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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by MiszaBot I (talk | contribs) at 01:04, 14 January 2012 (Archiving 3 thread(s) (older than 15d) to Talk:99 Percent Declaration/Archive 3.). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.


Revisit factual accuracy

Now that the article has undergone a major rewrite, are there still concerns about the factual accuracy?--Nowa (talk) 22:05, 1 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A couple minor points. First, I'd recommend changing all instances of "will" to "would" since this is all hypothetical.
Second, I think the article should be more clear that the entire apparatus they are suggesting, including the running of the supposed "election" itself (scare quotes intentional), is contemplated to be performed by people involved in OWS or the Occupy movements. Thus it appears to be an idea by OWS people, for OWS people, with no involvement by anyone outside OWS except that people outside OWS would supposedly be allowed to "vote" in the "election".
(I wonder how a bunch of protesters with limited means, and with no genuine political authority, could even pretend to conduct a legitimate nationwide election that no one has asked them or authorized them to conduct. And I wonder what they would do if they went ahead with all this only to discover that you don't get to amend the Constitution just because you "elected" a bunch of people and called them "delegates". But that's just my own unpublished thought.) Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:47, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Another thing, I think it would be best to eliminate the use of the "Juvenile Justice Information Exchange" and other self-published sources. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 14:59, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your feedback. Regarding "will" to "would", it sounds good in principal, but you might want to check readability before doing a global replace.--Nowa (talk) 15:12, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think I agree with the point that delegate elections would be run by OWS people or organizations. Did you see that in a reference?--Nowa (talk) 15:14, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I also don't think the 99 percent declaration is seeking to amend the US constitution. It instead is calling for the drafting of a petition for the redress of grievances.--Nowa (talk) 15:16, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I agree in principal that we should avoid self published sources, but I don't think Juvenile Justice Information Exchange falls into that category. They have an editorial staff. They have also been cited by other reliable sources.--Nowa (talk) 15:28, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • (1) Wouldn't that make them a reliable source on their field of expertise? Note that reliable sources are only citing them on topics related to juvenile justice. I don't see how they could be considered a reliable source for anything else.
  • (2) Regarding who would conduct the elections, this issue is confused somewhat by the fact that they seem to keep changing the text of the Declaration. The comment I made was based on the last time I looked at the document, at which point it read:

Election Committees, elected by local General Assemblies from all over the United States, shall coordinate with the 99 Percent Declaration Working Group (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/the99declaration /) to organize, coordinate and fund this national election by direct democratic voting.

To see this language in the context in which it appeared before being removed, take a look at this mirror of the original document.
As you can see, it was clearly indicated that this election would be conducted entirely by OWS people, since only OWS people join these "local General Assemblies", and since the document declares that they "shall coordinate with the 99 Percent Declaration Working Group". This leaves little to the imagination.
At the same time, even with this language having been removed, it seem relatively clear, IMO, that these elections would have to be conducted by OWS people or somebody acting on their behalf. After all, it's only OWS people who want any of this to take place to begin with. It's utterly inconceivable that "The 99% of Citizens" are just going to spontaneously self-organize and say, Hey, OWS said we should do this, so let's all do this together in nationwide unified solidarity. It'll be done by OWS, or not at all.
  • (3) Regarding amending the Constitution, again, you can see there have been changes since the original document, but it now says:

We demand the immediate and complete elimination of all private political contributions by law and Constitutional amendment. . . . [We also demand] [t]he immediate abrogation, even if it requires a Constitutional Amendment, of the outrageous and anti-democratic Supreme Court holding in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and its progeny."

Note the curious nature of the demand: they're basically ordering Congress to amend the Constitution. But you can't really do that. Congress itself doesn't have authority to amend the Constitution. It only has the authority to propose amendments to state legislatures -- and even then, only by a large majority -- or, in theory, to call for a convention for amendments to be proposed, but only if a majority of states ask for a convention. If there is no large majority in Congress wanting to make that proposal, or if there is not a majority of state legislatures asking Congress to propose amendments, Congress doesn't have the authority to make the proposal in the first place. And even once a proposal is made, the authority to ratify the proposal and thus actually amend the Constitution rests in the state legislatures alone. There's no "we speak for the vast majority of the entire country, and you'll have to trust us on that, so just do what we say!" button that can be pressed. Thank God. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:12, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
About the "Juvenile Justice Information Exchange" ref, I tend to agree with FC, but then that has been a problem here from the start: Next to no references to work with. Again I will say, it was our (Wikipedia's) fault that this article was ever accepted in the first place...but now we are stuck with it and have little choice but to do the best we can. So with that in mind, I believe that Nowa has done a fine job of trying to put something together. FC, I'm not sure that you have been following this problematic article, but if not you need to understand that the 99% group is actually not related to the OWS group in NYC other than that some of the people grouped in NYC put it together, mainly Michael Pollok. Not only has it never been accepted by the OWS group, it seems that there has been a great deal of anger and bad vibes between the two of them. Gandydancer (talk) 18:20, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I couldn't agree more with your statement about how this mess is our own making (regardless of whether we voted to Keep) and now we have to do our best to clean it up. And I agree Nowa has taken it forward quite well. The things I mentioned above are relatively minor IMO. Regarding your concern that readers not be misled as to how closely this doc is associated with OWS, what do you think about moving the very last sentence of the document section to the lead, or at least including a paraphrase of it in the lead? ("The declaration has not been backed by the OWS movement in New York or accepted nationally.") My own gut tells me that if we're pointing out it's associated with OWS in the lead, we should also point out that the association is disputed and perhaps a bit weak.
My own concern is that the language about delegates, elections, mention of Congressional districts, etc., tends to imply that there is some sort of "official" legitimacy to all of this, as if these plans were sponsored by the government, or are part of some standard, already-recognized means of petitioning the government, when it's all completely outside of the actual official authority of any state or local government. In fact it seems to be an explicit part of the plan that all of this ignores and circumvents the actual government and official mechanisms in place for attempting to bring about political change. Yet using all of this language that is normally associated with established, legitimate political processes looks like an attempt to borrow a sense of legitimacy that has not been earned. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 19:28, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I concur that the last sentence should go into the lead. I would also amend the first sentence to read The 99 Percent Declaration is a document that some commentators have associated with Occupy Wall Street. Hopefully this will clarify that Occupy Wall Street does not currently associate itself with The 99% Declaration not do they with it.--Nowa (talk) 20:59, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]


Comment on another minor detail. The article says one of the demands is the "reversal" of Citizens United, and that is, indeed, what the source says. But it would be more correct to say they want the abrogation of that case, which would mean Congress declares it is no longer valid. "Reversal" would imply that the Supreme Court decides to hear a similar case, and decides they made the wrong decision in Citizens United, and states that they are overturning that case. You can't really order Congress to pass a law, but even more than that, you really can't order SCOTUS to reverse a case—nor do they even have the authority to do so unless they are considering their previous decision in the context of a newer, similar case that they have decided to hear.

So, this is a subtle but fairly important difference in terminology IMO. And I'll be the first to admit that it'd be OR to let my analysis guide the article. But here at this article, where we have a subject practically untouched by reliable sources, for perhaps the first time ever, I am tempted to invoke WP:IAR. If you disagree, that's fine; I don't care enough about this issue to dispute anyone else's judgment on the matter. But I do care enough to mention it here. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 22:26, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well first, I think that your suggestion to mention that they are not part of the NYC OWS right off the bat is a brilliant idea. But when you get into the nuts and bolts of how our system works, you lose me. Thom Hartman discussed their plan the other day (he too thought it was lunacy), but again, I have so little knowledge that I couldn't follow him either. Now as for your WP:IAR suggestion...interesting. But, again I have little understanding about the finer points of WP policies. I have wished more than once that more editors were willing to use the Common Sense policy, and I felt that perhaps Nowa had used some of that in his rewrite... But I would guess that Common Sense only works when an article is not hotly contested - and how often does that happen? (I have been "hotly contesting" at the Rutabaga article, of all things, for some two years now!) How would you use "ignore all rules" FC? Gandydancer (talk) 23:11, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Heh, I guess I should walk that one back a bit. I am a big believer in rules and following rules for the sake of respecting their universality. I guess what I mean is, for the first time I am thinking it might be ok to sometimes ignore one or two rules, whereas previously I would always want to follow every rule to its letter.
I guess that would basically be the same thing as a "common sense" policy. And yes, I think Nowa has been doing a bit of that, and normally I would protest when this or that rule technically gets broken, but in this case I see this impossible project that is going to be damaging if it is done wrong, but the rules just don't seem to allow it to be done right. I agree that the "common sense" rule will not generally work at a disputed article since everyone's differing common sense will conflict and it'll just be another way of waging the same disputes. But maybe it is OK to give it a try, where there does not seem to be any other way. So I remain willing to look the other way if Nowa plays a little loose with the rules, because (1) I trust his/her judgment and motivations, (2) I want this article to be as accurate and neutral as possible, and (3) *I* sure as heck don't want to take that task upon myself (the only reason I didn't vote to Delete was because I commented exclusively on Dualus in the AFD and didn't want to get involved in too many arguments at once).
That said, give yourself a little more credit. I'm of the opinion that the high-volume, high-profile, hotly disputed articles are where editors really show their depth of understanding of WP policy, because successful editing at such articles requires a solid understanding of the policies that aim at neutrality AND the policies that aim at civility and building consensus. If you don't have that, you won't go far at a hot article without getting blocked or just being ignored by everyone else. And even if you have encountered vicious fights while toiling away at obscure articles (a chore which I respect, and I feel a bit ashamed I can't or don't do that myself), I still get the sense that you're really in the big leagues when you're faced with 50 ideological editors on both sides of the fence, 40 neutrality-minded editors that nevertheless bring their own POV to the article, 30 personal grudges and old hatreds, 20 bombastic, partisan sources, 10 different ways of looking at any given issue, and a partridge in a pear tree. And you've been doing just great at OWS, where we have all of that and more.  ;) Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 23:40, 2 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
WP:IAR cool. I hadn't seen that one before.
And don't forget, rules are made to be edited....by anyone.
And I concur with using the word abrogation. Good civics lesson.--Nowa (talk) 04:02, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I went ahead and made the change. Did a little civics study as well and am now more knowdedgable. Thanks! Gandydancer (talk) 14:41, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Nice job.--Nowa (talk) 15:48, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It seems that whoever placed the NPOV/Fact tags is no longer concerned or is no longer participating in the discussion. (Actually, I think one of the tags was placed by Dualus, who isn't around anymore.) Seems like it should be OK to remove them now. However, if anyone here is a glutton for punishment, they could open an RFC asking outside editors whether they think it's OK to remove the tag. Hey, who doesn't like a fresh can of worms? :)
[runs and hides] Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:33, 3 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm going to remove them.--Nowa (talk) 02:03, 8 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

NEXT STEP: GA STATUS!!!! Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 03:13, 8 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The NYCGA reinstated the 99% Declaration Working Group. See http://www.nycga.net/groups/the-99-declaration-working-group/ Occupy Philly has a link to the 99% Declaration on its homepage. See http://occupyphilly.org/ Other Occupy groups have endorsed it on various levels 24.161.123.221 (talk) 08:43, 10 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Source suggested by WP:COI editor

Hi, y'all. I have a COI. If anyone thinks this article from the Atlantic should be cited, please consider using it. It's from a WP:RS, it describes a national convention to draft a petition for the redress of grievances and, in its last paragraph, identifies the 99% Declaration group as working toward that end. Thanks for considering it, whether you use it in the article, list it as "Further reading", or decide its not helpful. Here 'tis: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/11/has-a-harvard-professor-mapped-out-the-next-step-for-occupy-wall-street/247561/ David in DC (talk) 12:40, 16 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. By now I've read that article more times than I even like to think about and I thought it was still in the refs. I added it as a ref using this info: Already, "The 99 Percent Declaration" is calling for "a NATIONAL GENERAL ASSEMBLY beginning on July 4, 2012 in the City Of Philadelphia", but I don't know what else I can do. Please don't think that I (we) are not doing our best to present an article here - we just have not yet been able to find references. I see that Lessig is starting to speak about his thoughts/plans here and there - saw him on Jon Stewart the other night (and he has spoken to Jimbo Wales as well). But until he says he has talked to the 99% group, I don't see that we can use anything from him in this article. Thoughts? Gandydancer (talk) 16:58, 16 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In my view, y'all are doing fine, according to the best standards of wikipediadom. Beyond that general observation, I'll stay silent. If I notice a source I think can help, I'll post it here. Thank you for all your hard work (that "your" is meant to be plural, BTW) under truly vexing circumstances. David in DC (talk) 20:13, 16 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Recent POV and unsourced edits

In the last few days some editors have done extensive POV edits to the article. I will try to work on the article today to attempt to bring it back to Wikipedia standards... Gandydancer (talk) 16:05, 13 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

What is the source for the Occupy Philadelphia rejection? Also, I noticed this newbie work got reverted without any communication with the new user, and on close inspection it does appear to be partially sourced. Is any of that usable? Selery (talk) 17:02, 13 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I added some refs. They meet with OWS today, so will see what happens... Gandydancer (talk) 17:47, 13 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! Intriguing stuff. Selery (talk) 18:14, 13 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The 99% Declaration has asked that the logo be updated. The group voted on several different logos and selected the one on their webpage www.the99declaration.org — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.161.123.221 (talk) 17:42, 13 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done Selery (talk) 18:13, 13 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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