User talk:Lou franklin

From Campaigns Wikia

Contents 1 Rat 2 From Jennifer 3 18 September!! 4 SSMcat laid to rest 5 Why can't we be friends? 6 Hmm

[edit] Rat

Hi Lou, I have to say I find something very suspicious about the new voters. I'm in the middle of my tests so I can't be around much, but I would appreciate it if you keep a lookout for anymore one-time voters, and give me a call if any more appear (especially if since they all seem to be voting for #2). --ШΔLÐSΣИ 11:36, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with you. Very suspicious indeed. The voting pool has been tampered with! The community had voted to remove the category before the mercenaries were brought in to reverse the outcome. That is the most blatant election fraud imaginable. How can we let this sham vote stand and then pretend to have a balanced site here?

The other admins are going to have to step up and take corrective action. There is no point in holding elections at all if they are going to be mickied this way. This is a very bad precedent for this site. Lou franklin 12:43, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Mercenaries? Are you suggesting people were paid to vote? I'd like to see you back that one up. And extrapolating what the community wants from a handful of votes is just insane. McLurker 12:59, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

A mercenary is a professional soldier hired to serve in a foreign army. Liberals who have never even visited this site before have been actively recruited by a liberal admin to make decisions about the site. You see nothing wrong with that?!?

How would you feel if the Republicans were to change the laws to allow Russians to vote in our elections? Maybe the Republicans were down in the polls, so right in the middle of election season they went to Russia to recruit foreigners to vote conservative. My guess is that you wouldn't think that was very fair. But that is exactly what is happening here. This is a travesty! Lou franklin 03:01, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

But those who have been "recruited" are voting the opposite way from the person alleged to have done the recruiting. Which shows that either this is a highly incompetent piece of recruiting, or that there is no recruitment in fact taking place. McLurker 08:29, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

There is clearly recruitment taking place. Nobody denies it. This user [1] , for example, couldn't be bothered to create a home page or a talk page and has no contributions before or after the vote. Assuming that this isn't an outright sockpuppet, the user's name is Demgal. It doesn't take MacGyver to figure out what is going on here. Chad openly admits that "they are people I know who saw the issue" on "mailing lists and blogs". Of course liberal blogs were selected because he "doesn't have contact with conservatives". This is an abomination!

He justifies it by saying "I DON'T CARE if this vote goes in a way that I don't personally agree with" and now claims his "objective is to get people engaged and contributing" instead. But isn't it important that the vote be fair? Aren't admins supposed to be the ones who make sure that the site is run in an honest an impartial way?

The members of the community voted to remove the topic from the civil rights category before the ringers were brought in. The article should be removed from the category. Lou franklin 10:15, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

You know, Lou, you could advertise the vote and employ the same technique of getting outsiders (but conservatives, of course) to support the issue. Jfingers88 17:04, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I would never do something that unethical. This was supposed to be a vote of the community. Assuming that these are not all sockpuppets, getting people to cast a vote on something that doesn't even affect them is unscrupulous. The fact that an admin did it is astonishing. Lou franklin 20:07, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Couple of questions here. What, or who, defines the community? Just the people who have made significant edits on this particular wiki? Define significant. What kind of edits should be required to qualify? As far as I'm concerned, this community includes anyone who goes to the page and has an opinion on the subject of the vote. This is a public website owned by a for-profit company, paid for by advertising. Getting more and more people to view the pages is part of what we are here to do.

I've created a policy proposal to define voting qualifications. I'd be interested to see your views on this. Chadlupkes 21:42, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

That is disingenuous. You don't need me to "define significant". People who were recruited to come here to vote, and who never return, are not part of the community. You know that. You don't need me to explain that to you.

I have no problem with "getting more and more people to view the pages", but that is very different from an admin fixing an election. How we catergorize articles on Campaigns Wikia doesn't affect these people in any way. They are either sockpuppets or people who would have no reason to care because they don't use the site.

What you have done is dishonest. You didn't try to "get more and more people to view the pages", you actively recruited external votes from only liberals in the middle of an election. The site can never be balanced if even the admins won't play fair, and frankly I hope you will have the decency to step down. Lou franklin 04:05, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] From Jennifer

Hi Lou :-) I'm into community building stuff. I just wanted to let you know that I added you to the list of campaigns participants and you might want to point a link to a blog or add something to your description or whatever. It's a place you'll "be seen" as a prominent contributor and you might want to manage people's impression of you :-)

Also, I was wondering, if I nominate you to be an admin are you up for serving the community? I've not really comfy with your "quotas based on party affiliation" proposal but I think the basic idea of getting committed people from diverse political backgrounds to be admins is really good... and you appear to be committed and diverse... are you up for it?

-- JenniferForUnity 22:50, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your offer, but I am going to pass. We need conservative admins here for sure but it's more important to build up the site right now. Any conservative's candidacy on this site would be a battle royale, and the last thing we need right now is another time-consuming distraction.

I'll have to think about blogging though. That sounds interesting.

Best regards, Lou franklin 03:57, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Any Conservative's candidacy would not be, but yours certainly would. Representation of your beliefs among the admins would be a good idea, representation of your methods would not. You should consider blogging though, I'd be interested to read that. --whosawhatsis? 04:10, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I am overwhelmed by your kindness and goodwill. The blog is http://loufranklin.blogspot.com/ . Maybe tomorrow I'll post an entry about civility. Lou franklin 04:16, 25 September 2006 (UTC).

Welcome to blogspot! I'll add your blog to my list on my own. Interesting title, btw... Chadlupkes 13:21, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Several things: (1) Perhaps we could find someone else to maybe bring some balance? Like Lou, do you know any "respected wikipedians" who you'd be politically on the same political wavelength as, while Chad and whosawhatsis would be able to wavelength sync with them on wiki stuff? (2) Your blog is linked to from the list of people now :-) (3) Your blog is sadly set to prevent anonymous comments and I have no account with blogspot... so I didn't comment on your first post but thanks for the thanks :-) (4) If bloggers are looking for other places to promote: you could try the Unity Wiki bloggers page :-)

I just reconfigured my blog to allow anonymous comments. I have never blogged before, so not knowing the ins-and-outs of it, I had taken all the defaults. Let me know if you notice anything else that isn't right.

I don't believe there are any conservative "respected wikipedians". (I don't believe there are any "respected wikipedians" for that matter ;-) ) I have seen unwitting conservatives happen by Wikipedia and try to contribute there, but they quickly get steamrolled/blocked/frustrated and end up leaving one way or the other. I guess most people don't have the threshold for abuse that I have.

By "conservative" do you mean non-liberal? If so, I'm not sure that I entirely agree with all the above. I feel that there may be "conservative" "repsected wikipedians." A possible example! But they don't stick up for "conservate" wikipedians steamrolled/blocked/frustrated by "librols" (American Liberals, do you live in America?). So you notice that, then you find someone who agrees with many of you views steamrolled/blocked/frustrated and you come and help them, you find out why? You get told not to feed the trolls. 220.152.112.132 00:38, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

I thought that this site had potential to be balanced because the policies have not been formulated yet. I thought that if fair policies were put in place that conservatives and moderates could contribute here without being trounced. But it looks like it isn't going to happen that way. I know lots of politically active moderates and conservatives who could contribute, but they would get eaten alive here.

On Wikipedia, liberals game the 3RR policy to get conservatives booted. The way they work it, 5 liberals take turns reverting a conservative's legitimate edits. The conservative doesn't want to be denied his voice so he reinserts his edits. Then one of the liberals reports the conservative for 3RR and the conservative gets blocked. The liberals don't get blocked because they took turns. No individual liberal made more than 3 changes. They tag-teamed.

On this site, they aren't that coy. Since almost all of the admins here are liberals, they just creatively define what "vandalism" means and boot you for things like editing your own talk page. Then they vote against policies that will bring balance in the future.

What I am trying to say is that you aren't going to "find someone else to bring some balance" here the way this site is currently structured. If fair policies are adopted you'll see lots of moderates and conservatives contributing here, but until then you won't. You may see the occasional conservative try to contribute for a week and then give up, but long-term you can't have balance unless you have balanced policies.

The difference between this site and Wikipedia is that Wikipedia can survive without being balanced; this site can't. A political site that is controlled by one political viewpoint is like one hand clapping. Lou franklin 11:17, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I defy you to show how any of the proposed policies are biased toward any one viewpoint. The difference is that we have different ideas of what a wiki, specifically a non-NPOV wiki, should be. You want to limit POVs under a group of admins apportioned according to US demographics with absolute power. Most of the rest of us want to encourage POVs under a more open and, when necessary, democratic community with admins that can set their politics aside to keep things running smoothly. --whosawhatsis? 19:21, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I can see his point at least this far: This site is biased towards allowing points of view that some people may disagree with, including categories. It seems to be a fundamental difference in opinion on whether points of view that we don't agree with should be allowed on the site. Chadlupkes 19:37, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps, but not toward allowing points of view that any particular group would disagree with, as Lou seems to be implying. --whosawhatsis? 19:48, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

And about your accusation of gaming on wikipedia, unless there is sockpuppetry involved (including the "hey, buddy, edit this for me" type), it sounds like the system is working exactly as intended. I can't speak to what was specifically reverted in any such instances, and it may be that a few unscrupulous Liberals were trying to push an agenda, but it seems more likely that they agreed that the edits being reverted were not NPOV enough. If the latter is not the case, it just proves the need for admins who can separate their political beliefs from their admin duties. --whosawhatsis? 19:21, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I have never, and will never, engage in puppetry. I agree that it's wrong. I don't agree that trying to get more people involved during a vote is a bad thing. If there people who "swoop in for a one vote" and don't come back, then it's up to us to keep up the encouragement for them to come back, not throw their votes out the door because they create a result that we don't like. Chadlupkes 19:37, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

That is disingenuous. The community had voted to remove the category. An admin of this site went out on the internet in the middle of an election and solicited votes from only liberals. Admins are supposed to be the ones who keep things on the up-and-up. There are no words to describe how wrong it is for an admin to throw an election. Lou franklin 01:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Hi there your anonymous friend, could you tell me, what is the difference between a "conservative" and a "liberal" (pre your use of those terms). 144.139.85.110 17:32, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I did not participate in this discussion. However, I can offer a fresh view on a difference between liberals and conservatives. http://www.henrykkowalczyk.com/freedom_lost.htm --HAK 04:23, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 18 September!!

Hi Lou!!

Join in the Celebration!! From Chile I send you the Joy we live!! Dance Cueca and eat Empanadas!! It is a great day, and I invite you to feel it too!!

--ШΔLÐSΣИ 02:04, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Can you invite some fairness too? Lou franklin 02:07, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh yes, of course. On to more serious issues, I think I have come to the conclusion that this SSMcat vote cannot be allowed to end like this. I'm going to talk to Chad and Jfingers88 first, but I believe that if this vote is closed and the cat stays, it would be a very controversial stain in CW history... --ШΔLÐSΣИ 02:14, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. The category really must be removed. That is only fair. This has gone on long enough. Lou franklin 02:17, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] SSMcat laid to rest

Hi Lou. Well, the debate has been laid to rest, at least for a while. I must say I'm relieved, although this was not the way I wanted it to end. At least this result is acceptable to everyone. No cats on SSM until we have a set of policies to regulate voting. I'll be seeing you around... --ШΔLÐSΣИ 03:33, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. Justice has been served. Lou franklin 03:41, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

You really are a conservative. Only a conservative would call getting one's own way, ignoring not one but two votes, "justice". --whosawhatsis? 04:42, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Ignoring the millions of people who are offended by that categorization is not justice.

But I will try to be more liberal in the future. Do you know where I can find an intern and a cigar? Lou franklin 05:57, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, millions of people. Did you know that 93.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot? Another funny fact, Conservatism requires liberal use of the word "offense". Lou, sometimes the truth hurts. --whosawhatsis? 06:44, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I believe that millions of people are deeply offended by that categorization. I believe that the majority of people are. What I can say for sure is that many people disagree with that categorization. And if many people disagree with a categorization, it seems to me that the only fair thing to do is to remove it.

I'm sorry that you don't see it that way. We will probably never agree, but at least now we can put this behind us and spend our time actually building the site. That is a good thing. Let's move on. Lou franklin 11:40, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Now we can put it behind us? How many times did I suggest that we put it behind us? But no, you whined about it like a child until you got your way, and now that you have you expect the rest of us not to do the same? I won't, I just can't ignore that kind of hypocrisy. --whosawhatsis? 19:18, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Lou, you aren't honestly going to defend yourself in the neo-con fashion, are you? You feel justified because you feel the majority of people are with you? You feel millions of people were 'offended'? I could understand you clogging up the works and raising a big stink if you knew the majority of people were offended by the category, but you didn't. From where I'm sitting, it seems more people here, at least, are offended at the suggestion same-sex marriage is not a civil rights issue. But I see no regard for them in anything you've written. I see no hint of fairness in your views. You don't seek a resolution that all can live with. You don't come up with a creative solution to this problem. You just scream and scream and scream your opinion until you get your way. It's childish, and you've gained no love for it. Congratulations on your astonishing victory. -- Ferguson 17:19, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Grow up. Obviously "more people here" agree with your liberal viewpoint. Nobody ever questioned that. But there are 6.5 Billion people in the world, and 6,499,999,980 of them don't visit this site. Are you suggesting that we ignore them all and consider only the viewpoints of the 20 liberals who come here?

I have no idea what your crack about "defending yourself in the neo-con fashion" was supposed to mean, but it says a lot about your tolerance for diversity of thought. It says a lot about your commitment to the site's goal of bringing together people from diverse political perspectives.

Can you prove that millions of people are not 'offended'? I could understand you raising a big stink if you knew the majority of people were not offended by the category, but you don't.

Read these: [2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]

There are one Billion Catholics alone who believe that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered and cannot be approved of under any circumstances. That's actually part of the Catechism. You don't think that millions of those people are offended by homosexuals trying to spin homosexual "marriage" as a civil rights issue? That is preposterous.

I have come up with a creative solution to this problem. I drafted this policy. Other than leaving juvenile insults on people's talk pages, what "creative solution" have you come up with for this problem? Lou franklin 03:26, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

I wasn't going to get back into this, but...

Even the catholic religion, despite being (in my own opinion) quite possibly the most dogmatically hateful religion that exists today, acknowledges the difference between homosexuality and homosexual acts. And no, same-sex marriage does not count as a "homosexual act", they actually use the term "homogenital". Even so, I have to believe that some fraction of those billion followers are tolerant enough not to be offended by something that in no way affects them (those of them, that is, who are not themselves homosexual, which judging by the way their priests are always making the news, can't be that small a minority). --whosawhatsis? 04:30, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Dude, you linked to a gay site and the writings of a gay guy. Here's a quote right from the Vatican: "There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural moral law." [21] I'm not sure how the Catholic position on the matter could be stated any clearer than that.

Millions of people are offended by the categorization of homosexual "marriage" as a civil rights issue. That is a fact. To deny it is patently absurd.

Do the math. Even if 99% of Catholics disagreed with their own religion and magically started thinking that homosexual "marriage" is a civil rights issue, that would still leave millions of people who are offended by it. And that's just the Catholics.

You can think Catholics are "dogmatically hateful" if you want, but you can't deny that there are a lot of them. And there are also millions and millions of non-Catholics and even non-Christians who don't approve of homosexual "marriage" and don't think it is anything like a civil rights issue.

To ignore that many people and then claim to have a balanced site wouldn't be very fair, would it? Lou franklin 05:45, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

I can think of another religion that objects to Homosexuality, and actually provides a punishment of death for it. Islam. At least none of us are advocating that. At least we can be capable of enough respect for each other to argue about semantics and nuance. Shall we give the 1 Billion Muslims in the world one sixth of the space on this wikia because they exist? Or should we give them an invitation and get on with the work until they show up? There are also 900 million Hindu, 376 million Buddhist, 300 million indiginous (including the modern pagan religions), etc. Shall we give them all proportional space?

I personally don't feel a need to follow the dictates of the Holy Roman Empire. And I would hope that the United States, as a secular nation, would be able to put aside the religious dogma and deal with reality, something that the Catholic Church failed to do for nearly 2,000 years, started to do with Pope John Paul II, but now have begun to retreat from again under Pope Benedict.

I don't deny that millions of people in the US don't like the idea of homosexual marriage. But I don't think that you can deny that millions of those people depend on the news media and third party experience to teach them what it's like to be the target of discrimination and hatred. But hey, it doesn't affect their lives, so why should they care? But when it does affect the lives of children, children that they are not guardians of or have any legal responsibility for, they suddenly care. They care enough to project their own moral values and demand that everyone else follow their moral standards. The United States is a nation of laws, and the church does not dictate those laws. If it did, we would call ourselves a Theocracy. Is that where we want to go? If I am required to follow the moral values of others, then they are required to follow mine. Or we can find common ground, debate the details, and get on with our lives. Chadlupkes 06:08, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

"Finding common ground" is exactly what is needed here. The article can be fairly categorized under many topics. But "civil rights issues" is not "common ground" because millions of people disagree with it.

Nobody is suggesting that we give all religions "proportional space" or "follow the dictates of the Holy Roman Empire" or the dictates of "1 Billion Muslims". But even as judged by secular Western sensibilities, homosexual "marriage" is not widely-accepted as a civil rights issue. Lou franklin 03:25, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Re: Growing up

I've said what I said about the Proportional Politics thing. I do commend you for trying to come up with a solution for the broader issue of making sure the admins do not abuse their power to put forth their own agenda at the expense of fairness.

Speaking of offense, I did feel a little twinge of offense (not too much, but just a knee-jerk twinge) at having my viewpoint being called 'liberal.' It'd be one thing if I even suspected you were referring to the actual liberalism--the ideals this country was founded upon--but I'm pretty sure you're calling me a progressive, at worst a Democrat, and that's something that really caught me off guard. Wait...no it didn't.

Well, I guess it's time to cover our women in burkhas and stop eating pork because apparently people somewhere are offended by that. You decide policy by whose present, not who exists. If I saw a lot of people seeing the SSM cat as a problem, I'd be more willing to entertain this notion, but I've only seen one person vocalizing concern. I want you to vocalize concern, but you also have to accept that other people have concerns, too. My real concern is that the posts I saw from you did not seem constructive. You came to the table with a stubbornness and a tunnel vision that seemed to inhibit reasonable discussion. That's just what I noticed.

And I don't even understand the offense. While categorizing it as a civil liberties might be a clever ploy to gain sympathy, refusing to acknowledge gay marriage as a civil rights issue seems like a blatant attempt to silence the other side. If the question is, 'Is _________ a civil right?,' it would seem to me that that question is a civil rights issue. By saying something is a civil rights 'issue,' you aren't calling it a civil right. You're saying someone is asking the question. A whole lot of someones in this case (dare I say...millions?). And doesn't making gay marriage a category unto itself grant it more visibility than if you just file it away under 'crazy things people think are civil rights issues'?

And Catholics are not hateful dogmatics; they are wonderful people who serve dutifully in their communities, give us wonderful architecture, and have perservered through intense persecution arising from their faith. -- Ferguson 08:26, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

"You decide policy by whose present, not who exists" if you want the site to suck. "Who exists" are a bunch of far-left liberals. If you want the site to be relevant and achieve its stated goals then you need balance. You can't build a compelling political site by assembling 20 liberals who all agree with Hugo Chávez that Bush is Satan. That's the way to build a site that is a joke. Lou franklin 03:25, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

To be fair, I was referring to the religion itself, not its followers. I stand by my belief that Catholicism is inherently dogmatic and hateful, but in no way am I trying to imply that the same is true of all, or even of the majority of its followers. --whosawhatsis? 19:37, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Lou, why do you keep on saying that anyone who disagrees with same-sex marriage will be offended by its categorisation as a civil rights issue? As I've said elsewhere, I don't agree with widespread handgun ownership but it is obviously a civil rights issue. The issue is not whether you agree with a viewpoint, but whether you agree with limiting its expression. I don't have any strong viewpoints on the SSM issue, but its my views on censorship and free expression which make my contributions to the vote somewhat heated.

The only question in the SSMcat debate is "do we allow the expression of political views on this site even if it offends people?" That we need to be asking this question here, and that people who regularly contribute to this site can answer "no" to that question is a major cause for concern. McLurker 14:49, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Where did I say that everyone who disagrees with same-sex marriage will be offended by its categorisation as a civil rights issue?

"Do we allow the expression of political views on this site even if it offends people?" is not "the only question in the SSMcat debate". It's not even a good one. Of course we should. But it should be clear to the reader that they are reading an opinion. The reader knows that "pro" and "con" sections contain opinions. But you shouldn't try to sneak your opinion into the categorization of an artice. That's not what categories are for.

If you think that abortion is murder then you should state that in the "con" section no matter who it offends. But it is not appropriate to place abortion under a category of "murder". The purpose of a category is to help the reader locate like articles; not to editoralize. Lou franklin 03:25, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Why can't we be friends?

We should probably all walk away from this topic for a while. I'm pretty sure I suggested it a while back. Now that the categories are gone, there really isn't anything to be upset about. Sure, once we all cool down we can have some nice friendly debates about same-sex marriage (or "marriage," depending on who you are), but right now, it's taking up too much time bickering over the same points that were argued two months ago. I know the two sides are pretty polarized, but there are going to be hard feelings about this argument for a while. Let's all let the thing sit for a while, unless something really major happens (like complete legalization in some country that was rather unexpected). Agree to disagree for now, ok? Jfingers88 03:56, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

I would be delighted if "we all walked away from this topic for a while". I didn't enjoy debating this two months ago, and I surely don't enjoy it now. I suggested that we "move on" above, but was met with hostility. I have nothing more to say about this, so unless somebody stirs the pot again I am more than happy to agree to disagree. Lou franklin 04:16, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Funny how you refused to let it go when the article was categorized as everyone else agreed it should be, but you're suddenly willing to agree to disagree now that you've gotten your way. How benevolent of you. --whosawhatsis? 04:20, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Jfingers88, do you hear stirring? Lou franklin 04:22, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hmm

I did not know that it had become official policy yet. However, before you do anything that could perhaps be considered drastic, I suggest you read this. Jfingers88 01:32, 11 October 2006 (UTC)