Talk:Gary Anandasangaree

Removal of content

It's disappointing that Keithbob has removed content based on Bajan loch's threats and lies and without any further discussion at WP:BLPN. The removed content is not "off topic" as claimed. If you read this article you will see that Anandasangaree has been accused of being a member of/supporting the LTTE. Therefore that fact that LTTE supporters supported his Tory opponent at the last election is very relevant.--obi2canibe^{talk contr} 19:36, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Your statement "Therefore that fact that LTTE supporters supported his Tory opponent at the last election is very relevant". There are no facts that LTTE supported the Conservative opponent. That is not true and is not supported by any verifible source. That reference has not relevance to an autobiography; it is not an article about what happened during the election for example.Bajan loch (talk) 20:37, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Except for the facts that (1) it was supported by a source, (2) that source is about the election, and (3) given that this article is including allegations that he is associated with the LTTE, it is critical under our WP:BLP rules that we do include the verifiable evidence that he isn't — precisely because including the LTTE allegations without acknowledging that the LTTE wasn't backing him deliberately creates a false impression about his political loyalties, and therefore we're libelling him if we don't include the information you're disputing. Bearcat (talk) 20:38, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Just because someone posts a libelous statement on a blog does not make it so. I have a simple solution; you have used the word "allegations". These are allegations in fact against both candidates, remove the reference to LTTE on both sides and the situation is resolved. I can tell you for a fact that this will end up in court if it is not resolved. Just look at what both candidates do for a living.Bajan loch (talk) 20:51, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

The claims that he's affiliated with the LTTE aren't sourced to blogs — they're sourced to real coverage in real media. And nothing about your behaviour so far has suggested that you're even remotely concerned about ensuring that nobody gets linked to the LTTE in this article — just based on what you removed vs. what you left in, it's painfully clear that you only want the Conservative candidate protected from the implication, while wanting Anandasangaree to remain smeared by it. You can say that you're concerned for both sides all you want, but concern for both sides is not an accurate description of what you did. Bearcat (talk) 21:11, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I did not write the autobiography; I simply wanted to remove what is a libelous statement against the Conservative candidate. I cannot speak for the other side, but they themselves are trying to say that they do not support the LTTE are they not?

You call that real media? real coverage? You are being naive. Who is the author of the article? What were his/her references? Bajan loch (talk) 21:31, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

There are these cute little things in the article called "footnotes". You wanna know what they do? They show you what the references are. Bearcat (talk) 22:16, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

You are missing my point. The article in question is #12, read the article and then read my question again.Bajan loch (talk) 23:33, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I can't miss a point you didn't make in the first place, but thanks for coming out. At any rate, other than the fact that the newspaper in question is based in Sri Lanka rather than Canada, what is your point exactly? Bearcat (talk) 03:56, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Read the article in question and tell me who wrote it. You won't be able to. There is no author, no references. That is not journalism as we know it in North America. That is my point. Do you understand? Bajan loch (talk) 16:24, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Many articles run in North American newspapers where there is no author (or just the vague "Staff" authorship) and the journalist does not cite his/her sources. That's why the reliable source standard says to look at the newspaper and its editorial policies. I can't find a full online masthead, but I see where the publisher is Upali Newspapers (Pvt) Ltd. On the surface, it sure looks like a reliable newspaper. Other than the missing byline, on what other basis do you assume The Island is not reliable? —C.Fred (talk) 16:29, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Not sure how you can tell that quickly that it is a reliable newspaper. Question: does Wikipedia follow the "reliable source standard"? Bajan loch (talk) 16:46, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

I don't see telltales that tell me it's not reliable. And yes, WP:Reliable sources is a content guideline. —C.Fred (talk) 16:48, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

well from that guideline "Definition of a source"; I think it is arguable that this source does not meet that guideline. Just my opinion I gues. Bajan loch (talk) 17:17, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Indeed, not all North American or European newspapers run direct bylines over every news article either — and even when there is a byline, sometimes it's just a press agency like Canadian Press or Associated Press or Reuters, or just "Staff" as C. Fred correctly notes), not the name of any individual writer. Certainly opinion content has to be bylined (except the "official" editorials), but stuff in the news section may or may not be depending on many variables. And just try finding direct author credits on most of the text articles published to the websites of broadcast news outlets like CBC News, CTV News, Global News, BBC News or CNN: if it's a transcript of a broadcast segment then you will (but that's pretty rare, since most broadcast segments are now just uploaded directly to the website as video), but if it's original content by one of the organization's web newswriters or a CP/AP/Reuters reprint you usually won't. And neither do North American newspapers footnote their news coverage in the way you're demanding. That's just not a thing.

Which is why our tests for the reliability of a source do not depend on whether that source is bylined or footnoted; they depend on looking at the overall fundamentals of the publishing organization or company. I'll grant that there are a couple of places where the article's tone lands a bit oddly on my eyes and ears — but that's not a factor of unprofessionalism on their part, it's a factor of the fact that it's an English language publication in a country where English is mostly a second language rather than a native one, and where the local dialect of English has semantic and stylistic differences from the Canadian variety. And being stylistically indistiguishable from The Globe and Mail or The New York Times is not a precondition of being considered a reliable source either — so the tone and grammar are not legitimate reasons to question it.

Nothing about the way the article is written betrays a lack of reliability as such — it's certainly within the realm of possibility that it's actually a less reliable source than it looks like, but none of the issues you've raised constitute proof of that, and so we would need much better proof of its unreliability than has been offered so far (such as concrete evidence that it has a record of being wrong about a lot of things). And "it doesn't look like one to me" is not proof, either — it does look like one to both me and C. Fred, and since you're a brand new editor with an agenda and we're long-established Wikipedia contributors with substantial experience in using and citing and evaluating potential sources for Wikipedia content, what it looks like to us counts for a lot more than what it looks like to you does.

And finally, Wikipedia does not put much stock in unsourced assertions that a source was wrong or lying about something. Yes, even reliable sources get stuff wrong sometimes (even the CBC has gotten stuff wrong sometimes), and we already know that — but we still need a source for the corrected information (whether that's the media outlet's own published correction of its own error, or another media outlet giving the correct information instead.) We cannot assert that a source was wrong about something just because somebody waltzes in here with unverifiable assertions that the original source was wrong — we need a verifiable source which shows that the original source was wrong.

One thing I think you may be erroneously hung up on, especially if you think there's a libel claim involved, is that neither our article or The Island's was claiming that the Conservative candidate courted Tamil Tiger support — in both places, the only claim being made was that LTTE-affiliated people backed the Conservative candidate, which is not the same thing. The people in question are perfectly capable of making their own decisions about who to support, and did not need Leslyn Lewis' permission to support her, or even necessarily her knowledge of their decision to support her. I've been voting in Canadian federal, provincial and municipal elections for almost 30 years now — and in that entire time, Canadian election law has never required me to seek or gain my chosen candidate's permission to give him or her my vote. None of this says anything about Leslyn Lewis at all — so how exactly is it libel against her? Bearcat (talk) 17:24, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

The Island is a long established national English newspaper which is published by Upali Newspapers, one of the three big newspaper publishers in Sri Lanka. Bajan loch's assertion that it's a blog or otherwise unreliable is utter nonsense. It is the second newspaper listed on BBC News' Sri Lanka media profile (is Bajan loch going to argue that BBC News is unreliable because it doesn't have an author or sources?). It meets all the definitions of a reliable source given in WP:V and WP:RS.

I presume Bajan loch's problem with the removed content is that it he/she believes that it implies that the Tory candidate supports the LTTE. It doesn't, as Bearcat has pointed out. Donald Trump receiving support from a white supremacist super PAC doesn't mean that Trump's a white supremacist or that he supports white supremacy. A candidate has no control over who supports him/her.

I note that Bajan loch has made a second legal threat in violation of WP:LEGAL.--obi2canibe^{talk contr} 19:47, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

My edit

My edit removed this text:

• However, LTTE supporters openly backed Anandasangaree's conservative opponent during the 2015 federal election campaign. ref name=TI102115/

To my eye this is a classic example of WP:COATRACK. The information is related to the article subject rather than being about the subject itself. Furthermore its inclusion could be seen by some as pushing a point of view. However, I'm open to other comments and discussion.-- — Keithbob • Talk • 20:07, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

The issue is that the content which immediately precedes it does leave the reader able to walk away with the impression that Anandasangaree actually does have LTTE sympathies or affiliations. So if we can properly source the fact that he doesn't, then we have to state that outright, so that the reader isn't being given a false or misleading impression of him. Possibly an alternate wording might be appropriate instead, but some kind of content about it does have to be there to counter the LTTE allegations immediately preceding it. Bearcat (talk) 20:46, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

This whole issue goes away if that last sentence is taken out from this Career section. That statement does not having anything to do with his career. If this was an article about the recent election it would seem to be more relevant in that context. The statement "So if we can properly source the fact that he doesn't" is interesting. I have a few articles that allude that he "is" published in the mainstream press in Canada. But is is not relevant to his biography. Bajan loch (talk) 20:58, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Actually, depending on what those sources say about his being "published in the mainstream press in Canada", that would be relevant to his biography if properly sourced. (That is, it would be relevant if other people were writing about his writing; it would not be relevant if your "sources" were just the publication details of his own content.) We're not limited to solely describing things a politician did in office; as long as it's properly sourced, some background information on what they did before getting into politics is permissible, and even expected, in a Wikipedia article about a politician. Bearcat (talk) 21:25, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Now that Bajan loch's theory that The Island is unreliable has been debunked he is suggesting that we can't include anything to do with an election in a candidate's biography. Ridiculous. You will find hundreds of politicians articles that do exactly that. Barack Obama's article (a Featured Article) includes information on elections such as details of his opponents. This is despite that fact there are separate articles on Obama's election campaigns. Bajan loch has suggested that content about Anandasangaree's alleged links to the LTTE be moved to an article about the election but I have no doubt that if we were to include that the Tory candidate was supported by the LTTE in that article he would find some other excuse to censor Wikipedia.--obi2canibe^{talk contr} 21:11, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

As there has been no further comment from Keithbob and Bajan loch I intend to re-insert the content.--obi2canibe^{talk contr} 19:30, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Can you provide a quote from the source? Thanks.-- — Keithbob • Talk • 20:49, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

The Island 10/21/15: "In a bizarre twist the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and pro-LTTE elements in Toronto canvassed strongly against Gary Anandasangaree at the elections. Tiger elements supported the conservative party in the current poll".--obi2canibe^{talk contr} 15:24, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

Given the controversial nature of the information and how quick Sri Lankan newspapers are to label Tamil activists as LTTE supporters, it might be best (if inclusion is what the consensus is) to at least contextualize it with something like "According to Sri Lankan newspaper The Island," so it is abundantly clear that it is not a Canadian newspaper reporting. However, I am of the opinion that such a statement would best simply be removed, as it is potentially libellous to whoever Mr. Anandasangaree's CPC opponent is, unless someone can provide additional (and preferably Canadian) sources for the LTTE claim. ---- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 21:18, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

How is it libelous to the Tory candidate? It doesn't say that the Tory candidate supports the LTTE. It says that LTTE supporters supported the Tory candidate. There is a difference. Please also remember that Wikipedia is a global project. As long as the source is WP:RS it doesn't matter where it's from. We shouldn't give preference to Canadian sources.

I am happy to attribute the statement e.g. "However, according to The Island LTTE supporters openly backed Anandasangaree's conservative opponent during the 2015 federal election campaign".--obi2canibe^{talk contr} 10:43, 13 March 2016 (UTC)

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