Talk:Charles Manson/Archive 2

message: Dear Asc85 -- As you indicate, Tex Watson's autobiographical report that he, not Susan Atkins, stabbed Sharon Tate does not quite belong in the Charles Manson entry; but as I recall, I placed it there -- i.e., in the entry's "Aftermath" section -- because another editor had inserted the same information awkardly and without citation in the entry's account of the Tate murders.  Recognizing that the information was likely to be reinserted eventually if I were simply to delete it, I moved it to "Aftermath," where I footnoted it.
I urge you to undo your deletion of the sentence.  To put my argument generally: the ordinary rules of composition can not be applied at Wikipedia.  The material you have deleted will pop up again; that is, some editor or another will eventually reinsert it, almost certainly awkardly and without citation.  The article would be in better condition with the version you removed, the material's questionable relevance notwithstanding.
I could probably think of three or four other bits of information I have inserted in the article for roughly the same reason -- i.e. to prevent their being inserted carelessly by other persons.  The article really does not need, for instance, the name of Bobby Beausoleil's girlfriend who spoke with officers of the L.A. Sheriff; but because another editor kept inserting the incorrect name, I placed the correct one there.  To restate my point:  In an ordinary situation, this would be poor composition; at Wikipedia, it is beneficial.JohnBonaccorsi 04:20, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Dear John,  I appreciate your EXTREMELY gracious comment to me above.  However, I do disagree with you on it's relevance to keep it in.  That being said, if you want to re-insert it back in for the reasons you state, I will not have a back-and-forth "war" on this matter.  Asc85 14:52, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Deletion of Watson statement 

message: Yesterday, at the User Talk Page of a Wikipedia administrator, I posted an entry headed “Manson-page vandalism,” in which I recommended that Charles Manson be protected against vandals.  As I indicated in the entry, I knew, at that time, virtually nothing about Wikipedia’s anti-vandalism measures; but as I have mentioned in a follow-up entry (i.e., on the same page), I have since encountered Requests for page protection.  There, in a quick look, I got the impression that shielding the Manson article might involve, first, a brief period of “semi-protection,” after which “indefinite semi-protection” might be available.  Shades of Double Secret Probation.
As I indicated in my first statement to the administrator, I personally am no longer able to keep watch on Charles Manson, which I’ve guarded intermittently for some months; I am also no longer able to take part in Wikipedia exchanges, either on the present discussion page or on my own User Talk Page (where I am about to enter a note to that effect).  Before taking my leave, so to say, of Wikipedia, I will say that the encyclopedia’s attitude toward vandalism is, to be blunt, contemptible.
To repeat – I know virtually nothing about Wikipedia’s administration; I don’t know how policies are examined, proposed, or implemented.  I can understand that vandalism – which, I gather, is frequently discussed by administrators – is uniquely difficult to thwart; nevertheless, I think the present regime of warnings, temporary blocks, and so on is softheaded and weak.  If you will visit 23:11 10 November 2007 of Charles Manson, you will see the sort of foul – not to mention poorly-punctuated – treatment to which the article is periodically subjected.  If you will proceed to the User Talk page of 21.217.148.147, you will see that the response to this sort of sociopathy – exercised anonymously upon a worldwide readership of millions – is a polite request that its perpetrator “not introduce incorrect information into articles.”  After a statement that the edits “appear to be vandalism,” the response continues:  “If you believe the information you added was correct, please cite references or sources or discuss the changes on the article’s talk page before making them again….”
If you believe the information you added was correct?  The information that was added included names that might well be those of real persons and that I will omit as I quote it:  With no where to go he walked his old neighbor hood, and met a little girl named name omitted, daughter of name omitted and siter of name omitted, charles had thought that she was the sluttiest little girl that he had ever seen and he asked her to go down on him.  She agreed and started to take off his pants.  Charles fucked name omitted in a playground, name omitted screamed for more and he was grlad to give it to her.  after he pulled out and she started to give him a blow job. 2 minuetes later, charles nutted in her face.  One wonders about the seriousness of an enterprise whose overseers permit such a feckless response to the sort of behavior represented by the insertion of that passage in this article.  To say it again, the whole scheme of polite warnings to, and temporary blockings of, persons who can not be unaware of the vileness of their actions as they vandalize this resource is worthy of contempt.  There is no point in addressing oneself reasonably to persons who, by taking advantage of a most-obvious opportunity to impose upon others, have demonstrated that they are unreasonable.
Again – I personally must now say goodbye to Wikipedia.  I will not even be able to respond to any responses that might be made to the present comment.  The preceding paragraphs are an adieu – a brief statement of my view of a serious problem in the workings of an interesting entity.JohnBonaccorsi 04:26, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Grand pronouncement on vandalism 

message: As I've looked over this article the last few days, I think it's nearly ready to be submitted for Good Article nomination. There are a couple fact tags that need citations remaining in the article. I've worked on the references, condensing them with "ref name=" citations to shorten the list without losing the citations. Hopefully, someone with the needed references can supply the last two citations and if no one objects, I am going to submit it in a few days. Wildhartlivie (talk) 23:51, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Anyone interested please look over this article this evening. I plan to submit it for good article review tonight. Thanks. Wildhartlivie (talk) 21:17, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Good article nomination? 

message: I've nominated this article for good article consideration as discussed above. Wildhartlivie (talk) 06:05, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Just as a note (I'm not reviewing it, yet...) - this article really needs an expansion on the lead if you want it to be a GA. Dihydrogen Monoxide ♫ 06:28, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Done.71.242.203.167 (talk) 17:06, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Good Article Nomination 

message: For all active editors concerned with the article - 
I'm beginning to become concerned that when reviewers for GA status come in, they are going to see this recent back and forth editing & the lengthy talk page entries as evidence of edit warring & reject the article without due consideration (that's one of the quick-fail criteria). I really would urge everyone involved to discuss this on the talk page before charging in to change it back, if for no other reason than to avoid the appearance of edit warring. Discussing it is evidence of collaboration, while allowing all editors involved to arrive at consensus on what is going to be included, and obviously, how it's going to be presented. Thanks. Wildhartlivie (talk) 20:20, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Note 

message: I am going to pull the good article nomination for the time being. When I brought up the idea of nominating it, it may have been in need of some fine tuning, but the page had been relatively stable of controversy for a while. Since I've brought this up, there has been an explosion of back and forth reverts, disagreements, and quite honestly, over the last couple of days, conduct bordering on incivility on the talk page. It's disheartening and obviously not being done in the spirit of collaboration, but instead, hostility and positioning. Under Wikipedia:Reviewing_good_articles, one of the criteria for quick-fail (#4) is "The article has been the subject of recent ongoing edit wars." Under WP:EW: Edit warring is a distinct behavior characterized by a confrontational attitude. Of the last 500 edits on this page, just barely over 200 occurred from October 18th until November 19th. I broached nominating the page on November 21. Since then, in FIVE days, there have been almost 300 edits, most of which are in the midst of extensive arguments over how a sentence is phrased. It will not pass good article review while this is happening. I'd rather it be pulled until this nitpicking - on both parts - dies down. It's not worth the anxiety it's causing. Wildhartlivie (talk) 01:09, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  GA nomination 

message: *FYI, keep an eye on Wikipedia:Peer review/Charles Manson/archive2.  With any luck, you may get some feedback from some other uninvolved editors.  At the very least, you will probably get some stylistic advice from a Semi-Automated Peer Review, which I often find to be very helpful in and of itself even if no one else comments at the Peer Review.  If you want some more feedback, I suggest posting a notice about the ongoing Peer Review at relevant WikiProjects.  If you want me to do this for you in a neutral manner on the WikiProjects' talk page, I'd be glad to, just let me know on my talk page.  Cheers, Cirt (talk) 13:12, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Peer review/Charles Manson/archive2]] 

message: In "My edits from today...," an earlier section of the present page, there was discussion of the moment in which Wojciech Frykowski was wakened by the arrival of the intruders at the Tate residence. The discussion involved quotation from Chapter 14 of Will You Die for Me?, Tex Watson’s autobiography (1978) as told to Ray Hoekstra.  For the record — that is, for the benefit of future visitors to the present page — I provide additional pertinent material.
First comes testimony from Susan Atkins’s grand jury appearance, December 5, 1969 (see Bugliosi 1994, page 173 ff.). Atkins has explained that Tex Watson entered the house through a window "to the right" of the front door: "Tex opened up the window, crawled inside, and the next thing I knew he was at the front door opening the door." After examining a photograph, in which she identifies the house, the door, and the window, Atkins participates in the following exchange:
:Q. After he went through the window, then he opened the front door, you say?
:A. Yes.
:Q. Did all of you girls enter at that time?
:A. Only two of us entered, one stayed outside.
:Q. Who stayed outside?
:A. Linda Kasabian.
:Q. And you and Patricia Krenwinkel entered the residence?
:A. Yes.
:Q. And at that time, Tex was already inside the residence, is that correct?
:A. Yes.
Shortly thereafter, there is this:
:Q. What happened after you and Patricia Krenwinkel joined Tex inside the residence?
:A. As I walked in Tex was in front of the couch and there was a man laying [sic] on the couch and his head was — the back of his head was facing me and he was facing the opposite direction.  It was — I was standing here and he was lying with his head here and his feet extending that way.
:Mr. Bugliosi: Can you hold it for just one second, Susan. — Mr. Foreman, I have here a photograph of a female and male Caucasian. May this photograph be marked Grand Jury Exhibit Number — I believe it is 10 — 11 for identification?
:The Foreman: It may be so marked.
:Q. by Mr. Bugliosi: Susan, I show you Grand Jury Exhibit Number 11, a photograph of a female and a male Caucasian. — Do you recognize any of the two individuals shown in that photograph?
:A. I believe I recognize both of them.
:Q. Do you know who they are?
:A. I think the woman is Abigail Folger and the man is a man by the name of Frykowski.
:Q. The man being on the right in the photograph, is that correct?
:A. Yes.
:Q. Is this the man that was lying on the couch?
:A. By the appearance of his face. I can’t tell by the clothes. He wasn’t wearing these.
:Q. By the appearance of his face does this appear to be the man who was lying on the couch when Tex approached the couch?
:A. It appears to be, I can’t say for sure.
:Q. What happened after Tex approached this man on the couch?
:A. The man stretched his arms and woke up. I guess he thought some of his friends were coming from somewhere. He said, “What time is it?”
:Q. Did Tex say anything in response to that?
:A. Tex jumped in front of him and held a gun in his face and said, “Be quiet. Don’t move or you’re dead.”
:Q. Did the man say anything to Tex when Tex said that?
:A. He said something like, “Well, who are you and what are you doing here?”
:Q. What did Tex say to that, if anything?
:A. He said, "I am the devil, and I’m here to do the devil’s business and where is your money."
:Q. What happened next?
:A. He said, "My money is in the wallet on the desk." And Tex told me to go over and look at the desk. I went over and looked at the desk and I didn't see a wallet and I told Tex I didn't see one.
:Q. What happened next?
:A. Tex told me to go into the bedrooms — the other rooms, he didn't say bedrooms — go in and see if there was anybody else in the house.
The next piece is from Tex Watson’s testimony at his own trial. Watson has just said that he "walked right in the door" of the house and found "a guy laying [sic] on a couch asleep." (Later in the same stretch of testimony, he will expressly deny slitting a screen.) There is this exchange:
:Q. All right. What happened when you got in the house?
:A. Then I saw Sadie [Susan Atkins].
:Q. Where?
:A. She just popped up.
:Q. Do you know where she came from?
:A. No.
:Q. Did you see her before or after you saw the man on the couch?
:A. I saw her — did you say before or after I saw the man on the couch?
:Q. Yes.
:A. I believe I saw her before.
:Q. What was she doing, if you know?
:A. She went by me and went in the other part of the house. I was in the front room and she started bringing out people out of the rooms.
:Q. How many people were in the front room that you went in?
:A. There was one man laying [sic] on the couch asleep.
:Q. And was he awakened while you were in that room?
:A. He awakened when everybody was coming into the room.
:Q. Who was coming into the room?
:A. A bunch of people walking into the room.
:Q. How many? Do you remember?
:A. Three or four people were walking into the room.
:Q. Was Sadie one of them?
:A. Sadie, yes, Sadie was one of them.
:Q. Do you remember who else among the girls was in that group, if they were?
:A. I didn’t see any other girls yet.
:Q. You didn’t see Linda?
:A. No, I didn’t see Linda.
:Q. Nor did you see Patricia; is that right?
:A. She walked in the house as everybody was walking into the room.
Later in the same testimony, Watson expressly denies ever using "the expression 'I am the devil here to do the devil's work.'" He expressly denies saying it at the Tate house.
I present once more — at greater length — the passage that was presented in the earlier discussion. Again — it is from Will You Die for Me?, Chapter 14:
:I told Linda to go around to the back of the house and check for open doors or windows. She was back in a few moments, saying that everything was locked. A window that opened into the entry hall, just to the side of the front door, was raised several inches, so — after telling Linda to go back down to the gate and keep watch in case anyone was alerted by the sounds of the shots — I slit the bottom of the screen, removed it, pushed up the window, and climbed through.  It was very still inside the house.
:I crept to the front door and let in Sadie. Katie [Patricia Krenwinkel] had disappeared for the moment, gone down to Linda at the gate to get her knife, so the two of us slowly moved past a couple of large blue trunks that were standing in the hallway and slipped into the living room beyond. At first it seemed empty, but as we got in farther we could see a large blond man — Voytek Frykowski — asleep on a sofa that faced into the room, away from the door, and was incongruously draped with a large American flag. As we stood over him, I whispered to Sadie to check the rest of the house.
:Frykowski stirred at the sound of my voice and mumbled something like: "What time is it?" I kicked him in the head. As he struggled up in confusion, mumbling: "Who are you? What do you want?" I answered, "I'm the devil and I'm here to do the devil's business."
:I jerked my head to Sadie and she disappeared down the hall. Frykowski started to say something else but I cut him off: "Another word and you’re dead!" When I asked him where his money was, he nodded toward a desk, but then Katie appeared and Sadie returned from the back of the house, saying there were three others: a man and two women. I told her to get them.
:She brought back Abigail Folger first, a dark-haired woman in a long white nightgown. Katie held a knife on her while Sadie went back for the other two.
Chapter 19 of Will You Die for Me? treats Watson's trial and contains the following:
:Then I took the stand. Despite some of the truth I’d begun to see through reading the Bible and talking to Chaplain Goffigan, self-preservation won out in court and I admitted only what I felt I had to....
71.242.203.167 20:15, 30 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  For the record 

message: Chapter 14 of Tex Watson’s autobiographical Will You Die for Me? (as told to Ray Hoekstra) contains the following:
:[After killing Frykowski,] I stood up and went back inside with Katie. Sadie was sitting next to Sharon on the couch as the pathetic blond woman sobbed, begging us to take her with us and let her have her baby before we killed her. It was the first time I’d realized she was pregnant, and for a moment it almost seemed like a good idea. But then Katie hissed, "Kill her!" and Charlie’s tape whirred, "Kill her!" inside my head and I looked at Sadie. But she just sat there holding Sharon, so I reached out and made the first cut across her cheek. Later, Prosecutor Bugliosi — because of some things Susan-Sadie bragged about in jail in one of her attempts to get attention — was convinced that it was she who killed Sharon Tate, but his suspicion was not true. It was my hand that struck out, over and over, until the cries of "Mother... mother..." stopped. Suddenly it seemed very quiet. It was over.
I am going to add Tate’s last words, as reported by Watson, to the Wikipedia article.71.242.203.167 00:02, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tate's demise 

message: The end of the introduction of the article states that the California Supreme Court eliminated the death penalty in California. This is not the case; the death penalty still exists in California and it is still used (recently, in the Scott Peterson case). Source: http://www.deathpenalty.org/index.php?pid=history
While for a time, the death penalty was banned, strictly speaking, the death penalty was never permanently banned. I will edit. that part of the article to reflect this.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Raliugar (talk • contribs) 05:35, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: For the record: The article didn't say there is no death penalty in California. It said the Supreme Court of California eliminated the death penalty in that state. That is correct. Nothing can be "permanently banned," strictly speaking or otherwise. — Anyway, I can see why you thought it important to make clear that the death penalty returned.71.242.203.167 (talk) 01:53, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

text: I agree that the article is clearer and more informative with the change you made. I essentially indicated that when I said I could see why you thought it important to make the revision. You are not splitting hairs, and I'm not either. I've pointed out that your initial statement that the article contained information that is "not the case" was erroneous. In fact, you yourself, in constructing your note, apparently noticed that and, rather than revise your charge of error, sought to explain it with your follow-up about the ban. (I now get the sense that your phrase "strictly speaking" applies to the first half of your follow-up, not the second; but it is positioned so that it might be taken to apply to either. This is a minor point, but I mention it.) Again — I don't object to your revision; I indicated that. I put my own statement on the record — as I indicated — lest visitors to the present page conclude the article contained an error as gross as the one you imputed to it. Should they conclude that, they will think the article not credible.71.242.203.167 (talk) 07:54, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  California Death Penalty 

message: At 06:49, 6 December 2007, an editor revised the article with a note that indicated Manson's middle name is Willis, not Milles. This is not correct. The 1994 edition of Bugliosi and Gentry's Helter Skelter contains the following on page 235 (i.e., about midway through the "February 1970" chapter):
:I was curious about something. Up until his arrest in Mendocino County on July 28, 1967, [footnote omitted] Charlie had always used his real name, Charles Milles Manson. On that occasion, however, and thereafter, he called himself Charles Willis Manson. Had Manson ever said anything about his name? I asked. Crockett and Poston both told me that they had heard Manson say, very slowly, that his name was "Charles' [sic] Will is Man's Son," meaning that his will was that of the Son of Man.
:Although Susan Atkins had emphasized Charlie's surname in talking to [her fellow inmate] Virginia Graham, I hadn't really thought, until now, how powerful that name was. Man Son. It was tailor-made for the Infinite Being role he was now seeking to portray.
Another editor has already removed the erroneous note. At the article's head, where Manson's full name is given, I'll enter an invisible comment, to try to prevent the note's reappearance.71.242.203.167 (talk) 07:34, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You certainly can put a note, but what was added at the very bottom of the page would more be considered mild vandalism and not truly a good faith effort to edit the page. A note would likely either not be seen, or ignored. That sort of edit pops up on articles many, many times. It's best to just remove it and go on. Wildhartlivie (talk) 08:21, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Middle name Milles, not Willis 

message: At 04:46, 11 December 2007, an editor added "Former Scientologists" to the categories listed at the bottom of the article.  His or her edit summary reads: "This was missing. Charles Manson was at one point a Scientologist." In the word "Scientologist," a dollar sign ($) stands in place of the initial S.
In the past, the article has, in fact, mentioned Manson’s involvement with Scientology.  In "Rise of the Family," the statement that Manson established himself as a guru in Haight-Ashbury is presently followed by this:
:He soon had his first group of young followers, most of them female.
Formerly, that sentence was this:
:Expounding a philosophy that included at least some of the Scientology he had studied in prison, he soon had his first group of young followers, most of them female.
The phrase about Scientology has been deleted twice, I think, in the article’s history.  The first time it was removed, I figured the editor who had excised it simply thought it trivial; the second time, I began to think the deletion was executed by someone concerned about Scientology's reputation (or Manson's).
The 1994 edition of Bugliosi and Gentry’s Helter Skelter contains the following at page 144 (two pages from end of chapter headed "November 22-23, 1969"):
:[For a staff evaluation conducted after his July 1961 transfer to the United States Penitentiary at McNeil Island, Washington,] Manson gave as his claimed religion "Scientologist," stating that he "has never settled upon a religious formula for his beliefs and is presently seeking an answer to his question in the new mental health cult known as Scientology."
:Scientology, an outgrowth of science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard’s Dianetics, was just coming into vogue at this time. Manson’s teacher, i.e., "auditor," was another convict, Lanier Rayner. Manson would later claim that while in prison he achieved Scientology’s highest level, "theta clear." [Footnote omitted]
:Although Manson remained interested in Scientology much longer than he did in any other subject except music, it appears that, like the Dale Carnegie course, he stuck with it only as long as his enthusiasm lasted, then dropped it, extracting and retaining a number of terms and phrases ("auditing," "cease to exist," "coming to Now") and some concepts (karma, reincarnation, etc.) which, perhaps fittingly, Scientology had borrowed in the first place.
At pages 163-64 (one page or so from the end of the chapter headed "December 2, 1969"), the passage about the persons whose attention Manson drew in Haight-Ashbury is followed by this:
:They were also young, naïve, eager to believe, and, perhaps even more important, belong. There were followers aplenty for any self-styled guru. It didn’t take Manson long to sense this. In the underground milieu into which he’d stumbled, even the fact that he was an ex-convict conferred a certain status. Rapping a line of metaphysical con that borrowed as much from pimping as joint jargon and Scientology, Manson began attracting followers, almost all girls at first, then a few young boys.
I am going to reinsert the twice-deleted phrase, with a footnote of its own.71.242.203.167 (talk) 08:54, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Scientology 

message: At 23:21, 12 December 2007, the following sentence in the article’s section headed "First offenses" was revised:
:For the federal crime of taking a stolen car across a state line, Manson was sent to the Washington, D.C., National Training School for Boys.
As revised, the sentence was as follows:
:For the federal crime of taking a stolen car across a state line, Manson was sent to the austin texas [sic], National Training School for Boys.
The lack of capitalization of "Austin" and "Texas" were part of the revision, as was the lack of a comma between the two words.
This is insidious vandalism.  That is to say, it is deliberate, gratuitous falseness that can easily survive in the text.  The response to such should be the immediate and enduring blocking of the IP address from which it has been executed.71.242.203.167 (talk) 23:52, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Unfortunately, vandalism is going to be part of a collaborative effort such as Wikipedia. Obviously, someone pranking around. There are lots of people who patrol recent changes as well as specific articles and the rule is that such things will be reverted. The effort required to permanently block someone who has committed minor vandalism outweighs the effort to revert it. Nothing is ever permanently gone, and while its frustrating and annoying, it is going to happen, and will be reverted. Quite often, people who do such things are on public computer access systems, or on dynamic  IPs, so it also ends up being a futile effort. Don't let it get to you. Wildhartlivie (talk) 02:12, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  More insidious vandalism 

message: I have taken the liberty of undoing three edits executed at 12:39, 12:42, and 12:46, 24 January 2008, by Finneganw.
Edit of 12:39:
In the Criminal Infobox at the article’s head, Finneganw changed the charges against Manson from "murder and conspiracy" to "premeditated multiple murder and conspiracy." As can be verified in the opening passage of the decision in Manson’s appeal from his Tate-LaBianca convictions, the charges were, as the infobox originally indicated, murder and conspiracy.
Edit of 12:42:
The article’s opening sentence had read "Charles Manson is a convict who led the 'Manson Family'...." Finneganw changed this to "Charles Manson is a convicted multiple murderer etc."  The adjective "convicted" is superfluous; moreover, the revision clashes with the article’s two following sentences, which indicate Manson was found guilty of the Tate-LaBianca murders and of conspiracy to commit them.  If Finneganw finds the first sentence unsatisfactory, he is free to change it — but not at the expense of the paragraph’s coherence.
Edit of 12:46:
The opening sentence of the section headed "Encounter with Tate" had indicated that, on March 23, 1969, Manson entered uninvited upon 10050 Cielo Drive.  As revised by Finneganw, the sentence indicated that Manson entered the property on that date illegally.  That is unfounded.71.242.195.148 (talk) 07:15, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Edits of 24 January 2008 

message: At 22:14, 27 January 2008, an editor removed "impended" from a sentence in which it is the correct verb.  The edit summary was as follows:
:"have never heard 'impended' used as a verb (not standard English)"
The verb is defined in the 2007 Oxford Pocket Dictionary of Current English; the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition, 2000; and elsewhere.  The editor’s statement that he or she has not heard "impended" used as a verb is nonsensical; how else is it used?  Charitably interpreted, the assertion that it is "not standard English" means simply that the editor is familiar with the verb only in its usual form, the participle "impending."  I would point out that this is the same editor who, at 11:28, 30 November 2007, justified the removal of the verb "burgle" with the falsehood that it does not appear in the Oxford English Dictionary.
One minute after removing "impended," the same editor removed a comma he or she deemed "unnecessary."  The comma was not without function, but I’ll let that go.  I will restore "impended."71.242.195.148 (talk) 00:14, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Impend" 

message: Does anyone have information regarding his atistic works / skills? I seem to remember to have heard that he is an accomplished painter, and is working from prison. Information about exhibitions, dealers, media? I was trying to google it, and I have found several sites offering alleged manson art and various collectible objects, but none which to my mind seems credible enough to document that we are actually talking about real Manson art...
I believe I saw it once upon a time in a tv documentary many years ago, where there was also an interview with Manson, and they actually showed an art piece, which in my humble opinion seemed very interesting...
Dinofant (talk) 00:18, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: There is an external link on the main page to some art of his. He's been known to send little artsy pieces to people who have written to him, but that was more in the past than now. There was some backlash from people trying to exhibit and sell Manson Family related art, so it's not as available now. Wildhartlivie (talk) 01:02, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  manson - artist ? 

message: I think he did, I've heard it somewhere, I'm just not sure. If he did, I think it should be noted somewhere in this article. - J-Whitt (talk) 19:50, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Am not aware of any statement that he lived in Charleston; but according to both Helter Skelter and Manson in His Own Words, that was the location of the service station that his mother and her brother robbed.  In reaction to your comment, I've noted that fact in the article, as you may see.  I've also indicated that the relatives' home where Manson lived while his mother was in the state penitentiary was in McMechen, West Virginia.  (Previously, the article indicated only the state in which the service station and the home were located.)  Because both localities have Wikipedia articles of their own, I've included internal links.71.242.195.148 (talk) 20:21, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Didn't Charles Manson used to live in Charleston, WV? 

message: At 12:01, 19 February 2008, in the article’s "Childhood" subsection, an editor deleted the indication that Kathleen Maddox was unmarried at the time of Charles Manson’s birth.  The edit summary reads:  "deleted the word 'unmarried' (incorrect as de facto is indeed a marriage)."
I don’t know what that means.  In Bugliosi 1994 (Helter Skelter) at page 136 — i.e., at the beginning of the chapter headed November 22-23, 1969 — is this:
:Charles Manson was born "no name Maddox" on November 12, 1934, in Cincinnati, Ohio, the illegitimate son of a sixteen-year-old girl named Kathleen Maddox.
On pages 28-29 of the 1988 Evergreen edition of Manson in His Own Words is this:
:On November 12, 1934, while living in Cincinnati, Ohio, unwed and only sixteen, my mother gave birth to a bastard son.  Hospital records list the child as "no name Maddox." The child — me — was an outlaw from birth.  The guy who planted the seed was a young drugstore cowboy who called himself Colonel Scott.  He was a transient laborer working on a nearby dam project, and he didn't stick around long enough to even watch the belly rise.
In "Mother Tells Life of Manson as Boy," the 1971 newspaper interview-article linked at what is presently footnote 8 of the Wikipedia article, is this:
:"Charles was born out of wedlock," [Manson’s mother] admits, "but it wasn’t just any man.  I wasn’t a prostitute, I’ve never been a prostitute.  I was just 15 years old and a dumb kid.["]
I am going to reinsert the indication that Kathleen Maddox was unmarried at the time of Charles Manson’s birth.  If an editor thinks that is inaccurate, he or she should make an argument to that effect on the present page.71.242.195.148 (talk) 19:24, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Married or unmarried 

message: At 16:32 and 16:33, 1 March 2008, the article’s subsection headed "First offenses" was revised to indicate that Manson robbed — not burglarized — stores and service stations.  This is incorrect.
Pertinent passages in Bugliosi and Gentry's Helter Skelter, 1994 edition, are found on pages 137 and 138 (in the chapter headed "November 22-23, 1969"):
:[Manson’s mother] didn’t want him, and he ran away again.  Burglarizing a grocery store, he stole enough money to rent a room.  He then broke into several other stores, stealing, among other things, a bicycle.  Caught during a burglary, he was placed in the juvenile center in Indianapolis.
:...
:In February 1951, Charles Manson and two other sixteen-year-olds escaped [from the Indiana School for Boys] and headed for California.  For transportation they stole cars.  For support they burglarized gas stations....
 
Burglary and robbery are not synonyms, as is made clear in Black’s Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition (West Publishing, 1990).  In fact, that work's definition of robbery concludes with advice to the reader to compare the definition of burglary.  As presented therein, the definitions of the words are as follows:
:Robbery:  Felonious taking of money, personal property, or any other article of value, in the possession of another, from his person or immediate presence, and against his will, accomplished by means of force or fear.  (Page 1329, citing People v. Eddy, 123 Cal.App.2d 826, 268 P.2d 47, 51.  Emphasis added.)
:Burglary:  A person is guilty of burglary if he enters a building or occupied structure, or separately secured or occupied portion thereof, with purpose to commit a crime therein, unless the premises are at the time, open to the public or the actor is licensed or privileged to enter.  (Pages 197-98, citing Section 221.1 of the Model Penal Code.  Emphasis added.)
I'll note, too, that Bugliosi and Gentry also mention armed robberies committed by Manson in the period between the burglaries referred to in the passages quoted above; thus, there is no reason to think the distinction between burglary and robbery was lost on those authors (as would have been unlikely in the case of Bugliosi, who worked as a prosecutor).
I am going to undo the revisions and leave a hidden note re this.71.242.117.180 (talk) 21:41, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Burglary, not robbery 

message: Hey doesn anyone know why he has a swastika on his forehead, is he now a neo-nazi, or what? I saw it when he was interviewed behind bars for a documentary they did on him? How long has he had it and for what reason does he have it?Levi Seigel (talk) 04:07, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The swastika started out as the X on his forehead during the trial. At some point in the 70s, he adapted it to a swastika. The reasons are as many as Charlie has mood swings, although it was probably to garner acceptance when he went on to prison. Charlie doesn't belong to any groups that don't directly benefit Charlie. He's not a Nazi, neo or otherwise. What he is, to use a colloquialism, is more than a little nuts. Sane, crafty, sly, but crazy. Wildhartlivie (talk) 04:53, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Swastika on Forehead 

message: Forensic Experts Find Possible Evidence of More Charlie Manson Murders --87.79.251.32 (talk) 21:46, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  More victims found? 

message: In the physical-evidence paragraph, with which the "Investigation and arrest" subsection concludes, the sentence about the television crew’s discovery of the killers’ bloody clothing after the publication of the Atkins crime-account is as follows:
:Acting on that same newspaper account, a local ABC television crew located and recovered the bloody clothing discarded by the Tate killers.
Previously, the sentence included the word "quickly" – i.e., "quickly located and recovered" the bloody clothing.
The newspaper account was published December 14, 1969.  (Bugliosi 1994, page 193, chapter headed "December 14, 1969.")  The TV crew apparently located the clothing the very next day.  (The discovery is related on pages 197-198, near the beginning of the chapter headed "December 15-25, 1969."  It precedes the account of Susan Atkins’s pleading of non-guilty, which account is introduced by the words "On Tuesday, December 16.")
December 14, not incidentally, was a Sunday, which means that December 15, on which the crew seems to have located the clothing, was not only the very-next day but the first work-week day after the newspaper story's publication.
I think the word "quickly" was valuable and should be reinserted.71.242.159.196 (talk) 18:56, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I see your point.  "Quickly" will be re-inserted. BassPlyr23 (talk) 20:54, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clothing discovery 

message: In the subsection headed "Second imprisonment," I have inserted a passage about Manson’s marriage to, and child with, "Leona."  I have inserted it only because Leona and the child are, rightly, mentioned in the infobox at the article’s head and because, if you will read "Children," which is item number 44 in Archive 1 (July 2003 – 30 October 2007) of the present talk page, you will see that an editor questioned the existence of Leona and the child.JohnBonaccorsi (talk) 23:38, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Leona 

message: In adding (to "Aftermath") a paragraph about statements Barbara Hoyt made on a recent episode of Discovery Channel's Most Evil, I included a link to a YouTube clip from the episode.  Because the clip presumably infringes Discovery Channel's copyright, the link is probably in violation of Wikipedia policy; but in the absence of, say, a Discovery Channel transcript to link to, there is no other way to source the statements.  That's why I went ahead and posted the link; I am hoping that editors who are more Wikipedia-savvy than I am will know what, if anything, should be done about this.JohnBonaccorsi (talk) 07:51, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, yes, Youtube isn't a good source for the reasons you outlined. In the past, when I've come across such situations, I usually try to find the citation from the actual show or episode, most often through the website for the network. I'll see if I can find one for this. Wildhartlivie (talk) 08:39, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: As I see you've added. I think that link is sufficient for citation and the youtube can come out. Wildhartlivie (talk) 09:01, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

text: There are citation templates that outline how to cite a television episode at WP:Citation_templates which has one specific one, , which is outlined in more detail at Template:Cite episode. Note that you don't have to use all the parameters in the template and it can be used either vertically or horizontally. Hope that answers your question. Wildhartlivie (talk) 20:04, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hoyt clip 

message: It is well understood that Manson has been given life in prison since capital punished was abolished in CA in the seventies. But is there any reason that he is eligible for parole? Shouldn't his sentence been changed simply "life in prison" WITHOUT the eligibility of parole. I think this information is crucial to the article. -silic0nsilence (talk) 04:37, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't believe that was an option, although I'll defer further information to one of the other editors who are more up to date on his status. Wildhartlivie (talk) 13:30, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I and others appreciate this. It seems to me that going from death to life without parole seems to make more sense than death to life with chance of parole. Why would CA want to give everyone they were putting to death a chance to return to society? 68.193.84.36 (talk) 17:15, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

text: "[A]ny prisoner now under a sentence of death ... may file a petition for writ of habeas corpus in the superior court inviting that court to modify its judgment to provide for the appropriate alternative punishment of life imprisonment or life imprisonment without possibility of parole specified by statute for the crime for which he was sentenced to death."
I don’t know whether that means the statute that was in place at the time the crime was committed or the statute in place at the time of California v. Anderson.  Anyway — I’ve added the information to the article.71.242.159.196 (talk) 01:35, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Parole 

message: Manson has released a new album called One Mind. It's under a Creative Commons license. I think this is worth mentioning, but I don't know many details (is it a recent recording or is it old material, etc.). Anyone know anything more so we can put it in the article?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lancelottjones (talk • contribs) 20:21, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The article's footnote-link to a recordings-list at mansondirect.com indicates that One Mind was released in April 2005 and that it contains music, poetry, and speech that was then new.  I've added that information to the sentence about Manson's released recordings.71.242.159.196 (talk) 17:23, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

text: Belated postscript:  Yes, the album was released under a Creative Commons license.  The article now notes that fact, which is supported with footnote-links.71.242.115.59 (talk) 03:46, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Album - One Mind 

message: Is it true that Manson  once auditioned for a part in the television series The Monkees ?jeanne (talk) 13:35, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: To me that's doubtful. If you mean for one of the starring roles, then no, it's not possible since the show was cast long before Manson was released from prison. If if was for a bit part, I still doubt it, since the Monkees show ended in early 1968, only a few months after Manson was released from prison. According to searches on Google, this is just another one of those silly urban myths, and in fact, The Monkees article makes mention of the myth. Wildhartlivie (talk) 17:22, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: There is another story I read in Christopher Andersen's biography on Mick Jagger. On page 5, the author states that Manson attended the Stones free concert at Altamont and that Jagger tried to strike up a conversation with Manson. That sounds incredible to me. What do you think?jeanne (talk) 06:58, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, the talk page is for discussing improvements to the Manson article. However, I'll answer your question, since it appears that Andersen hasn't done his homework. If you will check the article on the Altamont Free Concert, you'll see that the Stones concert took place on 6 December 1969. Then if you'll check this article, you'll find that Manson was arrested in October 1969. He hasn't been free since that arrest. In my opinion, this kind of glaring mistake casts doubt on the reliability of Andersen's writing. If, by chance, the information about the Monkees audition was also in Andersen's book, then I'd probably stop reading it. Wildhartlivie (talk) 08:56, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

text: Forgive my faulty memory.I knew the Altamont concert took place on 6 December 1969.It's just that I always had it in my mind that Manson was arrested in early 1970 not October 1969.Had my memory been better I'd have known the book couldn't have been accurate. Anyway,jeanne (talk) 11:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Monkees 

message: A section discussing the contrasts between Watson and Atkins accounts of the Tate murders was added and I expressed my concern about the focus of it to the author here. Discussion of it occurred above and response here and afterwards, I am removing that section that doesn't seem to quite fit into the voice of the  article. I'm making note of this here if there are any questions. Wildhartlivie (talk) 01:25, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Addition of section "Atkins report" 

message: This art is my copyright. Created by Mark Hanau for Apex Pictures/AIP Films. Aimulti (talk) 11:53, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: That's all well and good, however, it doesn't serve to contribute anything to this article. It's a conceptual art piece and as such is a POV unsupported statement. It has no mention in the article nor relevance to what it purports to illustrate. It really doesn't belong in the article. Wildhartlivie (talk) 19:16, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Manson. The man who killed the 60's. 

message: At Wikipedia’s “Sandbox” – a childishly-named page at which, to my unwarranted astonishment, I was quickly interfered with by vandals and by persons whose motivation I do not know – I attempted to determine how many of the article’s bytes are represented by footnotes.  Before I was forced to give up, I got to the end of the subsection headed "Crowe shooting; Hinman murder."  That’s a bit more than a third of the way through the article.  I was working quickly and, as I say, suffered interference; but my results were these:
:Article’s size up to "Crowe" subsection:  34,566 bytes
:Footnotes up to "Crowe" subsection:          7,686 bytes
That’s more than a fifth of the article – about 22 percent -- in the form of footnotes.  The percentage might well go up in the article’s remainder, which includes several footnotes with links that include long newspaper headlines and the like.
In running this experiment, I discovered that the article doesn’t contain a footnote for nearly every clause, as I stated above; but I still wouldn’t be surprised if 22 percent is well above the pertinent average.
The article’s overall count was 94,215 bytes, of which 22 percent would be 20,916.  That puts the non-footnote byte-count at 73299, although, as I say, the count could well be lower than that.JohnBonaccorsi (talk) 22:04, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: 386
I'm going to spell that out:  Three hundred eighty-six.
On the basis of all of those numbers, plus the information I gained from the "Sandbox" test I ran on the Manson byte-count, I'm going to guess that, in terms of text proper, the Beatles article and the Manson article are about the same size.  In fact, the Beatles article might be a bit longer.  At the same time, the Manson article is sourced about three times as densely, so to speak.  Large parts of the Beatles article appear to have no footnotes at all; and in fact, one of its sections is headed by a "needs citations" tag.
And do you know what?  Well — I really don't know how Wikipedia works; but if I understand the lists on this page, The Beatles is a Good Article.
In the light of all of that, the suggestion that the Manson article must now be revamped — summarized — to win the coveted Good Article laurel is, to put it mildly, insupportable.JohnBonaccorsi (talk) 12:01, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Byte-count test

message: I have just taken a look at Wikipedia's article on The Beatles.  I chose it more or less at random, simply as a subject that is connected to Manson and that is about equal in, let us say, general prominence to him.  The article is 84,761 bytes.  It has 119 individually-numbered footnotes, some of which are multiples, by which I mean the type that represent several individual notes that share a "name=[whatever]" code.  Naturally, it's hard to count such things by eye as one scrolls down through a list of them; but the total number of footnotes appears to be about 132.
Earlier in this discussion, I estimated that the Manson article has "nearly two-hundred-fifty" footnotes.  I was a little bit off.  Would anyone care to know the actual number?
The Manson article has 183 individually-numbered footnotes; but of course, many of those, too, are multiples.  Again — it's hard to scroll through the list and count them; but the total number of footnotes appears to be:
::::386
I'm going to spell that out:  Three hundred eighty-six.
On the basis of all of those numbers, plus the information I gained from the "Sandbox" test I ran on the Manson byte-count, I'm going to guess that, in terms of text proper, the Beatles article and the Manson article are about the same size.  In fact, the Beatles article might be a bit longer.  At the same time, the Manson article is sourced about three times as densely, so to speak.  Large parts of the Beatles article appear to have no footnotes at all; and in fact, one of its sections is headed by a "needs citations" tag.
And do you know what?  Well — I really don't know how Wikipedia works; but if I understand the lists on this page, The Beatles is a Good Article.
In the light of all of that, the suggestion that the Manson article must now be revamped — summarized — to win the coveted Good Article laurel is, to put it mildly, insupportable.JohnBonaccorsi (talk) 12:01, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Astonishing numbers

message: Should we incorporate the music that he has put out since he has been in prison? Notably the songs, collectively Albumized as "One Mind." These were released under a creative commons license and can be downloaded at: http://www.limewire.org/zlatin/digg.html
I only include the link to add veracity to the existence of the music.
Centrisian (talk) 22:07, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It's already in there, under the Manson and culture section in Recordings. Thanks. Wildhartlivie (talk) 23:34, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  One Mind 

message: He is mentioned in "Natural Born Killa" and "Straight Outta Compton"... Why isn't this included in the article?--J.C. (talk) 03:00, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: If you'll notice, there is no listing of songs that mention Manson in passing, and in general, lists like that are considered trivia, which isn't encouraged or encyclopedic. Manson's own music is more relevant to his article, and is well enough recorded or covered that it needs no extraneous fill-in. There really isn't a place in the article for a one liner mention of the phrase "So f**k Charles Manson" or "with a crime record like Charles Manson" in a song that is otherwise not about Manson. It would take two articles of just one liners to cover when Manson's name gets dropped. The media section is specifically about the films and TV shows about Charles Manson and the Family.  Wildhartlivie (talk) 04:43, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  NWA? 

message: Guys, this article is absolutely taxing to read. Let's take the following sentence as an example:
Charles Manson Jr., Manson's son by Rosalie, was born while Manson was in prison.
Charles Manson Jr. is the subject, but he's not the one doing anything, Rosalie is. I changed it accordingly:
Rosalie gave birth to their son, Charles Manson Jr., while Manson was in prison.
The whole article is written in this awkward manner. As a reader, I have to keep lots of little bits and phrases in my mind and then parse them all together at the end of the sentence. Using a more active voice, it is much easier to to visualize and understand the concepts being communicated. I did several edits to the First Imprisonment section, but i got discouraged when i skimmed the article and realized the entire text was written in such a manner. If you're looking for ways to improve this article, spend a few minutes on each section and move it from the passive to active voice.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Evillawngnome (talk • contribs) 19:39, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Major Overhaul: Passive to active voice 

message: Doesn't Manson have a swastika tattooed on his forehead? Isn't this worth mentioning? --MosheA (talk) 21:55, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: This was discussed before here and it seems that the main problem with this is being able to source it. You can only discuss what you can provide references to cover. Wildhartlivie (talk) 22:42, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

text: No one said he didn't have a tattoo/scar, but to use it as article content requires sourcing about it, and that hasn't been findable. The article talks about the X in the forehead placed during the trial. That can be sourced. Wildhartlivie (talk) 10:24, 16 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tattoo?