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Releases from the Gulag

My edit stating that "Golfo Alexopoulos, Anne Applebaum and Oleg Khlevniuk write that the government frequently released prisoners on the edge of death in order to avoid officially counting them" was reverted. I believe that such information is crucial as without it a reader of the article may erroneously conclude that Alexopolous alone holds this opinion. It is, in fact, a view shared by many prominent scholars of the Soviet Union. JakeTheKing42 (talk) 18:20, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

There are two reasons for a revert. First, you provided a source that just briefly tells the same story as the original Alexopolous book. It is not an independent source, so by adding it you create a false impression that this figure has been independently confirmed. That is not the case, another author just reproduced what she said at the Hoover institution web site. No independednt confirmation mas made, and that was not tantamount to a peer-reviewing. The results of peer-reviewing are presented below, and they are negative (in regard of the figures).

Second, the text is wrong. If you read Wheatcroft's paper you probably noticed he didn't just reproduce the official figures. There were several articles authored by Wheatcroft, Ellman, Rosefielde and other authors who discuss the question how can the Soviet archives be trusted, and what the main sources of inaccuracy could be. They did acknowledge the fact of release of prisoners who were suffering from incurable diseases, and they agreed that the main reason was to improve mortality statistics. Therefore, the consensus number of GULAL death (which is close to what Wheatcroft gives) is not just the one obtained based on the official figures (the official data are presented in the Getty, Rittersport and Zemskov's article in the American Historical Reviews, and they are lower). The consensus figures already take into account concealed deaths. That was done, for example, by counting of those who were released from the camps and those who arrived to their permanent addressed (they all were under permanent police control). These scholars used many other ways to reveal concealed mortality. Again, the consensus figures of GULAG mortality rates do exist, and they do take into account concealed deaths.

If you read Wheatcroft (I personally doubt you read even the title of his article, which explicitly says it is devoted to the analysis of reliability of official statistics), you must agree he does not say official figures are real figures, and the claim that official data are considered unreliable implies that Wheatcroft just uncritically reproduces what Soviet archives say. However, that is not a reason to claim the real mortality was several times higher. Even Robert Conquest concedes that the number of person who passed through GULAG was 14 million. If Alexopolos figures are correct, that means there was more than 40% mortality rate during the whole period of GULAG's existence, which contradicts to mainstream views. In connection to that, I think the unsourced statement "However, official Soviet documentation of Gulag deaths is widely considered inadequate. " should be removed (Wheatcroft and others does recognizes these facts and takes it into account in his estimates), and Alexandropulos's opinion, which has been severely criticised for being methodologically flawed, should be moved to the footnote, along with criticism.

However, you are right that Wheatcroft was not the only person who studies this question, I'll add other mainstream sources to this paragraph (Wheatcroft has several opponents who argued the actual figures were somewhat higher) and rewrite this paragraph accordingly.--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:45, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

You misunderstand my statement entirely. My addition to that section stated that there are other academics who agree that Gulag mortality was often concealed by early release. This is seperate from Alexopolous' conclusion of 6 million deaths. You yourself state quite clearly: "Therefore, the consensus number of GULAL death (which is close to what Wheatcroft gives) is not just the one obtained based on the official figures (the official data are presented in the Getty, Rittersport and Zemskov's article in the American Historical Reviews, and they are lower)," meaning that even the academics you cite agree that official Gulag mortality rates are deceptive. I cited the article you mention because it points out that Applebaum and Khlevniuk are among those who agree with this statement. By all accounts, the Soviet government manipulated the statistics to produce lower mortality rates. That is all my edit claimed.

You are referring to an earlier edit I made which was also reverted, which pointed out Alexopolous' challenge to the scholarly consensus on such grounds. This is a different question. On this point, it seems reasonable to include this challenge here as significant debate exists within the relevant academic community on the death rate applicable to the camps.

Furthermore, this edit was not intended to challenge Wheatcroft. The article stated: "After the Soviet Union dissolved, evidence from the Soviet archives became available, containing official records of the execution of approximately 800,000 prisoners under Stalin for either political or criminal offenses, around 1.7 million deaths in the Gulags and some 390,000 deaths during kulak forced resettlement – for a total of about 3 million officially recorded victims in these categories," to which I added the addendum stated above. You say that my addition "implies that Wheatcroft just uncritically reproduces what Soviet archives say," but the article itself implied that by openly stating that the number being referenced was the one "officially recorded." It does not say in any fashion that this number is corrected for bias or hidden mortality. If in fact, it was, that should have been stated.JakeTheKing42 (talk) 03:31, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

JakeTheKing42, (First of all, I believe you don't mind me to format your post in accordance with talk page style. In future, please, stick with this formatting to allow others understand who is responding to whom; and don't forget to sign your posts) I perfectly understood your post. You added the reference to Hoover Institution that re-tells what Alexandropulos says. However, that is not a separate, independent study that confirms these data; they just say the book was interesting and important. However, by providing two references to support a single statement, you create an impression that two different researchers made independent studies and came to the same conclusion: that the number of deaths was 6 millions. That is misleading, and that is why I reverted your edits. With regard to "significant debates", there were significant debates about 10-20 years ago, but I saw not fresh papers on that account, so it would be correct to say that some (maybe temporary) consensus has formed about that.

Regarding the rest, I disagree that the scholars agree that statistics was deceptive. The scholars say the statistics may be incomplete, and that is the fact. With regard to "deceptive", as Wheatcroft correctly noted, "Western historians who consider that all these data were falsified 60 years ago, and then held in secret to be produced in order to disinform them, appear to be suffering from an exaggeration of their own importance . When Gulag officials were pleading for more supplies they had no incentive to underestimate the number of prisoners. When Gulag officials were planning production they needed to know the real number of prisoners. Their health departments needed to know how many were dying. When MVD leaders were briefing Stalin in their top security `Osobye papki’ reports they had good reason to avoid the charge of misleading." The only thing that sounds reasonable is the attempt to conceal mortality by release of incurable prisoners. That is the only reason why the number of actual deaths may be biggeer. With regards to the rest, scholars say that data is incomplete (pertially because not all archives were made publicly available, partially because some data were lost), not falsified. That is an important nuance. I do not claim that it was your intent to challenge Wheatcroft, I just say that your recent edit had drawn my attention to that paragraph, and I think it needs to be rewritten. --Paul Siebert (talk) 01:55, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

You are still operating under a misapprehension of my meaning. My reference to that particular Hoover institute article was in order to provide a source for the following: " Two scholars offered the same explanation. In her Pulitzer-Prize-winning work, Gulag: A History, Anne Applebaum wrote that “both archives and memoirs indicate that it was common practice in many camps to release prisoners who were on the point of dying, thereby lowering camp death statistics.” Expert historian of the gulag Oleg Khlevniuk stated that “early release for disabled and chronically ill prisoners offered an easy opportunity to tweak the figures. … Since they did not die in the camps, they did not affect gulag statistics.” . The purpose of including this citation was to indicate that multiple scholars agree with the assessment that Gulag reports regarding mortality are inaccurate (and consciously deceptive), not to theoretically bolster Alexopolous' conclusion regarding total mortality. I think I was actually fairly clear on this given how I worded that sentence: "Golfo Alexopoulos, Anne Applebaum and Oleg Khlevniuk write that the government frequently released prisoners on the edge of death in order to avoid officially counting them, with Alexopoulos estimating at least 6 million died in the Stalinist Gulag or shortly after release." Nothing about that sentence implies that the other two scholars mentioned endorse the 6 million figure.

I understand that such claims are contentious, but they are nonetheless relevant and indicate that the "consensus" you refer to is in fact tenuous.

In any event, it is the "release of incurable prisoners" to which I refer, and which certainly occurred with some regularity in the camps. The Gulag as an institution was designed to extract maximum physical labor from prisoners, and so-called "last-leggers" were frequently released or sent into internal exile before illness claimed them.

I have corrected some spelling and grammar errors in your post. I hope this too is alright.

JakeTheKing42 (talk) 03:31, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

No problem. I also added "::::" to your posts, and I hope is alright :)

I am not sure I misapprehend you. There question about incompleteness of Soviet archival data was raised not by Applebaum, and all authors mentioned by me discussed it earlier, in 1990s (before Applebaum started the work on her book). Applebaum hardly did her own archival study of Gulag statistics (she cites some archival documents, but she is not a professional historians, her main focus was memoirs and similar sources). She writes vividly, and her book is a captivating reading, but she, as many non-professionals, is too focused on extreme cases, which may lead to some incorrect generalisations. Applebaum's book is a good source for the article about Gulag, but it is hardly good for this particular issue. In addition, it seems to me Applebaum never made a claim about Gulag 6 million deaths, this figure was produced by Alexandropulos.

Regarding unreliability of archival data, we must distinguish between "incompleteness", "unreliability", and "falsification". As far as I know, historians agree that Soviet archival data are incomplete in some aspects, but they do not speak about their falsification. With regard to their unreliability, sometimes, errors come from different interpretations. Anyway, historians do not say Soviet archival data are unreliable/deceptive, they say they may be incomplete in some aspects. Thus, there is a consensus about the overall GULAG population, but it is still unclear how many prisoners released from GULAG were suffering from incurable diseases and died soon after that.

Contrary to what you say, it was Wheatcroft who wrote about release of ill prisoners as a way to improve statistics. As Ellman says:

"Wheatcroft correctly drew attention to the fact that senior ofŽfcials were concerned about high mortality and that ‘incidents of high mortality were often investigated’. This, however, did not necessarily lead to an improvement in conditions, since camp bosses could improve their mortality statistics by releasing those about to die."

He also adds:

"In fact , the bosses of the Gulag as a whole were keen to improve the mortality statistics this way. An instruction of 2 April 1943 by the head of the Gulag forbade including deaths of released former prisoners in Gulag mortality statistics."

This instruction was made public by V.A. Isupov, and independently checked by Ellman That means, not "Golfo Alexopoulos, Anne Applebaum and Oleg Khlevniuk write that the government frequently released prisoners on the edge of death in order to avoid officially counting them", it was Ellman and Iusupov who did that. Other authors just reproduce it, and reproduce inaccurately. Thus, Ellman says that:

"In accordance with a decree of the USSR Supreme Court of 1 August 1942 and the joint directive of the NKVD, Narkomyust and the Procuracy of 23 October 1942 resulting from it, prisoners suffering from incurable diseases were to be released from their places of detention. In accordance with a list of incurable conditions, approved by the head of the Gulag, people were to be freed if they suffered from ‘emaciationas a result of avitaminosis’ (this was a bureaucratic expression for starvation), ‘alimentary distrophy’ (this was another bureaucratic expression for starvation), leukaemia, malignant anaemia, decompressed tuberculosis of the lungs, open bacilliar y tuberculosis of the lungs, acute amphysemna of the lungs etc . As Isupov sensiblynotes, ‘In other words, the prisoners were released to die' "(ibid)

In other words, opinion of these two scholars, who discovered this fact first, should be presented, not the opinia of others who inaccurately reproduce it. Why is it important? First, according to Ellman, it was not just an arbitrary release of all who were dying, but a strict bureaucratic procedure, and many prisoners were still dying in the camps, whereas an unknown fraction of those who were released for formal medical reasons survived: as Ellman noted, not every prisoner who was released under this order died soon after the release. Second, this order took effect only in late 1942, that means it covers only a part of GULAG history. Release of prisoners for medical conditions was banned in between 1934 and 1942 (arguably the most deadly period of GULAG history). That means, Applebaum's claim is simply incorrect: release of ill prisoners was practiced not by some camps, but by all camps during some part of GULAG's history.

Now I understand that it was not your intention to create an impression that Applebaum and Khlevniuk endorse Alexandropulos data, but the proposed text creates an impression that they do. Finally, the question is open about the time threshold between the release and death. Almost all Gulag prisoners are already dead, what part of those deaths should fit a category of GULAG deaths? Ellman gives 6 months as a threshold, and he notes that some prisoners released for medical conditions lived much longer. Of course, just by increasing the threshold up to 10-20 years it is quite possible to obtain Alexandropulos's 6 million, but, as other authors say, this methodology is deeply flawed, and it deserves mention only in a footnote.

As I already told, this paragraph must be rewritten, I, thanks to you, already started re-reading sources, but I need some time. Most likely, we need to cite Ellman and Iusupov (and probably Wheatcroft and Rosefielde), and add that this statement is reproduced in a Pulitzer-Prize winning book (although I am not sure if that adds anything to the story). --Paul Siebert (talk) 14:28, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

If Wheatcroft spoke about such releases by all means add him as a source but I see no reason to remove references to the scholars I mentioned. Indeed, it demonstrates that they are in agreement that Gulag mortality rates were gerrymandered in this fashion. I simply fail to see your distinction between "incomplete' and "deceptive" archival data. You include the quote, "Wheatcroft correctly drew attention to the fact that senior ofŽfcials were concerned about high mortality and that ‘incidents of high mortality were often investigated’. This, however, did not necessarily lead to an improvement in conditions, since camp bosses could improve their mortality statistics by releasing those about to die." This is not merely an inaccuracy or an example of incomplete data but conscious deception. I would also submit to you that such deceptive practices call into question the reliability of Soviet archival data as such. If the camp bosses were willing and able to manipulate their statistics, what incentive did they have for reporting deaths correctly?

Also, releases from the Gulag for medical conditions was not universally banned from 1934-1942: "In 1930 the OGPU issued order no. 361/164 of 23 October ‘On the unloading from the OGPU camps of the elderly, complete invalids and the very ill’. This provided a procedure for the release of this ‘unfit for work ballast’.6 In January 1934 this order was cancelled by OGPU order no. 501.7 In November 1934 NKVD order no. 00141 once again provided a procedure for the release of ‘the ill, the elderly and invalids’. Amongst other things it instructed the relevant bodies to draw up a list of illnesses which would qualify the person concerned for release. In June 1939 a decree of the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet banned the practice of early release of prisoners.8 On 29 April 1942 Beriya and the USSR Procurator Bochkov signed a joint directive banning ‘until the end of the war’ all releases from the camps (e.g. of people who had completed their sentences) with the exception of ‘complete invalids, the unfit for work, the elderly and women with children’, who could be released ‘in the case of complete impossibility of using them in the camps’.9 In accordance with a decree of the USSR Supreme Court of 1 August 1942 and the joint directive of the NKVD, Narkomyust and the Procuracy of 23 October 1942 resulting from it, prisoners suffering from incurable diseases were to be released from their places of detention"

Therefore, medical releases were officially permitted during the years 1930 - January 1934 and November 1934 - 1939 and banned from January 1934 - November 1934 and 1939-1942, except for catastrophically ill inmates (Though, many "releases" during this time period were releases into the deadly and dangerous frontline fighting forces which was effectively a death sentence. As a side note, what the Soviets did to the released POWs was stupifying in its brutality.).

In any event, simply because an official order prohibiting such releases was in effect at a certain point does not preclude the possibility of unofficial releases during those years. Given that we're talking about an entire caste of political prisoners who had frequently been forcibly disappeared and could be held incommunicado at the whim of the guards, it's not unreasonable to assume that official practices were not always followed.

I further fail to see how the cited sentence could be interpreted by anyone with a basic understanding of the elemental components of English grammar to suggest that Applebaum and Khlevniuk endorse Alexopolous' figures. I will quote it again, for clarity: "Golfo Alexopoulos, Anne Applebaum and Oleg Khlevniuk write that the government frequently released prisoners on the edge of death in order to avoid officially counting them, with Alexopoulos estimating at least 6 million died in the Stalinist Gulag or shortly after release." The subordinate clause "with Alexopoulos estimating at least 6 million died in the Stalinist Gulag or shortly after release" is crystal clear in referring to Alexopolous only and not the other two scholars.

Finally, with regards to the timeframe issue you bring up, it's not clear to me that it's unreasonable to extend the relevant time period years after release if we're talking about long-term, crippling illnesses. I think that there are legitimate crticisms of Alexopolous' methodology, but it is sufficiently rigorous to deserve more than a mention in "a footnote." As far as I know, there have been two scholars who offered criticism of her work, with only the first being specifically harsh. It at the very least bears further research. JakeTheKing42 (talk) 05:17, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

First, if you are responding to someone's posts, please don't forget about indentation (by adding colons). If you want to continue the same thread without indentation, put "od" enclosed in double "{"s. Otherwise, others may decide you are responding not to me.

Second, regarding "incompleteness" and "deceptiveness", I think, release of incurable prisoners is an example of deceptive data. However, the lack of statistics about mortality of released prisoners is an example of their incompleteness. We don't know how many of them died soon after release, and that is because the data are unavailable (not forged, not listed under another category, just unavailable).

Third, it seems I didn't explain that clear enough: the information about release of incurable patients as a way to improve statistics was discovered not by Wheatcroft, but by Iusupov/Ellman. Wheatcroft pointed attention at the fact that Gulag administration was interested in improving statistics.

Fourth, Wheatcroft explains the reason why camps administration had a reason to provide correct statistics: reporting too low or too high figures of camp population and camp deaths would affect the amount of supplies they obtain, the volume of work that had to be done (remember, the camps were an important part of state economic), etc. All of that was tightly interconnected, so there was absolutely no incentive for administrations of each individual camp to forge data. In addition, as Wheatcroft correctly noted, by providing false data, camp administrators themselves risked to become Gulag victims (that was not unusual).

Fifth, releases for medical conditions in 1930-34 hardly change a picture, because the size of Gulag population was relatively small, so that could hardly conceal a significant amount of camp deaths. What is important in that these releases were banned from 1934 till late 1942, one of the most deadly period of Gulag history.

Sixth, regarding "unofficial" releases, that is just your hypothesis, and it shows your deem misunderstanding of Soviet realities. Any unofficial releases from prisons were very dangerous things, and it was a very risky enterprise that could have much severe consequences for cam administration than criticism for high mortality rate. In addition, by writing about a "caste" of political prisoners, you demonstrate your total misunderstanding of Stalin's penal system. There were no category "political prisoner", and it is impossible to separate real criminals from political prisoners. There are two reasons for that. First, it is incorrect to say that political prisoners were those convicted under article 58, because some ordinary criminals could have been convicted under the pretext of "anti-Soviet activity" (for example, a theft from a military plant). Second, some political opponents were convicted not for "antisoviet activity" but for some other crimes they allegedly committed. Political prisoners and criminals were always kept in the same camps, and "incommunicado" you are talking about was "10 let bet prove perepiski", which actually meant a capital punishment (presented to the relatives as a 10 years term without a right of communication).

Seventh, can you please explain me what new information Applebaum and Khleniuk's books contain about the release of prisoners? Do they contain some fresh data in addition to what Ellman/Iusupos say, or they just re-tell the same story with distortion (that releases were at camp administration's discretion and they took place during the whole Gulag's history)? Please, provide the quotes or explain what exactly do they say. If their claim contradict to what Ellman/Iusupos say, we need to see what additional evidences their claims are based on. If they do not cite any primary sources in addition to what Ellman does, why do you think they deserve mention? Regarding Alexandropulos, her analysis of Gulag's health system is good, her numerical estimates are flawed, they should be moved to a footnote as an opinion of one scholar that challenge a consensus and that was criticized for methodological flaws. However, if you believe it is "sufficiently rigorous", please, explain it.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:09, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Basically all I was saying is that such releases are deceptive. If you admit that, then you concede all that I was arguing.

You're still being confusing here. You stated above: "Contrary to what you say, it was Wheatcroft who wrote about release of ill prisoners as a way to improve statistics." This cannot be true if it's also true that "All of that was tightly interconnected, so there was absolutely no incentive for administrations of each individual camp to forge data. In addition, as Wheatcroft correctly noted, by providing false data, camp administrators themselves risked to become Gulag victims (that was not unusual)." Your own source indicated that medical releases as a method of forging statistics occured with some regularity.

You have misread the source (which, again, is the one you cited originally), which states quite clearly: "In November 1934 NKVD order no. 00141 once again provided a procedure for the release of ‘the ill, the elderly and invalids’. Amongst other things it instructed the relevant bodies to draw up a list of illnesses which would qualify the person concerned for release. In June 1939 a decree of the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet banned the practice of early release of prisoners. On 29 April 1942 Beriya and the USSR Procurator Bochkov signed a joint directive banning ‘until the end of the war’ all releases from the camps (e.g. of people who had completed their sentences) with the exception of ‘complete invalids, the unfit for work, the elderly and women with children’, who could :::be released ‘in the case of complete impossibility of using them in the camps’. Meaning, that from November 1934 - June 1939 and 1942 - 1945 (which, as you point out were some of the deadliest years in the Gulag owing to the excessive mortality caused by WWII) medical releases were permitted. This, in fact, lends some credance to Alexopolous' methodology, since during these harsh years medical releases were officially permitted by the Soviet government.

The risks were only there if the release was discovered, which was unlikely given the vulnerable position these prisoners were placed in - isolated and stripped of their human rights. In any event, "political prisoner" was obviously not an official Soviet designation but all accounts of the camps agree that those convicted under Article 58 (the so-called "58s") were treated much more harshly than the general criminal population. They were, by all definitions, a lower caste of people - as oppressed as the Indian untouchables. This was documented most especially in The Gulag Archipelago in which it is repeatedly emphasized that political prisoners were much more often the targets of violence from the guards, subject to harsher conditions, often under the thumb of the "trustees" who were always ordinary criminals, and so on. Prison is hardly the place for such nuances as the ones you bring up and for all intents and purposes, a sentence under that law was sufficient to be treated as a political prisoner.

It is precisly because Applebaum and Khleniuk agree with the earlier assessments of early release that their inclusion is relevant. It indicates that a consensus on this topic has been reached. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JakeTheKing42 (talk • contribs) 18:34, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

My bad, I haven't noticed the 1939 order. Yes, the time when the release was banned was shorter, from 1939 till late 1942. However, I have two comments on that. First, Ellman says it was an official policy, not an attempt of individual camp administration to conceal mortality. Second, Ellman says "release of prisoners on the point of death was official policy and practised on a currently unknown scale over many years." In connection to that, I am wondering if the authors other than Ellman/Iusupov add anything new to that (beyond transmitting the same idea in a more vivid although less accurate words. Concretely:

- do they provide evidences that the release of incurable prisoners occurred unofficially too (was on camp administration's discretion) and occurred in 1939-42?

- do they shed any light on the scale of the release of dying prisoners (which was "unknown" to Ellman)?

- do they provide any estimate of mortality among released prisoners (Alexandropulos does, but her methodology is considered flawed by others)?

If you answer these questions, and the answers are "yes", then we can use these authors. If not, I don't see a reason for doing that.

One more comment on "forged" statistics. We can speak about forgery, when some data are manufactured, and these data have nothing in common with real data. For example, the 1939 census data were forged, because the 1937 census disappointed Stalin. In that case, and with Gulag statistics in general, we cannot speak about forgery: no artificial figures were invented, there were manipulations with some data, they are misleading, but they are not false. The documented amounts of released prisoners correctly reflect the actual one. It is even possible (theoretically) calculate the amount of incurable prisoners (just by the analysis of the reason of the release: according to the 1934 (or 1942) order, or because they had served their term). The only problem is that it is extremely difficult to do technically. --Paul Siebert (talk) 19:09, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

By the way, a brief look at the Khlevniuk's "History of Gulag" shows that the author concludes (322) that, although individual attempts of forging had been documented, the strict control of Gulag's central office over prisoners' movement, as well as other factors, made official data quite trustworthy, because, even if some local forgery had occurred, different factors balanced each other, so the final picture remained adequate.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:52, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

To be honest with you Paul Siebert, we're going in circles here. I've answered your questions at least 3 times already (The authors I cited corroborate the position that early medical releases occured in the Gulag, not bring any new information. Such releases were done with conscious deception in mind, making this an example not of incomplete data but gerrymandered data. And on this basis alone, not to mention the other issues present there, the Gulag figures on mortality cannot be trusted) and if it's not sufficient for you we've come to an impasse. Either a third party will have to adjudicate this or we will have to live with having not convinced each other of our perspective. JakeTheKing42 (talk) 03:11, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

I disagree that we have no progress. You forced me to re-read some sources and correctly pointed that I misread one of them. I've also looked at what Khlevniuk writes, and I didn't find anything there that would allows me to say he add any fresh data to what Ellman says. I don't know about Applebaum (maybe, you can tell me?), but it seems Ellman + Iusupov are quite adequate sources to support the statement about early release of ill prisoners to conceal mortality, Wheatcroft is a good sources to support the statement that local camp administration worried about too high documented camp deaths, and Khlevniuk is a good source to say that some limited scale attempts have been made by local administration to conceal camp mortality and escape. However, frankly speaking, all of that is more relevant to the article about GULAG, because this article is about mass killings.--Paul Siebert (talk) 03:57, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

I'm glad you find my perspective useful. In that case, I'll make another attempt at explaining myself. There is nothing new to find in Applebaum and Khlevniuk. They corroborate the positions of Wheatcroft and Ellman. I think including them is useful for those who aren't familiar with the specifics of the academic controversy surrounding Gulag statistics because it indicates that a wide range of scholars across many generations and opinions agree that we cannot rely exclusively on Soviet archival data with regards to Gulag mortality. There is a case to be made that Gulag deaths do not belong here, but they do seem to fall under the category of "mass killing" even if they are not necessarily genocidal actions.

Though, one could argue they are democidal or minimally genocidal in the case of the exile of entire national groups such as German and Greeks. Solzhenitzin wrote about these and it makes for some harrowing reading: "Neatness and uniformity! That is the advantage of exiling whole nations at once! No special cases! No exceptions, no individual protests! They all go quietly, because... they’re all in it together. All ages and both sexes go, and that still leaves something to be said. Those still in the womb go, too, and are exiled unborn, by the same decree… Yes, children not yet conceived go into exile, for it is their lot to be conceived under the high hand of the same decree; and from the very day of their birth, whatever that obsolete and tiresome Article 35 of the Criminal Code may say, ("Sentence of exile cannot be passed on persons under 16 years of age"), from the moment they thrust their heads out into the light they will be special settlers, exiles in perpetuity. Their coming of age, their sixteenth birthdays, will be marked only by the first of their regular outings to report at the MVD post. All that the exiles have left behind them-their houses, wide open and still warm, their belongings lying in disorder, the home put together and improved by ten or even twenty generations-passes without differentiation to the agents of the punitive organs, then some of it to the state, some to neighbors belonging to more fortunate nations, and nobody will write to complain about the loss of a cow, a piece of furniture or some crockery. One final thing made the principle of uniformity absolute, raised it to the height of perfection—the secret decree did not spare even members of the Communist Party in the ranks of these worthless nations. No need then to check Party cards—another relief. Besides, the Communists could be made to work twice as hard as the rest in their new place of exile, and everybody would be satisfied."JakeTheKing42 (talk) 04:46, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

I would say, they rather popularise Ellman's views, not corroborate. "Corroborate" means "independently confirm". In connection to that, I am asking again: how exactly does Khlevniuk confirms Ellman's statement. How exactly does Applebaul do that? This question is not rhetorical: if you have an access to these books, please, answer them (I am too lasy to go a library).

Regarding "democidal" etc., all of that looks like a boolshit: the term "democide" was coined by Rummel who was known for introduction of factor analysis in genocide studies, and who became familiar due to his concept of "democratic peace". His death toll estimates are deeply flawed (thus, he claims about 20 millions were killed in the USSR after Stalin; he uses totally unsatisfactory obsolete sources and totally weird assumptions to obtain these weird numbers), his statistical approach has been severely criticized, his concept of "democratic peace" has been challenged as methodologically flawed. The scholars working it this area (so called "genocide scholars") even failed to develop a common methodology; it is not a surprise that no satisfactory theory was proposed so far. As a result, historians who work with archives and study real events in, e.g. USSR and "genocide scholars" live in two parallel universes: the formers are trying to restore a real course of events and explain them, whereas the latters are engaged in handwaving and developing various buzzwords. That is not a surprise that real historians totally ignore all these "-cide" theorisings.

Speaking honestly, I see no much difference between internment of Japanese Americans and Volga Germans: taking into account that Nazi Germany hadn't occupied even a small patch of American soil, Soviet attitude to Volga Germans was much more mild than American's attitude towards their Japanese compatriots.

I am also wondering why the Bengal famine (totally man-made) is not considered "mass killing", but Soviet WWII time or post WWII famine is. Note, only "genocide scholars" and politically motivated writers do so, whereas serious historians use quite different terminology.--Paul Siebert (talk) 05:15, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

Well, I actually would consider that exile to be genocidal rather than democidal, but as far as I know, that term was first used in reference to Cambodia, in which no national, ethnic or religious class was targeted, and yet the government slated millions for death. The state's bloodthirst was so all encompassing a new term was needed to describe it (remember that the Khemer Rouge eliminated a quarter of their own population).

With regards to the Japanese internment camps, I disagree that the comparison is accurate. These camps never had a high death rate, not even at their worst were they even close to the lowest estimates of Gulag mortality. They were a monstrous assault on civil liberties and one of the most disgusting acts of the United States government, but they were not an act of mass murder.

There is significant debate regarding the Bengal famine and whether it was man-made. The British made many efforts to resupply India, and from what I understand there was no desire on the part of the government to see Indian civilians starve (see the citation for further information)

I am not in possession of Khlevniuk's book, but a cursory google search yields the following: "early release for disabled and chronically ill prisoners offered an easy opportunity to tweak the figures. It is quite possible that many of the released prisoners, in the tens of thousands, never made it to their destinations. Since they did not die in the camps, they did not affect gulag statistics. Also, Gulag practice could have allowed the inclusion of those already dead among the number of those being released. There may have been other, undiscovered ways of falsifying death statistics."

Similarly, Applebaum says, (addressing your question concerning deceptive practices of individual camp commanders: "Yet even if and when these numbers are improved, the question 'How many died?' will still be difficult to answer with ease. In truth, no death figures compiled by Gulag authorities can ever be considered completely reliable. The culture of camp inspection and reprimand meant, among other things, that individual camp commanders had a vested interest in lying about how many of their prisoners died: both archives and memoirs indicate that it was common practice in many camps to release prisoners who were on the point of dying, thereby lowering camp death statistics."

Do you have other concerns in this regard? JakeTheKing42 (talk) 06:16, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

Re Democide etc. These buzzwords are invented by non-historians, and they are not helpful in understanding real causes of these events. Don't see any practical value in discussing all of that. Re Cambodia, if you read real specialists (for example, Kiernan), he clearly outlines a strong ethnic and ethnosocial components of those events. Regarding "millions", it is also not accurate: the number of victims was ca 2 millions.

If you put this situation into a historical content, you will see that American internment camps were more brutal that Soviet ones. Japanese Americans were interned in the situation when there was no enemy invasion (and even no potential threat of invasion). In that situation, there was no reason on internment at all. In contrast, by September 1941, the USSR was on the verge of military catastrophe, and the actions of the government are more explainable. Second, there was an excess of food in USA, and noone was starving. In contrast, it is estimated that about 5-7 million of Soviet people starved to death during the war: even ordinary civilians were suffering from severe food shortage. Lastly, labor conditions of civilians were not significantly different from those in Gulag. All of that makes your comparison incorrect and ahistorical.

Begnal famine was clearly Sen's entitlement famine, and, whereas it was clearly not interntional, there was an obvious criminal neglect. By the way, the intentionality of the Great Chinese famine (responsible for ca 50% of "communist deaths toll") is also a subject of debates: it was partially due to natural causes (deadly famines were a norm in China), martially miscalculations, partially poor management.

Yes, that is exactly what I mean: Khlevniuk writes about petty falsifications capable of concealing tens of thousands. That does not add much to Ellman, although we can include this reference too. In any event Alexandropulos definitely says apart, and her opinion is fringe.

Re Applebaum, she, being a journalist, just summarises what the authors we are talking about say. I see no fresh facts there. However, she definitely contradicts to what Khlevniukk says: since all documentation was under strict control of central authorities, local administration had not much freedom for falsifications, and, as Ellman says, secret Soviet statistics is much more trustworthy than the open one.--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:36, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

We are now straying pretty far from the topic and I'm not sure a wikipedia page is the correct forum for some of this discussion, but let's go ahead nonetheless.

The Cambodian genocide was targeted against anyone considered "upper class" or "intelligensia." It went so far as to target people who wore glasses because the government assumed they must be smart and therefore burgeoise. Doctors, lawyers, anyone with a university education, anyone who spoke a foriegn language, the list goes on. The point being that it was not a well-defined national, religious, etc. group. I would like to point out that 2 million people would still be considered "millions" but my point was actually that a quarter of the population was exterminated - a staggering figure and not one encompassed clearly by an ethnic group.

I'm not so sure the Bengal famine was the result of criminal neglect. If there were indeed resupply efforts it doesn't seem to be the case that the situation was neglected. The Great Chinese Famine is an entirely seperate topic, and one I happen to know less about, but from what I understand, the government denied local access to food supplies until quotas were met. Given that these quotas were frequently unachievable, the foreseeable result was mass death (which is the standard applied by the UN to define a crime against humanity).

Khlevniuk was writing in that section about a local circumstance, but it is implied that it happened on a much larger scale. Alexopoulos (which I believe you are misspelling, by the way) claims that it occured on a larger scale than we previously thought, and if it did happen during the war years, I think it's certainly a possibility.

Applebaum says, answering your earlier question, that camp authorities had motive and means to forge statistics by prisoner release. This indicates that it is likely that even during years when such releases were prohibited they occured and during those years when they were permitted they occured at a higher frequency.

Finally, per the Japanese Internment Camps, you must know that this comparison cannot be made. The structure of the Gulag can be traced back to the early years of the Leninist regime, a time period of peace in the Soviet Union. It is more reasonable to look at the death rates of the population of those in the Gulag vs Internment Camps, and this comparison is rather alarming. According to the wikipedia article on this topic (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internment_of_Japanese_Americans) "The WRA recorded 1,862 deaths across the ten camps, with cancer, heart disease, tuberculosis, and vascular disease accounting for the majority." This out of a population of roughly 110,000 yields a death rate of approximately 1.6%, largely from natural causes. While the death rates of the Gulag are precisely what is at issue here, I will be generous and use some of the lower adjusted estimates, say 1.6 million out of the 18 million who passed through the camps: a death rate of roughly 9% at minimum, more than 5 times the death rate of the Internment Camps, largely as a result of mistreatment and starvation. Furthermore, the Gulag was a system of forced labor and brutal degradation, including a process of interrogation, torture, starvation and unsanitary conditions. It is widely considered one of humanity's worst crimes. I would say that it is comfortably several orders of magnitude worse than the Internment camps, despite their horrific nature.

JakeTheKing42 (talk) 04:52, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

No, we are not straying too far, all of that has a relation to the article's subject.

Cambodian genocide had a very strong ethnic and ethnosocial component, and it had a very strong regional specifics. Just read the literature (not the bullshit written by libertarian activists like Rummel, but really good books. I recommend Kiernan or Fein)

Yes, it happened because HMG and Winston Churchill preferred to ignore this problem. Read O'Grada, he is a famine expert.

I am not sure if Khlevniuk say that, but I am sure he says Moscow kept all of that under a very strict control (I provided teh page), so there was not much freedom of manouevre for local camp authorities.

Applebaum essencially repeats what Wheatcroft and Ellman say, and her (or yours) "most likely" is just a suggestion.

Regarding Volga German and Gulag, you misunderstand one important point: Volga Germans were not imprisoned in Gulag. Actually, they even weren't disenfranchised: those who were members of Communist party retained their membership, they attended meetings of a local party organisation, all Volga Germans could vote etc. The conditions were severe, but all of that can be better understood if you compare the overall deterioration of living conditions of civilians during war time, as well as their labor conditions: it was normal when even 12-years old children were working full time. You should compare not the mortality of Japanese in American camps vs that of Volga Germans in Soviet camps, but mortality of American Japanese/Overall US mortality vs mortality of Volga Germans/Overall Soviet mortality. As I already said, there was a tremendous jump of mortality among civilians (I mean even unoccupied parts of the USSR) due to food and medication shortage, and without that your comparison is senseless.--Paul Siebert (talk) 14:56, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

Appologies for not responding sooner, I have been in the process of moving and things are chaotic here. If you wish to continue this line of discussion, I'm happy to do so.

I understand that there may have been a defacto ethnic component to the genocide, but you must know that the ideology of the Khemer Rouge was decidedly radical socialist. It aimed to completely agrarianize the population, wiping out the industrial class altogether. This meant sweeping away all professionals and "burgeoise." Their massacres were targeted against economic classes primarily, not ethnic ones, though in practice this was not always the case.

This may have been the case de jure but it was not so de facto. Inspections were rare in the camps - even more so in the Siberian camps.

Applebaum adds the important addendum that individual camp commanders had motive and means to forge statistics.

Notwithstanding the fact that they were still exiles and "special settlers," my point was actually more broad than the one you're making. I'm referring to the Gulag population as a whole, not just specifically to the Volga Germans. We're probably misunderstanding each other here in this regard. But, still, I believe the Germans were used as forced labor by the Soviets whereas the Japanese never were by the Americans. This is a crucial difference.

JakeTheKing42 (talk) 06:40, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

When discussing some mass killings, one has to focus on what the perpetrators wanted to achieve, but what factors made them successful. Accodring to Kiernan, the major driving force of this genoclassicide was (i) an econimic disparity between desperately poor rural Khmers and a relatively rich urban population, a significant part of which was non-Khmers, (ii) traditional Khmer's extreme nationalism, (iii) national traditions of revenge. Not only there was an ethnic component, it was a core prerequisite of genocide: without that, it would be impossible. In addition, one important trait of genocides in Asia is that differences between social groups may be so big that it amounts to a level of difference between two ethic groups: to poor rural Khmers, wealthy urban Khmers looked more like rich Vietnamese or Chineese.

That makes Cambodian case totally unique. This genocide had more common traits with Indonesian or Rwandian genocide, and it had nothing in common with what happened in the USSR. By the way, it was the USSR who condemned KR first (while the US supportedthem), and it was Vietnam who stopped mass killings. KR vehement antiurbanism has absolutely nothing in common with Leninism and even Maoism (Chinese comrades warned Pol Pot he was too radical). Another important fact: whereas Great chinese famine had no appreciable demographic consequences about 5% of population was killed, KR killed a significant part of their own compatriots, which has no analogy with any so called "communist mass killings".

Re Apllebaum, the same was said by Wheatcroft: he also noted camp administration tried to conceal mortality. By the way, isn't it an argument against the thesis that "Gulag was de facto death camp"? I doubt a director of Auschwitz had an reason to conceal mortality...

I think I understand your point, but I am not sure you understand mine. It is ahisotrical and incorrect to compare a situation with Volga Germans and Japanese Americans. Actually, the only comparison that can be made is the comparison of a military situation in the US and the USSR: there were even no a threat of any military invasion of the US mainland when the decision about internment was made. In contrast, the decision about internment of Volga Germans was made only after a huge part of Soviet territory was captured by Germany, and there was a real threat of a total defeat of the USSR. That means, according to Soviet standards, Roosevelt had absolutely no reason for deportation of Japanese Americans.

Regarding the rest, as I already said, you must compare Volga Germans vs other Soviet civilians and Japanese Americans vs other Americans. I think it would be correct to compare a life of civilians who fled from German occupation to the East with that of Volga Germans. Both of them had desperate living conditions (a half of a room per a family), a food shortage was desperate, labor conditions were very hard, young children had to work full time, no unaithorised absences, no possibility to leave your official place of residence, etc. These were living and working conditions for free people during the war, which means the life of deported people was not much worse.--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:22, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Alexandra Laignel-Lavastine

I see that this author has been quoted twice in the "Terminology" section. I have three objections to that. First, the quote is taken out of context. These words are in the opening paragraph of the chapter, the author disagrees with these views, and the whole chapter is devoted to debunking these views. As another author summarises Alexandra Laignel-Lavastine's views, "in her opinion, postcommunist Romanian historiography had been captured by (both inter-war and national-communist) ideology." (the quote was taken from Shafir, I added the ref to the text). Second, Romania is not a leader in world historiorgaphy, so I am not sure why should we devote a space to what Romanian (Serbian, Panamian, etc) scholars think. Especially if this thinking "had been captured by (both inter-war and national-communist) ideology". Third, the authors speaks about Romania only, she mentions the rest of Eastern Europe in a previous sentence. I remove both quotes as misinterpreted, misleading and only marginally relevant.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:35, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

According to Laignel-Lavastine, Romanian historiography is captured by ideology (p. 180-82). Therefore, the information about usage of the Red Holocaust by Romanian intellectuals is hardly helpful. If someone wants to restore the text removed by me, please, don't forget to add the above notion of Laignel-Lavastine (about ideologically captured Roman historiography).--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:23, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Estimates Soviet Union

You cite R. J. Rummel's estimate of 110 million deaths due to communism. Rummel surveyed only English language sources published prior to 1990 to arrive at his estimates. In The case of the Soviet Union from 1927-53 he claims 42,672 million victims of communism, 2,000 million famine deaths in 1933 & 333,000 in 1947, and 26,125 million war/famine dead (1941-45), total unnatural deaths 71,330 million. The figures come from Lethal Politics by Rummel, I own a hard copy of the book.
In 1993 the Russian demographers Andreev, Darski and Kharkova (ADK) published a study of the Soviet population for the Russian Academy of Science, Naselenie Sovetskogo Soyuza : 1922-1991. The conclusions of their study are summarized in Demographic Trends and Patterns in the Soviet Union Before 1991. The source of the often cited statistic of 27 million Soviet war dead is this 1993 study by (ADK). In the 1993 study they listed the population balance from 1927-53, 1927 beginning balance 148,656 million; 149,965 million births; gain 1939-45 annexed territories 20,268 million; emigration out of country 822,000; total base population 318,067 million. Total deaths were 191,623 million, including war dead of 26.668 million and infant mortality of about 20 million, leaving population of 191,623 million at the end of 1953. In a 2001 article on the Russian website Demoscope (ADK) estimated 38 million unnatural deaths from 1933 53[1] 7.2 million famine dead in 1933; 2 million purge deaths in 1937-39, 27.2 million war dead 1939-45; 1 million famine dead in 1947 and 1 million repression deaths 1946-53. We have a difference of 33 million deaths between Rummel and ADK, in the case of Rosefielde who claims 45 million unnatural deaths (22 million victims of communism and 23 million war dead) the difference is 7 million. The difference in Rummel and Rosefielde can be attributed to forced labor in remote regions of the USSR by free Soviet citizens building socialism. The workers had Stakhanovite movement work quotas, only they strong survived, the weak perished.--Woogie 10w 19:13, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Woogie, you are right, but we are mixing two categories: mass killings and unnatural deaths. Only a fraction of authors (e.g.. Rummel, Rosefielde and Valentino) equate them. Others disagree. that means your data are the maximal possible estimate.

In general, I would say, there is a huge problem with sources in the Estimate section.

1. Ref 30 cites Rummel's "Death by government" Rummel is known to use obsolete sources (see Woogie 10w), and his figures have been criticized.

2. a footnote "n" is an introduction to the Black Book (its figures have been widely criticised)

3. a footnote "o" is an opinion of Malia, this opinion has also been criticised, and it is not clear where these figures are taken from (looks like he just repeats what Courtois says). Obviously, he never did his own study, and some sources say he was just obsessed with the idea to get a magic figure of 100 million to advocate a very concrete idea: that Communism was much more murderous than Nazism.

4. a footnote "p" cites Valentino, but it cites it wrongly: Valentino makes a reference to Rummel (without endorsing this figure), and his own summary of the secondary sources available to him give different figures: 21 to 70.

5. a footnote "q" contains (i) a reference to Rummel (again); (ii) a reference to Courtois (again); (iii) a reference to Malia (again); (iv) a reference to Brzezinski (are you really sure he was doing his own estimates? He is not a historian, he was a politician; he definitely cites someone else's figures, probably Rummel's; (v) a reference to White's "Atlas of history" (which is definitely a tertiary source, which is not good; (vi) a reference to Culbertson, which Valentino seems to copypasted from Rummel's book without checking. The reference (both in the Wikipedia article and Valentino's book) is wrong. By copypasting a reference to a non-existing source (just try to google it), Valentino demonstrated his actual professional level (in my field, that mistake is unforgivable).

6. a reference 31 is a reference to Rummel's non peer-reviewed personal blog (interestingly, Rummel seems to take into account new data only when they increase his estimates; the new archival research that reevaluate the data to lower side are igniored by him)

7. a reference 32 is to Rosefielde, arguably, the only good expert in this panopticon. Unfortunately, he is a specialist in Soviet history only, and he is known to produce higher figures than anybody else in this field.

8. a reference "r" is White (this tertiary source is used again)

9. a reference "s" is to some non-peer-reviewed blog (although it, at least, mentions the names of the authors where the dat awere taken from, but most names are odd, whereas Brzesinski's name and Rummel's name have already been mentioned above;

10. a reference "t" and 33 is to a newspaper article that doesn't disclose sources. It is just Kotkin's opinion, but it is unclear where these data were taken from.

To summarise. The whole section is pure cheating: it presents not the best sources, provides obsolete, fake or unreliable data, and even worse, in a series of cross-references, it actually reproduces the same figures twice or trice to create a false impression of abundant studies in these area. If we remove cross-references and get rid of desperately obsolete sources and the sources that jus tangentially mention some figure (so we cannot talk about serious fact-checking and accuracy), the whole list shrinks to a couple of items. That is an indication of a simple fact that good source on this subject are desperately lacking. The explanation is simple: good scholars are not working within this paradigm.

Meanwhile, a lot of fresh and reliable sources (peer-reviewed articles published in top journals) exist that discuss the three major perpetrators of mass killings (Stalin's USST, Mao's China and Pol Pot's Cambodia) separately. According to Valentino, there were almost no mass killings in other countries, so I see absolutely no reason why cannot we present three different modern figures for each of the three regimes instead of presenting obsolete and questionable cumulated figures taken from obscure sources. That is a good example how an intrinsically flawed concept serves as a magnet for various garbage.

In addition, our neutrality policy advises us to avoid segregation of text to create an apparent hierarchy of data. That is exactly what we see in this section. Not only it uses poor and obsolete sources, it segregates criticism from the estimates. That means the policy has been violated twice here: by providing a lot of redundant sources (most of which cite the same data many times), the section gives undue weight to them, and, by creating an apparent hierarchy, the criticism of those figures is understated.

If we remove all sources that just re-group the figures obtained from a couple of authors who assembled them from the literature available to them (not just cite a figure like Kotkin or Brzesinsky), only few sources will remain: Rummel (widely cited in popular media), Courtois, and Valentino. Since the first two authors have been criticized for their figures, they must be supplemented with needed criticism (which should not be put to the bottom.

Moreover, Mann (an author who has been cited in this article as an originator of the term "classicide") says that he does not consider Great Leap famine as "classicide", and considers it as an unintentional consequence of mistakes made by Chinese leadership. It is neither mass killing nor classicide, according to him. Other authors also have reservations on what part of excess deaths under communist regimes should be considered killing. However, a Great Leap famine is responsible for about 50% of all "communism death toll", which means Mann's opinion has a direct relevance to the subject on this section.

In connection to that, I think, we need to change the "Estimates" section as following:

1. Per Valentino, we explain that majority of excess deaths in communist states occurred in China, USSR and Cambodia.

2. We provide recent estimates for each country, and split the numbers by categories: "famine", "civil war", "executions and political repressions".

3. We explain that different opinia exist among scholars if deaths resulted from mistakes and callous policy should be considered a killings (Mann vs Rummel vs Valentino vs Wheatcroft, etc). It is also should be explained that some authors discuss documented deaths, whereas others include population losses (from all causes, including birth deficit and migration).

4. We provide estimates of total figures (Rummel, Courtois, Valentino), as well as Rosefielde, and we explain all controvercies around these figures (for first two sources).

That would be a good and professional presentation of what various sources say on that account.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:34, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Paul you wrote In general, I would say, there is a huge problem with sources in the Estimate section. IMO the problem in a nutshell is that the editors are going to Google Books or the internet to dig up a single solitary statistic from a reliable academic source and then they spin a story around it. I suspect that they don't have a clue about how these statistics are derived or what they represent. I beg you on bended knees please read Population dynamics: consequences of regular and irregular changesby Andreev, Darski and Kharkova (ADK) in Demographic trends and patterns in the Soviet Union before 1991

At this point we are on the level of Fox News when they attempt to discredit Bernie Sanders and Socialism. [2] I would not be surprised if the hack on Fox News got his information from this page.--Woogie 10w 21:27, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

I am reading it currently. Meanwhile, can you please comment on my proposal (at the bottom of my post)?--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:53, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

@Woogie 10w: Can you please make a Wikipedia account? It is important for several reasons. RhinoMind (talk) 14:53, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Wow, this sounds real serious [3]--Woogie 10w 21:38, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

It seems it was a technical problem with a signature. Actually, a user who made this post was Woogie10w (no space).--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:08, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

@Woogie10w: Thanks. Better try to ping the guy then. RhinoMind (talk) 16:42, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Terminology section

The way this section is written is misleading and redundant. Usually, the goal of a "terminology" section is added at the beginning of monographs and articles to explain the terms that are extensively extensively in this particular book. An example is the Mann's monograph. In contrast, majority of the terms listed in the "Terminology" section are not used in the article (the term "democide" is used when Rummel's views are described). As a result, this section looks totally redundant.

The second problem is that the section makes a lot of undue generalisations. Thus, it creates an absolutely wrong impression that the term "genocide" or "classicide" are applied to all excess mortality events. (A short reservation ("in whole or part") is added at the beginning, but it is totally unclear). In reality, with exception of Rummel's "democide", which, by definition, is identical to "excess deaths", all other terms are applied (or not applied) selectively to each separate event. Thus, mainstream scholars do not apply the term "genocide" to famines as whole (neither in the USSR nor in China). There are two exceptions: a significant fraction of them sees the 1933 famine in some part of Ukraine as genocidal, and many scholars also consider the famine in Cambodia as a part of genocide, but almost no authors describe a famine in China as genocide. Furthermore, many scholars note that in East Asia a social division leads to separation on social groups that have some traits of ethnic groups, so any repression against a separate social group has some traits of genocide. That is specific for Asia, but not for communist states only. And so on, and so forth.

A third problem is that by listing the authors who calls MKucR as, e.g. "genocide", the section does not list those who thinks otherwise. Thus, Mann, Wheatcroft and many other scholars openly object to the attempts to characterise MKucR as genocide, and their opinion (and their rationale) should be presented, otherwise the section looks extremely biased.

A fourth problem is that the section does not explain why all those new terms are needed. Actually, the only goal this section currently serves to is to support the obscure statement in the lead. It is clear why was the term "genocide" proposed: it is a legal category (a crime), and its introduction allows prosecution of a certain type of mass killings. What other terms are needed for? The section does not describe that. Meanwhile, these explanations can be provided for "democide" (Rummel introduced it to create a mathematical model of global state violence), for "politicide" (Harff used it for her own model and the database), for "classicide" (Mann proposed it to contrast the events in communist states with genocide). However, the section does not explain that.

A fifth problem is that the section mixes scholarly terms ("genocide", "politicide", "mass killing") with polemical epithets like "Red Holocaust": this metaphor does not play any positive role in understanding of the events in communist states, it is not used by scholars (except one, who used it only in his popular book, not in peer-reviewed papers), and its usage is condemned as the Holocaust trivialisation. In addition, some terms are used almost exclusively by those authors who coined them, and some authors (e.g. Shaw) clearly say that 'ethnic cleansing', 'democide', urbicide', 'classicide' and the bizarre 'auto-genocide' and other labels do little to further our understanding. Therefore, to avoid discrediting Wikipedia, I propose to remove "Red Holocaust" (and probably "Crimes against humanity", with a reference to a single blog article with zero citations), and to explain that many authors are sceptical about invetion of various labels.

I propose to rewrite the section using the scheme that was used by Mann in his monograph. This book has a "Terminology" section, but, in contrast to this article, Mann discusses the meaning and applicability of a certain term to different instances of violence, and it groups them according to various degrees. Actually, this scheme works here too, because mass mortality (more precisely, "population losses", because most figures presented in this article are based on demographic evidences) in communist states had several components, from the excess deaths resulted from bad policy (for example, partially man made Chinese famine) to a Holocaust style mass murder (killing fields in Kampuchea). Overwhelming majority of authors (except Rummel, who calls everything "democide") apply different terms to each of those events, and we need to explain that.--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:51, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

I agree it does not belong. These terms should be introduced in the article where they arise. For example, when discussing the views of various suthors. For example, the article uses the term "Red Holocaust": 'In 2010, Steven Rosefielde stated that the "Red Holocaust" "still persists in North Korea...."' It would be better to explain what he means and how accepted his terminology is. Alternatively, we could substitute the term mass killings. TFD (talk) 01:23, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, this topic's terminology subtopic is unusual in this regard.

1&4) Rather than discussing terminology in order to define it for future reference in the same publication, sources discuss the terminology in a similar way to how this article's terminology section is used: to describe the variety of competing or alternative terms used by various academics. For some examples, see excerpts a, c, d, e, f, g, h, j, l, and m, reproduced below (it's likely you have already read these, Paul, but others may not have):

Excerpts

a) Krain 1997, pp. 331-332: "1. The literatures on state-sponsored mass murder and state terrorism have been plagued by definitional problems. Terms such as state-sponsored mass murder and state terrorism can be (and often are) easily confused and therefore need elaboration. The main difference between state-sponsored mass murder and state terrorism, for instance, is one of intentionality. The purpose behind policies of state-sponsored mass murder such as genocide or politicide is to eliminate an entire group (Gurr 1986, 67). The purpose behind policies of state terrorism is to "induce sharp fear and through that agency to effect a desired outcome in a conflict situation" (Gurr 1986, 46). The former requires mass killings to accomplish its goal. The latter's success is dependent on the persuasiveness of the fear tactics used. Mass killings may not be necessary to accomplish the particular goal." ... "2. Genocides are mass killings in which the victim group is defined by association with a particular communal group. Politicides are mass killings in which "victim groups are defined primarily in terms of their hierarchical position or political opposition to the regime and dominant groups" (Harff and Gurr 1988, 360). Interestingly, many of the instances coded by Harff and Gurr as "politicide" are considered by much of the literature to be instances of state terrorism (e.g., Argentina, Chile, El Salvador) (Lopez 1984, 63). Evidently there is some overlap between state terrorism and some kinds of state-sponsored mass murder." c) Karlsson & Schoenhals 2008: "‘Crimes against humanity’ is a linguistically and logically cumbersome term when the aim is to analyse physical violence perpetrated by individual groups, institutions and states against specific victim groups in their own country, which is essentially the case in the context of communist regimes’ crimes against humanity. In addition, it is not in keeping with the terms that have long been used by the academic community. Naturally, the work of creating an inventory includes examining the terms used in practice by researchers in their analyses, and it is reasonable to assume that every time, every society and every paradigm has its own terms to refer to the crimes of communist regimes. Nonetheless, it is possible to establish at this early stage that researchers have long used the word terror to describe the crimes of the Soviet communist regime, regardless of the framework of interpretation to which they adhere. Although the extent to which the mass operations and forced deportations of specific ethnic groups ordered by Stalin before and during the Second World War can be defined as genocide is debated, there is agreement among researchers that the term ‘terror’ is the best reflection of the development of violence in Bolshevik Russia and in the communist Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin. As a result, terror will be the term most frequently used here in analysing the Soviet communist criminal history. On the other hand, the term terror is seldom used to describe the mass killings in Cambodia between 1975 and 1979, which may be because it is less clear that the actual intention and stated motive of the Khmer Rouge was to terrorise people into submission. The term genocide, however, is relatively widely accepted and established in describing the systematic and selective crimes of the communist regime in Cambodia, although the use of this term is not entirely uncontroversial. Therefore, in analysing the criminal history of Cambodia, this term will be used in precise contexts dealing with the killing of a category of people, whereas more neutral terms such as mass killing and massacre are used to refer to the general use of violence. The terminology used in the Chinese criminal history is dealt with in detail as part of the section on China." ... "In the Soviet case, as Klas-Göran Karlsson so rightly notes, there is an ‘established term’ for the crimes of the regime, namely ‘terror’ – and this is used almost regardless of the general frameworks of interpretation employed by individual researchers. In the same way, he notes that ‘the term genocide is established and accepted as a description of the crimes of the Khmer Rouge’. In the case of the People’s Republic of China, however, there are no equivalent terms that are accepted or generally established in the academic community and that can be made use of in a research inventory. Bibliographies and search engines all speak their own clear language: those who carried out research on Maoism in its day made very limited use of words such as terror and genocide, and neither do these terms appear among the key terms that carry implicit clear explanations and are therefore regularly used by current foreign and Chinese historians." d) Semelin 2009, p. 318: "'Classicide', in counterpoint to genocide, has a certain appeal, but it doesn't convey the fact that communist regimes, beyond their intention of destroying 'classes' - a difficult notion to grasp in itself (what exactly is a 'kulak'?) - end up making political suspicion a rule of government: even within the Party (and perhaps even mainly within the Party). The notion of 'fratricide' is probably more appropriate in this regard. That of 'politicide', which Ted Gurr and Barbara Harff suggest, remains the most intelligent, although it implies by contrast that 'genocide' is not 'political', which is debatable. These authors in effect explain that the aim of politicide is to impose total political domination over a group or a government. Its victims are defined by their position in the social hierarchy or their political opposition to the regime or this dominant group. Such an approach applies well to the political violence of communist powers and more particularly to Pol Pot's Democratic Kampuchea. The French historian Henri Locard in fact emphasises this, identifying with Gurr and Harff's approach in his work on Cambodia. However, the term 'politicide' has little currency among some researchers because it has no legal validity in international law. That is one reason why Jean-Louis Margolin tends to recognise what happened in Cambodia as 'genocide' because, as he points out, to speak of 'politicide' amounts to considering Pol Pot's crimes as less grave than those of Hitler. Again, the weight of justice interferes in the debate about concepts that, once again, argue strongly in favour of using the word genocide. But those so concerned about the issue of legal sanctions should also take into account another legal concept that is just as powerful, and better established: that of crime against humanity. In fact, legal scholars such as Antoine Garapon and David Boyle believe that the violence perpetrated by the Khmer Rouge is much more appropriately categorised under the heading of crime against humanity, even if genocidal tendencies can be identified, particularly against the Muslim minority. This accusation is just as serious as that of genocide (the latter moreover being sometimes considered as a subcategory of the former) and should thus be subject to equally severe sentences. I quite agree with these legal scholars, believing that the notion of 'crime against humanity' is generally better suited to the violence perpetrated by communist regimes, a viewpoint shared by Michael Mann." e) Weiss-Wendt 2008, p. 42: "The field of comparative genocide studies has grown beyond recognition over the past two decades, though more quantitatively than qualitatively. On the surface, everything looks good: the number of books on genocide has triple within less than a decade; the field of comparative genocide studies has its own professional association and journals; more and more colleges and universities offer courses on genocide; several research institutions dedicated to the study of genocide have been established. If we are talking numbers, comparative genocide studies are indeed a success. Upon closer examination, however, genocide scholarship is ridden with contradictions. There is barely any other field of study that enjoys so little consensus on defining principles such as definition of genocide, typology, application of a comparative method, and timeframe. Considering that scholars have always put stress on prevention of genocide, comparative genocide studies have been a failure. Paradoxically, nobody has attempted so far to assess the field of comparative genocide studies as a whole. This is one of the reasons why those who define themselves as genocide scholars have not been able to detect the situation of crisis." f) Williams 2008: "A vital element of the evolution of genocide studies is the increased attention devoted to the mass killing of groups not primarily defined by ethnic or religious identities. Most vulnerable minorities around the world had been so defined when Lemkin was crafting his genocide framework, and when UN member states were drafting the Genocide Convention. Such groups continued to be targeted in the post-Second World War period, as in East Pakistan/ Bangladesh in 1971, or Guatemala between 1978 and 1984. But it became increasingly apparent that political groups were on the receiving end of some of the worst campaigns of mass killing, such as the devastating assault on the Indonesian Communist Party in 1965—1966 (with half a million to one million killed), and the brutal campaigns by Latin American and Asian military regimes against perceived dissidents in the 1970s and 1980s. One result of this re-evaluation was that the mass killing by the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia between 1975 and 1978, previously ruled out as genocide or designated an 'auto-genocide' because most victims belonged to the same ethnic-Khmer group as their killers, came to be accepted as a classic instance of twentieth-century genocide. Detailed investigations were also launched into the hecatombs of casualties inflicted under Leninism and Stalinism in the post-revolutionary Soviet Union, and by Mao Zedong's communists in China. In both of these cases—and to some degree in Cambodia as well—the majority of deaths resulted not from direct execution, but from the infliction of 'conditions of life calculated to bring about [the] physical destruction' of a group, in the language of Article II(c) of the Genocide Convention. In particular, the devastating famines that struck the Ukraine and other minority regions of the USSR in the early 1930s, and the even greater death-toll—numbering tens of millions—caused by famine during Mao's 'Great Leap Forward' (1958—1962), were increasingly, though not uncontroversially, depicted as instances of mass killing underpinned by genocidal intent." g) Wayman & Tago 2009, pp. 1-17: "The two important scholars who have created datasets related to this are Rummel (1995) and Harff (2003). Harff (sometimes with Gurr) has studied what she terms 'genocide and politicide', defined to be genocide by killing as understood by the Genocide Convention plus the killing of a political or economic group (Harff & Gurr, 1988); the combined list of genocides is sometimes labeled 'geno-politicide' for short. Rummel (1994, 1995) has a very similar concept, 'democide', which includes such genocide and geno-politicide done by the government forces, plus other killing by government forces, such as random killing not targeted at a particular group. As Rummel (1995: 3-4) says, 'Cold-blooded government killing ... extends beyond genocide'; For example, 'shooting political opponents; or murdering by quota'. Hence, 'to cover all such murder as well as genocide and politicide, I use the concept democide. This is the intentional killing of people by government' (Rummel, 1995: 4). So Rummel has a broader concept than geno-politicide, but one that seems to include geno-politicide as a proper subset." h) Midlarsky 2005, pp. 22, 309, 310: "I distinguish between genocide as the systematic mass murder of people based on ethnoreligious identity, and politicide as the large-scale killing of designated enemies of the state based on socioeconomic or political criteria. Although genocide can be understood to be a species of politicide (but not the converse), in practice, genocidal (i.e., ethnoreligious) killings tap into much deeper historical roots of the human condition. In this distinction, I follow Harff and Gurr 1988, 360." ... "Turning to Cambodia, the mass killings in that country during Pol Pot's murderous regime are often characterized with other seemingly identical circumstances. Cambodia and Rwanda, for example, are typically treated as genocides that differ little from each other in essential characteristics. However, the victimization rates for the two countries are similar only when treated as proportions of the total country population systematically murdered. Although the mass murders in Cambodia are frequently characterized as genocide, I argue that in fact genocidal activity was only a small proportion of the killing and that the vast majority of Cambodians died in a politicide, substantially different in origin from the genocides we have been examining. The matter of etiology lies at the root of my distinction here, not definitional semantics. If we lump the Cambodian case other instances of systematized mass murder, then the sources of all of them become hopelessly muddled." ... "Essentially, I argue that genocides stem from a primitive identification of the "collective enemy" in Carl Schmitt's sense, whereas politicides, at least of the Cambodian variety, are attributable to more detailed ideological considerations. Further, the Cambodian case falls under the rubric of state killings, having a particular affinity with earlier practices in the Soviet Union and China. Indeed, an arc of Communist politicide can be traced from the western portions of the Soviet Union to China and on to Cambodia. Not all Communist states participated in extensive politicide, but the particular circumstances of Cambodia in 1975 lent themselves to the commission of systematic mass murder. Because an element of Cambodian state insecurity existed in this period, especially vis-à-vis Vietnam, a genocidal element is found in the killing of non-Khmer peoples such as the Vietnamese, who comprised a small proportion of the total." j) Staub 2011, p. 100: "In contrast to genocide, I see mass killing as 'killing (or in other ways destroying) members of a group without the intention to eliminate the whole group, or killing large numbers of people' without a focus on group membership." l) Wayman & Tago 2009, pp. 1-17: "Our term, 'mass killing', is used by Valentino (2004: 10), who aptly defines it as 'the intentional killing of a massive number of noncombatants'. The word 'noncombatants' distinguishes mass killing from battle-deaths in war, which occur as combatants fight against each other. The 'massive number' he selects as the threshold to mass killing is 'at least fifty thousand intentional deaths over the course of five or fewer years' (Valentino, 2004: 11-12), which of course averages to at least 10,000 killed per year." ... " One reason for selecting these thresholds of 10,000 and 1,000 deaths per year is that we find that in the Harff data on geno-politicide, which are one of our key datasets, there are many cases of over 10,000 killed per year, but also some in which between 1,000 and 10,000 are killed per year. Therefore, analyzing at a 1,000-death threshold (as well as the 10,000 threshold) insures the inclusion of all the Harff cases. Valentino chooses 50,000 over five years as 'to some extent arbitrary', but a 'relatively high threshold' to create high confidence that mass killing did occur and was deliberate, 'given the generally poor quality of the data available on civilian fatalities' (Valentino, 2004: 12). We believe that our similar results, when we lower the threshold to 1,000 killed per year, are an indication that the data in Harff and in Rummel remain reliable down even one power of ten below Valentino's 'relatively high' selected threshold, and we hope that, in that sense, our results can be seen as a friendly amendment to his work, and that they basically lend confidence, based on empirical statistical backing, for the conceptual direction which he elected to take." ... "Within that constant research design, we then showed that the differences were not due to threshold either (over 10,000 killed per year; over 1,000; or over 1). The only remaining difference is the measure of mass killing itself - democide vs. geno-politicide." m) Semelin 2009, p. 37: "Mann thus establishes a sort of parallel between racial enemies and class enemies, thereby contributing to the debates on comparisons between Nazism and communism. This theory has also been developed by some French historians such as Stéphane Courtois and Jean-Louis Margolin in The Black Book of Communism: they view class genocide as the equivalent to racial genocide. Mann however refuses to use the term 'genocide' to describe the crimes committed under communism. He prefers the terms 'fratricide' and 'classicide', a word he coined to refer to intentional mass killings of entire social classes."

The role of the terminology section in this article is two-fold: to reflect the reliable sources, per WP:BALANCE and WP:IMPARTIAL, and to inform readers of the other terms used. This second reason is particularly important because we are using a descriptive title readers may not be looking for (which was necessary due to the lack of a consensus among the sources on the best term to use).

2) This sounds like something you could clarify by adding additional sourced statements. Nothing is perfect, and the article will always be a work in progress. But please edit the section in a way that does not prioritize one reliable source over another. Where there are disputes among the sources, we should describe them.

3) Those who think otherwise would be included for the term they use, we should not list all the sources that do not use a term as part of that term's text.

5) Wikipedia's standard for reliable sources does not restrict itself to academic sources and that is the standard for inclusion that we must follow.

6) We should avoid trying to synthesize this variety into something more coherent than it is among the reliable sources. Using Mann's book as the basis for the section would give undue weight to his opinions on which terms are appropriate and which ones are not. Since there is no consensus among the sources on the best term, it is most neutral to include them all. We should, of course, include any criticism that has been published in reliable sources as well. I don't think we can say what they "overwhelming majority" say without something solid to back that up. My reading has left me with the impression that there is no consensus for the best term, and Valentino says that explicitly (excerpt b: Valentino 2005, p. 9: "Mass killing and Genocide. No generally accepted terminology exists to describe the intentional killing of large numbers of noncombatants."). AmateurEditor (talk) 03:14, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

How does it help readers to explain the term "red holocaust" and say it is rarely used? It seems self-explanatory anyway, hence needs no explanation. In fact it isn't even defined, which is unusual for a terminology section. TFD (talk) 03:53, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

@AmateurEditor. Re 5. Yes, Wikipedia standards do not prohibit usage of non-academic sources. However, this section tells about scholarly terms. We must clearly separate terminology from allegory (the words that are used to explain from the words that are used to condemn). Thus, introduction of the word "genocide" or "politicide" helps scholar to understand something about the events these words describe. In contrast, the words like "Red Holocaust" carry just an emotional load. I suggest to remove all non-scholaraly sources: if some journalist calls MKucR "Red Cannibalism" it can hardly be considered a scholarly term (although meets WP:V). In connection to that, "Red Holocaust" should be removed (the only scholarly sources that discuss it condemn its usage). "Crimes against humanity under communist regimes" was introduced in the review published in some blog (with no citations in google scholar), so it also should be removed. Other non-scholarly sources should be removed too. All mentions of state organisations or NGOs should be removed too: let's limit with terminology sensu stricto. the terms "Crimes against humanity" or "Red Holocaust" belongs to the section about the attempt to condemn the crimes of communist regimes.

I agree we should avoid synthesis. To this end, it should be clearly explained that overwhelming majority of authors cited it this section do not focus on MKucR. Actually, they even do not attempt to propose any comprehensive term for MKucR, because do not see MKucR as a single category.

Thus, Wheatcroft speaks only about Soviet Union. However, the term "repressions" he (as well as all historians of Stalinism) does not even refer to mass killings only, and different scholars applied it to different parts of mass killings. Per Ellman, the term "repressions" is very vague, it includes both lethal and non-lethal actions. Wheatcroft does put collectivisation and dekulakisation deaths (especially, famine) into the "mass killings" category, however, in his view, repressions victims include survived Gulag prisoners.

Another example is Harff. Her global database of genocides and politicides does not include majority of the events Valentino sees as "Communist mass killing" (it starts from 1955, so it does not cover USSR, however, Chinese famine is not included, and that reflects majority views). Exclusion of Chinese famine only immediately decreases the scale of describing events by more than a half.

Obviously, if we decided to explain what terms was used for MKucR, we also have to list the events that are beyond the scope of the proposed terminology, and to tell the reason of that. We also should explain the views of those who think otherwise.

In connection to that, the section should clearly explain who exactly applied which term to which event. Only few authors tried to apply "genocide" to all MKucR, and they should be listed. Others applied it only to Cambodia (the least controversial case), many author applied it to the 1933 famine in some parts of Ukraine (it is known there as Holodomor). All other events are called "genocide" very rarely, and we must explain that.

Semelin's, Mann's etc theorisings should be explained, however, the terminology used by country experts must be described too. Thus, I think it is necessary to make Cambodia, PRC and USSR sections, and explain what terms are used by numerous historians working in these fields. If different terms are used for different events, that must be explained.

That is exactly what we need to get rid of synthesis (which is currently present in this section).--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:02, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

The section is not restricted to scholarly sources any more than the article as a whole is. About the hypothetical example "Red Cannibalism", lets cross that bridge when we come to it. Polemical terms can be notable as well. In fact, they sometimes become the commonly used term for a topic (such as Boston Massacre). I suspect that some oddball journalist using the term would not be considered a reliable source, but if he were, then it actually ought to be included, along with any criticism from other reliable sources that it has received. The use of "Holocaust" for this topic may be an example of this already, but it has definitely been used in a significant way by multiple sources, including academics, and is tied to an academic dispute about the "double genocide theory", apparently. It is appropriate that the criticism is also included and appropriately referenced. I don't know what blog you are referring to about "Crimes against humanity under communist regimes", but there are academics who prefer that term among the current references. If you believe that this is a fringe topic that the majority of scholars reject, then that can be added to the article only if you can support it with direct reference to reliable sources. We cannot assume to know why such-and-such scholar chooses not to study or address any particular topic. Please note that Michael Mann, who you wanted to use to structure things, says (excerpt ab) "All accounts of 20th-century mass murder include the Communist regimes. Some call their deeds genocide, though I shall not." This strongly suggests that the topic is mainstream, rather than fringe, but you are free to present alternate sources. Those alternate sources, however, should positively state your conclusion so that we do not have to interpret why they choose not to say something, which would be original research on our part. I agree that the individuals who used the different terms and how should be explicit in the section. About the terminology used by country experts being included in country-specific sections, I have no objection in principle. AmateurEditor (talk) 02:55, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

AmateurEditor, I disagree. The very name of the section implies some academism. That means each term introduced in this section is supposed to increase our understanding of the subject. Any terms that are used for polemical, political or similar purposes must be clearly separated from scholarly terms. If some journalist or political organisation introduces some word, we must clearly explain the context. For example, if the term is proposed by an anti-communist political organisation, that should be explained clearly. In addition, we should separate universally accepted terms and the terms that are not used widely. Thus, Fein writes about "comminist genocides and 'democide'" (in quotation marks) implying that "democide" has not become an established scholarly term, and is used mostly by Rummel himself.

Second, the whole section is a big logical fallacy. It names the terms, but it does not explain to which events has this term been applied, thereby creating an absolutely false impression that these scholars are trying to propose a better term for Valentino's 70+ million victims. In actuality, this is a worst example of lye. For example, the text says: "Professor Barbara Harff studies "genocide and politicide", sometimes shortened as geno-politicide, in order to include the killing of political, economic, ethnic, and cultural groups," which is correct. However, if one takes a look at the list of Harff's "genocides and politicides", it is easy to see that Harff studies mostly non-communist politicides. In other words, the section creates an absolutely false impression that Harff was trying to propose some terminology of MKucR, although it is absolutely clear she is not separating the events in communist states from other geno/politicides, and the events in communist countries are not the focus of her study. This is just one example of cherry-picking that is intended to mislead a reader by creating an absolutely false impression that the subject (MKucR) is seen by genocide scholars as a separate and notable topic. (I believe, we agree that country experts do not see it as a separate topic).--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:20, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

The quote from Mann is somewhat misleading. He actually states that some communist regimes committed some number of mass murders that are considered as genocide. This statement is absolutely indisputable, because we know at least about one communist mass killing that is recognized as genocide almost universally ("there is at least one sheep in New Zealand that is black at least from one side"). Moreover, I can agree that there was some connection between some mass killings in different communist states, and it might be correct to analyze them in connection to each other. However, that does not mean that each author cited in the Terminology section speaks about the same events. Thus, Rummel claims all excess deaths in the USSR was "democide", and it includes some 6 million deaths in post-Stalin USSR (which is totally ridiculous: his calculations are based on some obsolete data on prisoner population multiplied by annual mortality, which was a product of his own speculations; the fact that several million people were killed in the USSR after 1953 is a totally fringe view, but this figure is implicitly present in this article as a part of Rummel's estimates). Anyway, the article cites Rummel's view that there was 60 million "democide" in the USSR. Then it cites Mann's view that that was not genocide but "classicide". Formally, both statements are correct and attributable to reliable source. However, these two authors are not talking about the same event. Rummel speaks about some unstopping killing machine that was continuously destroying the population of its own country during a 70 years period. Mann speaks about some separate events that happened during some separate periods of time and had some limited scale. Although Mann cites the figure of 6-7 million victims of 1933 famine, he attributes it to mistakes of the Stalinist policy, and does not apply the term "classicide" or "genocide" (or other "-side") to it. He definitely considers famines, as well as some other deaths, as a separate topic (I mean, separate from "classicide"), but the article doesn't make it clear. The article directly misleads people. By the way, the very title of the Mann's book implies that Mann sees mass killings (he is mostly focused on ethnic violence) as a result of democratic transformations that occurred globally in XX century. Interestingly, this article prefers comfortably ignore this thesis. Instead, selectively cited Mann is used to support views of Rummel. If it is not a lie than what is a lie?--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:11, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

The only solution would be to clearly explain which term was applied to what event and by whom. --Paul Siebert (talk) 15:43, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

Actually the solution is status quo ante and not worry about the exceedingly long posts on the talk page. Once the post gets too long, it is clear it will not get consensus support, historically. Collect (talk) 17:45, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

Collect, this is just a part of a long discussion between AmateurEditor and me that started on his talk page. We are discussing possible ways to improve the article because many sources are represented incorrectly and some are ignored almost completely. I encourage you to read in full it before making comments of that kind.

In addition to that, please, keep in mind that we are discussing several questions in parallel. The post does not look exceedingly long if one focuses at one question and (temporarily) ignores others. Do you have any specific comment on some separate questions raised in our discussion?.--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:52, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

Paul Siebert, as I understand you, you see troubling implications that are hinted at and go unrefuted in the article but you don't feel you can fix them on your own (presumably this can't be resolved by changing the name of the Terminology section). If so, then you are right to bring it here for discussion, but your language to describe the issues is full of vague value judgments and unfalsifiable interpretations ("...implies...", "...polemical, political or similar purposes...", "...should be explained clearly...", "...universally accepted...", "... not used widely...", "...implying...", "...established scholarly term...", "...creating an absolutely false impression...", "...worst example of lie...", "...intended to mislead a reader...", "...somewhat misleading...", "...the very title of the Mann's book implies..."). Part of this I think could be solved by you adding what balance or additional clarifying statements you believe to be missing. As long as you do so with solid references to reliable sources (that rely on a literal reading of those references), I don't think anyone would have a problem with that. I certainly would not. Beyond that general point, there are a couple more specific responses I want to make.

1) You said "I believe, we agree that country experts do not see it as a separate topic". No, I repeatedly stated in our discussion on my talk page that we cannot assume to know what people think outside of what they explicitly say, and I stand by that. I do not agree that, because a scholar chooses to study an event in a single country without reference to the wider phenomenon, he rejects the idea of the wider phenomenon. As I said before, another explanation is that the wider phenomenon is simply outside the scope of his interest.

2) About different authors including different events, this is primarily related to the famine debate and we have an entire section of the article about that already, as we should. Different sources/terms do not all have to include all famine deaths or all exclude those deaths in order for them to all be discussing/be applied to the same topic.

3) About this being a continuation of the discussion on my talk page, I thought that was primarily about the Estimates section and your proposal to include a table of estimates from more specialized single country sources. AmateurEditor (talk) 03:40, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Re 1. Yes, sometimes, the conclusions that we make based on what the sources say are pretty obvious, but we cannot write that, because the sources do not say that directly. Thus, Wheatcroft, Ellman, Davis and Getty are focused on Stalinist repressions, they never mention Communist ideology and see no parallelism with other communist states, however, this fact is insufficient to write in the article that they do not support ideas of Courtois (although they definitely don't). Moreover, whereas it would be absolutely correct to conclude that they ignore Courtois, we cannot write even that: they really ignore Courtois, which means they do not write about him at all. Note, I am perfectly aware of this problem.

However, it seems you don't understand that it would be equally incorrect organise the article in the way that may lead a reader to wrong conclusion. Thus, no evidences have been provided that the views expressed by Courtois, Rummel or Valentino are shared by numerous country experts, so we must do our best to avoid creating an absolutely false impression that country experts use theories of Rummel, Valentino, Malia or Courtois in their work, and that their explanations of these events are based on these theories. In reality, they propose their own explanations, and they are totally different from what Courtois or Rummel say.

This problem can be solved by choosing correct article's structure. These two examples demonstrate bad and good way to arganise text. The bad version is as follows:

Rummel proposed a concept of "democide" that was specific to all totalitarian states and had roots in ideology and concentration of power. "Democide" killed people through direct executions, murder, famine, disease, overwork.

Wheatcroft described mass killings in the USSR as "repressions", whereas Maksudov speaks about "demographic catastrophes".

Kiernan notes that Cambodian genocide had roots in Cambodia's colonial past

Vincent and Dulic note that Rummel's statistical approach has serious flaws."

From that text, a reader may conclude that Rummel proposed some general theory that has been accepted by Wheatcroft, Maksudov and Kiernan, who are working within that paradigm and identified some additional specific features in their countries of interest. Some authors contest Rummel's conclusions because they found some flaws in Rummel's methodology, but they represent minority views. That is a conclusion a reader draws from this text. However, we have absolutely no ground to claim Wheatcroft, Maksudov and Kiernan are working within the paradigm that was set by Rummel. They never wrote about that. In other words, this text is deeply misleading, although each separate statement is correct. However, if we reorganise this text in this way, the problem is resolved. An adequate text contains the same statements organised in different order:

Wheatcroft described mass killings in the USSR as "repressions", whereas Maksudov speaks about "demographic catastrophes".

Kiernan notes that Cambodian genocide had roots in Cambodia's colonial past

Rummel proposed a concept of "democide" that was specific to all totalitarian states and had roots in ideology and concentration of power. "Democide" killed people through direct executions, murder, famine, disease, overwork.

Vincent and Dulic note that Rummel's statistical approach has serious flaws."

See, everything becomes absolutely correct: yes, country experts are studying their countries of interest, and they propose their own explanations. Rummel tries to do some generalisations (and the text does not create an impression that country experts are working under auspices of Rummel's theory), and the criticism of his theory has been duly represented. That is exactly what happens in reality. (Of course, this text is very primitive, it describes a very oversimplified situation, I deliberately did that to demonstrate my point)

I believe I have been able to explain you my point.--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:22, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Re 2. No, it has relation not only to famines (and the very title of the "Famine debates" section is misleading: there is only one famine (Holodomor) that is a subject of debates; all other famines (Volga famine, post WWII Soviet famine, Chinese famine) are not considered mass killing or genocide by overwhelming majority of scholars, and Kampuchean famine is considered a part of genocide). Thus, civil wars are not considered mass killings/-cides by most authors. Prison camp mortality and forced labor also are not considered as mass killings.

Again, the descriptive approach (see above) will allow us to avoid unjustified generalisations. Like you, I am also want to avoid original research, but I also keep in mind the problem of giving undue weight to few theories proposed by a small fraction of authors, which are not shared by majority of scholars.--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:36, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

The same can be said more briefly: the works of the authors writing about specific subjects can be presented in a context of more general theories only when these theories are universally accepted by country experts, or these authors make explicit reference to these general theories; otherwise, the works of country experts and general theorists should be presented separately: the text must clearly separate the facts and conclusions presented by country experts from attempted generalisations made by genocide scholars.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:41, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

1) "See, everything becomes absolutely correct: yes, country experts are studying their countries of interest, and they propose their own explanations. Rummel tries to do some generalisations..." But in your example of the correct way to do things (granting that it is just a rough example), you are not stating Wheatcroft's and Maksudov's explanations, you are stating terms they use. Then you switch subjects to an explanation from Kiernan, then you switch back to a term from Rummel that you believe to be an explanation (but isn't). Then you switch to technical criticism of Rummel's statistics. Being more critical of this example, I would tell you that Wheatcroft uses "mass killing" in his publications, not just "repressions" (which includes mass killing), Maksudov's term "demographic catastrophes" appears to be a one-off turn of phrase, rather than any kind of term he uses repeatedly to define something, your definition of "democide" is wrong (it is just murder by a government of any kind, see here, and not a theory of totalitarianism), and Vincent and Dulic's note about statistics methods is only relevant to estimates, not to terms or theories.

I understand you wanting to put the most accurate sources first (although if we knew which were most accurate, why would we bother with any others to begin with), but Wikipedia has no basis for determining accuracy (and neither do we), it only cares about verifiability of content from what it defines as reliable sources and the popularity of that content among the reliable sources. It makes some sense that the country-specific specialists would have the most precise or perhaps the most up-to-date numbers (ignoring that they can and do disagree with each other and that any publication can become out of date over time), but it does not make sense to use country-specific specialists for explanations when they don't actually have them (Wheatcroft seems focused on what happened, i.e. the numbers, not why) or putting them ahead of reliable sources that directly speak to the article's topic in whole, especially when the broader reliable sources are themselves based upon country-specific sources already. You appear to be prioritizing these academic sources because they resonate with what you believe to be True, rather than them being more mainstream or popular in academic circles. Without an evident consensus among the sources, which is the situation we are in, we need an objective way to organize them that does not depend on our own personal preferences. Chronological order is the obvious answer, which is what the article tries to do currently. This is not an objection to including single-country sources, but it is an objection to putting them first because they are single-country sources.

2) "...civil wars are not considered mass killings/-cides by most authors. Prison camp mortality and forced labor also are not considered as mass killings." I believe that all the estimates included here are of the murder/manslaughter type (that is, intentional killing of noncombatants directly or intentional killing of noncombatants indirectly through conditions that would reasonably result in death), but correct me if I am wrong. About the famine section being misleading because it is or should be only about the Holodomor, that is not true. The section right now contains sourced statements of wider debates that include other famines as well.

3) Weren't you going to try adding a table of single-country source estimates? AmateurEditor (talk) 05:03, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Re 3. Yes, but it may take a significant amount of work, and I would like to make sure I will not be reverted. I already did that once (it was not a table, but something of that kind), but the text was mauled and moved elsewhere.

Re 2. If you are talking about Courtois, he includes not only famines, he also attributes all civil war victims (from both sides) to Communism. Rummel includes de facto all excess death resulted from government's policy (e.g. resulted from good faith strategic blunders) to the "democide" death toll. Look at the Harff's "genocides and politicides" table and tell me what part of Courtois' "Communist death toll" is included there? Actually, all authors who calculated a total "Communist death toll" (Courtois, Rummel, Rosefielde) do that assuming all famines, camp mortality, etc were the result of a calculated policy of the regimes. Meanwhile, the authors who consider, e.g. Chinese famine partially man made but non-intentional do not bother to calculate their own "communist death toll" figures, because they consider the very subject non-existing. The exception is Valentino, who provides a range. However, even he does not explain the origin of the difference between 20 and 70 million: the actual difference is not because the figures are not available but because different authors interpret figures differently. Thus, a current consensus is 15-30 million died during the famine. However, there is no consensus that the famine victims were the victims of "Communist mass killings". Just read the specialised articles, and you will see that country experts put no more responsibility on Mao for the Great famine than on Churchill for the Bengal famine.

Re 1. AmateurEditor, my example is totally artificial, that is not a draft of the text, so your main criticism is both correct and irrelevant. What is important is your misunderstanding of the main point. You write "I understand you wanting to put the most accurate sources first ", and this your understanding of my words is wrong. The problem (and possible solution) is as follows:

We have two groups of authors. The group A studies individual countries, they produce data, provides their own explanations of the events in each country (separately), and they totally ignore the authors from the group B. The group B performs no study of each separate country, they use the works of the group A authors, and they make their own general statements about the subject as whole. If we describe the general views of the group B authors first, and then provide country-specific details from the works authored by the group A scholars, we create an absolutely wrong impression that the group A is working within a paradigm defined by the group B. However, if we present the views of the group A first and add later that some authors (group B) proposed some generalisation, this description would be correct, and a reader would not be mislead.

--Paul Siebert (talk) 14:48, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Just one more thing

I have taken the time to read the article. Good job, the editors have created a reliable and credible article based on sources in the English language. As Columbo would say just one more thing,the Russian government today does not like to see this topic discussed. Best keep an eye on the article, ballbusters in Russia might try to gangbang it. --Woogie 10w 22:17, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Just one more thing, the mass killing figures are hypothetical, the official vital statistics in the Soviet Union (1927-53) for live births and natural deaths are fragmentary. Historians push a POV by manipulating the estimated vital statistics. I disagree when you say "peer reviewed" because only demographers or others who specialize in numerical analysis should be considered peers capable of reviewing numerical data. Grover Furr and Rudolph Rummel are academic sources that push a political POV. They are both numerical illiterates who disregard and dismiss demographic analysis. The mass killings article should include a section on demographic analysis. I just recieved Demographic trends and patterns in the Soviet Union before 1991, edited by Wolfgang Lutz, Sergei Scherbov, and Andrei Volkov. This is a reliable source that I am reading. --Woogie 10w 12:53, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Woogie, you will be surprised, but the data published by Rummel have not passed a peer-review procedure. That means you just confirm what I say: peer-review filter is working fine.

Actually, I disagree with your words about Rummel. He was a good researcher, but his contribution is greatly misunderstood and misinterpreted. He never tried to produce accurate data, and he had never be interested in going into details. His approach can be summarised as follows:

"We need to know how many people were killed by each regime to perform statistical analysis and find correlations between regime's type and violence. To do that, we need a reliable statistics. Let's take all available data, define all excess domestic deaths as "democide" and calculate a median value of deaths caused by each regime based on the all sources available. We know some sources are unreliable, but, assuming that they are equally unreliable for each regime, our approach can provide us with a satisfactory data set for our calculations."

This approach was absolutely correct, and the introduction of factor analysis in the study of violence was a significant step in our understanding of that subject. However, when we are using Rummel's data we must keep in mind their limitations. Their accuracy strongly depends on the initial data set. Thus, his estimates of Cambodia deaths were astonishingly accurate, but his estimates of deaths in the USSR is a total bullshit. The reason is that accurate data for Cambodia were available to Rummel already in late 70s, whereas only rough estimates for the USSR were available by that time.

The only problems with Rummel are: (i) his refusal to take into account fresh archival data for the USSR; (ii) his ahistorism (he attributes deaths only to the current regime and ignores a historical context; (iii) his obsession with statistics (correlation does not mean causation).

To summarise, Rummel can and should be used in the article, but his views should be represented duly, without giving too much weight.--Paul Siebert (talk) 14:25, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul, peer-review procedure by whom? other numerical illiterates. Synder and Wheatcroft cherrypick statistics from various sources that they do not tie into a population analysis,it is amazing that their estimates are regurgitated without question. ADK in Russia however does provide a detailed credible population analysis. At least Rosefielde provides a detailed explanation of how he derived his figures. Rummel took numerous English language sources and came up with a range of losses from high to low, he estimated a mid point which he hangs his hat on. We can see in black and white Rummels sources, his analysis tells us that the widely cited "reliable sources" of the cold war era are as soft as shit. Wheatcroft for example claims 5.7 million famine dead based on "the Lormier corrections" He does not tell us that Lormier maintained that his 1946 population model was hypothetical. Just one more thing if your broker sent you a statement with a beginning and ending balance with no listing of the detailed activity, what would you do? I would confront the guy and say Ehi,where's the rest? [4] --Woogie 10w 17:20, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Woogie, I am not sure I fully understand you. I agree with your opinion about Rummel, although the problem with his estimates not only in the Cold era sources, but because in a situation when a median is taken from the data that are limited by zero at the low side and have no limit at the high side will inevitable lead to the final figure that is skewed to a high side. That means not only the data are lousy, the very procedure id flawed.

However, I do not understand your criticism of Wheatcroft or Snyder. They separate killing from population losses. For example, both Rosefielde and Maksudov independently came to a conclusion that there was a serious demographic catastrophe in 1990s Russia. Does it fall into a "democratic mass killing" category? They don't say that. Hovewer, Maksudov applies the term "demographic catastrophe" to 1990s population decline, to 1932-33, to 1941-47. In other words, we must clearly explain that population losses and mass killings are seen as two different categories by majority of scholars.

In other words, I think Snyder or Wheatcroft do not cherry-pick statistics, they select those data that seem relevant to the subject of their study.

By the way, you criticise them all, but who, in your opinion, is a good source for population dynamics? ADK?--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:26, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul please do not misunderstand me, I am not trolling here. My remarks off the cuff can be a bit flippant at times, for that I apologize. My objective is to made editors think in terms of a total population base and how the human losses are allocated. Snyder and Wheatcroft pontificate and expect that readers accept their statistics without question. We need first to understand the population dynamics of the Soviet Union before we judge the data in Snyder and Wheatcroft. Maksudov and ADK however provide a demographic overview and then discuss the unnatural deaths due to famines, repression and the war. As editors we use only reliable sources, Snyder and Wheatcroft are reliable but we can contrast them with Maksudov and ADK who analyze the unnatural deaths in the context of the entire population. --Woogie 10w 19:57, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Maksudov [5]----ADK [6] Google translate does a decent job for us. --Woogie 10w 20:03, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

I think I understand your point well: you say that demographic data set a high limit for mass killing estimates, so any Rummel's claim about 60+ million "democide" in the USSR is not confirmed by modern demographical data. With regard to ADK&Maksudov vs Wheatcroft&Snyder, I don't see much contradiction between them when we talk about, e.g. the 1933 famine. If I understand correct the population losses were about 5 million, according to ADK, right?--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:36, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Where does ADK say famine deaths were 5 million?--Woogie 10w 03:23, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

ADK, page 48, table 18. Actually, the natural growth was -5.5 million, but partially due to a decline of a birth rate. I During other years, the table shows a normal population growth.--Paul Siebert (talk) 03:57, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Interesting, ADK cite UNO's prognosis for life prospective life expectancy in USSR for 2005-7 (it was made in 1988, noone expected USSR would dissolve in 3 years). They predicted life expectancy would be 70.4/78.2 (World Population Prospcets. 1988. N.Y. I9H9, V. 555). I am just wondering if modern Marxists tried to attribute a decline of life expectancy in post-Soviet states (which is far lower that these UNO figures) to democratic transformations? Can we consider them "mass killing under capitalist regimes"? Of course, I am not serious, I just want to demonstrate how ridiculous some claims of Rummel&Co are.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:36, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

I think this piece of text should be removed from the article:

"R.J. Rummel wrote in 1993 that "Even were we to have total access to all communist archives we still would not be able to calculate precisely how many the communists murdered. Consider that even in spite of the archival statistics and detailed reports of survivors, the best experts still disagree by over 40 percent on the total number of Jews killed by the Nazis. We cannot expect near this accuracy for the victims of communism. We can, however, get a probable order of magnitude and a relative approximation of these deaths within a most likely range." "

This statement belongs to the author who never did any archival research and worked with secondary sources only. He was not a demographer either. That means this is his personal opinion, and it is relevant only to the discussion of his own estimates. Any objections?--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:50, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul, when you say archival research, the archives in Russia since 1991 are not fully open. Zmeskov and the other researchers were given selected files to work with. In the case of military casualties the archival material in the Krivosheev report has been criticized as being incomplete. Wheatcroft considers only those convicted and sent to prison or executed, c.3-4 million . Rosefielde has his own hypothetical model that takes into account his estimate of 10 million additional lives lost due to Stalinist policies. Rummel may be also including a hypothetical figure children not born. --Woogie 10w (talk) 14:31, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Historians always are dealing with incomplete data. That is a part of normal historian's job (in the same sense as working with noisy data is a part of physicist's job). However, even incomplete archival data provide much more information than just indirect estimates.

By the way, do you agree that total Russian/Soviet population losses in XX century (including both World Wars) were significantly smaller than Rummel's median estimate of "Communist democide"?--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:42, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

ADK have given us their estimate of Russian/Soviet population losses in XX century based on an analysis of the population(births & natural deaths) that indicates 38 million unnatural deaths. 27 million in the war(18 million killed,8 million famine), 7 million 1933 famine dead, 1 million 1947 famine deaths and 3 million archival repression deaths. If one manipulates the figures of births & natural deaths, as Rosefielde has done in order to claim 22 million repression deaths. Rummel may be bumping up the number of births in the USSR to arrive at his figure of 43 million repression deaths. In Russia today Boris Sokolov and Igor Ivlev manipulate the population data and claim 42 million war dead, Rummel and Rosefielde manipulate the figures to claim 22-43 repression deaths in the Stalin era. The ADK figures I mentioned above are consistent with the view of mainstream historians outside of Russia.--Woogie 10w (talk) 16:06, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

In other words, did I understand you correct that you say that Rummel's data are totally inconsistent with commonly accepted demographic evidences?--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:36, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Also Paul I believe that the real problem here is that other editors fail to grasp these points,they are convinced in the validity of single figures that they do not understand, they are trying to prove a political POV right or left. Demographic analysis goes way over their heads.--Woogie 10w (talk) 16:13, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I think, in that case e reference to WP:COMPETENCE may be relevant.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:36, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul what I believe to be true is not relevant on Wikipedia. I only edit using reliable sources that can be verified. If there are reliable sources that disagree I believe they should be posted. Rummel, was an academic writing on the Soviet Union so is Snyder and Grover Furr. They all publish statistics that are as soft as shit IMO, but my opinions don't belong on Wikipedia--Woogie 10w (talk) 16:26, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

@Woogie10w: Woogie, you need to sign your posts properly. Someone might accuse you of sockpuppeting. RhinoMind (talk) 13:12, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Ehi,RhinoMind, I am not going to change how I sign, what are you going do?--Woogie 10w (talk) 13:51, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

It's just important that we follow basic wiki guidelines. And this includes proper signing. Sockpuppeting is a serious business on Wikipedia and I am just trying to give some friendly advice. No threats or bullying, just notifying. I am not going to do anything, but someone else might. And why give them a cheap opportunity? How do we know you are the real Woogie 10w if you don't sign? RhinoMind (talk) 13:57, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Ehi,RhinoMind, I am not going to change how I sign, what are you going do? Rhino Mind stop your harassment! --Woogie 10w (talk) 14:19, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

It is not a big problem, RhinoMind, one can easily check who is who by looking at the page history. Sockpuppeting is a situation when other users have no technical tools to figure out who is who without using administrator's tools. --Paul Siebert (talk) 15:42, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Paul, you are right. I will disregard RhinoMind and continue to edit Wikipedia. RhinoMind what are you going do?--Woogie 10w (talk) 15:47, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Frankly, I agree with RhinoMind that when you forget to sign, you sign improperly, that creates some inconveniences. That is not sockpuppeting, however.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:49, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm going to thank you for signing. RhinoMind (talk) 16:10, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

RhinoMind the next time you are in Greenpoint Brooklyn let me know, I will buy you lunch.--Woogie 10w (talk) 16:16, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

:-) not sure if you mean it? Thanks anyway. No offence on my part. RhinoMind (talk) 16:37, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

WorldNetDaily Source

I removed a source published in WorldNetDaily, as I understand WND to be a notoriously unreliable source. This was reverted with the summary "he meets the standard for reliable sources." Please discuss. –dlthewave ☎ 11:26, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

I posted the question on WP:RSN.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:03, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

It looks like the discussion is arriving to a consensus that expert's opinion published in these blogs are not considered as good sources when are not supported by better quality sources. In connection to that, I am going to remove this text from the article.

• In 2005, R. J. Rummel revised his estimate of total communist democide between 1900 and 1999 upward by 38 million to "about 148,000,000", due to recent publications about Mao's role in the Great Chinese Famine.

I couldn't find a better source that supports this claim (which is obviously exceptional). If anybody can find another source that says the same, please do that in a week. BTW, I think this source is acceptable in the article about Rummel himself.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:21, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I made a search for the independent source that publishes the same Rummel's claim about 148 million, and I found nothing in Google scholar but a reference to an unpublished speech Rummel gave to American Bar Association Committee on Law and National Security.

The google search gives a bunch of references to Wikipedia mirrors, to WND, and to some obscure web sites like this one. Interestingly, Rummel seems to be supported by creationists : ).

In connection to that, and taking into account the arguments presented during the RSN discussion, I remove this statement and this source from the article.--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:30, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, I think that, if nothing else, this is clearly WP:UNDUE without a reliable secondary source. I'd also argue that it's an WP:EXCEPTIONAL claim, which requires more than a single WP:SELFPUBLISHed source to include in the article. There are limited situations where we could use a blog of an expert like that, but not for such shocking claims. --Aquillion (talk) 17:55, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Just to be clear, the sources that were used for Rummel's "revised estimate" were Rummel's blog and an opinion piece by Rummel in the Hawaii Reporter, not WorldNetDaily.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 19:32, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

Actually, the words "revised estimate" are somewhat misleading, because Rummel did not revise his estimates: all old figures from his "Lethal policies" are not changed in his blog. He had not revised his estimates, he just added the Great Chinese famine deaths (which are known to be in between 15 and 30 millions, and will never be known more accurately because of lack of demographic data) to the category of "democide" victims. In other words, we have a personal opinion of one reputable author who published it in his personal blog. This claim is exceptional (because the term "democide" is applied to Great Chinese famine only by him, other authors consider famine as an unintentional consequence of Mao's policy), therefore, this source is not good for it.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:36, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

"Estimates", and article's structure in general

The very structure of the article creates an apparent hierarchy of sources, which is directly prohibited by our policy: the sources that provide a total "Communist death toll" are presented in the "Estimates" section, whereas the sources that provide figures for separate countries and events are split among different sections. That would be fine if these two type sources were consistent with each other. That is not the case, however. Thus, overwhelming majority of sources (Rosefielde is the only exception) deal mostly with Cold war era sources, and they, by and large, ignore more recent and accurate data presented in other sections. One of the most ridiculous case is the figures from the Courtois introduction to the Black Book: he presents figures that directly contradict to the data provided by his own co-authors (who are much better experts in the field, according to many BB's reviewers). Nevertheless, the current structure of the "Estimates" section conceals this fact from a reader. There are several other problems that are directly related to this one.

• First, each country sections devoted too much attention to figures, and much less attention is devoted to the explanation of the events that lead to those deaths. That is not correct.
• Second, the explanation of the events moved to a "Proposed causes" section that describes mostly umbrella theories that explain communist violence in general and ignore opinia of country experts.

To remove this bias, the structure of the article should be reorganised, and I propose to start with the "Estimates" section. The first problem that should be addressed is that estimates are different mostly because different experts include different deaths into "mass killing" category. In connection to that, we must separate opinia from facts. To this end, the section should start with the description of the data about a overall demographic effect of Communis rule (mostly under the three most murderous regimes): in other words, we must explain how many people died prematurely under Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao. These data are available at least for Cambodia and the USSR, and they are pretty reliable. After that, modern data should be presented for the estimates of the scale of mass killings in different countries. These data should not be just figures, we must explain which deaths each author includes in a category "mass killing/genocide/politicide" etc. After that, I propose to add a subsection "Estimates of a global Communist death toll" This section should describe the sources that are currently presented in the article is a chronological order. Since many of those sources are controversial (the sources I described above are not), each source should be supplemented with criticism. Moreover, since these sources were published with an explicit or implicit attempt to compare Communist and Nazism, and all these sources are written from the point of view that commonality between each communist regime are much more important for understanding the essence of these events than historical and social factors other than Communism, we need to explain these aspects first. We also should explain who are supporters of these views, and present criticism of these views. That, in my opinion, will be a correct way to write this section. --Paul Siebert (talk) 20:16, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, since the neutrality issues that I described above are serious, to promote a discussion of them on the talk page, I am going to restore the POV template in the article in close future.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:38, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

I feel that the first thing to do is to summarize and emphasize the content of the "States where mass killings have occurred" section more thoroughly, especially the absolutely vital point about categories of deaths (Gulags, forced resettlement, starvation.) That should be the first section - explaining the debates over each kind of death, whether to include individual instances of mass starvation, etc. Individual estimates should then be described after that in specific breakdowns according to those lines, explaining how and why specific people reached specific estimates; those estimates will make more sense once we've described the broad lines of debate. Also, any estimate that is just "total deaths" must be broken down into intentional killings and deaths to other causes as a result of Soviet policy. (Possibly, we should just omit anything that isn't identified as "killing" as off-topic for this article; but including them is useful for distinguishing between estimates.) Also, the estimates section should be written as a timeline to an extent, describing estimates in the sociological climate where they were formed. --Aquillion (talk) 01:34, 18 November 2018 (UTC)

This quote is completely inappropriate:

Historian Helen Rappaport describes Nikolay Yezhov, the bureaucrat in charge of the NKVD during the Great Purge, as a physically diminutive figure of "limited intelligence" and "narrow political understanding.... Like other instigators of mass murder throughout history, [he] compensated for his lack of physical stature with a pathological cruelty and the use of brute terror."[64]

REASONS: 1. historians are not qualified psychologist able to make assessment of character based on physical attribute.

2. short - compensation... does being black or a women = compensation ... my guess is "No" ... this reads like a bad case of heightism [was there an investigation of the average height of his ethnic group's height] or does it also double as British Colonial Racism ... please advise.

3. Edmund Emil Kemper III at 6 feet 9 killed because he had a napoleon complex, come on now?

4. Aileen Carol Wuornos Pralle at 5'4" killed because she was average height for a woman, let's get real.

Saying that height contributed to serial killer, is like saying Samuel Little was a serial killer because he's black. That would be racist, just like linking this man's mental health to his stature is heightist.

Height, weight, gender & race have nothing to do with this - let's get the real story right. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.58.0.233 (talk) 01:07, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

The inclusion of Helen Rappaport's comments is indicative of the poor quality of the article. It is not that historians cannot provide psychological assessments. Professional historians rely on research by professional psychologists. The problem is that Rappaport is not a professional historian but a popular writer and former actor with a BA in Russian literature. If we follow weight, we would only mention opinions that had entered mainstream academic discussion. TFD (talk) 22:29, 13 January 2019 (UTC)

Vietnam

Last September, AmateurEditor deleted Valentino's (larger) estimate of U.S./South Vietnamese mass killings during the Vietnam War, opting to include only Valentino's estimate for North Vietnamese mass killings on the grounds that the former were irrelevant to this article. However, one might argue that including both sets of figures balances the section by contextualizing the mass killings against the backdrop of the broader war, which included many atrocities. On the other hand, I concede that allowing U.S./South Vietnamese actions could set a bad precedent that might open up this entire article to Anti-communist mass killings by Whites during the Russian Civil War, the Kuomintang during the Chinese Civil War, South Korea during the Korean War, ect., which could easily get out of hand. Therefore, I have moved this content to Anti-communist mass killings for the time being, although I welcome comment on this matter.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 10:06, 18 February 2019 (UTC)

"Classicide" is considered "premeditated mass killing" narrower than "genocide"

This text says: "Classicide" is considered "premeditated mass killing" narrower than "genocide" . Which is of course total non-sense. An ethnic group can contain more than one social group, and a social group can contain more than one ethnic groups. The collection of ethnic groups or even one ethnic group just does not overlap the collection of social groups or even that of one social group, certainly not word-wide and mostly even not nationally or even regionally. Considering that we tend to distinguish far more ethnic groups than we tend to distinguish social-groups, it is far more likely that "Genocide" should be considered "premeditated mass killing" narrower than "Classiside".83.98.229.18 (talk) 15:44, 18 February 2019 (UTC)

The characterization is based on the source cited. From the source: "Mann justifies the creation of the term with the observation that the existing analytical categories do not allow a sufficient distinction between the targets of mass violence. On the one hand, classicide differs from genocide because only a pre-defined part of the population – namely identified by its social status – is subject to being eliminated. On the other hand, since the members of a given class are being targeted independently from the degree of their political activity and ambitions, the term politicide would be too restrictive (Mann, 2005: 17). Therefore, the author establishes classicide as a form of partial “premeditated mass killing” within his own matrix of mass violence (Mann, 2005:12)." AmateurEditor (talk) 05:26, 19 February 2019 (UTC)

Numbers, starting with the "People's Republic of China"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_communist_regimes#People's_Republic_of_China

I found some if not all the numbers listed here dubious, so I started following the source. I started with "These sessions resulted in 92,000 deaths out of a population of about 6 million" from "Jones, Adam (2010), Genocide: A Comprehensive Introduction (2nd ed.), New York: Routledge, ISBN 0-415-48619-X"

I found the reference from this handy textbook website https://www.mcvts.net/cms/lib07/NJ01911694/Centricity/Domain/155/Textbook.pdf, where I found the author Adam Jones, plagiarized (not paraphrased, plagiarized) the entire section word for word, including the numbers... from this book here: "CTA, Tibet under Communist China, p. 9"

Which an easy google led me to this gem: https://tibet.net/2001/01/tibet-under-communist-china-50-years-2001/ or this: https://docs.google.com/viewerng/viewer?url=https://tibet.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/TibetUnderCommunistChine-50Years.pdf&hl=en_US

basically, a glorified propaganda pamphlet by the Tibetan government in exile. Anyway, the trail continues, as it turns out, they copy pasted this number from somewhere else too. Shockers. However, this time it's from an obscure book titled A Portrait of Lost Tibet https://www.amazon.com/Portrait-Lost-Tibet-Rosemary-Tung/dp/0030504511

I can't get access to it, but my academic experience tells me that if a source number is not independently verifiable from multiple sources, and it's only found through a long trail of non-scholarly, obscure and politicized books, the likelihood of it being reliable is next to null. wikipedia:v

I'll bet that most of these numbers were just as unreliable and obscure. Yes, we volunteers do the job of making sure it's right, but in the meanwhile, I'm just going to pull of this whole shamelessly plagiarized section off of this article.

Please discuss. I'll watch this page, if there's no replies I'll follow through with the edits.Gw2005 (talk) 04:08, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Gw2005, it is not plagiarism when Jones encloses a sentence in quotation marks followed by a reference to the source document. That's actually the most accurate way for him to cite something. Your characterization of the source document he cites as "a glorified propaganda pamphlet" also needs more than your own assertion to carry any weight with me. I would revert your deletion of this material from the article. AmateurEditor (talk) 06:09, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

AmateurEditor I will retract my comment about plagiarism, I did not see the quotation marks. My bad.

To your point about my assertion, it is propaganda, when it's written by the propaganda organ of a government. (and then also published the said government's website). I don't believe I need to explain why an obvious piece of propaganda is what it is. For the record, the propaganda pamphlet is published by this:

Secretary (Information)
Department of Information & International Relations
Central Tibetan Administration
Gangchen Kyishong
DHARAMSALA 176 215
H.P., India

index page vi

Had, say, the Chinese government's ministry of information commissioned itself a report on Tibet, one full of loaded language, half truths, with numbers quoted from an obscure, third-hand, non-scholarly source, and then published on its own website, you would have no problem calling it for what it is - propaganda. So how is the reverse not true? When it's biased and when it's simple propaganda, it should be called out. That's all.

Gw2005 (talk) 23:14, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Somethings to point out to AmateurEditor: I'm questioning the (WP:V) of the numbers used here, specifically in this one section I've singled out where even the basic investigation I've done so far have put these numbers into question; and I'm questioning the (WP:NPOV) of this specific section, as the article deals with controversial subjects, and yet sources from only one side the controversy is represented, leading to a non (WP:NPOV) article.Gw2005 (talk) 00:48, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Gw2005, I agree that the source is politically biased and not too reliable. However, Wikipedia rules are much less stringent than you think. If the source you are talking about was published, this source can be used per our policy. Your argument that it is unreliable or biased is not working, because it is just your own speculation. However, if you can provide more reliable sources on the same subject, it is quite possible to add the information from these sources, and, probably, remove the source you are talking about (because better quality sources are always preferable). If no such sources exist, this material will stay. Another option is to find some reliable source that explicitly says this source is highly questionable. In that case you can either remove it, or supplement with a sourced criticism.

To summarize: you cannot remove this information just because you believe it is incorrect: this information is properly sourced, and it is relevant. However, you can either replace it with some better data from more reliable sources (if you find some), or supplement it with a well sourced criticism.--Paul Siebert (talk) 01:48, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Paul Siebert That's fair, I will take that into consideration. Thanks for point this out.Gw2005 (talk) 03:00, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

This may be related, I added this article [7] from Patrick French, former director of the Free Tibet Campaign, who said he found no evidence in regards to the commonly cited 1.2 million deaths figure. He previously estimated the deaths to be around half a million.--LucasGeorge (talk) 16:47, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

References

Stalin estimates correction

On June 2nd, I reverted the May 15th incomplete removal in three edits of two sentences with 10 citations related to the estimates under Stalin by user Applefunbox12647 (who has no other edits before or since and appears to be a single-purpose account or sock puppet) with the edit summary "(manual undo of the edits by Applefunbox12647 that broke reference citations here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mass_killings_under_communist_regimes&type=revision&diff=897266875&oldid=896994213)". My edit was reversed the same day by user Jack90s15, who did not add the missing reference for his replacement sentence or fix the broken reference citations. I did not have time to argue about it then but it still needs to be fixed.

The edit summary of the reversal was "(Undid revision 899998650 by AmateurEditor (talk) I put edit back with proper Attribution it was copied from this page that page explains post-collapse estimates and current estimates and there are sources on this page to about the number/Attribution: content in this article was copied from Excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalinon may 15, 2019. Please see the history of that page for full attribution)". Each statement in this article needs to be properly sourced within this article and referring to sources in some other article without specifying what they are is not sufficient. I have since checked the other article, and it also doesn't justify this change. The estimate under Stalin is disputed among reliable sources (which is correctly noted in the other article), and we need to accurately represent the full range found in reliable sources in this article until the dispute no longer exists. We should not be trying to resolve it ourselves or exclude sources we personally disagree with. Improvements to the text are always welcome but this change is not an improvement, even ignoring the citation errors it created. AmateurEditor (talk) 03:54, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

AmateurEditor The Only reason I put it Back in was I have seen other editors. Do it for other people's edit I was doing it as good Faith,

But if Citations are needed I can put them in.Jack90s15 (talk) 04:04, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

AmateurEditor I will put the other sources in for the higher estimate Just was a attempt at good faith helping

I did add to two sources for it and again I if I got you aggravated from what I did I am sorry I put my self up for Wikipedia adoption So I get proper guidance in doing Wikipedia efficientlyJack90s15 (talk) 05:30, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Jack90s15, thanks for trying to fix this but it still is not corrected and a new problem has been created. The prior sentences and sources should not have been removed in the first place and have not yet been restored, which will fix the six reference errors that have piled up at the bottom of the "Excerpts and notes" section. I know you are new to this stuff and I do not expect you to fix that on your own, especially considering that this article uses a more complicated referencing scheme. It's not a problem for me to fix that. However, the new problem is that, while the new sentence ("Prior to the collapse of the USSR and the archival revelations, some historians estimated that the numbers killed by Stalin's regime were 20 million or higher.") does have references to estimates of 20 million or higher, the references do not appear to mention those estimates in the context of later "archival revelations", which imply that the estimates are in conflict with those revelations. That is, although there may be such a conflict, saying so is not supported by these sources as far as I can tell (the New York Times article is behind a paywall, but it is from 1989 and titled "Major Soviet Paper Says 20 Million Died As Victims of Stalin"; the Rummel book page is readable online through googlebooks and does not mention archival revelations). This violates Wikipedia's policy against Original Research, which states "Wikipedia articles must not contain original research. The phrase "original research" (OR) is used on Wikipedia to refer to material—such as facts, allegations, and ideas—for which no reliable, published sources exist.[a] This includes any analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not stated by the sources. To demonstrate that you are not adding OR, you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and directly support the material being presented." The specific problem of an unsupported implication is further explained in the policy page subsection titled "Synthesis of published material", which can be read here. This can be solved in a few ways: by finding a source that does support the whole sentence, rewording the sentence to be in line with the sources cited, or removing the sentence from the article for now. I'm fine with any of those solutions. AmateurEditor (talk) 04:54, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

AmateurEditor Thank you for Explaining this I see what you are saying going to save this in my Notes. I do have a source that I was going to use but after reading this its all ready on here its from Timothy Snyder who is the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University and a Permanent Fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. So I will put it in for that part of itJack90s15 (talk) 05:41, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Jack90s15, that source checks out. I reformatted your references to match the article's style and restored the text and citations deleted by Applefunbox12647, which fixed the reference errors in the "Excerpts and notes" section. AmateurEditor (talk) 17:50, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

AmateurEditor Great!! I looked over it looks good with out the error messages Jack90s15 (talk) 19:20, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Requested move 31 July 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (non-admin closure) Calidum 21:03, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

---

Now I know many sources refers and uses Communist state, but in practice they all refer to this, a Marxist–Leninist state; Communism as state ownership of the means of production rather than as a classless, moneyless and stateless society society under common ownership; and Marxist–Leninist state or Marxist–Leninist regime have been used anyway. I would argue it's also a non-neutral title in that it refers to a specific ideology (Marxism–Leninism), but calls it communism, which is much more than Marxism–Leninism.--80.180.196.242 (talk) 20:37, 31 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi. I don't have any meaningful opinion on this requested move. I would like to say, however, that this might exclude China, Cambodia and NorthKorea for example. Maybe also Vietnam and some other cases described in the article. I would just like to point out this issue. RhinoMind (talk) 01:15, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply. I don't think it would exclude them because all the states you listed are also Marxist–Leninists. Indeed, Maoism and others are all considered variants of Marxism–Leninism; or as they proclaim themselves to be, Marxism–Leninism adopted to their respective country's conditions. Only North Korea ceased to be one following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the 1990s and later with the Constitution revisions as it adopted Juche and Songun; there're also doubts on whether the Khmer Rougue was actually communist in any meaningful way, whether it was Marxist–Leninist or even Maoist, but I let realiable sources decide.--80.180.196.242 (talk) 03:41, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

NK is not Marxist and definitely not Leninist. KR were not Leninist: their vehement anti-urbanism was a direct negation of the core of Leninist idea. Frankly, the word "Communist" also does not satisfies me: it is an umbrella term used by some Western writers to label a certain category of hostile states, but we have to live with that.--Paul Siebert (talk) 15:10, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

I agree, but the truth is that all these so-called Communist regimes were Marxist–Leninists. Marxism–Leninism is neither Marxism nor Leninism; it's basically like National Socialism which is far-right, German fascism and not socialism in any way; I mean in the sense of the ideology being missnamed since it isn't actually what it claims or name itself to be. Marxism–Leninism was developed and codified by Stalin and as a result it's basically Stalinism (theory); and what is referred as Stalinism is nothing but Marxism–Leninism in practice or simply Stalin's policies (practice). Thus, all so-called Communist regimes were Marxist–Leninist but not all were necessarily Stalinist; see Yugoslavia, which mainted many Marxist–Leninist precepts (one-party state, socialism in one country, etc.) but didn't have exactly the same economic policies of orthodox Marxism–Leninism (this was justified in that Titoism, just like Maoism and all other -isms are simply Marxism–Leninism adapted to their respectve countries cultures and material conditions). North Korea officially stopped being Marxism–Leninism (then again, it could be argued that it never stopped, that Juche and Songun are simply policies that were adopted due to changing material conditions; Marxism–Leninism could basically be used to justified anything and any policy, really) in the 1990s, although it could be argued it stopped in the 1970s with the first adoption of Juche and that Juche itself isn't overwhelming considered communist. Either way, I reiterate that the page the word communist in the title should be changed to Marxist–Leninist because when sources describe these Communist regimes, they're describing Marxist–Leninist regimes; they just call it Communism because ever since the Cold War Communism basically meant Bolshevism and Marxism–Leninism and not communism. Hell, there was a 1950s propaganda in the United States to describe itself as a "classless society of prospering workers versus societies of "slaves" in the Soviet Union and China". Finally, I believe this to be a more accurate and neutral name and that this accuracy is "worth the loss in recognizability/naturalness".--87.17.95.218 (talk) 15:47, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose. We list titles according to their WP:COMMONNAME, so that the average reader will quickly know they have found the right article by looking at the title. The common name of the regimes listed here is "communist", not "Marxist-Leninist". Rreagan007 (talk) 14:15, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Per WP:COMMONNAME, then it should be capitalised since that's how the word is used in many sources; just like Italian Fascism and National Socialism are all capitalised, so Communism and Communist state were capitalised for the same reason to refer to a specific ideology, Marxism–Leninism; a state governed by a communist party that follows Marxism–Leninism, etc. Either way, what to do in cases like these where a word means literally the opposite of what some people understand? What to do when the word Communism is used to refer to a specific model, Marxism–Leninism; and when it's basically used as a synonym to refer to that? Should we call an apple apple or orange, even if the source itself aknowledge it's an apple but calls it orange anyway?--80.180.196.242 (talk) 20:44, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Yes, we should call it an orange. Egg creams contain neither egg nor cream, but we call them 'egg creams' because that's what RS overwhelmingly use. WP:COMMONNAME does have the following exception: Ambiguous or inaccurate names for the article subject, as determined in reliable sources, are often avoided even though they may be more frequently used by reliable sources. But I think it would be hard to make such an argument work in this case. You'd have to show clear RS agreement that the common name is inaccurate, and RS support for the proposed name. And there would still need to be agreement that the gain in accuracy is worth the loss in recognizability/naturalness. Colin M (talk) 21:01, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

Ambiguous or inaccurate names for the article subject, as determined in reliable sources, are often avoided even though they may be more frequently used by reliable sources. That's exactly what I was saying and referring to. I thought my argument work in this case, but I could be wrong. It's not a big deal to me; I will respect the decision, I just wanted to try to see other users' thoughts and have a dicussion about it. I don't think that was WP:OR because "Sources say X, but what they really mean/should be saying is Y", I think you misunderstood me; what I meant was that "Sources say X, even though they known it's Y and basically speak about Y, they state it's Y but call it X anyway". Besides, all these Communist regimes followed Marxism–Leninism, or one of its variants; as they said, Marxism–Leninism adapted to the country's conditions. I'm not even saying that the common name is inaccurate; I'm just saying that Communist state means Marxist–Leninist state; that the article is about regimes that were Marxist–Leninists; that per WP:COMMONNAME sources capitalise it; and instead it just causes even more confusion because then it equates communism as a whole with Marxism–Leninism; that communism means state ownership of the means of production, totalitarianism, etc. rather than a classless, moneyless and stateless society under common ownership of the means of production, etc. and thus could be considered in violation of WP:NPOV, but I could be wrong. I don't want to impose my views, I just want to discuss and try to help.--80.180.196.242 (talk) 22:18, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. "Sources say X, but what they really mean/should be saying is Y" is an argument based in WP:OR. Incidentally, I noticed a large change made by nominator a couple days ago at History of communism, in which they replaced many instances of 'communist' (and a few of 'socialist' and 'stalinist') with 'Marxist-Leninist'. I didn't revert because I'm far from a subject matter expert on this, and the diff included some good cleanup, but in light of these iffy RMs, I think nominator may be going overboard in their attempts to overhaul this terminology across Wikipedia based on a narrow interpretation of sources. Colin M (talk) 20:48, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

I did that simply because the text was referring to Marxism–Leninism. I also put the missing information template exactly because the article's history section refers to the history of Marxism–Leninism; no mention of libertarian communism, no mention of 1968, the New Left, the Vietnam War and no mention of all the antagonism and criticism between Marxists–Leninists and other communists, etc.-80.180.196.242 (talk) 22:18, 1 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME.Jack90s15 (talk) 00:09, 2 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose as I did in the case of the other move request. --Comment by Selfie City (talk about my contributions) 13:55, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

@SelfieCity: Can you post some form of argument or reason, please? RhinoMind (talk) 22:14, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

I have to say I'm disappointed that no one, beside a precious few who also seemed dissatisfied with the current name but may disagree with my proposal, actually replied to my objections and no one actually provided a single source; even if it's a fact, that doesn't mean sources shouldn't be provided for. I don't even dispute that Communism is the WP:COMMONNAME, although I repeat once again that by the same logic the word should be capitalised in the title since that's what many sources do and they do it exactly to distinquish between communism and Marxism–Leninism. I'm just saying that I believe accuracy and WP:NPOV triumph in this specific case and that this is justified in being an exception. If you disagree with this, fine; but at least reply to my objections, which some did but stopped now; and do it with sources, which no one did as of now. I have no problem accepting whatever decision will be final, but I would have liked to have a more thorough discussion and sharing of sources.--82.63.72.187 (talk) 02:24, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. No other rationale is necessary. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:33, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

For the 100th time, I don't even dispute that Communism is the WP:COMMONNAME. Now what is the more common one, no pun intended; Communist regimes or communist regimes?--82.63.72.187 (talk) 03:19, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

The capitalization question is a knotty one. I'd say that in my reading I've come across both versions an equal number of times. That being so, I'd stick with the current status quo, on the deep philosophical grounds "Don't fix it if it ain't broke." Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:41, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

I have come across the same. I just want to know if I'm right in my reasoning in that whether it is Communist regime or Marxist–Leninist regime, they're referring to and talking about the same thing; but I'm wrong in my proposal in that the WP:COMMONAME is Communism, even if by that is meant Marxism–Leninism or one of its variants; and that's all I ask for and want to know. I agree that "Don't fix it if it ain't broke", but the thing is that both Crimes against humanity under Communist regimes and Mass killing under communist regimes should be uniformed; either both are capitalised or neither should be.--82.63.72.187 (talk) 03:52, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Well, WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS. I don't see that Communist vs. communist is all that big a deal. If forced to make a decision, I'd probably go with small "c", because big "C" implies that all communist regimes have the same ideology, and that's really not the case. Looking at the analogous situation with "Fascism" vs. "fascism", I believe that standard usage is that big "F" Fascism refers to the original fascists in Italy, and small "f" fascism refers to it and all the other versions in various countries, including Nazism. On that model, I'd go with big "C" Communism meaning the first real-world instance of it in a state, also called "Marxist-Leninism" ("Marxism" would be theoretical communism as envisaged by Marx and Engels, which has never been put into effect by anybody, abywhere), and small "c" communism would include that plus all the other versions, such as Stalinism, Maoism, Trotskyism, etc. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:17, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

It's not a big deal to me either, but I value consistency and thus either both pages should be capitalised or neither should be. I remember an old discussion where it was stated that Communism was capitalised because it was a short way to refer to a Communist Party-state regime. I would also argue that Communism is capitalised the same reason Fascism is when referring to the original fascists in Italy, namely that Communism refers to Bolsheviks/Marxism–Leninism and its variants; and thus this could be a reason to capitalised, but I could be wrong. I'm glad you recognise the difference between classical Marxism, or Marxism as as envisaged by Marx and Engels, and Marxism–Leninism. Then again, it could be argued that Stalinism, Maoism, etc. aren't actually communist (otherwhise, anyone that wishes a classless, moneyless and stateless society is; the means also matters) just because they see communism in the far future, but rather state socialists (in practice, state capitalists). They're like the Lassallian socialist state; unlike Lassalle, they see communism as the end goal, but in practice both are state socialists rather than communists, although they be nominally communists in the sense of having it as a long-term goal. This is just my opinion based on my own reaserch and I could be wrong; I just wanted to state it.--82.63.72.187 (talk) 14:49, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Requested move 14 August 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved. The related move here showed a consensus to move, so with this RM the consistency argument used in support no longer valid. And no evidenced case was made that it is correct to capitalise.  — Amakuru (talk) 18:08, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

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• Mass killings under communist regimes → Mass killings under Communist regimes

I apologise for making another request and I hope it's not a problem, but I have accepted the previous result and this one is mainly based on consistency since the Crimes against humanity under Communist regimes page is capitalised. I would support this move based on WP:COMMON NAME. I don't know which one is more common; I believe when it isn't capitalised it's only because communism is considered a noun, but it's also just as often capitalised both to distinquish it from communism and because the word Communism is used to refer to the Communist Party-state rule rather than communism. Either way, please vote on talk pages whether you want both of them to be capitalised or not. Thank you.--79.52.17.197 (talk) 16:00, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

• Comment: Please, check Talk:Crimes against humanity under Communist regimes#Requested move 14 August 2019. --MarioGom (talk) 16:22, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support. Capitalization of word "Communist" is more relevant here. Yours sincerely, Гармонический Мир (talk) 16:38, 14 August 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose move per my argument in the RfC above. The IP should stop initiating RfCs, which is becoming borderline disruptive. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:57, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

• Comment: It's always me. Thank you for your comments. @Beyond My Ken: I apologise for that, I'm not trying to be disruptive; I'm just trying to be bold and I thought talk pages were all about discussions and to reach a consensus. I made this request only to keep consistency. Anyway, I will stop open new discussion to many different pages; I have decided to take all my concerns to Portal:Communism, which is probably what I should have done since the beginning. Anyway, thanks for your attention.--95.245.199.21 (talk) 20:48, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

• Support for consistency. Cloud200 (talk) 23:03, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

• Consistency can be achieved by capping this or smallifying the other. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:51, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose, but support Crimes against humanity under Communist regimes → Crimes against humanity under communist regimes for consistency. Also consistent with Communist party (see lede), Criticism of communism, LGBT rights under communism, etc. --MarioGom (talk) 23:08, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

• Comment: That's exactly what I was talking about. Criticism of communism (which should actually be a page and not just a disambiguation page) should be about general criticism of communism as a whole whereas in all other cases it refers to a specific form of communism, i.e. states governed by a Marxist–Leninist communist party. LGBT rights under communism refers to LGBT rights under all communism and not just one variant, so it makes sense to leave it as it is now.--95.245.199.21 (talk) 23:38, 15 August 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, but I fail to see how Communism (capitalized) means Marxism-Leninism. And that discussion is already closed, by the way, not sure if you are just trying to prove a point here (see WP:POINT). For what is worth, a quick search on JSTOR yields these: so-called "really existing socialism" or more briefly "communist regimes" [8], communist regimes [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14], Communist regimes [15], post-communist regimes [16]... it seems the uncapitalized form might have wider use, not sure, this is a small sample, but I don't see anything suggesting that using the capitalized form conveys a distinctive and well-defined meaning to the reader. --MarioGom (talk) 00:05, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment: I thought Communism was capitalised specifically to refer to that and not to what is described in the communism lead section; indeed, I remember reading in the talk of the page in which the word is capitalised that the reason was it was referring to Communist Party-state rule. I agree it's probably more used in the uncapitalised way, but I'm not sure and don't know how to 100% verify that. Anyway, thanks for doing that research for me; could you also search what does it yields if you search for communist state and Marxist–Leninist state? All I'm saying is: doesn't words such as really existing socialism or communist regimes refer to socialist states governed by a Marxist–Leninist party? And isn't the word communist regimes used to refer to states that follow Marxism–Leninism (the official state ideology of the Soviet Union, of the parties of the Communist International after Bolshevisation and the ideology of Stalinist political parties) rather than a regime that follows communism as the [...] socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money, and the state? Do you agree with me that all these sources are nonetheless talking about socialist states governed by a Marxist–Leninist party rather than communism as a whole? That's all I'm asking for; forget about the moves and everything else, just tell me whether I'm right or wrong in saying that the word communist regimes refers to socialist states governed by a Marxist–Leninist party (which is what you also stated in Talk:Communist state, or maybe I misunderstood you)? Just reply to this question; it's all I need to know. Because even if I'm right, I know and I understand it won't change anything because I realise sources use communist regimes, communism instead of Marxism–Leninism, etc. I just want to have a confirmation in my belief that even if I'm not necessarily wrong per se in my arguments and reasons, or perhaps even if I'm actually right, it wouldn't change anything because the sources say communism, even if by that they don't mean the [...] socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money, and the state but the official state ideology of the Soviet Union, of the parties of the Communist International after Bolshevisation and the ideology of Stalinist political parties and I have to accept that. Thank you for the attention.--95.245.199.21 (talk) 00:46, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

In order to avoid an endless discussion on a move request, I'll comment in this discussion only about the capitalization issue. I see other problems with the substance of some of these articles but these should be treated separately. Yes, all sources I checked here are referring to really existing socialism or socialist states governed by a communist party, which are essentially the same thing. --MarioGom (talk) 11:48, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment: @MarioGom: Thank you very much for your reply. So, doesn't that mean I'm right, that sources using communism are actually referring to really existing socialism or socialist states governed by a communist party (a communist party following Marxism–Leninism)? Then why not actually using Marxism–Leninism in the title or text when it's clearly referring to that? Is there any doubt that some states didn't follow Marxism–Leninism, even though my research lead me to believe that they all followed Marxism–Leninism (one-party state, socialism in one country, etc.) in one form or another? Then by the same logic, if communism is the common name that actually refers to these regimes, then we should actually change the whole lead of communism to reflect this; I would be opposed to this, but if that's what the sources say, there's nothing I can do about it; and I value consistency and accept the rules.--82.53.106.200 (talk) 18:07, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

These sources indicate that lowercase "c" for "communist regime" is commonly used, and that there is no apparent difference in meaning with sources that choose to use uppercase "C". I would like to remind you that this request is about changing capitalization of the word "communist", not about renaming to "Marxist-Leninist" (that one was closed already). --MarioGom (talk) 18:13, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Comment: @MarioGom: Then the question is: which one is the more used? Capitalised or uncaptalised? If uncapitaised is the more used, then that should be the one used.--82.53.106.200 (talk) 18:33, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

• Discussion listed at WikiProject Politics and WikiProject Socialism. --MarioGom (talk) 13:20, 16 August 2019 (UTC)
• Neutral pointers to this discussion have been placed on the talk pages of the WikiProjects listed above. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:39, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
• Support most sources capitalize Communist. As explained by Sara Diamond, "I use uppercase "C" Communism to refer to actually existing governments and movements and lowercase "c" communism to refer to the varied movements and political currents organized around the ideal of a classless society."[17] "communist regime" is an oxymoron, since communism means the state has ceased to exist. TFD (talk) 23:53, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

• Comment: TFD, "most sources" seems inaccurate here. See my comment above: Special:Diff/911007739. At least by a random search on JSTOR, "communist regimes" appears to be more common than "Communist regimes" in academic literature. --MarioGom (talk) 00:06, 17 August 2019 (UTC)

• I don't know how scientific that is. Certainly the Black Book capitalizes Communist in Communist regime. You might want to search on the word "Communist" rather than Communist regime. TFD (talk) 01:48, 17 August 2019 (UTC)

• TFD: As I mentioned initially, not so scientific, but it's a start. I'm looking for "communist regimes" and not plainly "communist" or "communism", because I was looking for common capitalization for this exact usage. The article title doesn't say "under communism"/"under Communism", it says "communist regimes". Usage of other variations of the word in different contexts is not necessarily useful. --MarioGom (talk) 16:47, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

• I don't know why you would do that. "Communist regime" is not a phrase. It merely means the government is fully under the control of the local Communist Party. It could be called a Communist state, socialist state or any of a number of things. Regardless of the frequency of use, it would seem to make more sense to use the most precise term. TFD (talk) 17:52, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Related discussions

• Talk:Communist state#Requested move 31 July 2019 (31 July, closed)
• Talk:Crimes against humanity under Communist regimes#Requested move 31 July 2019 (31 July, closed)
• Talk:Mass killings under communist regimes#Requested move 31 July 2019 (31 July, closed)
• Talk:History of communism#Marxism–Leninism called communism (August 3, open)
• Talk:Crimes against humanity under Communist regimes#Requested move 14 August 2019 (14 August, open)
• Talk:Communist state#Scope of the article (14 August, open)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Navboxes

• User:Гармонический Мир is removing the "Communism" navbox from the article. Is there some reason that navbox isn't appropriate? I know that they prefer the "Marxism-Leninism" navbox instead, despite the article being specifically about "communist regimes" and not "Marxist-Leninist regimes". Beyond My Ken (talk) 11:52, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
• On the other hand, since we have the "Communism" sidebar, do we need either navbox? Beyond My Ken (talk) 12:01, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
• Гармонический Мир Please do not make edits to this article with an edit summary saying you have consensus to make the edit, when there is no consensus to do so on this page. "Consensus" doesn't mean that you made an argument in favor of the dit, it means that the editors on this page agreed with your suggested edit. That is not the case. Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:27, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• Beyond My Ken, this version of the page that I returned is consensus. And the current version, where the unreasonable use of two identical communism templates (navbox and sidebar), is not consensus. --Гармонический Мир (talk) 20:43, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• This is a very simple matter. Your edit summary said you had a consensus to make the edit, and you did not. Look around this page and show me where the consensus is. You cannot, because it is not there. Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:54, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• Exactly, you did not have a consensus in order to add a second identical communism template. I returned the page to the consensus version. --Гармонический Мир (talk) 21:09, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• After you had added a different navbox, so your motivation was not to return to the status quo ante, because you had already broken that with your previous edit, it was to revert a navbox you did not agree with. You have no consensus for that. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:16, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Nevermind, the article shouldn't have both the communism sidebar and the communism navbox, so Ive removed the navbox. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:27, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

• Now I agree. --Гармонический Мир (talk) 22:30, 28 August 2019 (UTC)