Talk:Refuse Fascism

Redneck Revolt

There is currently a link to Redneck Revolt in the see also section. I removed it, as I don't see the relevance. @Arms & Hearts: replaced it, arguing "i think they're related enough -- similar politics and both groups came to prominence in 2017". I get the 2017 connection, although Redneck Revolt was formed in 2009. But I don't see the similarity except in the most general sense that they are both on the left and anti-Trump. (Refuse Fascism is a Marxist-Leninist front organisation; Redneck Revolt is an anti-authoritarian anti-capitalist network.) Any other opinions? BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:16, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm not absolutely set on the link remaining there or anything like that – I don't think it's that important and there are certainly reasonable arguments for removing it. I'd argue though that the political differences between the two groups, while fairly substantial when seen in the context of the left specifically, are much less so when one zooms out, so to speak, and sees them in the context of the broader political spectrum. Aside from their theoretical similarities and differences, there's also the fact that they're present at the same sort of events (i.e. anti-fascist and anti-Trump ones) and sometimes seen as part of the same movement (e.g. Buzzfeed). I'd also note that, while Redneck Revolt was established in 2009, there's virtually no coverage in reliable sources prior to 2017. Finally, note that the Redneck Revolt article also has a "See also" link to this one; I think if one is removed then both probably ought to be. I'd welcome others' perspectives. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 20:08, 14 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks A&H, and agree with you about consistency between the articles. I also don't feel that strongly, so I won't act in absence of other comments. But it's hard to know how far to zoom out. Sure, they both oppose Bush and fascism, but there are probably plenty of other groups that do too who have also gotten some prominence as a result of the protests (e.g. the others mentioned in the Buzzfeed article). That Buzzfeed article (which is pretty good) is the only google news hit mentioning both groups. But it's not that big a deal, so I'll leave it there.BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:34, 15 September 2017 (UTC)

Conspiracy theories

The article currently has conspiracy theories around 4 November beginning following reports on Infowars in late September or early October. Snopes, on the other hand, has "rumours" beginning in August, following a video by Jordan Peltz. BuzzFeed also identifies Peltz as the source. Given that rumours are generally not worthy of inclusion in the encyclopaedia (so I don't think we can say, as Snopes does, "rumours began in August 2017" or similar), I'm not sure how we can document the history of this phenomenon without misrepresenting the available sources and I'd be interested to know what others think. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 10:02, 28 October 2017 (UTC)

"In September and October 2017 the claims were reported in multiple articles and broadcasts by Infowars.com, by the John Birch Society's publication The New American, and by Richard Spencer's AltRight.com website.[5]"

This is a pretty specific claim against three organizations, but it's not substantiated by a Reliable Source. The End Note provided is to an article from the little-known Political Research Associates, who themselves have a poorly sourced Wikipedia page. That article, again, does not provide any links which substantiate the claim. It's especially bad to make claims about Living Persons which are not verifiable. This sentence should either be referenced properly, or removed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ZeroXero (talk • contribs) 15:47, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

It took seconds to verify the Birch and infowars statements.[1] [2] Feel free to add them. And to remove altright.com/ Doug Weller talk 17:31, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

@ZeroXero: To clarify, the claim is sourced to the Political Research Associates article, and that article supports the claim:

These claims were later picked up by media with larger reach, like Infowars­, who have promoted the conspiracy in multiple articles and broadcasts. But it is just one of dozens of Far Right websites and videos— including the John Birch Society’s New American and Richard Spencer’s AltRight.com—which promote and elaborate on the details of the story.

Your comment above makes it seem as though the claim is entirely unsourced, when really you're questioning the reliability of the source given. On which point, I think Political Research Associates, a think tank producing research and analysis on the U.S. far-right, is a reliable source for those topics. Its mission statement and principles are publicly available, as are its staff and board. The organisation has a distinct political perspective, but reliable sources are not required to be unbiased. The quality of the organisation's article has no bearing on its reliability as a source. Spencer Sunshine, the author of the piece in question, holds a PhD in sociology and is widely published, including a forthcoming book to be published by Routledge. Unless I've misunderstood what you meant, you're also wrong to claim that the PRA article "does not provide any links which substantiate the claim": the New American and AltRight.com articles are linked, as are an Infowars article and video. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 19:02, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Recent edit

I removed material that was both future looking and dated; preserving here by providing this link. Please let me know if there are any concerns. K.e.coffman (talk) 20:42, 5 November 2017 (UTC)

Title

Shouldn't the F in Facisim be lower case? Darkness Shines (talk) 11:32, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

The title of the group is a proper noun, so it's correct to use the capitalization used in the references and on their website. The word "fascism" outside of their name is correctly in lowercase in the rest of the article. The Mighty Glen (talk) 12:50, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

Agree. Unlike "antifa", Refuse Fascism is a formal group so its name is a proper noun. BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:20, 8 November 2017 (UTC)

Bob Avakian and RCP as founding members

Recently my edit from months ago in regards to "Refuse Fascism" being formed specifically by Bob Avakian and RCP was removed by a person clearly affiliated with the organisation (2600:1012:b01e:2f2b:2e29:146f:29b9:1351). You can see the IP is affiliated with the organisation, since all the edits this account does are only in regards to Bob Avakian and RCP by putting them in positive light. I propose user to be banned from editing this page, as well as pages affiliated with RCP and Bob Avakian, due to them being affiliated with the organisation and person in question. (FreedomGonzo) 29 December 2017

Question for Grayfell: you have removed my mention of Carl Dix being a co-founder of RCP, which his main and open credential everywhere. You have also removed my mention of Sunsara Taylor being a leader of RCP when it's the first line in lead of her Wikipedia page. Could you provide real context and motives for these changes, as without itlooks like pure whitewashing and ignoring the facts. It's hard for me to see it as good faith, although I am trying. How many sources do you need to confirm obvious facts, that these people are prominent leaders of RCP, if it' right there on every website? And why should we hide this from the public. Maoists are political extemsists and connection of Refuse Fascism with Maoists and clear overlap in leadership is as important, as mentioning connections of Breitbart to Far-right. FreedomGonzo (talk) 03:38, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Anyone who is affiliated with this organization should be proposing edits on the talk page, and should generally avoid directly editing the article at all, per WP:COI.

Moving on, The Mic.com article contains a lot of context that could be added to the article, but this is not accomplishing that goal at all. The connection between Refuse Fascism and RCP should be directly explained and supported by sources, not insinuated. Emphasizing the overlap in membership is a subtle form of editorializing unless this is also emphasized by these sources. If the Mic.com source says Taylor is current leader of the RCP, I missed it, perhaps you can find a direct quote supporting that point. If the source doesn't support the attached statement, it absolutely cannot be placed in such a way as to imply that it does. Likewise a source which describes her views as "draconian" published years before Refuse Fascism was formed, cannot establish that her as a Maoist in relation to this organization. This is attempting to insert attributes that you, personally, might believe are important or relevant, without support from outside sources. This would be a minor problem by itself, but your edits also misrepresent existing sources, which is not acceptable. Grayfell (talk) 03:43, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

In response to your comments, you have to be cautious not to bypass B when going from A to C, if that makes any sense. Sources need to spell this out directly.

Sources doubtless say Maoism is extremist, and sources also say RCP is Maoist. Those sources cannot be used to imply Refuse Fascism is extremist by proxy. You will need to neutrally summarize a reliable source that actually spells it out for you. Does that explain the problem?

Breitbart is directly described as far-right by a huge number of reliable sources, as has already be tediously discussed at that article's talk page (and elsewhere). For this reason this is not a useful comparison. Grayfell (talk) 03:52, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

Okay I understand picture more clearly now and will add enough sources to make the connection clear and obvious. Let's start with Carl Dix. Here are the sources from their own website that he is their National Spokesperson. Can they be included in the article to support that? , . These are primary sources, but the party is (thank god) obscure enough to only have primary sources. But this is clear evidence that he in fact is national spokesperson for RCP. Can this be included? I will next find sources on Sunsara Taylor. And yes, I do find the fact that these people are political extremists are important to mention. FreedomGonzo (talk) 03:59, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

That's an extension of the same problems. Those sources don't mention Refuse Fascism, so they shouldn't be used here. WP:PRIMARY profiles are seldom useful for substantial details, anyway. There's a deeper, related issue which I'll get to, but remember that we are not here to catalog every connection between people and groups. We need to use reliable sources to figure out which traits are defining traits, and which are trivia/coincidence/cross-promotion/etc. I understand you find this to be important, but if reliable sources don't find this to be important, than it's still editorializing. If this party is too obscure to have better sources, than it's still too obscure to go into detail on a separate article. Wikipedia isn't the bleeding edge of information, we're a relatively conservative (in the apolitical sense) tertiary source.

The deeper problem is that articles for both Dix and Taylor need serious attention also. They lack substantial independent sources, and contain a lot of puffery and filler. This also, in my opinion, applies to this article to a lesser degree. This is pretty common on Wikipedia, sadly, so it would be an obnoxious mistake to single these three out as examples. The number of WP:BLPs with source problems is staggering. Hundreds of thousands? Regardless, we cannot fix the problem by adding to it. As you're probably noticed, there is a big banner across the top of Carl Dix listing the issues with the article. Using that article as a precedent for adding content to this article is smearing the problem around. Grayfell (talk) 05:20, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

I agree it is edging into OR/SYN to make the points that RF spokespeople are "Maoist" or "extremist". But to edit out RSs that say that RF is connected to the RCP seems to be erring in the opposite direction. It is sufficient to limit ourselves to articles mentioning RF itself and to the facts. I have restored the sourced material here, without editorialising. BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:48, 16 February 2018 (UTC)

• I just looked at that "Maoist" edit--it's kind of funny, as if they have, you know, a Maoist spokesperson but also a Stalinist one and maybe a Gramscian one in the backroom. Also, the source of course doesn't say she is a Maoist, let alone a prominent one. I think FreedomGonzo's interest here isn't purely encyclopedic: this is POV editing. Drmies (talk) 15:18, 6 March 2018 (UTC)

The fact that Sunsara Taylor is a Maoist is a) something she multiple times claimed herself in the past b) was listed on her wikipedia page at the time. She used to be fairly open about it, now the agenda is to hide it and pretend Refuse Fascism is not a front for RCP, even though it is run by the same people from the same bookshop. Oh, and I had friends who heard her speech on Refuse Fascism event in New York and yes, she was talking about Maoism. I can not prove it and I am looking for sources. And I will add them, once I find them. Yes, the source doesn't say that currently, but adding it there is a rookie mistake of a new wikipedia contributor. As for assuming my non-encyclopaedic POV, I am not surprised, since this is how you came to this article: I reverted your removal of huge part of Dave Rubin's biography, for which you accused me on my talk page of promotion of Dave Rubin (even though I didn't write any of the removed content, just reverted your massive removal of content, not much of it was actually promotional and suggested to discuss it on talk page, which you refused) and then you went through my contributions to find this particular spot and accuse me of bias here. Personal vendettas look very strange for an experienced Wikipedia editor like yourself. Maybe you just had a bad day and you had to let off steam by being overtly combative towards a random contributor, which happened to be me? Oh well, one of those days. But do take a chill pill next time and try to avoid baseless accusations. You should learn from Grayfell. He has a leftist bias too, but he keeps it to Wikipedia standards and educates, rather than launching into personalized attacks and trying to suggest bad intent with insufficient evidence. FreedomGonzo (talk) 06:35, 22 March 2018 (UTC)

References

Cornel West as Co-initiator, list of initial signatories

The Intro has significant issues. Refuse Fascism was co-initiated by Carl Dix, Cornel West, Sunsara Taylor, and Andy Zee . RCP members were involved but not alone and not facelessly. Even the current source says a “swathe of other leftists” were involved in founding Refuse Fascism. This is not reflected in the current language. There was also a very broad list of initial co-signers involved in launching the movement, listed at the bottom of this article . While naming all of them would be gratuitous, but the wide array of involvement should be noted and paints a very different picture than the current intro. Signers to this “Call to Action” from RefuseFascism.org include: Imam Aiyub Abdul-Baki, Justice Committee, Islamic Leadership Council of New York; Ed Asner, actor; Bill Ayers, activist, educator; Charles Burnett, filmmaker; Isabel Cardenas, Salvadoran-American activist; Margaret Cho, comedian, actor; Chuck D, rapper, author; Joe Dante, filmmaker; Carl Dix, Revolutionary Communist Party, USA; Alex Ebert, musician; Niles Eldredge, evolutionary biologist; Eve Ensler, playwright; Merrill Garbus, Founding band member, tUnE-yArDs; Pastor Gregg L. Greer, Freedom First International, SCLC; Lalah Hathaway, singer; Marc Lamont Hill, CNN commentator and professor, Morehouse College; Chase Iron Eyes, Standing Rock Sioux Tribe; Evelyn Fox Keller, Professor Emerita of History and Philosophy of Science, MIT; Robin D.G. Kelley, Gary B. Nash Professor of American History at UCLA; Wayne Kramer, musician; John Landis, filmmaker; Vic Mensa, rapper; Debra Messing, actor; jessica Care moore, poet; Thurston Moore, singer, songwriter, guitarist of Sonic Youth; PZ Myers, evolutionary developmental biologist; Rosie O’Donnell, comedian, actor; Arturo O’Farrill, composer and musician; Michelle Phillips, musician; Milton Saier, PhD, Professor of Molecular Biology UCSD; Yusef Salaam, one of the Central Park Five; Michael Shannon, actor; Danny Simmons, visual artist; David Strathairn, actor; Alice Walker, author; Cornel West, writer and professor; Saul Williams, poet and performer. (Organizations, institutions listed for ID purposes only) MackNoodles (talk) 23:13, 13 February 2022 (UTC) Also, the group officially launched at an Emergency Meeting at the Great Hall of Cooper Union in NYC on December 19th, 2016. Watched by some 200,000 people on HuffPo’s FaceBookLive, Andy Zee, PZ Myers, Carl Dix, Jeremy Scahill, Imam Ayub Abdul-Baki, Rev. Doris Johnson, Sunsara Taylor, Immortal Technique, and Fran Luck spoke along with messages from Gloria Steinem, Chase Iron Eyes, Isabel Cardenas, and others on the fascist character of the Trump/Pence Regime and called on people to get organized to stop it before it came to power. MackNoodles (talk) 23:19, 13 February 2022 (UTC)

References

These detail may be true, but that does not mean they are due for inclusion. Do you have any reliable, non-primary sources that establish weight for these many details? Freelance-frank (talk) 14:02, 14 February 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for responding. Considering that the entry exists, and talks about who initiated the organization, the “weight” of that information is already established. The problem is not the brevity of the current entry, but that it’s incompleteness presents a skewed and inaccurate picture of reality. The sources already cited say that others were involved, this is simply filling in the details. You can’t “co-initiate” something by yourself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by MackNoodles (talk • contribs) 17:08, 15 February 2022 (UTC)