.S. constitution. But someone might then argue that (Z) although the people of Texas were for annexation and Texas was admitted immediately as a state, the people of Hawaii were overwhelmingly opposed to annexation and Hawaii was given only the inferior status of a territory. That is (goes the argument), Texans were exercising their basic human right of self-determination, but Hawaiians were in fact being deprived of theirs; so the Texas case is not relevant, is it? Without getting into details, basically, some would argue yes, some no. So referring to the Texas case as if its relevance were an accepted fact just compounds the difficulty by adding more POV.
If president Grover Cleveland is to be mentioned, then one should probably mention the reason his administration opposed annexation: namely, that the Blount report to Congress determined that the planters' "republican government" was totally unrepresentative and had no legitimacy among the people. The American president, or so I have read, further recommended that the U.S. reinstate Queen Liliuokalani, by force if need be. If that is true, then that would be very relevant to understanding the phenomenon of support for Hawaiian independence. But then anti-independence contributors would want to insert material supporting the planters' POV, and so on.
The topic of Hawaiian independence merits serious treatment. As the history of Oscar Temaru and the Tahitian independence movement shows, it would be wrong and short-sighted to just say "won't happen" and dismiss the topic out of hand. Due to patriotic sentiments, Wikipedia's U.S. readership may have a strong vested interest in seeing an anti-Hawaiian-independence POV here. That presents an underlying dilemma, as with all Wikipedia topics where all existing historical accounts are highly politicized and even today draw a strong emotional response.
--IslandGyrl 11:38, 2 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Neutrality and quality problems

message: Is there any relation between the HIM and the monarchist Akahi Nui? - Keith D. Tyler ¶ (AMA) 19:11, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Akahi Nui