Talk:Dada Masiti

Dada Masiti DYK

Hi Middayexpress. I'm trying to understand your actions at Template:Did you know nominations/Dada Masiti. You've twice now removed/changed the hook that I proposed. If you have alternate hooks to propose, by all means, offer up some ALTs. If you have issues with the hook, make a comment. But please stop erasing my hook and putting your own in there. Thank you, gobonobo ^{+ c} 23:44, 12 June 2014 (UTC)

Hi Gobonobo. As I already explained, your hook is misleading. The only history on Dada Masiti that has actually been corroborated by both her own family and herself is her elopement as a teenager (which, incidentally, I notice was somehow originally omitted altogether). Both can't be simultaneously asserted because she obviously could not have gotten married and divorced if the rumours had been true. Her elopement should therefore logically be the hook not the debunked rumours, regardless of whether or not it is less titillating. Regards, Middayexpress (talk) 14:41, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

Actually, you didn't explain any of that until now. There has been zero comment from you on the template for DYK. Moreover, the hook is supported by two of the references in the article. Your own interpretation of which competing story is correct is original research. The Dictionary of African Biography and Kassim both support the language in that hook. Regardless, overwriting other editor's hooks because you don't like them is not acceptable and feels like bullying. If you're going to abuse the DYK process and continue to refactor hooks because you think it's "logical", I invite you to step away from the process. As I've said before, you're welcome to provide feedback and offer as many alternative hooks as you'd like. gobonobo ^{+ c} 21:45, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

Actually, I explained several times in my edit summaries on the DYK what was wrong (e.g. "fix speculation", "actual corroborated account"); so did User:AcidSnow. There were a number of problems with both this page and the DYK hook. First, you neglected to mention here the key fact that, per her own relatives, Dada Masiti was not enslaved as a six year old, but instead eloped as a teenager with her consent to a suitor that her family had rejected. This version was also apparently confirmed in her own verse. All of this is explained in the same Vianello profile on her early childhood as the slavery story [1]. Per that historical bio, the teenage elopement is the only corroborated account of her early years. Yet you somehow left out the fact that it was consensual, and have instead championed the uncorroborated and diametrically opposed oral tradition claiming that she was sold into slavery as a six year old. You also suggested in a within-text message here that she may have been of Bantu origin, when here again the historical profile actually indicates just few lines earlier that Dada Masiti was Ashraf (a lineal descendant of the Prophet Muhammad) on both sides of her family, and that the Ashraf had settled in Brava only around two centuries prior. It even names a specific subclan, the Ali Naziri Ashraf. Lastly, Wikipedia:Did you know stipulates that "articles and hooks that focus unduly on negative aspects of living individuals or promote one side of an ongoing dispute should be avoided"; so there's no legitimate reason why the uncorroborated childhood slavery oral version should be mentioned at all let alone privileged as the lede hook. Middayexpress (talk) 16:26, 14 June 2014 (UTC)