Talk:Andrew Weil/Archive 1

Latest comment: 6 years ago by InternetArchiveBot in topic External links modified
Archive 1

Strange?

Weil wrote the introduction for Paul Stamets book "Psylocybin mushrooms of the World".

He has been catagorized, even associated with strange people like Terrence Mckenna.

Thus, can anyone provide insight into his personal life? Strange he certainly is, especially knowing vaguely about his past, and currently he seems to be making a strong attempt to interpose values into American Society. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.144.236.228 (talkcontribs) 19:53, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Birthdate

His birthdate of 1942 derived from being 63 in Nov 2005 (source: CNN). Yet it might be 1941 (e.g. if he was born in December) or Jan 1943 (e.g. if he likes to round up his age, as some people do). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.24.244.5 (talkcontribs) 19:45, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Mega Man Network

According to 1UP.com, Doctor Weil sent an angry letter to Mega Man Network over defamatory comments. Mega Man Network replied with the e-mail for Capcom USA, since it was referring to the character Doctor Weil from Mega Man Zero. - Stoph 01:21, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Note concerning edits from 207.145.113.102 to this article

That IP address resolves to the mailserver at drweil.com [2]. While I found the article, put in a reference and assumed the usual good faith that the current article accurately reflects its reportage (it is now locked away for pay in the Citizen's archives, I nevertheless felt it necessary to see where the edits came from and found that. So any material coming into this article from that address (which has only made edits to this article and Integrative Medicine) should be looked over carefully and flagged for unsourcing (as I did) when it occurs. Daniel Case 03:23, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Categorization

I have reverted the persistent addition of the Pseudoscience Category to this article, as the author is not named on the Pseudoscience article. Further, placing articles in controversial categories without consensus contravenes Wikipedia:Categorization. --apers0n 09:03, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Dr. Weil promotes homeopathy. This is psuedoscience. I'm not saying his promotion of pseudoscience is appropriate for a section in this article, but come on. --Skidoo 20:33, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Controversy

I'm not an expert in this field to make any corrections but there are many statements by Dr. Weil that are downright questionable, such as his assertion that most overweight people are so because of glandular problems, among others which do not come to mind now. Can anyone edit the article and insert a counterpoint to his claims, if credible, scientific ones exists? Philosopher2king (talk) 22:05, 20 July 2008 (UTC)philosopher2king

Source of 207.145.113.102 edits

I am Brad Lemley, editorial director of drweil.com, and made the edits in question as a response to inaccuracies and biases in the article as I found it. The anonymous author(s) of the original piece had a strong, obvious bias against Dr. Weil; these were rectified or responded to in good faith and facts were all taken from the public record. May 5, 2006. Additional details, sourced to www.drweil.com, added May 18, 2006. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.145.113.102 (talkcontribs) 20:11, 5 May 2006 (UTC) (redacted by — Preceding unsigned comment added by Blemley (talkcontribs) 05:24, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

What I find odd is that this article does not sound like it was ever critical of Dr. Weil, in fact, the lack of any counterpoint makes it suspicious. The bias now seems in favor of Weil. Someone should add credible criticism of Dr. Weil's claims for the sake of balance, as it is it's too much like an advertisement. Philosopher2king (talk) 22:15, 20 July 2008 (UTC)philosopher2king

Drug usage

Weil is open about his past and present use of illegal substances, claiming, "I think I've tried about every drug in [his book] From Chocolate to Morphine."

Can you confirm from his writing that he presently uses illegal substances? This seems to be unsubstantiated. --Dforest 06:12, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Heard about his acid usage on the radio just now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.210.170.143 (talk) 15:50, 21 March 2010 (UTC)

Timothy Leary and Harvard section

Currently the article says Weil opposed Alpert & Leary's work but the source cited says "the alternative medicine guru whose undergraduate exposes of Leary and Alpert’s unorthodox methods ultimately led to their flight from Harvard." We don't know if the expose was about methodology or what its substance was. The section then seems to imply hypocrisy because Weil was also interested in psychedelics. Without access to the exposes or at least what they were about a reader can not tell if Weil's position was in any way contradictory.Tjc (talk) 11:16, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

These are fair points. To be more neutral, the section should have more data on exactly what Weil's exact opposition was to Leary and Alpert's methods. I will see what I can come up with. I don't have the book referred to in the reviews yet.Melizg (talk) 06:38, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
Years ago I was at a public event, I believe in 1996, in which Andrew Weil was speaking. Much to Weil's dismay when Terence McKenna took the stage he gave a quick run down of what exactly happened. That according to his first hand conversation with Timothy Leary, it was in fact Leary who had never lived it down, because if not for Weil's personal relations with Richard Alpert, and then Alpert wanting to brake off the relationship, there would have been no exposé. Alpert on the other hand, became Ram Dass, essentially because he was kicked out of Harvard. And anyone who nows what Ram Dass is about would know he is all the happier for it, and therefore has no hard feelings, towards just about anyone for that matter!
Andrew Weil never denied what happened, but just stating it was inappropriate. There were extreme feelings by all in attendance because of the actions McKenna took. Many of the other psychedelic luminaries took sides, and not only were McKenna and Weil were never to be billed together again, but it brought an end to many of these speaking events. The discord even came to affect the longtime friendship of Terrence McKenna and Paul Stamets, who had defended Weil at the conference. McKenna would later be diagnosed with cancer, he denied the medicine Paul Stamets offered, quite possibly contributing to his death. Hopefully this can be wiki "verified" cause I know it's true! 174.30.59.40 (talk) 02:45, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Page is advertisement for nonsense

Like all pages about pushers of voodoo medicine, this page should show exactly why Andrew Weil is a fraud and why people believe in his nonsense. It should not be a ringing endorsement of the snake oil he sells. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Randy Blackamoor (talkcontribs) 06:55, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

no one's stopping you from telling us why we shouldn't believe in him. 70.144.65.152 (talk) 22:42, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Umm... Wouldn't writing about how "he is a fraud" and that everything he believes is "nonsense" make this a non-neutral article. The point is to share the facts and allow the rest of us to decide. Not to push Your brand of voodoo and nonsense... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.121.202.162 (talk) 16:12, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

medi?

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Andrew_Weil&diff=636346357&oldid=636244923 This edit changed "medical doctor" to "media". I believe this to have been a mistake and changed it back as I am not familiar with the term "medi".104.173.194.250 (talk) 04:04, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Criticism-section template removed

From its template page: Note that criticism and controversy sections are not prohibited by policy, and the tag should only be used if there is a real concern that the criticism section and its contents are causing trouble with the article's neutrality.

Adding this template to a section without opening any discussion of the matter on the article's talkpage may result in the template's removal from the article.

The tag is over a year old (added by Charhenderton in January of 2014) and no such discussion was ever opened. If anyone puts it back, give reasons why the section presents a problem. When it lingers this long, it comes across as having been put in place merely to be a permanent, highly-visible objection to the article's contents. 72.200.151.13 (talk) 14:38, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

  Fixed Tag was re-added to the section before I came, but removed again in response to this paragraph. At the same time, the section was edited to strengthen it, in terms of its citations and neutrality. Note, I think the citation of the television discussion is weak, and could be removed. Also, I moved the FDA Letter to a separate section, because that is quite a serious, and utterly objective matter. Finally, note, that section is Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 07:00, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Edits of this day

They were extensive, but incremental, and all were explained with thorough edit summaries and/or by tags calling for explicit improvements. Please, in your aversion to tags, do not simply revert. A simple comparison of the citations before and after this days edits will make clear the hours of work, and (to any with an imagination they are willing to put to use) the underlying scholarly work that went along with the improved status of the citations, and the necessary placement of tags.

In short, the tags are placed to be removed, as I have been doing already today—but after the issues are solved, and not just to make the article look better than it is. Vis-a-vis inline tags—these were placed somewhat thoroughly at ends of sentences, after finding, repeatedly, that the presumption that an end of paragraph citation covered all of paragraph simply did not hold anywhere checked.

Bottom line, as a source for a group of sentences is checked, if that source indeed covers the group, simply remove the [citation needed] tags. Eight or ten back spaces per paragraph edited, this is a small price to pay as we mark a march through the article making sure the long blocks of unsourced material are not just someone's made up fantasy, or speculation, or other sort of guesswork.

Finally, note, in seeking to assign any of these edits to one end of an opinion spectrum or another, the only spectrum I care about is verifiability of information from quality secondary sources; hence, the onset of my every effort is a check of citations and information to sources (which takes forever, and is not done here). Please leave your opinions at the door, and bring your secondary sources!

[That I near to loathe Weil's perspectives on some categories of agents such as homeopathic remedies, disagree with him on experimental drug use, agree with him nutrition and lifestyle (exercise, smoking, etc.), and am "middlin" on questions that bear on natural products chemistry matters (as an expert, and being more German than American in that regard), and am completely in accord with his perspective on non-chemotherapuetic approaches to mild to medium cases of depression often leading patients to seek medicative answers—these are all utterly immaterial to the article.]

What matters is what published experts have said about him and his ideas in secondary sources.

Please, discuss big changes here. Were there any ongoing / recent work here, I would have done the same. Cheers. Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 07:00, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Edits of this day, 2

The following were addressed, in part or in whole today:

  • The lead now better reflects the text, but it is not perfect;
  • Weil as person and Weil as brand now appear as part of text, see below;
  • integrative medicine is now defined;
  • biographical content from Baer 2004 and EB 2015 were used to reduce citation needed tags;
  • the Harvard Crimson citations and a dissertation were added to further emphasize the controversial nature of his college years;
  • the huge gap (lost years) of AW are highlighted in an expand section tag in the biography section;
  • various further citations were added throughout; although
  • preliminary citations related to AW's description in the media, in re: his books, remains as URL only as of close of work; and
  • a Pop culture section, other subsections were added so lede material and refs with no place to go (Oprah, Larry King, etc.), have homes.

Note, the fact that "Andrew Weil" and "DrWeil" represent both person and brand now appears in the text, along with preliminary citations supporting the various descriptions of the person and brand. Until separate articles appear for man and brand, this article has to encompass both.

People familiar with the post career commercialization of Michael Jordan are familiar with the notion of person as brand; it is clearly operative here, see the new "Affiliated digital media operations" section, e.g., see here, [3], a section that remains to be populated. Bottom line, this name is selling lots of stuff.

And again, PLEASE NOTE, RETURN TO BARE URLS IS TEMPORARY. Thy can go as soon as I to others can replace them. Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 23:26, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Edits of this day, 3

The following was done today:

  • Better Baer sources placed, so the full articles are now readable, online;
  • End date of 1971-1975 ICWA established in 3 sources, and so corrected in text;
  • ICWA dead link replaced and completed;
  • Further dead link moved here, see below; and
  • DEAD LINK AND BARE URL tags removed.

The last dead link was this:

Weil was honored by the New York Open Center in 2004, for having made "extraordinary contributions to public awareness of integrative and complementary medicine."[This quote needs a citation] [1][dead link]

This quotation simply could not be traced, though pages of citations, mostly WP mirrors and plagiarisms, were reviewed. Until a valid citation for this quote and award can be found, the sentence should stay here.

Cheers, Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 03:50, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

Discuss deletions of longstanding text before continuing

In doing the major edits described above, two points:

  • Longstanding text was left in place, out of respect for previous editors, with tags added to call attention to places where sources were needed (unless the material was so factually dubious to warrant removal); and
  • No unsourced text was added, and in particular, no unverifiable material was added to the lead (though a little preexisting unsourced lead material was left in, with tags).

Finally, the lede was made uniformly without sources, with each sentence being tied to a sourced sentence in the main body, again, with only a couple of exceptions.

This is stated clearly here, because a recent editor, though once already having been reverted, has taken it on her/himself to delete material from the article in large blocks, with the only edit summary being "unsourced." In the case of the lead this is simply fallacious. The lead is sourced, through sources appearing in the main text, and this is an accepted WP practice.

With regard to unsourced material in the main body of text (and those deletions by this source-zealous editor), I would note that I have been encouraged to leave in place likely accurate and constructive text for which sources do not yet appear by my fellow editors (because I too am more prone to distrust and delete such material).

In this case, the easy step of deleting large blocks simply is not the answer. Doing so gutted the lead, making it end in dangling fashion, and led to exclusion of key elements of the article (which a lead is not supposed to do). Doing large deletes throughout had the same disruptive effect.

If editor 104.218.136.34 wants to have only sourced content, I am on her/his side. Simple replace the unsourced content with sourced statements that "cover the same ground" (give coverage to the same subject to a somewhat comparable degree. Don't just delete.

Thank you, please discuss deletions, here, immediately below. Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 17:12, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

Edits of this day, 4

I did the following in this session:

  • Reverted the large redactive edits of editor 104.218.136.34.
  • Began shortening and tidying the lead, see above. Note, a lead's content is acceptably sourced thtough inline citations appearing with comparable text in the main body. Under no circumstances should lead content be removed because "unsourced" (because this statement is simply untrue).
  • Returned and clarified Weil-as-brand information to opening, see following.

On this brand business: "Andrew Weil", "Dr. Andrew Weil" and "Dr. Weil" all connote both person and brand, depending on context, and Weil-as-brand is increasingly discussed in business publications (in part because Dr. Weil's business issues press releases every time he lends his name to a new product (facial care, shoes, even mattresses). The three names are ubiquitous identifiers for the person, yes, but also for the brand, and as there is no separate article for the brand, this one has to do.

Moreover, the matter is relevant because some of the academic critique of the person has to do with the fact that at times his health care messaging lacks disclaimer of personal financial interest (see Hans Baer review, and places it is cited in the current article).

Discuss deletion edits above, and concerns over the brand matters here, please. Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 17:12, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

The lead is too long, so I tagged it as such. Six paragraphs is more than the maximum recommended. 100.12.206.17 (talk) 18:07, 25 November 2015 (UTC)
I concur. As a scholar, I overwrite, amking sure it is accurate, and then allow others to winnow to what is considered best for this audience. Feel free to recommend things to be removed. Cheers. Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 20:38, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

Unsubstantiated statement suggesting controversy removed

The following statement, suggesting controversy surrounding the Weil-Nature's Path business dealings, could not be substantiated (no citation appeared, and no evidence of any issue could be found). It is therefore moved here, until someone can substantiate it:

A further specific criticism was leveled in 2008, for the promotion of some of his food products, such as fruit and nut bars, when he combined his personal brand with Arran Stephens's Nature's Path brand.[citation needed]

Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 20:38, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

Shameless promotion and whitewashing

The article fails to clarify whether Weil has ever completed any medical licensing exam (NBME, FLEX, or USMLE), or whether he is (or ever was) in fact licensed to practice medicine in the United States. If not, describing him as a "physician" is technically incorrect, since having an MD does not automatically make one a physician. The term implies the training and licensing necessary to actually practice medicine in an unsupervised capacity on patients who are not dead. I can find no convincing evidence that Weil has either of these requirements under his belt.

True, he went to Harvard Med, but was apparently a member of some sort of "lost class" which did not actually undergo their year 3 or 4 curricula, partially due to a petition endorsed by Weil himself to be exempt from them. That seems to imply that he got his MD by force of examination alone, and did not at that point have any clinical experience whatsoever. It is modern practice for a med student to have at least two years of clinical experience by the time they graduate, even if they did not accrue any as an undergraduate.

He also never entered, much less completed, any form of medical residency, and the only sort of clinical work I can determine he was ever positively involved with comes from UCSF Medical Center circa 1968, but it's unclear what exactly he did there. Most of his anecdotes about the time period are about his exposure to hippie culture at Haight-Ashbury, and by implication the massive amounts of drugs he was doing at the time, something which by modern standards would get a practicing physician's license revoked pretty much immediately.

Thus I consider Weil's attempted use of the "Dr." prefix and the "MD" suffix to be a degeneration of the degree, and they are being used by him to form an implication about experience and competence in science-based medicine which he does not actually have. He is not now, nor has he ever been, a member of the medical establishment which represents the best clinical practices and most credible research in medical science.

Apparently the most momentous bit of academic literature Weil has ever "published" was a 1965 essay of the psychoactive properties of nutmeg. Well gee thanks, Andy. Unfortunately, despite his claim (elsewhere) that "nobody knew anything about [the psychoactive properties of nutmeg]" before his essay, in fact he specifically cites Shulgin's 1963 work on it, noting explicitly that "Shulgin's conclusion is the best summary of our present knowledge of Myristica". Shulgin would go on in 1967 to publish an even more comprehensive and rigorous pharmacological study of nutmeg, containing original research data, which Weil's essay did not.

Conspicuously, none of this is mentioned in the article. I assume that's because Weil stooges are babysitting it to protect his fragile (and untenable) reputation, as admitted above.

I would also like to draw attention to this video stream of a debate between Weil and Arnold S. Relman, MD, from, 1999.

[4]

This video pretty much floored me, because I -- as a rational scientist -- have trouble understanding how Andrew Weil can possibly be so well-embraced by the public or the news media today, when such a video as this exists in the world, and is from 1999. To my mind, this video makes Andrew Weil and his philosophy a totally dead issue, to be diregarded as utterly uninformed in modern medicine. Dr. Relman has, as far as I am concerned, completely and utterly discredited Weil in an unrecoverable way.

Weil's main argument for 'integrative medicine' in the video seems to amount to "I am doing this because patients want it." But that is circular, because patients want it due to the fact that people like Weil are advertising it as legitimate, when in fact it isn't. The supply is essentially producing its own demand out of deceptive presentation and unjustified criticism of science-based medicine.

He refers in the video to folk medicine and primitive herb lore as "thousands of years of experimentation". I was unaware that this was the case. I was unaware that tribal shamans and juju men &c had a systematic way of differentiating between treatments which provide a biological effect and ones which produce only a psychological effect. Perhaps they learned this technique from ancient astronauts or from the lost continent of Atlantis, in which case we should ask them for a refresher course because apparently "some doctors" even today cannot readily tell the difference. Like for example Weil.

He claims that medical practitioners routinely guess as to diagnoses and treatments (because science is the art of guessing, right?), and calls the "do no harm" maxim "Hippocrates' first teaching" despite that there is no evidence that Hippocrates ever used the eponymous oath. Weil is just plain factually incorrect about this.

I also caught Weil saying "the word 'pharmacology' comes from the Greek root for 'poison'". I assume he means 'pharmakon', which today is primarily given an etymology emphasizing the word 'poison' by crackpot postmodern philosophers such as Derrida. In reality the term has a neutral connotation, and can refer equally to remedies and poisons, and does not actually differentiate between them. Thus the best translation might be "drug" which has exactly the same connotations in modern English.

Greek had a totally different word for 'poison', namely 'toxikon', from which we get the name of the related-but-distinct field of toxicology. In modern Greek, moreover, 'pharmakon' would never be used to refer to a poison, except in the most archaic and poetical way. Weil is, at best, uttering a half-truth here. Of course it's the half of the truth that best bolsters his case. One is forced to wonder, then, how often he does this in general. I get the impression that Weil meant to say "toxicology" in the first place, but when he heard "pharmacology" slip out of his mouth, he just ran with it and hoped nobody would notice. Again, one must ask how often he does this.

--76.217.94.92 (talk) 20:27, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

You've raised some substantive concerns - do you have a source for the information about Dr. Weil's education and time in medical school? It seems like you have personal knowledge of some it it. Frankg (talk) 15:18, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Dr. Weil's medical licensure can be confirmed by going to http://www.azmd.gov, the website of the Arizona licensing board, and looking him up. It took less time than it probably took the author of the above speculations regarding the issue to type them up.--Golgibody (talk) 04:09, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

I have somewhat mixed feelings about him. He came to my college (UMass Amherst) around 1990 and I loved him then. I parted ways with him in the early 00's when I began to drift towards a higher protein diet. Now that I have a science degree and have became more scientific-minded, I am concerned about some of the issues presented in the article. A few things I still like about him: He advocated not eating transfats long before it was a standard recommendation. I have avoided hydrogenated oils since the early 90s because of Andrew Weil and him alone, and I'm glad to have done so. He advocated oily fish early on as well. While I can't quite hang with all of his views on illegal drugs (and he's distanced himself from some of them too) he did bring back some common sense into that debate at a time when views on drugs were the most irrational in this country since alcohol prohibition (honestly probably including that time - alcohol, while pleasurable, is quite dangerous). Some of his books in the 90s did decry practices like juicing and homeopathy, which I'm sorry to see he has changed his mind on as he's become part of the counterestablishment establishment, as it were. On the other hand, he's modernized his views on macronutrient ratios and sugar away from the high carb fad of the 90s. His 1994 and 1995 books generally had sensible recommendations to promote health that still hold up - avoiding transfats, now commonly recommended breathing exercises, filtering water, integrating positive psychology into a daily routine and so forth - many of which it has taken a very long time for traditional medicine to catch up with. Transfats were recommended throughout the 90s instead of "tropical oils" because the scientific method takes a while to show evidence that something is unhealthful. So I think this article is fairly balanced in that it shows some of the positive and negative sides of the man and his philosophy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.182.34.126 (talk) 20:59, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

"Celebrity doctor" label source

The reference cited to label Andrew Weil a "Celebrity doctor," is an LA Times op-ed piece which tosses labels around like a tipsy juggler. To use this article as a reference to categorize any subject of any Wikipedia article violates WP:Reliable source. LA Times articles based on reporting are certainly WP:RS, but not opinion pastiches. Any article which presents the concept with its own proper sources in a fact based format would be quite acceptable. And BTW, one Wikipedia article can't be cited as a source in another. Tapered (talk) 04:59, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

Do not remove well-supported content, just because you don't like it. You can bring this to any board you want and based on the sourcing you will get shot down in a heartbeat. I'll add a couple more. Jytdog (talk) 05:03, 30 September 2016 (UTC)
done here. Really if you want to challenge this, bring it to BLPN or where ever you like. Jytdog (talk) 05:09, 30 September 2016 (UTC)
added several more as well, two of which were already cited in the article; dif. I note that the first sentence of the Andrew_Weil#Ethical section directly addresses ethics around his status as a celebrity doctor; i've added the WL there too Jytdog (talk) 07:42, 30 September 2016 (UTC)
"You threaten like a dockside bully." Sir Thomas More to Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex in A Man for All Seasons
suggesting you take it to a relevant board is not a threat. predicting another complete rejection of your stance is not a threat either. Jytdog (talk) 21:34, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

"Celebrity doctor" and BLP guidelines

Biographies of living persons need to be written a neutral style. Opening this article with "celebrity doctor" as the initial description/category of the subject violates this principal, just as describing him as "guru" would. Neutral descriptions, such as "physician," etc. are appropriate. "Celebrity doctor," while now a consensus included article, isn't a neutral term—it's weighted negatively, and needs to follow after neutral descriptions. Further, opening with "celebrity doctor," or "guru" for that matter, moves the article an increment along a continuum toward an attack page—opening with a negative term 'frames' all that follows in a negative light.

Further, opening a lead with any non-neutral term is inappropriate for the same reasons as adding negative categories. It's an attempt to color all that follows with a negative classification. Tapered (talk) 21:31, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

It is your perspective that it is solely a negative characterization. Read the sources where the term is used - many of them are casual about that using it like any other common attribute (like the Crain's Chicago piece), some are even praising, some find that status problematic. it is actually a great summary for the whole article. Jytdog (talk) 21:35, 30 September 2016 (UTC)
Putting "celebrity doctor" first is a contravention of the neutrality principle of BLP, and transparently POV editing. Tapered (talk) 01:37, 1 October 2016 (UTC)
again, You take that stance because you view the description as solely negative. That is your own interepretation and not reflected by the actual sources cited, which you are not discussing. Please discuss the phrase as it is used in the sources. Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 01:42, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

@ JzG: Putting "celebrity doctor" first in line is 'spin'—it changes the tone of the article from neutral to 'weighted.' Grammar is never a reason to revert a content based edit. It's fixable without reverting content. Tapered (talk) 19:35, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

And BTW, please explain the grammar error. I missed it. Tapered (talk) 19:40, 1 October 2016 (UTC)
Grammar is a valid reason to revert an edit. Your rationale for supposedly making your edit sacrosanct amounts to WP:CRYBLP. Others - with, I would add, vastly greater edit histories - have looked at the edit and see no problem. Guy (Help!) 20:52, 1 October 2016 (UTC)
Grammar can be a valid reason to revert, but you haven't cited the mistake, and you're reverting content—with grammar as the ostensible reason. Using a snarky associative term like "sacrosant" is a very good rhetorical debate tactic—it's lousy form @ Wikipedia. You toss out WP:CRYBLP as a label, without describing how my arguments dovetail with that essay. If you evaluate editors by volume of edits, I prefer quality of edits. I hope it shows. Tapered (talk) 03:36, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

Consider the following BLPs: Joseph Stiglitz, Paul Krugman, George Lucas, Warren Buffett, William K. Black. Very neutral, dry, non-POV lead openings. Too prestigious to compare to Weil? OK, try Mickey Mantle, or (living) Mike Trout. Or even Shoeless Joe Jackson—"Shoeless" isn't too complimentary, but if you look at the "Joe Jackson" disambiguation page, it's understandable. But let's go lower—how about Al Capone, or John Gotti, or even (living) Vinny Basciano, who's at the Florence CO Supermax, fer Chrissakes! Even "Vinny (not so)Gorgeous" (any more), is introduced by a dry, neutral opening sentence in his lead section. These are examples of good BLP lead intro sentences. Tapered (talk) 07:00, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

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