User talk:Ackees/Archive 2

This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Ackees (talk) 15:29, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Thnx for the words of encouragement. I worked really hard on that page. I do what I can between my own private library and googlebooks. I'll see who I can recruit. Are there any pages in particular u think need brushing up? Scott Free (talk) 03:25, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Will definitely check in on the articles you mentioned. Also, can I get your help on the African Empires page. I've got a stalker by the name of dbachman who has been trying to merge it with his african kingdoms page for a long time. he eventually gave up once he realized public opinion was against it (see discussion page of African Empires), and now he's at it again. I don't know the wiki bureaucracy as well as I'd like to, but maybe u do. if u don't wanna get involved i understand. either way, i will definitely get to work on the etymology of great zimbabwe and see what i can add on asanteman.Scott Free (talk) 21:37, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Gracias for the African empires edits. I went ahead and sourced the Kingdom of Zimbabwe page section for etymology. i apologize as i had gotten lazy...writing the article putting the sources but not the citations where needed. is there anything else in particular i can troubleshoot for you?Scott Free (talk) 19:29, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

no luck with recruitment. i'm still checking my contacts. i know a few folks. hollaScott Free (talk) 00:26, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Ackees (talk) 12:46, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

The article Owusu-Ankomah has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

No third party sources; tagged for a month without improvement.

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{dated prod}} will stop the Proposed Deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The Speedy Deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and Articles for Deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Durova³¹⁴ 04:13, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

SortedAckees (talk) 08:01, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

will need assistance in editing the sub-saharan page.Africabalance (talk) 21:05, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

You have been blocked from editing, for a period of 24 hours, for edit warring on Moors. Once the block has expired, you are welcome to make constructive contributions. If you would like to be unblocked, you may appeal the block by adding below this notice the text {{unblock|Your reason here}}, but you should read our guide to appealing blocks first. SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:46, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

This user's unblock request has been reviewed by an administrator, who declined the request. Other administrators may also review this block, but should not override the decision without good reason (see the blocking policy).

Ackees (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

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Request reason:

Blocking me is wrong. I haven't engaged in any kind of edit war. I have simply asserted the truth, that 'Moor' is an English term, with an English history of useage that includes reference to black Africans. For evidence I created a perfectly reasonable reference to the use of the word 'moor' as a description for a black person by William Shakespeare, one of the fathers of the English language. I therefore ask that I be allowed to continue editing. I am a highly respected editor who has created many well referenced and eminently truthful edits and articles. Blocking me for simply describing a well-known use of the English language seems unfair.

Decline reason:

You are not blocked because of the content of your edits; they may very well be correct. However, rather than attempt to achieve consensus on the article talk page, you repeatedly inserted your desired language into the article. This is not acceptable; please familiarize yourself with our policy regarding edit warring and you should understand better why you were blocked. --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 17:42, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

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This user's unblock request has been reviewed by an administrator, who declined the request. Other administrators may also review this block, but should not override the decision without good reason (see the blocking policy).

Ackees (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

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Request reason:

It is simply untrue to say that I did not try to achieve consensus on the talk page as my justification is clearly there on the talk page.

Decline reason:

If by achieving consensus, you mean saying "wikipedia is populated by hordes of racist trolls that simply hate black people", well, then yes. I don't see any reason to lift your block early. TNXMan 19:01, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

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If you want to make any further unblock requests, please read the guide to appealing blocks first, then use the {{unblock}} template again. If you make too many unconvincing or disruptive unblock requests, you may be prevented from editing this page until your block has expired. Do not remove this unblock review while you are blocked.

"wikipedia is populated by hordes of racist trolls that simply hate black people." I certainly hope not and I don't see much evidence of it, but even if that were true edit warring is not going to help your arguments. When in a content dispute you need to stay calm and reasonably state your case on the talk page or an appropriate noticeboard, backing up your position using reliable sources. I don't think many Wikipedians want to see articles slanted against any race, but equally Wikipedians don't like people aggressively pushing any point of view. Fences&Windows 14:58, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

This user's unblock request has been reviewed by an administrator, who declined the request. Other administrators may also review this block, but should not override the decision without good reason (see the blocking policy).

Ackees (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

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Request reason:

24 hour blocking period is over.

Decline reason:

You're about three minutes off. Kuru (talk) 16:43, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

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If you want to make any further unblock requests, please read the guide to appealing blocks first, then use the {{unblock}} template again. If you make too many unconvincing or disruptive unblock requests, you may be prevented from editing this page until your block has expired. Do not remove this unblock review while you are blocked.

I understand that you are upset at the rather one-sided content of the article. However, I would strongly recommend that you do not change anything unless you can back it with references. This is a very contentious article and it is easy to get into an edit war and get blocked. My advice to you is be patient and polite. If you are going to write summaries like "Most of it is just pro-empire propaganda with little about the actual war." and not put references the admins will most likely immediately revert it. Not to mention this: opposing editors will try to revert you and you will find yourself in an edit war which is best avoided by discussion. If you may have already seen, I have added a reply to your message on the talk page. Lets go slow and easy on this. :-). --Deepak D'Souza (talk) 10:18, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi Ackees, thanks for your recent edits to Atlantic slave trade. Unfortunately, I had to remove some (not all) of them, because they conflict with Wikipedia policy. I understand you sincerely want to improve the article and remedy any existing POV, so please allow me to help you do that in a way that will benefit all of us.

1. . Please provide a source when making claims. Edits like this one: [1] are considered to be WP:Original research, because they make claims without relying on a source. On the other hand, your edit here: [2] was great, because it included a source. THAT is the kind of edit we want to be seeing more of :)
2. . Please be very careful when changing statements that already have a source, otherwise, the reader will be given a false impression that the source given supports the new claim. Always be sure to read what the source says before making changes to the claim that uses the source. In your edit here: [3] you added that slavery existed in other regions of the world as well. However, the source [4] doesn't say that - readers would be left with the false conclusion that the Britannica article mentions pre-existing slavery in the Americas, Europe, and Asia. Maybe it should have! But it didn't, so we can't change that statement without providing a new source. If you want to make the change, the best way to do it would be to say something like this:
   1. Slavery was practiced in Africa^[1], Europe^[2], Asia^[3] and the Americas^[4] before the beginning of the Atlantic slave trade.

Please understand I'm not "for" or "against" anything except that I want everything to be well-sourced. This article needs sources, badly, and you can help by finding things that aren't sourced and adding a {{fact}} tag, like this: ^{[citation needed]}. Of course, sometimes if the claim is really inflammatory and it doesn't have a source, it's better just to WP:Be bold and remove it right away. I hope what I said here makes sense, and if you have POV concerns, feel free to express them on the Talk:Atlantic slave trade page. I certainly welcome additional sources, and hope you decide to continue working on the article. Thank you,

-- Joren (talk) 04:54, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

I'm adding your reply below, here:

Hi Joren, thanks for letting me know about your edits and making a valiant attempt to explain wikipedia's policies. I think the basic problem with the anti-Rodney demographics edits is that a) the citations were totally inadequate, lacking in quotations, page numbers, etc. b) they were expressing points of view that were irrelevant to the issue and b) they were inaccurate. It would be good if you're going to claim that an author has accused Rodney of mischaracterizing the slave trade to say exactly who that author was and when and how they made this accusation. Just saying 'some authors have accused Rodney' is pure POV. Also, you've failed to demonstrate the relevance of any relationship between Rodney's assertions of depopulation and the question of whether certain traders had permission for their activities. What you'd need to do in this instance is show clearly how the author in question was stating that 'permission to trade' (expressed in the phrase 'let Europeans in') was a counter-argument to Rodney. Otherwise it just appears to be one of those 'blame game' quotes that POV pushers are so fond of. What does the phrase 'compared the number effect on the continent as a whole mean'. I think we should try to maintain standard English on the article, and this collection of meaningless phrases falls well short of that standard, plus, there's no adequate citation, just a name. There's a claim that emmigration from Europe to the Americas is a 'far higher rate'. What is meant by 'rate'. Rate over what period and comparison of what to what. You claim that this is a 'citation', all I see is a POV argument with no page numbers, etc. You certainly haven't demonstrated that Eltis was in any way critiquing Rodney.

I'm worried by your evident belief that slavery was not practiced in Europe, the Americas or Asia. You know full well that this is the case, and I'm baffled that rather than trying to improve this sentence by making a couple of simple links, or just moving the reference to the left, you just deleted my edits. I hope that you're not oblivious to the fact that the article is not simply about 'Africa' or 'Africans' but is about an inter-continental phenomena. Ackees (talk) 10:15, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

if you're, you're, etc.

Please keep in mind that I didn't write the article. :-) Please do not address these concerns to me; I do not endorse it. If there is something wrong with it, be bold! Remove it and make an edit summary or post on the talk page stating why.

your evident belief

I haven't stated my belief, and at this point you don't know what it is. Please do not assume more than you are given. What you or what I believe isn't important; what the source believes is, and we need to take care not to misrepresent what the source believes. We try to make a conscious effort to separate the article from our own POVs and that is why it is strictly important never to go beyond what the source itself claims. That is why your edit was undone, because I actually read the source article, and as far as I can tell (I can always be wrong), it doesn't even talk about pre-existing slavery outside of Africa. To claim that it does when it does not is a disservice to the reader.

belief that slavery was not practiced in Europe, the Americas or Asia.

I'll try to explain it more clearly. Let's say editor A makes a statement here: The sky is blue^{[Joren 1]} You see that reference at the end of the sentence? You can click that reference tag, and it will take you to a list of references (in this case, "Example References", below). Right now, that reference tag is claiming that John Doe's work, The sky's true color, is supporting the assertion that "The sky is blue". Then let's say some other editor B comes along and changes the statement. "Although the sky is blue, sometimes it has been known to be green too."^{[Joren 2]}. Do you see the problem? Suddenly, we are now claiming that The sky's true color supports the idea that it turns green sometimes. Does the sky turn green sometimes? YES - try getting trapped in a good supercell if you doubt this! However, the problem is we don't know whether or not The sky's true color actually talks about the sky turning green or not. Some academically-minded reader's gonna come along, see the reference, and think "Ahh, if I pick up a copy of The sky's true color, then I'll be able to find out about the sky turning green!" But at this point we don't know if the book even talks about it. If editor B hasn't actually read the source, then editor B should not be altering the claim without additional references. What editor B needs to do is something like this:

"Although the sky is blue^{[Joren 3]}, sometimes it has been known to be green too. ^{[Joren 4]}

This is what I'm asking you to do. If you want to add the claim to an already-sourced statement, you will need to find a source that explicitly mentions pre-existing slavery outside of Africa. If you re-read my comment above; I gave you an example of how you could fix the claim and add it back, you just need to do some Googling or go to your local library and find a source that says slavery existed in these specific areas prior to the Atlantic slave trade.

Example References

Again, be bold and remove any outright unsourced POV. Our goal is to improve this article. Thank you,

-- Joren (talk) 13:35, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Since we've been talking about this in three different places, I will post my response in three different places as well :-)

Wikipedia is not a battle ground. We are here to improve the article, and hopefully improve each other along the way. Whatever you may believe about what I've done, please at least note that in every case I have tried to adopt a friendly demeanor towards you at all times, and I will continue to do so. We're not here to "expose" each other. There's an old expression, "play the ball, not the man." If people make mistakes, quite simply and clearly point out what they were. There's no need to turn it into a personal battle; they're not really that fulfilling.

For what it's worth, somehow my browser (or, quite possiblywhen it comes down to it, my brain) was tricked into reading a different Britannica article. I remember being quite diligent, reading it thoroughly, and searching for key words in case I'd missed anything, and being surprised that, while covering the Atlantic slave trade, the article I was reading didn't talk about pre-existing slave societies. So I will gladly apologize for that :)

For those new to the discussion, I would encourage you to read Ackees' talk page to get the full scoop. If you believe I was being patronizing, you are certainly welcome to correct me and offer better phrasing that I could have used. Of course, with the caveat that since I'd been reading the wrong article all along, that would be a contributing factor :-P anyway, my motivation was to improve the article, and I certainly appreciate removing the blinder that prevented me from seeing that particular statement did have a source after all.

-- Joren (talk) 05:16, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I need to point out something, though. I stand by what I said concerning WP:original research (except, obviously, for the Africa, Asia, Europe claim, b/c now I see that wasn't original research), above, and about the fact that I did not write the article. I don't magically become responsible for the contents of the entire article by virtue of a single edit. Otherwise, the same logic would apply to you, that by making an edit to a single sentence and not the rest of the article, you'd let the rest of the article stand and therefore become responsible for it. I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want to be responsible for the unsourced mess in that article any more than I would. Remember, Wikipedia's about incremental improvement, otherwise nothing would ever get done and we'd all just be blaming each other. We improve what we can and let the rest stand unless you see something's wrong with it. This is why I keep saying, WP:Be bold - if there's something wrong, remove it yourself. It is always better to remove unsourced statements than to add new ones. You'll notice I didn't entirely revert you; I went through it and tried to keep sourced edits, like the Guardian one. Key word: tried :-) Anyway, again I hope you will continue to add sources to the article - it badly needs them.

Oh, and as to my comments - I'm sorry you find them patronizing (probably had something to do with me having read the wrong article :P); when it comes to talking online, it can be hard to know the context. I tried my best to be helpful/friendly and WP:Assume good faith, b/c as amply demonstrated, everybody can be in the wrong so it's best to assume everybody wishes to get better. Anyway, you are certainly free to remove my comments from your own talk page; it is your talk page after all. I do hope we can continue to work together on the article.

-- Joren (talk) 05:37, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi, Ackees, I see you are still concerned about the editing process of the Race and intelligence article (which is still under full protection at the moment, as the Arbitration Committee case on that topic is about to close). Please allow me tell you a story about my personal background that may help explain why I take the approach to editing here that I do. I'm a baby boomer, which is another way of saying that I'm a good bit older than most people who edit on Wikipedia. I distinctly remember the day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated—the most memorable day of early childhood for many people in my generation—and I remember the "long hot summer" and other events of the 1960s civil rights movement.

One early memory I have is of a second grade classmate (I still remember his name, which alas is just common enough that it is hard to Google him up) who moved back to Minnesota with his northern "white" parents after spending his early years in Alabama. He told me frightening stories about Ku Klux Klan violence to black people (the polite term in those days was "Negroes," as I think you remember), including killing babies, and I was very upset to hear about that kind of terrorism happening in the United States. He made me aware of a society in which people didn't all treat one another with decency and human compassion, unlike the only kind of society I was initially aware of from growing up where I did. So I followed subsequent news about the civil rights movement, including the activities of Martin Luther King, Jr. up to his assassination, with great interest and frequent dismay at setbacks to the movement.

It happens that I had a fifth-grade teacher, a typically pale, tall, and blonde Norwegian-American, who was a civil rights activist and who spent her summers in the south as a freedom rider. She used to tell our class about how she had to modify her car (by removing the dome light and adding a locking gas cap) so that Klan snipers couldn't shoot her as she opened her car door at night or put foreign substances into her gas tank. She has been a civil rights activist all her life, and when I Googled her several years ago and regained acquaintance with her, I was not at all surprised to find that she is a member of the civil rights commission of the town where I grew up.

One day in fifth grade we had a guest speaker in our class, a young man who was then studying at St. Olaf College through the A Better Chance (ABC) affirmative action program. (To me, the term "affirmative action" still means active recruitment of underrepresented minority students, as it did in those days, and I have always thought that such programs are a very good idea, as some people have family connections to selective colleges, but many other people don't.) During that school year (1968-1969), there was a current controversy in the United States about whether the term "Negro" or "Afro-American" or "black" was most polite. So a girl in my class asked our visitor, "What do you want to be called, 'black' or 'Afro-American'?" His answer was, "I'd rather be called Henry." Henry's answer to my classmate's innocent question really got me thinking. I tend to decline the opportunity to classify by people by "race," unless that is actively what they desire individually, because my observation is that many individual experiences trump some kinds of shared experience that individuals have because of how they are classified. I don't want to dismiss Henry's, or yours, or any Wikipedian's, or anyone else's point of view because of whatever "race" category someone supposedly belongs to. Nor do I want to assume that individual might fail to reach thoughtful agreement with another, just because the two individuals could happen to be regarded as belonging to different "race" groups. All such groupings are arbitrary, and there are a lot of edge cases that fail to fit any arbitrary group well. (Members of my immediate family have been categorized, or if you prefer miscategorized, into a variety of different "race" groups over the years.)

On my part, I will assume your good faith in desiring to edit Wikipedia based on reliable sources. That has been such a downfall of the article where you and I are discussing editorial policies that I have spent much of the last three months gathering sources to share with other editors. I would be delighted to see your suggestions for the source list, and I would be delighted to see you joining in on evaluating sources for their suitability for editing the article in question, whenever it is taken off of full protection.

P.S. Are you open to the idea of changing the name of that article (and perhaps its topic scope as well) as a way of making it less of a flame-bait article? What suggestions do you have about that? -- WeijiBaikeBianji (talk) 13:46, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi WeijiBaikeBianji

You'll forgive me for not being able to answer your point too fully at present. Unfortunately, I have an extremely important deadline to meet at present so won't be doing much wiking for a short while. I don't share autobiographical details with other editors, so I can't share my own experiences, but I certainly understand your wish to convey your experiences of US racial politics and your own sense of disquiet and hope.

I agree that many researchers believe that 'race' is an arbitrary form of political categorization rather than effective taxonomy, but that this remains a matter of controversy.

Theories of 'intelligence' whether conceived of as 'g' or as 'iq' are also an area of some controversy.

I think that whatever form this article takes, the key point must be, not an endless exposition of various theories but a cogent summary of what the controversy is and why it is controversial.

Now, in order to present the controversy coherently, it must be part of the narrative that these theories have arisen in societies where 'race' is an arena of persistent social conflict and discussion. Where 'race' is relevant, especially the 'race' of the people who are protagonists in the debates.

To pretend that the theories of Jensen et al simply arise from an objective experiment in a laboratory, would be disingenuous and treating the readers with contempt. Let us imagine that a reader, less familiar with US or UK racial politics (from, say Malaysia) reads this article. How odd it must seem that we fail to mention that ALL of the US/UK 'researchers' promoting the idea of black genetic intellectual inferiority to whites place themselves in the white category. That in the many decades since this 'theory' has been perpetrated, no 'black' researcher has been able to corroborate these findings. How false and immature such a Wiki position is. Do I have to make analogies in order to demonstrate its patent absurdity? Theories of female intellectual inferiority all put forward by men? The history of 'racial' science is far too sensitive and serious a subject to affect incomprehension of its contextual narratives - i.e. How do the theories relate to the theorists! Ackees (talk) 19:01, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

www.afropedea.org —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.186.48.62 (talk) 02:51, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

Hello Ackees: As I have started to (very slowly, I admit) look into the different Angola related articles, on the basis of several decades of research, I came across your changes in the one on the Colonial War, and reverted one of them. One problem with all these articles is that they are full of POVs, either pro-Portuguese (not really "neo-nazi": let's reserve this term to other things) or pro-MPLA or even pro-UNITA and pro-FLEC. The other one is that they are often a far cry away from state-of-the-art factual information. Can we agree that efforts to improve these articles have to, simultaneously, take into account these different aspects? Aflis (talk) 11:15, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Hello again: Thank you for your quick answer. Maybe we have a chance to sort things out in a differentiated way. Fully agreed as to not going along with any discourse that paints a pink picture of Portuguese colonialism (nor, for that matter, of any kind of colonialism). I hope we are also agreed as to not accepting any other kind of POV discourse. That said, our concern has to be with establishing the historical facts as correctly as possible. In this sense, it is fundamental to take into account the radical differences existing with regard to the different periods of Portuguese presence in Angola. I don't know whether you read Portuguese; if you do, you might have a look at the history section of the Angola article in pt-WP where I have tried to draw precise lines, mostly for the benefit of my Angolan students. In this context: the first wave of Portuguese explorers were certainly not "colonialists"; they wanted to discover parts of the globe that were until then practically unknown to Europe, and see what kind of trade could be established. In a second and third step things then changed - for the worse, as far as the African peoples in that region are concerned. If I find the time, I shall try and detail this out on en-WP as well. Aflis (talk) 13:15, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Hello Aflis. My point is simply this. The article Angolan War of Independence clearly states that Paulo Dias de Novais established a colony of one hundred civilian families and four hundred soldiers. I simply cannot see how you can describe this as anything other than colonialism. As I said on your page, surely there must be a distinction between somebody wandering around hoping to swap things, and somebody leading a military occupation.Ackees (talk) 13:23, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

I should have developed my argument above a bit more. Paulo Dias de Novais in fact is a symbol for the passage from the first to the second step. Mind you: this second step was not yet about territorial occupation. It was about establishing a fortified trade post in a place outside the states ("kingdoms") which then existed in that part of the continent (Kongo, Matamba, Ndongo). For three centuries, Luanda lived essentially on slave trade, obtaining their "merchandise" mostly through African middlemen. See Joseph Miller, "Way of Death" (and other carefully researched books like those by David Birmingham, John Thornton, Gervase Clarence-Smith etc.). They occupied just the area around Luanda, and then established peripheral posts on the lower Kwanza. Even when, in the 19th century, they organized major expeditions into the interior (the third step), this was for decades more about establishing networks than about carving out, and occupying, a coherent territory. The latter became a clearly formulated goal only towards the end of the 19th century, and was achieved only in the mid-1920s when (the fourth step) the process of building a colonial state was initiated. So this is the general setting we must have in mind. By the way: I begin to think that this historical reconstruction does not belong in the article on the Angolan War of Independence, but in the general article on Angola and, of course, in the one on History of Angola which, both, leave much to be desired in this regard. Aflis (talk) 15:42, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Aflis, are you not worried that it might seem patronising of you to give history lessons about Angola. For all you know, I might be a teacher of Angolan history! I think your notions about territorial occupation are flawed. It is impossible to have an armed encampment, a port and a city without having territory. Otherwise, the city would be floating in the sea! And I disagree with your last point. It would be madness to have an article about an anti-colonial war without first explaining something of the colonialism. The only problem I have found is that Portuguese nationalists are hell-bent on portraying the corrupt, decadent empire as some kind of earthly paradise (thus completely failing to understand why the empire collapsed).Ackees (talk) 15:52, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Ackees, I am sorry if you feel offended. This was certainly not my intention. I simply had the impression you had not been specializing in Angolan history, and thus wanted to be of help. On what you are writing above, very shortly: (1) You have difficulties imagining how it was possible to maintain Luanda (and, for that matter, the other bridgehead, Benguela) without substantial territorial occupation. Well, on this subject there exists a wealth of research findings by authors from different countries (including Angola!), and all the basic facts are by now established beyond doubt. (2) I agree of course that the historical roots of the war have to be described in the article on the struggle for independence. However, instead of dealing at length with the history of Angola, it would be functional to concentrate on the aspects which are clearly relevant for an understanding of the struggle. (3) I wonder what are the "Portuguese nationalists" you are speaking about. I happen to know rather well the (not so very numerous) Portuguese historians who are working on Africa, and I can assure you none of them has the leanings which are (rightly)irritating you. Are you perhaps speaking of a past generation? Aflis (talk) 17:55, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

My Dear Aflis, I am not in the least bit offended, so I am sorry if you got the wrong impression. And I am sorry that you thought I needed help.

1) I did not use the term 'substantial' when discussing territorial occupation. That is a vague and ill-defined term which was not introduced by me. The question of how 'substantial' the colony was, or what is meant by the term 'substantial' is an entirely separate question from whether or not there was a colonial occupation. Let us take, for example the state of Monaco. How 'substantial' is it? Or, the colony of Macau?

2) I agree it would be important to state clearly the grievances that led the Africans to fight for 13 years for their independence from Portugal. Although, to be frank, it doesn't take a genius to figure that out.

3) Of course, I do not know which historians you claim to know, and as you will never substantiate your claim it seems pointless to make it. I am referring to the systematic campaign by Portuguese nationalists working on the pages of wikipedia to falsify the history of Portuguese tyranny in Africa and how it was finally defeated.Ackees (talk) 18:04, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Hello Ackees: (1) I hope to answer this in the history section on Angola, on en-WP, as I did on pt-WP. (2) Agreed, evidently. NB: My PhD dissertation, written 30 years ago, covered exactly this field. (3) Having looked into several WPs - en and pt, but also fr and de - I have discovered nothing like the "systematic campaign" you are speaking of. On occasion, the odd looney pops up and is done away quickly, because of his/her lack of historical competence. Sometimes one discovers the old-fashioned anti-communist who seed the MPLA as the bolshevist devil and analyses history since the 1950s in this perspective. On the other hand, quite often Angolans and non-Angolans try to impose the party line (mostly MPLA, sometimes UNITA and even FLEC), across the different languages. Outside WP, all this is shrugged off by those who study Angolan history seriously. NB: If you are interested, I can of course give you some references. What are the languages you read? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aflis (talk • contribs) 11:49, 14 May 2011 (UTC) Sorry about forgetting to sign. Aflis (talk) 11:53, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

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Hi, I'm tidying up the templates related to prehistory and noticed that the Bronze Age one appears to be duplicated in your sandbox. Is this something you are still working on? Would you like to help tidy up the whole mess of prehistory templates? If it could be removed from your sandbox it might ease some confusion? Cheers, PatHadley (talk) 20:36, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

I notice you've added her to the 'Black British writers' category. I thought I'd mention I've also added her name to the list of Bermudian writers. This is not really a clash is it? She grew up in Bermuda even though she was published in Britain. Would anyone dispute she was a 'writer'? With her life-chances I would expect her to be illiterate, and she evidently dictated her autobiography; but then any writer would have done that if incapacitated, e.g. after his blindness Milton 'wrote' poetry, but via an amanuensis. Her publisher was certainly at pains to proclaim she was the true and sole author of the work.RLamb (talk) 10:51, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Black British writers includes people that can reasonably be said to be in the socio-political category 'black', and who have made work in Britain, or spent a significant part of their life there. I think that dictation can definitely be a form of writing, and so, in its broader sense, yes MP is a writer.Ackees (talk) 12:42, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Hello, Ackees. You have new messages at Malik Shabazz's talk page.
Message added 14:20, 24 April 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

You have shown a history of bias in your edits, particularly by removing the mainstream, neutral wording in an article and replacing it with either a controversial or anti-European wording. Please desist doing this immediately. I will not hesitate to revert edits of yours that follow this pattern. Your activity on the African Slave Trade page is but one example of how you have changed the information within the article to read the opposite of what the source said, and you continued to do this after I corrected it. ElliotJoyce (talk) 18:21, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Please, please stop WP:WIKIHOUNDING me. You've no idea how much distress its causing - I don't think I can take much more... Ackees (talk) 23:38, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

You can mock me all you want, sir, but your editing history demonstrates a consistent violation of neutrality of point of view, not to mention you have changed information on both the Atlantic Slave Trade and African Slave Trade articles (among others) that is in direct contradiction of the provided source. I am not hounding you- hounding you is for the purpose of harassing or annoying you. I could not care less how you feel or whether I annoy you or not- I am only concerned with correcting your biased edits. I am also reporting you for making a directed personal attack against me (calling me a neo-nazi) and for deleting accurate material on the Benin City page. Good day.ElliotJoyce (talk) 21:03, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Personal attacks on me at the Portuguese Angola talk page are unnecessary and do not reflect well on you. As Elliot Joyce says above, you also deleted accurate information from the article in a blatantly non-constructive manner, and added information that contradicted the sources provided. In our discussion, you attempted to equate me to a neo-Nazi (something of a theme of yours, looking at the posts above), and, as it appears to me, made the frankly offensive assumption that as somebody with Jewish heritage, I would be easily talked around if you equated my arguments to Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism. I'm all for working with people with viewpoints different from my own, but there is no need for you to blatantly break the NPOV like this, or to take personal issue with other contributors when they pull you up on it. No matter what you may think, they aren't doing it to annoy you or harass you. —Cliftonian (talk) 16:27, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Brother, there are no personal attacks on you and I am not interested in your personal heritage. It is a self-evident fact that apologists for Portuguese luso-racism, slavery and colonialism in Africa (Portugese nationalists) precisely mirror and echo the apologists for German nazi racism, slavery and colonialism in Europe (neo-nazis). As in so many other things, you are totally wrong about harassment at least one editor has been repeatedly banned for WP:WIKIHOUNDing my edits, and has even taken pride in it.Ackees (talk) 17:22, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

You have consistently called other editors on here "neo-nazis", "racists", and "white nationalists", among other things. The moment someone disagrees with your POV, you pull out the race card and start shouting "racism!" at the top of your lungs when the reality is quite the opposite: your edits on the African Slave Trade and Atlantic Slave Trade page directly contradicted the source. For example, on the Atlantic Slave Trade page, you recently changed the wording stating that black Africans sold other black Africans as slaves to the Europeans (an established and proven fact) to "black Africans were kidnapped by the Europeans", which is false, without adding any kind of source or explanation. The user Malik Shabazz quickly reverted you. On the African Slave Trade page, you tried several times to change the "less than 5%" figure to "at least 5%" and then to "approximately 5%" when your first edit was reverted. The source specifically stated LESS than 5%. Your edits on the Benin City page (which will shortly be undone), and the Benin Expedition of 1897 (also to be undone) scream of POV and anti-Caucasian racism. You're one of those individuals who hides behind the race card in hopes that your own racism will not be detected. Please stop referring to anyone who disagrees with you as a neo-nazi, a racist, or a "white nationalist"- your arguments have no substance and your edit summaries are either libelous or sensationalist. ElliotJoyce (talk) 17:33, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Please stop your disruptive editing. If you continue to violate Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy by adding commentary and your personal analysis into articles, as you did at Portuguese Angola, you may be blocked from editing. SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:46, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

You have been blocked from editing for a period of 3 days for your disruption caused by edit warring and violation of the three-revert rule at Portuguese Angola. During a dispute, you should first try to discuss controversial changes and seek consensus. If that proves unsuccessful you are encouraged to seek dispute resolution, and in some cases it may be appropriate to request page protection. If you would like to be unblocked, you may appeal this block by adding the text {{unblock|reason=Your reason here ~~~~}} below this notice, but you should read the guide to appealing blocks first. SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:39, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

This user's unblock request has been reviewed by an administrator, who declined the request. Other administrators may also review this block, but should not override the decision without good reason (see the blocking policy).

Ackees (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

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Request reason:

I have not reverted three times on the disputed page. I noticed a bias in the article and edited it. User:LuzoGraal reverted 3 times and I warned them about edit warring. I put up the item for discussion on the talk page. I used sourced edits and removed unsourced material. User:SarekOfVulcan claimed I was biased, but I don't think they have really understood the material. Ackees (talk) 20:47, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Decline reason:

1, 2, 3. Your other edits on that page do qualify under "undo in part" clause of WP:3RR so you may have actually made 5 or more reverts on that page. However, I'm absolutely not interested in edit counting: you obviously edit warred and you were rightfully blocked for it, no matter if it was technically a 3RR or not. And may I remark that I would have blocked you for a longer period, as you also attacked other editors by calling them nationalists. Max Semenik (talk) 21:05, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

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If you want to make any further unblock requests, please read the guide to appealing blocks first, then use the {{unblock}} template again. If you make too many unconvincing or disruptive unblock requests, you may be prevented from editing this page until your block has expired. Do not remove this unblock review while you are blocked.

User is continuing in the same vein: see see here. —Cliftonian (talk) 11:23, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

..some people might argue that this kind of comment is unhelpful, I on the other hand found it most amusing. Stay cool. I would offer to help but there are some things that I best avoid. For what it's worth on the human sacrifice issue, and setting aside dog shit colonialist sources, some compromise will probably be necessary because, as far as I know, there was human sacrifice. What is perhaps more interesting is why that was something that stood out for the colonists as opposed to say all of the other forms of violence in Benin, in their home countries, like executions for example, and by the colonists themselves. There are probably sources that talk about how the perception of these things by the colonists were filtered through and weighted by their "Christian values". Good luck over there. Sean.hoyland - talk 11:55, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Not really anything amusing about it, Mr. Hoyland. This user's m.o. is to throw out accusations of neo-nazism and white supremacy whenever he disagrees with a piece of information within an article. You seem to share a similar bias with Mr. Ackees. Human sacrifice in Benin is an established fact, and a rather unflattering one for the history of Benin, but that does not give anti-European trolls on Wikipedia the right to keep it from reaching light.ElliotJoyce (talk) 19:21, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

The quality of your editing is very concerning. You should do something about it. Human sacrifice in Benin City is certainly an established historical fact as far as reliable sources are concerned, but only someone who has no business editing would use a personal account in the way you did. I am beginning to take an interest in the article because it seems in need of protection from poor sourcing and edits that are grossly inconsistent with the actual history as published by reliable sources. History can be very unflattering for everyone but we should follow the best sources available. And for the record, I'm quite happy for the article to include any pertinent details about the culture and history of Benin City no matter how it makes people feel today because that is what editors are supposed to do, but the information must be based on high quality reliable sources. Sean.hoyland - talk 20:12, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Sean.hoyland about ElliotJoyce's confusion between the self-aggrandizing accounts of imperial storm troopers and historical fact. However, I would argue that in writing about so-called 'Human Sacrifice', we need to proceed with extreme caution, because, otherwise there is a danger of applying the traditional Anglo-Saxon/Norman practice of blood libel to other colonized peoples, besides Jews. What is the evidence of any particular person's death in pre-colonial Benin being attributable to so-called 'Human Sacrifice'? By that question I mean, which Benin priest has stated in public record, and not under colonial tribunal, that this is why they ordered such and such a person killed? Perhaps ElliotJoyce might like to acquaint themselves with Gibbeting in order to properly understand the feverish colonial imagination.

Ackees, regarding this edit you made, I want to ask why do you feel that these terms are derogatory? Even though some racists have used the terms to describe afro-textured hair, these are also terms used to describe afro-textured hair without any sense of being derogatory, including by blacks in Africa and of other parts of the world. "Thick," "bushy," "coarse" or "wooly" are just terms describing the texture, and this texture is generally true of afro-textured hair that has not been straightened. And "wooly" is still noted in the lead.

That said, you might want to take a look at this edit. While maybe there has never been a black African with naturally straight hair, except for at birth, there are definitely people of African descent wiith naturally straight hair. 72.216.11.235 (talk) 19:39, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.