User talk:PaulHammond/archive1

Incivility

Hi, no, it is not a typo. My english is not the best you could dream of, and I started the article at uncivility, and even now, I have trouble remembering which one is the correct one :-)

Thanks for reading it :-)

SweetLittleFluffyThing

Charles Darwin

You read the whole Darwin/Lincoln talk page!? Wow. Even I don't do that anymore. It's about half as long as a short Agatha Christie mystery. Anyway, I'd like to point out that the comment you moved off the vote section was placed there by JoeD. I had placed it on his talk page. (Just so you know.) Cheers, Vincent 04:16, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Re: revert question

You're welcome. I figured that was the problem. And by the way, it is generally considered inappropriate to remove material from your talk page, unless it has been vandalized (especially if a vandal has modified others' comments). If the page gets too large, you may archive the earlier discussions; people usually have links to these at the top of their talk pages. — Knowledge Seeker দ (talk) 09:30, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Yeshiva naming

To answer your question on Talk:Mir Yeshiva - many yeshivoth (= plural of yeshiva) are a continuation of those colleges in Eastern Europe that were wiped out during the Holocaust. There are various other examples, such as the Telz (= Telsiai) yeshiva which is presently in Wickliffe, Ohio. They usually retain their original name in memory of their legacy.

Many Hasidic groups do the same: Chabad Lubavitch takes its name from a Byelorussian town, although this Hassidic group is presently based in Brooklyn, NY. JFW | T@lk 19:54, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Doctor Who

Sorry for the delay in responding; I just took a bit of an unannounced wikibreak and didn't catch your message until today. I've been a Doctor Who fan for about two years, and have been watching rerun episodes on a local independent public TV station (WYBE) since towards the end of the Fourth Doctor (it's now at the very end of the Seventh Doctor). I've also read quite a bit of the literature on Doctor Who and a few of the novels. --Goobergunch|? 18:27, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Talk page vandalism

Hi Paul.. I just noticed that guy when I was doing "Recent Changes" patrol - I saw that he'd vandalised Minor Bahá'í divisions, so I reverted it, and left him a message. Then, as is my habit, I checked his contributions again an hour or so later, and spotted that he'd hit up this page and also User talk:Rboatright. No idea what his grudge was with you! --Stormie 02:06, Jan 31, 2005 (UTC)

I think his grudge was probably with the Baha'is rather than me - but I think you might have gotten me into something now - have a look here. PaulHammond 02:24, Jan 31, 2005 (UTC) (cc to Stormie's talk page)

Bahai attacks

I know you're not a Baha'i but... yikes, this is getting quite aggressive. Has it been like this for long or I just joined at an awkward time? -- Tomhab 16:03, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Firstly... does this come up as a new message, or is it only if you add a new comment?

Secondly have you seen Amir having a go at Refbot now?? Geez. I joined wikipedia because a friend always went on about how great the ethos is. Even if people make random changes, someone will correct them and it all works out in the long run. I was pretty convinced for a while (as the amount and quality of the articles must be far greater than Britanica by now), but upon getting sucked into this I'm having my doubts. Amir and Martin can't compromise and I just can't see them letting up. The only thing thats keeping me on here is the fact that I can't let them win :). They have made the interesting point that these pages are pretty much Baha'i leaflets mind.

Heh my watch list is almost entirely Baha'i pages though as I don't actually know enough about another topic to contribute. -- Tomhab 22:28, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)

To be honest I was born a Baha'i, and am now 21 - quite young but I've always taken a clinical approach towards the religion and am pretty well read. I've had quite a liberal upbringing and am quite familiar with pretty much all the crap thats been brought up by people trying to put a (how to put this)... less positive POV of the Baha'i faith compared to pamphlet literature (I've just rolled my eyes reading what I've missed since I went to visit my brother on Thursday). One thing I hadn't heard of is the two wives bit for Babis, and still not found much on the topic. I know one can argue that Baha'is are good at hiding details, but they're also good at defending themselves so its a tad odd I can't find any details anywhere. One thing which was interesting was reading one of the few early sources on Babism/Bahaism History and Doctrine of the Babi Movement. Its a little negative towards the Babis, but it does fill in a few gaps and seems reasonably factual. I only read the history sections though to be honest.

I think I'll be taking a step back from it all though. I'm tired of working against so many people, such as the whole issue of putting the image at the bottom of the page, debate going on between 4-5 people, free for anyone to put input into for several days and we finally get a consensus to try something. Then Raul - a wikipedia admin and arbiter comes in and ignores it all enforcing his own rules on standards. Wikipedia is great for some things, but its awful at anything where opinion can vary. There are too many pre-pubescent kids who think they know it all on the net, and yet more people who aren't, but still need to have a second go at puberty.

The idea of the Wiki being perfect for any situation has lost my vote I'm afraid. There needs to be a father figure who runs contentious pages and personally goes over every change. Not gonna happen but oh well. -- Tomhab 23:58, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Baha'u'llah's photo

Paul, here's my take on it. I'm the one who posted the original request that the photo of Baha'u'llah NOT be on the wiki. I _did_ post a photo of the shrine. :-/ I knew then, and know now, that this was a futile request, but the darn thing worked for nearly a year. :-)

As a moderator of soc.religion.bahai I have become used to the fact that in order to have discussion ABOUT the faith, it is nessesary to allow attacks ON the faith. If the moslems can't post on SRB stuff like "Baha'u'llah is short, ungrammatical liar" how can we RESPOND to the hate they're spewing elsewhere. We learn by doing.

The simple reality is, that photo has been up on the web for over 3 years, possibly longer. It's certainly been published in any number of books longer than that. Would you ask the nice folks over at H-Bahai to take down the pdf's of the books of Ahmad Sorhab because he was proclaimed a covenant breaker? Nope. It's historical context. We have to deal with that.

We deal with the orthodox Baha'is and mad-Joel. We deal with the occasional afnan who still feels shortchanged of his inheritance but will not embrace the cause as it exists. These things are part of growing a religion.

The photo of Baha'u'llah isn't an attack. It's a historical document. It's what he looked like on that day, in that place, at that time. The challenge before us as a community is not to waste our effort and credit on these small battles.

The challenge we face will come when attempting to participate in editing definitive encyclopaedic articles on Ahmad Sorhab or Ruhi Effendi Afnan, or even a definitive encyclopaedic article on Mirza Yahya himself, will be a true challenge. Save your breath, and blood for the fights before us, glance in passing at the face of the Manifestation of God for our day as you work on His page, and do the best you can. God can certainly ask nothing more of us.

Rick Boatright 06:24, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the coffee message; I am amazed at how much time can be spent on this thing. I just hope that most of the hours my children were spending online were on editing encyclopaedias rather than games. And thanks for removing the two references in Baha'i Faith. One tries so hard to be even-handed that it is easy to become tied up in knots. --Occamy 21:01, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)

And thanks for the external links guidance. I scanned the Editing Help pages without being wiser on the subject....and I complain about my mother's technology skills! --Occamy 19:04, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Paul: the passport photograph would have been taken shortly after Baha'u'llah's December 1852 release from the Siyah-Chal dungeon and before the start of His exile on 12 January 1853. Adib Taherzadeh, in The Covenant of Baha'u'llah, writes "...His neck badly injured and His back bent by the weight of heavy chains..." which would contribute to why Baha'u'llah appears as He does in the photo. I am minded that it is probably best to let the dispute about the photo come to a resolution before offering this information. What do you think? I am asking Rick Boatright, Tomhab and Gini too. --Occamy 07:31, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)