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Talk:Satanic panic/Archive 4

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Latest comment: 16 years ago by J.StuartClarke in topic Developing a concurrence of opinion as to where the page should go now
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Michelle Remembers

Latest comment: 16 years ago14 comments5 people in discussion

MR is a...special book. I think there can be a large amount of criticism and skepticism prima facie. WP:REDFLAG calls for high-quality sources for extreme claims; in the book, Smith claims that she saw Satan himself, and had her scars (conveniently) removed by the Michael the Archangel. Seeing the prime supernatural manifestation of all evil, and more importantly having extensive scarring (physical evidence) removed by another supernatural manifestation, are extreme claims, and given the controversy over recovered memories, I'd say that psychiatry couch recall that is unsubstantiated, if not outright contradicted by actual investigation and evidence, isn't a high-quality source. I've added better references for the book being crap, the last ones were pasted in haste from the MR main page and I had neglected these two. WLU (talk) 14:58, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

One version of the page says MR is considered "by some" to be untrue. Any RSes that say it's true? Otherwise, I'd say it's considered flatly untrue, unless we've a reliable source saying that angels can remove physical scars. WLU (talk) 17:59, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
The quote below is from the original book. It shows the co-author's extensive qualifications and the rigorous data checking done by the publishing company.
From the book “Michelle Remembers”by Michelle Smith and Lawrence Pazder, MD
“A NOTE FROM THE PUBLISHER” pages xi - xiii”
“Dr. Pazder’s credentials are impressive. He obtained his M.D. from the University of Alberta in 1961; his diploma in tropical medicine from the University Liverpool in 1962; and in 1968, his specialist certificate in psychiatry and his diploma in psychological medicine from McGill University. In 1971, he was made a fellow of Canada’s Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons. He is a member of three Canadian professional associations and of the American Psychiatric Association as well. He practiced medicine in West Africa and has participated in medical task forces and health organizations. He has been chairman of the Mental Health Committee of the Health Planning Council for British Columbia. A member of the staff of two hospitals in Victoria, British Columbia–the Royal Jubilee and the Victoria General–he is in private practice with a group of five psychiatrists. His professional papers include a study of the long-term effects of stress upon concentration-camp victims.
Two experienced interviewers journeyed to Victoria and talked to Dr. Pazder’s colleagues, to the priests and the bishop who became involved in the case, to doctors who treated Michelle Smith when she was a child, to relatives and friends. From local newspaper, clergy, and police sources they learned that reports of Satanism in Victoria are not infrequent and that Satanism has apparently existed there for many years. Satanism in Western Canada flourished in many areas with activities far more ominous than some of the innocuous groups now found in parts of the United States who claim some connection with Satanism.
The source material was scrutinized. The many thousands of pages of transcript of the tape recordings that Dr. Pazder and Michelle Smith made of their psychiatric sessions were read and digested; they became the basis of this book. The tapes themselves were listened to in good measure, and the videotapes made of some of his sessions were viewed. Both the audio and video are powerfully convincing. It is nearly unthinkable that the protracted agony they record could have been fabricated.”
Thomas B. Congdon, Jr
New York
April 22, 1980
Abuse truth (talk) 04:44, 7 February 2008 (UTC)


Looking at the sources claiming the book to be untrue,
"One of the most well known is Michelle Remembers, published in 1980, written by Michelle Smith and her psychiatrist (and later husband) Lawrence Pazder, though the book is now considered to be completely untrue." 5,6,7,8,9
^ a b Carroll, Robert Todd (2006-04-06). Satanic Ritual Abuse. Skeptic's Dictionary.
^ Aquino, Michael (1994-01-01). Witchcraft, Satanism & Occult Crime: Who's Who & What's What, a Manual of Reference Materials for the Professional Investigator. Phoenix Pub. ISBN 0919345867.
^ a b Medway, Gareth (2001-11-01), Satan in suburbia, Fortean Times, <http://www.forteantimes.com/features/articles/258/satan_in_suburbia.html>. Retrieved on 23 October 2007
^ Denna Allen and Janet Midwinter. "Michelle Remembers: The Debunking of a Myth", The Mail on Sunday, September 30 1990.
^ Cuhulain, Kerr (July 8 2002). Michelle Remembers. Pagan Protection Center.
I noticed that none of these came from peer-reviewed journals or even scientific journals. One cites "religious tolerance" as a source. The potential bias of each source is also apparent. Abuse truth (talk) 05:04, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
First off, you have things backward. You want to argue for the credibility of Michelle Remembers, a bizarre book filled with extreme claims. As per WP:REDFLAG, it is your job to provide reliable, high-quality, third-party sources substantiating it, not our job to debunk your conspiracy theories yet again. The "publisher's note" is not a third-party source and is certainly not peer-reviewed.
But here is a book that was published by a university press: Theater of Disorder: Patients, Doctors, and the Construction of Illness, by Brant Wenegrat (Oxford University Press, 2001). On p.190-192, this book blames Michelle Remembers (along with Satan's Underground) for "starting the epidemic of satanic abuse allegations." It refers to Smith "mak[ing] up these stories." There are numerous other books debunking Michelle Remembers; not all of these are peer-reviewed, but you have yet to cite a single peer-reviewed source supporting these crackpot claims. *** Crotalus *** 06:03, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Here's another one: The Oxford Handbook of New Religious Movements by James R. Lewis (Oxford University Press, 2003). p. 233. "Michelle Remembers itself must be treated with great skepticism, not least because literally all the charges involved seem drawn from accounts of West African secret societies from the 1950s, imported to Canada." *** Crotalus *** 06:10, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Since the time of that publishing blurb, 28 years ago, investigators have gone to the province of BC and looked into the contents of the book, finding them baseless. [1] The source is the Mail on Sunday, the link is a link of convenience. I was willing to give MR the benefit of the doubt until I read that the devil himself showed up, and Michael conveniently removed all evidence of her abuse. Claims of the supernatural and evidence-less practices do not get a long leash on wikipedia, and REDFLAG is the appropriate policy - if you wish to use it as a source or prove that it has veracity, you will need proof in the form of third-party citations. Michelle Remembers is fiction and there is no reason to believe the allegations are in any way true. To claim that Dr Pazder (who a) was her husband and b) made a mint off of the book and its various spin-offs) is a reliable source is not feasible. He is essentially charged with jump-starting a modern witch-hunt for which there is no real evidence (and being seen as the foremost expert on it). He is not a reliable source, his therapy tapes are unreliable, uncitable primary sources, and there is no reason to see the book as anything except fabrication produced by leading therapeutic techniques. Crotalus, could you add these sources to the article (possibly MR as well)? Here's the CTs: {{cite book |author=Wenegrat, Brant |title=Theater of disorder: patients, doctors, and the construction of illness |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford [Oxfordshire] |year=2001 |pages= |isbn=0-19-514087-7 |oclc= |doi=}} and {{cite book |author=Lewis, James P. |title=The Oxford handbook of new religious movements |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford [Oxfordshire] |year=2004 |pages= |isbn=0-19-514986-6 |oclc= |doi=}}. WLU (talk) 11:39, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I can't add anything to this article now because it's still protected. I have added the Lewis book to the Michelle Remembers article since it is a reliable academic source. The Wenegrat book was already cited there in a variety of contexts. *** Crotalus *** 02:59, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
All sources must be reliable. If some of the skeptical sources about the book are not, then they shouldn't be referenced in the article. And using phrases like "crackpot claims" does not add to the argument. I have seen no evidence stating that leading therapeutic techniques were used.
The book itself states on page 156 "Of course, Dr. Pazder never told Michele about the correspondences he sometimes saw between her experiences and the things he studied."
This phrase is interesting: "He is essentially charged with jump-starting a modern witch-hunt for which there is no real evidence." It is biased and false. There was no "witch hunt." There were, however, allegations of child rape, some proven in court. Abuse truth (talk) 03:18, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
All the reliable sources say that Michelle Remembers is false. Some academically published sources, one of which I have quoted above, also specifically say that the book was partially responsible for launching the SRA scare in the United States. Whether you agree or disagree with this is irrelevant. Your opinions don't matter; only the sources do. *** Crotalus *** 04:10, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>Crot (sorry for the horrible short form - you need a new user name : ), I meant since you have the books/have read them, could you put them in the place you consider most appropriate. If you think it's obvious, then anyone could do it.

It's not our place to evaluate MR as a source (and others do this for us) - the most we can say is evaluate if it's making exceptional claims per WP:V. Abuse truth - I consider 1) the existence of a continuous 80 day ritual 2) Satan physically appearing in Victoria, BC 3) teh appearance of other mythological figures and 4) physical scars being removed by supernatural means, to be exceptional claims, by any criteria. The book is not a source for how reliable itself is (it's unlikely to say that it is itself made up or possibly fictional, though I would consider it more reliable if it acknowleged that recovered memory and leading questioning were possible considerations). Summoning devils and angels and making scars disappear through magic (actual magic mind you, supernatural forces that momentarily suspended the laws of wound healing and spontaneous tissue regeneration, not stage magic) sounds like a 'crackpot claim' to me. WLU (talk) 19:40, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

I am a psychologist in Victoria, B.C., the city where Michelle and Dr. Pazder lived. I knew Dr. Pazder slightly - we shared one case (not of ritual abuse). I have (mostly in the early 1990s) worked with several survivors of ritual abuse by cults around here, who have told me they were indeed abused in the same places it allegedly happened for Michelle. They have corroborated one another's stories, sometimes of specific incidents. I believe this abuse to be real. The fact that some of it seems to derive from West African cults doesn't take away credibility; ritually abusive groups don't just worship the Christian Satan; they often worship deities of other countries including Africa, in particular Egypt. What about the actual Satan being seen? I think that was an illusion produced by stage magic. Actual human beings don costumes to frighten little drugged kids in these rituals. Most ritual abusive groups are sophisticated in the arts of trickery and stage magic, which work particularly on young children - and continue to work on young "parts" of adult survivors. The abuse is real; the tricks are tricks. Dr. Pazder was one of the first therapists to encounter this phenomenon and his religious views may have coloured his interpretation of events. That doesn't discredit the phenomenon itself. Alison Miller, Ph.D., Registered Psychologist —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.69.215.163 (talk) 23:38, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Note that Alison Miller is not Alice Miller (psychologist).—Cesar Tort 01:51, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
To state that the book is "now considered to be completely untrue" is an extreme claim.
None of the sources have been able to prove this. Also, of the sources making claims about the book here, none are peer reviewed. Abuse truth (talk) 22:12, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

New reference

Latest comment: 16 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

New reference, from the Australian government I believe. Could be useful, explicitly mentions SRA. [2] WLU (talk) 15:03, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

SRA in the courts

Latest comment: 16 years ago9 comments4 people in discussion

The first sentence of SRA in the courts is "In America and Britain, defendants in a small number of cases of organised abuse successfully engaged journalists in framing the charges against them as evidence of moral panic and mass hysteria, whilst child protection workers and social workers involved in the cases were restricted from challenging these claims by professional codes of confidentiality." Anyone else read that as 'A small number of defendants got away with molesting small children for satan by using the press to bypass the courts'? It looks like the whole paragraph has an assumption of guilt in it that is POV and unwarranted. WLU (talk) 15:16, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Further to the courts, there's broad statements which are linked to single sources, and these sources appear to be newspaper reports of single cases. And even these articles are either paper, with no way of verifying, or to an abstract of a news story. The whole section is looking OR-SYNTHy to me. WLU (talk) 15:33, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, that nonsense was stuck in by the POV editors and it clearly violates Wikipedia policy. It should be removed. *** Crotalus *** 21:24, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
The statement does appear to be well sourced. It also appears to be somewhat accurate in some of the US cases, at least in terms of the media. Hechler's "The Battle and The Backlash" goes into both sides of this. Abuse truth (talk) 04:25, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
There are currently two sources listed. One is not available online, so I can't tell offhand whether "Abuse Truth" is misrepresenting it, or whether it meets reliability standards. The other one — a book by Jenny Kitzinger (a "Professor of Media and Communication Studies" with no apparent sociological or criminological background) published by the fringe Pluto Press (which "has always had a radical political agenda") is not a reliable source. *** Crotalus *** 05:22, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
The first sentence is supported by two references - first Kitzinger, and I think Crotalus' statement is worth paying attention to. The second is sourced to a fourteen-year-old publication of "Children Australia", which my filters won't even let me look at - it calls the page it's apparently sourced to ([3]) a "Malicious web site". The only comment I can see is "Children Australia is a quarterly journal..." so apparently the source of the Goddard appears to be Oz Child, an NGO in Australia. I don't know if this is the best source for a pretty strong claim like that. It does show up on google scholar [4] though rarely with an accompanying link. Goddard shows up frequently as an author, anyone know anthing else about him? I think this is his university page. WLU (talk) 18:23, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Crotalus appears to be incorrect about this source:
Kitzinger, Jenny (2004). Framing abuse: media influence and public understanding of sexual violence against children. Pluto. ISBN 0745323316.
It is distributed in the US by a university press.
Pluto is a progressive publication.
http://www.plutobooks.com/shtml/aboutpluto.shtml
"Pluto Press has a proud history of publishing the very best in progressive, critical thinking across politics and the social sciences. We are an independent company based in London, with a sales and marketing office in the United States and distribution rights throughout the world."
"We commission the best in critical, progressive writing that bridges trade and academic markets, and our authors include many of the world's leading thinkers, past and present. We publish political classics by writers including Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, Leon Trotsky, Frantz Fanon, Andre Gorz, Manning Marable, Jack London and Antonio Gramsci. Contemporary political writers and voices of conscience include Noam Chomsky, Edward Said, Howard Zinn, bell hooks, Ariel Dorfman, Susan George, John Pilger, Ziauddin Sardar, Israel Shahak, Greg Palast, Milan Rai, William Rivers Pitt, Boris Kagarlitsky, Robin Hahnel, Saul Landau, Sheila Rowbotham, Peter Fryer, Joseph Rotblat, Frank Füredi, Eduardo Galeano and Vandana Shiva. We also have a fine list of European literature in translation that includes Jean Baudrillard, Guy Debord, Raoul Vaneigem and Pierre Bourdieu."
Here are some endorsements of Pluto.
Endorsements
Noam Chomsky
"Pluto is one of the world's finest publishers. There's no doubt about that. The Pluto people keep on turning out a range of exciting and, above all, important books....
John Pilger "Pluto Press is our Weapon of Mass Instruction. A courageous list." Greg Palast (for info. on Pilger, see 'The War on Democracy' is John Pilger's first major film for the cinema - in a career that has produced more than 55 television documentaries....
www.johnpilger.com/"
They also publish Chomsky : http://www.plutobooks.com/shtml/noamchomsky.shtml
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0QLQ/is_3_20/ai_n15390147
about Kitzinger's book:
Framing Abuse: Media Influence and Public Understanding of Sexual Violence Against Children
"Does the media shape our perceptions, or do they tell us what we suspect or want to hear? What effects do pressure groups have on the media? What actually happens when the media "discover" a crisis? Kitzinger (media and communication, Cardiff U.) uses sexual violence against children as a case study to examine how the media use theories of active consumption, creative identification and agenda-setting to develop controversial allegations and analogies, create empathy and a sense of place in viewers, and promote images of perpetrators and survivors. It appears that the media actually can make a difference in exposing social evils and injustice, if those concerned know how to work in partnership. Distributed in the US by the U. of Michigan Press."
Distributed in the US by U. of Michigan Press
http://www.press.umich.edu/titleDetailDesc.do?id=115103
This book offers fascinating insights into how the media shape the way we think. Combining in-depth analysis of media representations of child sexual abuse with focus group discussions and interviews with around 500 journalists, campaigners and a cross-section of 'the public', Jenny Kitzinger reveals the media's role in contemporary society.
And, I would think that a professor in media studies would be a good one to make a comment about the media.
On Goddard (2nd source);
Goddard, CR (1994). "The organised abuse of children in rural England: the response of social services: part one". Children Australia 19 (3): 37-40.
"Professor Goddard has a major research and publication record, undertaking research in health, welfare and legal settings. He undertook his basic social work education in England where he worked in social service departments. On arrival in Australia he established the Child Protection Team at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne. With other professionals, Professor Goddard founded Australians Against Child Abuse (now known as The Australian Childhood Foundation), an agency which offers counselling for abused children, as well as advocacy, research, education and prevention programs."
http://www.med.monash.edu.au/socialwork/staff/goddard.html
So far, both sources look good. I hope that the sources skeptical about the existence of SRA are looked at as thoroughly. Abuse truth (talk) 04:13, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
We've dealt before with Kitzinger as a source. On the plus side, she is a professor (= in the USA full professor) at a good university. She has co-authored two books with Sage and one with Oxford University Press, so in principle any work by her, not just her books with academic publishers and in academic journals, could count as a good source. On the minus side, she is an expert in media studies not in psychology or criminology. Also her work takes a marked slant. That's her prerogative as a scholar but for the purposes of the encyclopedia we should be careful to balance it wherever possible by work of other scholars who take a different perspective. Pluto also has a stance - by no means identical to that of Kitzinger - and it is a serious publisher but not one of the mainstream scholarly imprints. Itsmejudith (talk) 14:06, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>Plus, the book is about the media influence on sexual violence against children. That's where its authority is, not on whether there were wrongful convictions, legal error or whether the cases were true. The book has its place, documenting how the media feeds and fed into the SRA phenomenon, but not in saying the courts were wrong to release the accused. Also, is it about SRA, or organized abuse? They're different things, aren't they? Lanning says they are. WLU (talk) 19:29, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Spin-out news clippings

Latest comment: 16 years ago20 comments6 people in discussion

I would support a spinout of almost all of those snippets and press clippings to List of satanic ritual abuse allegations and cases. A bloated list does not belong in this article, and was being used to push POV that SRA is a widespread prevalent phenomenon rather than a series of anecdotes, "outlier" results, and unverified claims, which may have no validity as an actual phenomenon at all.

We also need a lot more information from credible scholarly sources such as books published in university presses. On the one hand you have (for example) Noblitt & Perskin's fairly obscure Cult and Ritual Abuse, a "personal but also scholarly journey" published by a house printing "academic and general interest books," and hardly known outside the SRA-wonk world. On the other you have David Frankfurter's work published by Princeton University Press and favorably reviewed in The New York Times and Publishers Weekly. Guess which one we assign more weight to currently? <eleland/talkedits> 05:27, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

  • The spin-off is probably a good idea. Then we could include a brief mention in this article, avoiding undue weight. Also, I've said in the past that this article would probably be better if we restricted ourselves to government-affiliated and academic sources (and maybe books by top-tier non-scholarly publishing houses, though there we would have to be very careful). Current sourcing needs lots of work. *** Crotalus *** 05:33, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Spin-out and {{main}} works for me, we can avoid undue by having a section that is just the {{main}} link, I've seen it before. I'd still be happier if the non-viewable news links were used much more carefully and any contentious statements citing them were backed up by more readily available sources. OK for the "list of ..." page as a lot of them are simply news reports on apparent SRA, not for the main.
The problem with restricting ourselves exclusively to government and academic works is that SRA is in part a cultural phenonmena. Careful use of non-scholarly works to delineate parts of the cultural aspects could be warranted. WLU (talk) 18:23, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
The list of cases was an attempt to document SRA via reliable sources court cases, convictions and allegations. It appears that some editors want to minimize the actual convictions of cases in courts of law, and even delegate them to a side page. And perhaps not even that. This is of course ridiculous. The actual convictions show the existence and at least partial prevalence of SRA as a world-wide phenomena. But these convictions do not fit the view (POV) that SRA is simply "unverified claims." Therefore it appears that some editors would prefer these convictions not be reported and eliminated. In order for the page to be NPOV (and accurate), data from reliable sources, including the media, needs to be documented. Abuse truth (talk) 04:30, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Really? These people were convicted of "Satanic ritual abuse?" Or were they convicted of abuse, in a context where unverified claims of SRA had been made?
Let's take a case study - and it's literally the first one I checked up on, so no selection bias here.

"Along with his wife, he was found to have used hypnosis and ritualistic abuse to sexually abuse and prostitute two children in the mid-1990s. Whilst in jail, he attempted to have the two children murdered in order to prevent them from testifying against him.79"

(Note that the web link was not originally provided.)
The source actually says nothing whatsoever about hypnosis, and in fact makes it clear that the judge found him not to have had religious motivations, but that "Fletcher's behavior, whether dressed up in the clothes of religion or connected with his professed concern for a vulnerable child in his charge, matched the course that best advanced his selfish sexual or financial interests [...] Justice Harper said religious freedom and tolerance were important, but they could not be used to cloak the exploitation of children, and religion could not be used as justification to pervert justice."
As usual, the SRA wonks have taken a sad, sick case in which the perpetrator happened to try and shift focus onto Satanism nonsense, and turned it into documentation for their fairy tales. This bullshit has gone on long enough. I want an arbitration case and I want editors who have repeatedly cited sources misleadingly to be permanently banned from Wikipedia. <eleland/talkedits> 05:40, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
I think all of "Abuse Truth"'s sources need to be carefully checked and we have to insist that he provide direct quotes from now on for any assertions he wants to make. We've seen on several occasions that we cannot trust him to provide accurate paraphrases without filtering through the lens of his own bias on this issue. Everything he has added should at the least be tagged with {{Request quotation}}.
As to the case above, labeling it as "satanic ritual abuse" is clearly original research. Neither the term "Satan" nor any derivation thereof even appears in the story at all.
And as I've said before, adding a list of convictions to this page is like adding a list of conspiracy convictions to the Conspiracy theory page. It completely misses the point, and misunderstands what the term actually means. *** Crotalus *** 13:22, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
The list of SRA cases (using this loosely, because I consider many to be debatable) in no way adds to the information content of the page; all it does is give the imrpression that SRA is a real phenomenon. This is not a judgement for us or our readers to make, and a separate list maintains the content while not giving a WP:SYNTHy impression that there is a world-wide, universal and coherent phenomena of interlinked SRA cases. I'm not willing to say AT should quote all things put on the page, I see no reason to violate the spirit of WP:AGF in this way. But there is huge precedent for this kind of thing: Category:Lists, List of kidnappings, List of assassinated people, List of political hostages held by FARC, List of poisonings, List of military controversies, List of controversial issues, it is very common in a main article on a topic, to have a 'list of' link in the see also section. Therefore, it is appropriate and I see no reason to dispute this. I'm creating and pasting the page now, it can be moved over and {{main}}ed when the page is unlocked. WLU (talk) 17:07, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>Done, List of satanic ritual abuse allegations, though it could be moved to cases I suppose, as cases is more inclusive to both allegations and convictions (any title with an 'and' in it, seems to be a bad one to me). Note that the page listing alleged cases might be more suitable as an external link on that page (from ra-info I think). Meh, I'll move it. When unprotected, the entire section should be replaced with {{main|List of satanic ritual abuse cases}} WLU (talk) 17:19, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Moved list of satanic ritual abuse cases. WLU (talk) 17:27, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
I moved it back, because "cases" is more POV than "allegations"; the latter term merely reports the existence of the allegation. (You can't have convictions without allegations.) --Orange Mike | Talk 17:45, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
Funny, because I moved it originally 'cause I thought 'allegations' was too sympathetic to the skeptics : ) Do you still think it's proddable, or is the discussion here sufficient to convince you it's worth a page? WLU (talk) 17:59, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm willing to defer to the folks here, if the skeptics and true believers alike agree that it's not a POV fork. "Allegations" is more neutral, because it takes no position as to truth or falsity of the allegation. "Cases" assumes that there's something substantive behind the allegation. --Orange Mike | Talk 18:12, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
I still strongly believe that this should not be forked into a separate page. These cases are part of the SRA phenomena.
In reply to eleland, note how he misrepresents my position to attack my argument. He states, "These people were convicted of "Satanic ritual abuse?" Or were they convicted of abuse, in a context where unverified claims of SRA had been made?" I previously stated "The list of cases was an attempt to document SRA via reliable sources court cases, convictions and allegations." I never stated that anyone was convicted of "SRA." Interesting that he needs to call people "SRA wonks." Let's look at another case.
"Mornington Peninsula, Victoria
In the late 1980s, a number of children at a daycare centre in the Mornington Peninsula, Victoria, began disclosing experiences of organised and ritualistic sexual abuse to their parents and the police.[73] Their disclosures included instances in which they were taken in a car from the creche to a nearby house, undressed by adults and sexually assaulted, video-taped and filmed while naked, and urinated and defecated upon by adults. The children disclosed that some of the abusers wore police uniforms, masks and costumes.[74]
In 1992, a government inquiry ordered that the daycare centre be shut on the basis that there was significant evidence that the owner of the centre had either participated in the abuse or facilitated it.[75] This include forensic evidence that some of the children had been sexually penetrated. The police never pressed charges against the couple, who later fled to Queensland and, in a serious breach of privacy laws, published the names and addresses of all the complainant children online.[76]"
Though no conviction was found, the media documents "organised and ritualistic sexual abuse."
Of course eleland finds the need to threaten people with a POV different from his by stating: "This bullshit has gone on long enough. I want an arbitration case and I want editors who have repeatedly cited sources misleadingly to be permanently banned from Wikipedia."
More interesting is the statement from "Crotalus horridus." (If you remember back to December, Crotalus was the user that came in without his name (using his ISP address) and reverted the page back two months. This was called vandalism by several skeptical and SRA believer editors alike.)
"I think all of "Abuse Truth"'s sources need to be carefully checked and we have to insist that he provide direct quotes from now on for any assertions he wants to make. We've seen on several occasions that we cannot trust him to provide accurate paraphrases without filtering through the lens of his own bias on this issue. Everything he has added should at the least be tagged with {{Request quotation}}."
Of course "Crotalus" is wrong again. I did not write any of the sections on the cases page nor did I ever edit any of these sections, other than restoring the deletions of them back to the page. His bias appears to have a very large lens. His picking of data to support his own POV shows an extreme bias. This has been shown on this talk page several times. This is apparent in how he picks the data (see the section above) on Pluto Press. Perhaps "Crotalus'" edits need to be watched more closely. Abuse truth (talk) 04:09, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Once again, you completely misunderstand the point. No one denies that child abuse takes place, both individually and in groups, and that some small number of child abusers have used ritual trappings (whether Christian, Satanic, or any other religion) to control and intimidate their victims. That's beside the point and irrelevant because it is not what this article is about. This article is about the topic of "satanic ritual abuse," a conspiracy theory popular in the 1980s that postulated a massive, multigenerational worldwide conspiracy killing thousands of children a year, breeding babies for sacrifice, infiltrating high positions in government and society, and so on. Putting small-scale cases of real ritual abuse in order to justify the SRA scare is like trying to use a small-scale conviction for "conspiracy to distribute cocaine" in order to prove that maybe conspiracy theories aren't so crazy after all. It's completely unacceptable. It is undue weight and original research by synthesis and it will not be allowed here. You have pushed your POV on this article for far too long, and it's over now. You will no longer be permitted to use Wikipedia as a platform for your fringe theories. *** Crotalus *** 04:17, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>Find me other articles (that aren't lists) where there is documentation of every single case that shows up in the news. I'd say they are the minority, and there are very few (probably none) that are featured articles. Kidnapping, comparable because it is a crime, links to the 'list of famous kidnappings', but it does not deal with them in the main body. What does placing them in the main body do, except attempt to prove in a sneaky way, that SRA is real. Cannibalism does (but probably shouldn't) but the difference is cannibalism is unambiguous (you've either eaten someone or you haven't). More comparable (because they deal with intent) are Conspiracy (civil) (none), Conspiracy (crime) (none), Fraud (every single one in the list has a main article; by comparision, we have four with main article for 19 sections, 21 if you include Brazil and Argentina). At best it could be re-named 'Notable cases', briefly summarize the main articles, and the list could go in the see also section. You appear to be trying to demonstrate that SRA is true, when we only establish if it is verifiable; with the news articles we can only verify information about those cases, not anything about SRA overall. Therefore, they should be on a separate page. WLU (talk) 19:24, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Satanic ritual abuse is not a conspiracy theory or scare. It is documented by news reports, court cases and journal articles. This has been shown through a variety of references. The many cases in newspapers and journals definitely show a pattern. We need to put these on the page and let the readers decide from all of the reliable soruces available as to veracity of SRA claims. The bias of some of the editors on this page is obvious. It does a disservice to the use of wikipedia as an encyclopedia, giving its readers a warped and onesided view of the debate. Abuse truth (talk) 03:58, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
Trying to demonstrate "a pattern" by a series of disconnected newspaper clippings is a classic example of original research by synthesis, and is prohibited. *** Crotalus *** 04:51, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
Agreed, synth. Those are individual cases of SRA, it is up to others to pull them together to say they are all connected, not us. And placing them in the main page, on a page like this, is for me a synthetic attempt to give credence to an unproven theory. WLU (talk) 12:53, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
But if the definition of SRA is not defined as a global conspiracy, but inclusive of all cases of ritual abuse with a satanic theme, then including the news articles on this page is not synthesis at all. It would be simply including more examples of SRA. And as has been shown on this page more recently by several editors, there are many definition of SRA. So, we can't close the definition of SRA to that of a few researchers. Therefore the news articles should be included on the page. Abuse truth (talk) 22:39, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
News articles should certainly be included, although it should be pointed out explicitally that they do not constitute scientific proof of the existance of SRA. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 02:35, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

SRA exists vs. SRA does not exist

Latest comment: 16 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

we don't need to constantly argue about the tone of the article and if it supports a majority or minority view, or what those views are- freud talked about it before any of use were born, so I think that the only possible view is that it is unknown if true. majority or minority viewpoint don't matter as much NOW, if some references essentially pre-date psychology itself. 66.220.110.83 (talk) 04:51, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Professional, peer-reviewed evidence

Latest comment: 16 years ago32 comments11 people in discussion

I would be inclined to disbelieve evidence of SRA unless it is professional and peer-reviewed. If those people who believe that it exists could give me a reference in a peer-reviewed and published journal to a group of professionals who have carried out a study then I might be more inclined to believe them, but so far no-one has managed to do just that, which is a very basic level of scientific veritability. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 14:44, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

If I'm understanding you, you're saying that the existence of Satanic ritual abuse is an exceptional claim requiring exceptional sources. In my mind, the cultural phenomenon of SRA is definitely something worth talking about. The existence of incidents of sexual, physical and other types of abuse in which satan is mentioned, is something worth talking about. But the idea of a world-wide conspiracy of people breeding and babies for killing, and abducting and ritually killing people for the purpose of summoning of satan to earth, is an extreme claim, which should not be given credibility without solid evidence. Cases of SRA found in papers are largely isolated, and often dubiously related to the actual satanic worship of satan. I'd say the page should focus more on the satanic panic of the 80s and 90s. WLU (talk) 19:04, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
I endorse what you say WLU. Itsmejudith (talk) 19:10, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
I also agree.
Above (in the archives now I think) I mooted the idea of splitting off a ritualistic child abuse article which could deal more with the treatment of actual ritual abuse w/o the requirement that it be "Satanic." Most of it is done by Christians, after all. That would pose problems of avoiding a POV fork, I don't think it's a POV fork in principle but I'm sure that tendentious editors would try and make it one. <eleland/talkedits> 19:12, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
I agree with this idea. There is no reason the page should be a POV fork; it deals with a different subject. This page is (or should be) about the conspiracy theory and cultural phenomenon that was widespread in the 1980s. A page on ritualistic child abuse would cover documented types of child abuse that take place in a ritualistic setting; this would include the cases where perpetrators use ritual trappings to intimidate/control their victims, as well as various other forms of ritualized abuse such as Christian exorcisms-by-beating. *** Crotalus *** 19:31, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
Absolutely. Indeed, I edited Child sacrifice in pre-Columbian cultures. Unlike SRA, that ritualistic child abuse was real and there is even forensic evidence after so many hundreds of years (unlike the SRA cases, where forensic evidence is zilch). —Cesar Tort 19:39, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
I disagree that "the existence of Satanic ritual abuse is an exceptional claim requiring exceptional sources." I also disagree that "the page should focus more on the satanic panic of the 80s and 90s." The page should focus on all related cases from reliable sources. This would be unbiased, allowing the reader to decide the truth about the issue. If we pick and choose data to promote, we are simply promoting a biased POV. Abuse truth (talk) 04:04, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
The theory of satanic ritual abuse postulated that a vast, intergenerational Satanist conspiracy was murdering many thousands of children a year and covering up all evidence, that they were breeding babies for sacrifice, and that they had infiltrated the highest levels of government and society. These are indeed extraordinary claims requiring extraordinary evidence. It is not an extraordinary claim to say that some perverts used ritual to intimidate and control their victims — but that is not SRA, any more than the local drug pusher's "conspiracy to distribute narcotics" is a conspiracy theory or that an aircraft whose markings you can't make out is an unidentified flying object. Most of the cases in the article have never been called SRA by reliable sources, making their inclusion a clear violation of WP:NOR. They also violate WP:UNDUE. *** Crotalus *** 04:55, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

The claims are that the evidence was covered up, yet the fact that the covered evidence was not in evidence is a contradiction. Checking into the descriptions of how children were forced to take part in either destroying that evidence or disposing of it in such a manner it was unlikely to be found, how could anyone reasonably expect it to be laying around just waiting for the CSI teams to discover? The concept that three and four year-old children told such similar stories would also indicate that either the stories are essentially true, or somehow these children, on being interviewed for the first time, had engaged in some vast conspiratorial hoax, as if children that young could find a means of contacting others around the country and conceive of such an idea. A practice that has had decades, if not centuries of time to develop a means of operating in secret would not lend itself to easy discovery. Examine the number of secret meetings that are known to occur, yet the content of which is unknown. The Skull and Bones and the Bilderberger group are examples that readily come to mind. Yet no one claims the groups do not exist. The other reality is that in actuality there are dozens of known cases where the evidence WAS found, the perpetrators confessed, a conviction was obtained, the guilty imprisoned. Yet even some of those were later overturned because of some technicality. Those convicted also seem to have an extraordinary effort made by others to overturn their cases. Why such a full charge effort to do that? What is it that must be discounted by any means necessary? Anyone who truly wants to dig into those cases and examine the evidence for themselves would end up wondering what is really being covered up. Even when the tunnels at the McMartin school WERE found, the news media stayed silent, and that evidence was ignored. The conclusion of many who followed the case from a distance would be that no such evidence, therefore, exists. Just like the huge numbers of children who developed the same STD's from each source, more evidence is once again not emphasized or reported. Having spent a considerable amount of time now in researching and finding the facts of numerous cases, there is no way to conclude that "nothing happened". So thousands of victims not only try to live with such a history, but also with being totally discounted and disbelieved. In fact, the more incredible and bizarre the practioners make their abuses, the less believable the tellers would be. Brilliantly deliberate, given the willingness of most people to refuse to believe what is too horrible to believe. How easy it is to dupe John Q Public. Julaine Cooper24.243.143.92 (talk) 05:36, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Claims that the evidence was covered up are fairly common in conspiracy theories. They are not a substitute for having actual evidence. Experience shows us that virtually all perpetrators, even the most careful, do usually leave at least some physical evidence behind. In fact, one of the basic principles of crime scene analysis is that everyone takes something from the scene with them, and leaves something behind (even if it's trace evidence that requires careful examination to find). Virtually all the major cases of the 1980s were proven to be baseless witch hunts, which is why there was so much effort put into overturning them — they were a major failure and breakdown of the criminal justice system in the face of hysteria. No reliable source ever verified the claims of tunnels at McMartin, though a few crackpots said they had found them. The reason the disclosures were all so similar is the same reason that disclosures of witchcraft in the early modern era were so similar. The inquisitors/therapists were working from a common source; in the latter case, the Malleus Maleficarum, in the former, Michelle Remembers. In fact, the claims in both cases are remarkably similar: a massive, evil satanic conspiracy is killing children, and only by waiving the normal rules of evidence, criminal procedure, and common sense can it be stopped. This similarity has been commented on by various scholars. *** Crotalus *** 05:50, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
  • "Even when the tunnels at the McMartin school WERE found..." (user Julaine Cooper, above).
Please read the archived talk pages. This has been discussed before when I called the attention to this article: The Dark Truth About the "Dark Tunnels of McMartin" —Cesar Tort 05:46, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
To AT - There are multiple editors who think that SRA is an exceptional claim. And all we can do with news stories is report the contents of those stories. Anything else we do with those stories is a SYNTH. Therefore, it's appropriate they be in a separate page, with no synth happening on either page.
To JC - Skull and Bones didn't kill people, did they? And the interviews are thought to come to a common end because of the leading interview questions used by investigators. Multiple cases of STDs in children is evidence of multiple sexual assaults, not satanic rituals. And the rest is a synthesis. If you have new sources, that will do more to advance your position than a long opinion. WLU (talk) 12:49, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
(Addressed to Crotalus and Juliane Cooper - moved by WLU (talk)) Where is your scientific proof to the contrary? BrianTolbert (talk) 13:00, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
Please thread your posts rather than interrupting discussion, per the talk page guidelines. WLU (talk) 13:07, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
He doesn't need "scientific proof." He needs evidence to support his claims, and it needs to be scientific evidence if it's a scientific claim. The author of Michelle Remembers was consulted on over 1,000 SRA investigations, according to the Daily Mail, and was one of the highest-profile "experts" cited in all the early news reports. According to The Commercial Appeal, a newspaper in Tennessee, prosecutors used the book as a guide to SRA cases.
The best source on McMartin excavations is the findings of the reputable archaelogical company which dug it up for the prosecution. They looked exactly where the kids had described trap doors, tunnels, etc, and found nothing. It's worth noting also that virtually every child had a different description of where these features were. The subsequent dig was done by one guy, hired by the parents of the "victim" children, and roped into their delusions. He found the same thing the first dig did - backfilled garbage pits from decades earlier - and interpreted it as proof of tunnels. His findings were specifically discounted in an article in the peer-reviewed journal Behavior and Social Issues On the scientific question here, you have two conflicting reports, one by professionals with all the certifications, and one by a little-known PhD which was subsequently discredited. <eleland/talkedits> 01:12, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
Crotalus's final point, about the similarity to witch hunts, has been the subject of an entire book published by an expert in a university press. See Frankfurter's Evil Incarnate. <eleland/talkedits> 01:12, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>McMartin preschool trial is reasonably sourced, and points to bupkus. Is an allegation, not proof. --WLU (talk) 02:18, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Obviously I agree that there should be a page on SRA, simply because of its fame and the fact that it is a very important issue, no matter what view you take on its veritability. However, I still feel that it should be more clearly stated in the article that this is not something that has been proven to have occoured. The most basic level of scientific veritability is for a paper to be published in a peer-reviewed journal, and since this is a psychiatry related issue, it is well within the realm of science. All the sources currently used to support the existance of SRA are fairly ephemeral in nature, and are certainly not serious scientific journals, of the type that would be necessary to state that this is a proven occourance. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 13:26, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
The problem is, SRA has occurred depending on your definition - any abuse in which satan is mentioned, the use of satanic elements in abuse (for religious, mental illness or victim terrification reasons), or the killing of a child within a ritual context, by some definitions, that is satanic ritual abuse (and that is a major point made by Lanning - it's hard to define, and there are valid cases in which abusers have invoked 'satanic/religious/ritual' elements. Lanning suggests focussing on the abuse and ignoring the motivation - motivation is only really necessary for charges beyond the abuse or for a psych defense). Add to that, the abuse can be sexual, physical or emotional, it's a very slippery topic. The strongest characterization of SRA, that of multi-generational families breeding and kidnapping children for supernatural purposes within the context of a nation- or world-wide conspiracy that controls governments, police, legal systems and businesses, that has never been even close to proven. However, it's well documented (in the news stories) that people have mentioned satan or worn robes while molesting children, and that dead children have been found in the context of rituals. But these appear to be isolated incidents, not a cohesive phenomenon in which all incidents of abuse are linked. Arguably, the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping is a case of ritual abuse, as it took place within the context of the abuser's religious (and therefore ritualistic) worldview.
For me, the more salient issue on the page is massive panic and belief in the existence of the 'strong form' of SRA - massive conspiracy version - that had a HUGE impact in the 80s and 90s, stretching overseas to Britain as well. I'd say that is arguably the true topic of the page, to the point that I could see moving the page to Satanic ritual abuse phenomenon or something similar. That's also the take used by Religious Tolerance.org (and possibly a bunch of books too, since I haven't read any). But that's my opinion, and I don't have enough WP:V to back me up - so I let it be. WLU (talk) 15:46, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

(Outdent, reply to WLU:) Here are a few definitions of SRA given in peer-reviewed academic journals.

deYoung, Mary. Satanic Ritual Abuse in Day Care: An Analysis of 12 American Cases. Child Abuse Review; May97, Vol. 6 Issue 2.

Frankfurter, David. Ritual as Accusation and Atrocity: Satanic Ritual Abuse, Gnostic Libertinism, and Primal Murders. History of Religions, Vol. 40, No. 4. (May, 2001).

Bette L. Bottoms; Phillip R. Shaver; Gail S. Goodman Bottoms, Bette L.; Shaver, Phillip R.; Goodman, Gail S. An Analysis of Ritualistic and Religion-Related Child Abuse Allegations. Law and Human Behavior, Vol. 20, No. 1. (Feb., 1996).

-*** Crotalus *** 16:50, 10 February 2008 (UTC)


Here are some different definitions of SRA.
two peer-reviewed sources
"Deviant Scripturalism and Ritual Satanic Abuse" Part One: "Possible Judeo-Christian Influences." S. Kent - Religion 23 no.3 (July, 1993): 229-241.
"A plausible explanation for satanic abuse accounts that is not explored by critics is that deviant: either develop satanic rituals from material that exists in easily accesible mainstream religious texts, or sanctify their violence by framing it within passages in otherwise normative scriptures." p. 231
"Multiple Personality Disorder and :Satanic Ritual Abuse: the Issue Of Credibility" Dissociation, Vol. III, No. 1 March 1990 S. VanBenschoten
Ritual abuse may or may not have satanic overtones. However, many of the allegations of ritual abuse which have surfaced over the present decade specifically implicate allegiance to or worship of Satan as the basis for accomplishing or justifying the ceremonial activities performed. Although the prevalence of satanic ritual abuse is not known, its involvement in a variety of social contexts and diverse belief systems has been reported. Highly secretive and rigidly structured cults have been implicated, as well as groups exploiting day care centers, groups disguised as traditional religious structures, families (including rnultigenerational involvement), small self-styled adolescent groups, child pornography and drug rings, and individuals acting either independently or within loosely knit groups (Brown, 1986: Gallant, 1986, 1988; Gould, 1986, 1987; Kahaner, 1988; Young, 1989).
two skeptical sources
http://www.religioustolerance.org/sra.htm
Satanic Ritual Abuse (SRA) can be defined as the psychological, sexual, and/or physical assault forced on an unwilling human victim, and committed by one or more Satanists according to a prescribed ritual, the primary aim of which is to fulfill the need to worship the Christian devil, Satan.


by Kenneth V. Lanning, Supervisory Special Agent
Behavioral Science Unit
National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime
1992 FBI Report --Satanic Ritual Abuse By Kenneth V. Lanning, Supervisory Special Agent Behavioral Science Unit National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime
What is "Ritual" Child Abuse?
I cannot define "ritual child abuse" precisely and prefer not to use the term. I am frequently forced to use it (as throughout this discussion) so that people will have some idea what I am discussing. Use of the term, however, is confusing, misleading, and counterproductive. The newer term "satanic ritual abuse" (abbreviated "SRA") is even worse. Certain observations, however, are important for investigative understanding. Most people today use the term to refer to abuse of children that is part of some evil spiritual belief system, which almost by definition must be satanic.
Satanic Ritual Abuse: The Evidence Surfaces
By Daniel Ryder, CCDC, LSW
http://home.mchsi.com/~ftio/ra-evidence-surfaces.htm
The report was written by supervisory special agent Kenneth Lanning. It has gone out to law enforcement agencies around the country; and has been cited consistently throughout the media the last several years. The report states, in regards to "organized" Satanic ritual abuse homicide (that is, two or more Satanic cult members conspiring to commit murder):
a comment from a previous editor on this talk page
There are some editors here who believe that claims of SRA have no basis in fact. In my experience, they have also tended to presume...that there are only two sides to this debate - the "skeptics" and the "believers" - and that anyone who is not a "skeptic" must therefore be a zealot or nutjob who believes in "Satanic conspiracies". As a result, editors like myself who don't subscribe to the "skeptic" POV on SRA tend to be accused of having a secret "agenda" or being a "conspiracy theorist". This is not the basis for calm and respectful discussion.
There are a diversity of opinions and explanations for SRA, even amongs the skeptics. You'll note that I've added the largest number of "sceptical" references on SRA of any editor. However, regardless of what your personal POV is, Wikipedia asks us to give adequate weight to all sources and POVs in order to meet the basic criteria of balance and NPOV.
The following is a sample of academics who have conducted research, and written articles and books, which take disclosures of SRA seriously: Prof. Liz Kelly, Prof. Roland Summit, Prof. Jenny Kitzinger, Prof. Catherine Itzen, Prof. Freda Briggs, Prof. Chris Goddard, Ass. Prof. Dawn Perlmutter, Dr Randy Noblitt, Dr Sara Scott, Drs Jonker and Jonker-Bakker, Dr Phil Mollon, Dr Katherine Faller, Dr Valerie Sinason, Dr Jean Goodwin, Dr Peter Bibby. Only a few of these authors are quoted on this article, but they have all made substantive contributions to the study of SRA and organised abuse. These people are not zealots, nutjobs, or "believers" in a "Satanic conspiracy". They are respected professionals and academics who are writing from a range of disciplines, and they take disclosures of SRA seriously on the basis of clinical experience and/or empirical research.
We all have strong views on the subject. I'm not advocating that we ignore the "skeptics" or entrench one POV in the article over another. I'm asking that we abide by Wikipedia policy: which is that we represent all POVs and sources in the article fairly, with consideration to balance and credibility. I'm also asking that "sceptical" editors presume good faith, and start treating myself, and other non-"sceptic" editors, as people of serious intent who are here to improve the article and nothing more. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 06:35, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
In reply to WLU: There is no consensus that "SRA is an exceptional claim." Nor is there a consensus to a definition of SRA, neither here or in the literature. To separate the news articles from this page, due to an unaccepted concept in the literature would be OR, wikipedia making up its own definition of SRA and claiming this is the only one. As stated previously, this would also be a POV fork, as this fork would be based on some of the skeptical editors more biased definitions of SRA.
McMartin was a very long complex trial. With many views from both sides of the issue.
Nine of 11 jurors at a press conference following the trial stated that they believed the children had been molested. These same jurors stated that they believed that the evidence did not allow them to state who had committed the abuse beyond a reasonable doubt. "Tapes of Children Decided the Case for Most Jurors". Los Angeles Times. Friday, January 19, 1990. pp. A1 and A2. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
—Preceding unsigned comment added by Abuse truth (talk • contribs)


I'll get back to you on those peer-reviewed sources you mention, since it'll take a while for me to check out one of the websites as it's in dutch... On the exceptional claim point I should mention that as per the wikipedia guidelines SRA is an exceptional claim, and it does require very serious sources to back it up. If we had an article in The Lancet, Nature or a similarly weighty tomb stating that SRA was a serious and verifiable issue then this would less of an issue. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 22:36, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
(Six weeks off from this ... is not long enough) Can I just reiterate that what is defined above as the "strong" definition of SRA (e.g. worldwide conspiracy of satanists) is (a) not the definition of SRA most commonly used in literature about SRA, (b) a view that is held by small extremist fringe and (c) a view that "sceptics" have widely attributed to everyone who uses the term SRA in order to paint them all with the same brush.
The term SRA has been used in a variety of ways and in a variety of contexts, and this article should reflect that. Attributing the "strong" definition of SRA to everyone that uses the phrase is a pejorative sleight-of-hand and it will be strongly contested here by me and others. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 01:25, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
I should point out that this particular section is about the lack of peer-reviewed and professional evidence of SRA, not its definition. I would agree with you that there needs to be greater clarity of thought regarding the very varied definitions of SRA, but that is for a different section. I don't mean to be annoying, but otherwise this section will get too vague. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 01:53, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
I think I'm replying to AT above - I don't think I said that SRA was an extreme claim. I think I was saying that Michelle Remembers made an extreme claim, and that it couldn't be used as a source on the page, and that it's justified to portray the book as fiction, false, or any other term that portrays skepticism on the claim that the events described therein actually happened. To others - there's no contest that the 'satanic panic' happened. There is (in my mind) no contest that some children have been abused by people who used satanic trappings as part of or around the abuse. My contention is that those incidents are the result of actions of small, isolated groups of people, or single individuals, and that there is not enough evidence to verify that there is an overarching organization that links them barring the media. They are isolated incidents as tragic, and unconnected, as any other incident of child abuse that occurs, and that it will be very difficult to verifiably demonstrate that the individuals in question are motivated by a desire to perpetuate abuse as part of worshipping the christian devil. WLU (talk) 19:07, 11 February 2008 (UTC)


Brief Synopsis of the Professional Literature on the Existence of Ritualistic Abuse

(by Ellen P. Lacter, Ph.D., Psychologist, Updated on 2-11-2008)

Psychological and legal evidence of the existence of ritual abuse is substantial and rapidly growing.

A recent review of the empirical evidence of ritual abuse is included in a book by Noblitt and Perskin (Cult and Ritual Abuse, 2000, Chapter 6). One national survey of 2709 clinical psychologists showed that 30% claimed to have seen at least one case of "ritualistic or religion-based abuse" and 93% of these psychologists believed the harm actually occurred (Goodman, Qin, Bottoms, & Shaver, 1994). Noblitt reports that, "In a survey of the membership of the International Society for the Study of Multiple Personality and Dissociation, [Nancy] Perry concluded that 88% of 1185 respondents reported belief in ritual abuse, involving mind control and programming" (Paper presented at the 40th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis, Fort Worth, Texas, March 18, 1998, adapted from Noblitt, 1998; Accessing Dissociated Mental States, referring to Perrys findings published in the International Society for the Study of Multiple Personality and Dissociation Newsletter, 1992, p. 4).

Updates of the empirical evidence of ritual abuse will appear in the soon-to-be-released book, “Ritual Abuse in the Twenty-first Century: Psychological, Forensic, Social and Political Considerations” (2008), edited by James Randall Noblitt, Ph.D. & Pamela Sue Perskin.

Numerous court decisions (criminal, family, juvenile, and civil) have been based on findings of ritual abuse. One list entitled, “The Satanism and Ritual Abuse Archive”, by Diana Napolis, is published on the world-wide web at: [archive contains 92 cases as of February 12, 2008.] In one notable civil case, the Honorable Warren K. Urbom, Senior United States District Judge, Omaha, Nebraska, awarded a million dollar judgement on February 27, 1999 to Paul Bonacci, based on sexual abuse (including pornography and orgies) and false imprisonment of Bonacci as a child, in the infamous Franklin ritual cult/sex/drug ring case. This case is discussed in depth in John De Camps 1994 book, "The Franklin Cover-Up". Numerous important cases are still to be added to the archive, including the 2006 criminal conviction of Father Gerald Robinson for the ritualistic murder in 1980 of Sister Margaret Ann Pahl.

An other interesting case involving possible ritual abuse just appeared in the news in January, 2008. Lawrence Douglas Harris, Sr., was charged with first-degree murder of his step-daughters in Sioux City, Iowa. Court documents state that Harris told police he "had been casting a spell that had gone bad, and that the spell could have had severe consequences." No other detail is available at present.

The post-trial geological survey under the McMartin preschool's foundation yielded convincing corroboration of the children's reports of being taken through underground tunnels beneath the school to get to abusive rituals (see: "The Dark Tunnels of McMartin", Summit, R.C.). The media widely portrayed the allegations of ritual abuse at the McMartin preschool as having resulted from therapists and investigators using poor interview techniques with the children. The geological survey argues otherwise.

A good deal more information on ritual abuse would be available if it were not for the secrecy preserved by the organized criminal groups that commit this abuse, the profound fear of disclosure among victims (Fraser; 1997b; Young & Young, 1997), and the abusers’ skilled use of torture to cause their victims to become highly dissociative and generally amnestic for their abuse.

Proponents of the position that memories of ritual abuse are false or grossly exaggerated, e.g., the False Memory Syndrome Foundation, were a strong international political force in suppressing the reality of ritual abuse beginning in the mid-1990's. They launched an aggressive media campaign and lobbied legislators, asserting their position that individuals reporting ritual abuse were influenced to believe they were ritually abused by negligent or malpracticing psychotherapists and by a social climate of “moral panic” and “mass hysteria”. This led to considerable influence on public opinion and considerable presence in the courts, particularly in malpractice claims against therapists and investigators.

This media campaign and hostile legal climate influenced many law enforcement officials receiving reports of ritual abuse, and many physicians and psychotherapists hearing disclosure of ritual abuse, to be very skeptical of accounts of ritual abuse, and to tend to stigmatize reporting individuals as delusional, schizophrenic, or otherwise seriously mentally ill. Physicians and therapists who believe that their patients have trauma based in ritual abuse are often very guarded about divulging this clinical data, making reports of such abuse to law enforcement and child protection, sharing their findings with their colleagues, and writing about treating trauma from ritual abuse. All of this results in tremendous suppression of this information (Brown, Scheflin, & Hammond, 1998; Coons, 1997; Whitfield, Silberg, & Fink, 2002; Young & Young, 1997). This is the basis for the sharp reduction in publications about ritual abuse in the mid 1990s to the present.

There are recent indications that the tide is beginning to turn. Two professional psychology books that address ritual abuse in depth have just been accepted for publication, and are expected to be released by mid-2008. These are, “Ritual Abuse in the Twenty-first Century: Psychological, Forensic, Social and Political Considerations” (2008), edited by James Randall Noblitt, Ph.D. & Pamela Sue Perskin, Oregon: Robert D. Reed Publishers, and, “Forensic Aspects of Dissociative Identity Disorder” (2008), edited by Adah Sachs and Graeme Galton. London: Karnac Books.

  • Thanks for the references. I fell it's unecessary to overwhem this section with them. I see that your above post is your IP's only entry to this discussion thread. Please read the archived talk pages discussions —or at least this current talk page. Thanks again. —Cesar Tort 09:39, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Yes, perhaps this is rather overwhelming. However, even a brief glance through the list shows several problems. For a start many of the sources appear to be talking about ritualized child abuse, which is completely different from SRA, with the former being a well documented occourance and the latter having no serious evidence to back it up as fact. Many of the sources are also books, which are rarely peer-reviewed, and the fact that a book has been published does not make it factually accurate. We really need direct quotes from these sources, since it is not possible for people to go through ever single one of those sources. Many of the peer-reviewed sources also appear to be questioning the reality of SRA. Either way, a set of direct quotes is needed, rather than a long list. —Preceding unsigned comment added by J.StuartClarke (talk • contribs) 14:35, 12 February 2008 (UTC) - Whoops... Sorry... --J.StuartClarke (talk) 15:05, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
References to 'Joe random website, like End Abuse Now, aren't helpful, and neither are massive text and infodumps. I've formatted for readability and brevity by collapsing the references and bibliography. A huge, raw dump of references isn't convincing because many are not credible (Journal of Psychohistory is edited by a single person, Dissasociation is of dubious use), they may be from non reliable sources, and generally must be evaluated individually. Also, it's a very long post to read; I only scanned it and doubt I will read it in detail. Please keep posts brief. WLU (talk) 15:08, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks WLU for collapsing Ellen P. Lacter's "Brief" Synopsis of the Professional Literature on the Existence of Ritualistic Abuse above. It makes the thread much more readable.

Even in the collapsed view it is remarkable to see that we are advised to read "The Dark Tunnels of McMartin" by R.C. Summit. This has happened many times before in the archived talk pages by other editors: Summit is considered by SRA believers as a star researcher.

Alas, Summit was a loon. "Church, schools, medical and social service agencies, police, courts, government and public media", Summit wrote, "remain devoted to beliefs, policies and priorities that not only ignore, but obscure the impact of adult sexual interest in children" (Roland Summit: "Too terrible to hear: barriers to perception of child sexual abuse", adapted from a paper written in support of testimony before US Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography, Miami, FL, November 20, 1985, p. 1).

In a 1987 speech he warned about police who might be part of the satanic cult. (A partial comment of that speech was shown during the Canadian Broadcasting System on January 2, 1993.) When asked by a CBS reporter if that statement was a bit paranoid, Summit expressed his fear if the highest levels of government might be involved in a conspiracy to cover up of SRA.

—Cesar Tort 00:33, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

I think that Lacter's addition to this page is an excellent one. She provides numerous sources and a rational for showing the existence of SRA. Cooper also presents an interesting theory about evidence being either hidden or ignored. As researchers, we need to consider all of the evidence to draw conclusions and not only pick and choose the evidence that fits our POV. About CT's comments above, calling someone "a loon" is inappropriate and unnecessary. In Summit's first quote, especially at the time, this may have been true. Fortunately now, this is different and CSA is taken much more seriously. As to the 1987 speech, it has been theorized that cults plant people at different stratas of society. So his fear may be well founded. More data is needed on this. Abuse truth (talk) 05:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
The main issue is that wikipedia cannot just use massive quantities of sources without having direct quotes taken from those. As a broad scope reference encyclopedia, it cannot expect its readers to trawl through a list that long in order to find the information. Direct quotations are significantly more helpful. If these could be found then you would be able to begin to claim the SRA was realistic. However, unless these come from a serious scientific journal then we will have to very cautious about our analysis of the source. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 11:10, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Suggested split

Latest comment: 16 years ago31 comments12 people in discussion
Rationale

"Satanic ritual abuse" generally refers to an unsupported conspiracy theory involving vast networks of satanic paedophiles abusing children for religious purposes, and often positing actual supernatural powers. The theory was devised in the 1980s, rocketed to prominence circa 1987, and slowly died through the 1990s. The parallels to the witch hunts of old were obvious and much remarked-upon.

"Ritualistic child abuse" unquestionably exists and has arguably been almost ubiquitous throughout history. It was already old hat when the Spartans did it. People have been convicted of it even in modern-day first world societies, and practitioners have examined diagnosis and treatment options. It does overlap with the SRA panic. Some therapists believe that SRA was real and relevant to treating ritualistic abuse, some therapists believe that SRA was a moral panic and the backlash against false allegations obscured a real, though much less prevalent, phenomenon, and some believe that SRA was a colossal distraction.

Satanic ritual abuse panic will document SRA from a sociological perspective, while noting that Ritualistic child abuse is real, and introducing medical information about it to the extent necessary to document SRA sociologically.

Ritualistic child abuse will discuss ritual abuse as a medical problem, while noting that the Satanic ritual abuse panic strongly affected the understanding of ritual abuse in the public mind, led to increased disclosures and diagnoses, some of which were false. <eleland/talkedits> 16:35, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

{{editprotected}} Please add {{Split-apart|Satanic ritual abuse panic|Ritualistic child abuse}} atop the article. This proposal has a reasonable level of support already per the preceding section, thus it is reasonable to edit the protected article in this manner. <eleland/talkedits> 16:40, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

I concur with the addition of the split-apart discussion template to the protected page. I am not yet ready to comment about the split, but it is an appropriate suggestion for discussion. Adding the template will encourage participation by more editors, and that is a good thing. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 01:58, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Added the banner; since discussion is ongoing, it seems reasonable to advertise it. – Luna Santin (talk) 07:08, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Discussion

I am against the split. The definition of SRA above is extremely biased and POV. It only represents one side of the argument. There are a variety of definitions of SRA. The literature itself does not split the two, so why should Wikipedia? I am also against rushing edits to this page. The reason the block was put on was to stop edit wars. The way to work these out is to take the time to discuss a compromise on the talk page. Abuse truth (talk) 21:28, 10 February 2008 (UTC) In addition, a split adds another problem to already problematic editing. Who will decide what goes on which page and how? And the use of the word "panic" in the title, makes the page title POV. “Sometimes the article title itself may be a source of contention and polarization. This is especially true for titles that suggest a viewpoint either "for" or "against" any given issue. A neutral article title is very important because it ensures that the article topic is placed in the proper context. Therefore, encyclopedic article titles are expected to exhibit the highest degree of neutrality.” Abuse truth (talk) 05:11, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Support, but with name alterations I would agree that splitting this topic would be exactly what is needed, since SRA is not accepted as scientific fact and ritualist child abuse is. I'm not sure about the wording you've used, particually for the SRA page, but I'll have a think about that in the pub... --J.StuartClarke (talk) 21:30, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Support; we need separate pages to separately discuss the real phenomenon of ritualized child abuse, and the SRA moral panic of the 1980s. I would leave the SRA page at this title, with a "This page is about..." header at the top, and move the content on actual ritual abuse to Ritualized child abuse. *** Crotalus *** 23:28, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Against the split I am against the split for the reasons stated above. Eleland's proposed definition of SRA is (a) not the definition of SRA most commonly used in literature about SRA, (b) a view that is held by small extremist fringe and (c) a view that "sceptics" have widely attributed to everyone who uses the term SRA in order to paint them all with the same brush.

Attributing Eleland's proposed definition of SRA to everyone that uses the phrase is inherently pejorative, in that it suggests that everyone who uses the phrase holds conspiratorial and extremist beliefs. Furthermore, Eleland's explanation for the interplay between "SRA" and "ritual abuse" outlined above is clearly a synthesis and the product of original research. It does not reflect the majority view, but, rather, it reflects Eleland's view. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 01:30, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

  • Support as per discussed by Eleland, J.StuartClarke and Crotalus. Splitting this article does reflect the majority view. The believers have never refuted the fact that the majority of sociologists and criminologists see SRA as a moral panic phenomenon. Ritual abuse of children, on the other hand, is something that nobody disputes. There are even vestiges of ritually sacrificed children back to the hominids; and child sacrifice continued up to the ascent of man, the Neolithic and the first early states of the ancient world, and it continued through our days, especially in the less developed countries. (See for example psychohistory, and psychohistorical views on infanticide: articles I have edited intensely the last week.) In contrast, SRA is analogous to UFO abductions tales; alleged recovered past-life "memories", and conspiracy theories. Splitting is a must if we are to have coherent and realistic encyclopedic entries about these two absolutely distinct social phenomena. —Cesar Tort 02:00, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose - I think the current page, or at least a single page with the same contents (minus news cases) but a different name, is more than enough to discuss the phenomenon. I think a split would lead to two very interlinked and stubby pages with lots of duplication and no comprehensive discussion. A single page would be lengthy, in-depth, and would allow a discussion of the 'satanic panic' (as a subsection of history) and problems with definitions, prosecuting and investigating claims of SRA. Lanning's discussion of the problems with the use of the term SRA could have more weight placed upon it, including one of the few situations where I think a lengthy quote would be appropriate. I think there are enough sources discussing the 'panic' aspect of SRA that it could easily be a separate section or sub-section (which would/should include the involvement of the repressed memory and confabulation discussions of leading therapeutic techniques), but not enough sources to have a good discussion of 'ritual abuse' as a separate phenomenon. Aside from news reports, I can't think of any extensive discussions where children were abused in a ritualistic context (but I could be suffering from myopia as I've over-focssed on other aspects of the page; if there's a relevant section I've somehow missed out on, please link for me!). I think the page needs qualification that there is abuse within ritual context, but there is no evidence that they are in any way linked beyond a common cultural paradigm. WLU (talk) 19:49, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
As a favour to me, those who support the split, could you list the sources that support 'ritual child abuse' outside the context of SRA and the satanic panic? It will make it easier for me to give my opinion on the evidence that supports your point. Apologies, I'm guessing it will involve a lot of duplication from the references extant to the page. Thanks, WLU (talk) 19:50, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
The Shadow of the Dalai Lama describes one historical case in chapter 3. A girl as young as 8, but preferably 12 or 16, "is selected and trained for initiation, and innocent of her impending fate is brought before the altar and worshipped in the nude, and then deflowered by a guru or chela." --AnotherSolipsist (talk) 03:53, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

I do not support the splitting of this page. As a psychotherapist, I have never read a single case history, nor a documented article, where one human being was treated for "satanic ritual abuse panic." The aforementioned term does not clinically exist. Dissociative disorders exist and are listed in the universally accepted diagnostic and statistical manual that guides the profession as well as the international classification for diseases. There are documented crimes of "satanic ritual abuse," or "ritual abuse" in many states of the United States. How can you have criminal acts for something that doesn't exist? Splitting the page omits significant information. Respectfully submitted, Eileen Schrader, LCSW, QCSW. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Eischrader (talk • contribs) 03:22, 12 February 2008 (UTC) — Eischrader (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

I am against splitting the page into two. While I can accept that there are people who wish to hold the disbelief that this kind of abuse can and does exist, outside of the boundaries of a Satanic Church, it is imperative that this truth, which is held by many, must be upheld. The proof is in the experience, and I'm happy many have never had this experience, and have not been touched by this extreme in human behaviour. May they never know it! Satanic Ritual Abuse DOES exist, and using a word like 'panic' will not take this away. If Wikepedia is going to be taken seriously in this arena, then all voices must be heard together. Splitting the information will just water down the knowing and expression of truth. Holdingthespace (talk) 03:32, 12 February 2008 (UTC)holdingthespace February 11, 2008Holdingthespace (talk) 03:32, 12 February 2008 (UTC)— Holdingthespace (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Hmmm. user: Eischrader and User:Holdingthespace, whose only edits ever were to this voting thread, have all the marks of meat-puppetry. Thanks Crot for marking their signatures!

  • "Aside from news reports, I can't think of any extensive discussions where children were abused in a ritualistic context (but I could be suffering from myopia as I've over-focssed on other aspects of the page; if there's a relevant section I've somehow missed out on, please link for me!) [...] As a favour to me, those who support the split, could you list the sources that support 'ritual child abuse' outside the context of SRA and the satanic panic? " —WLU way above.

I already pointed out to Child sacrifice in pre-Columbian cultures. If there is an article for ritualistic child abuse only in Mesoamerica and the Inca Empire, surely a much broader article on the Ritualized child abuse which has occurred since the Neolithic (and even before according to paleoanthropologists) is in order.

Since there is no Wikipedia policy that impedes me from starting such an article, I may do it.

—Cesar Tort 05:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

  • I don't see the point in marking someone's signature. People are welcome to edit any page they want to on wikipedia. Furthermore, there is absolutely no evidence (zero) that these votes are meat puppetry. To ascert this without any evidence is improper. And "Crot" himself has edited the SRA page using his ISP address only and not his user name. Abuse truth (talk) 05:49, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Done! I've already started the article Ritualized child abuse and explained our reasons in talk:Ritualized child abuse. —Cesar Tort 08:20, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Please be careful about pre-empting the discussion, although I do agree that a page on ritualized child abuse was probably necessary, but that's a separate point. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 14:41, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Also, having thought about it I believe that this split should still occour, but the name should remain as Satanic Ritual Abuse, with a discussion of the evidence on the page. Any other name would be overly confusing. It should still be made clear on the SRA page that it is not supported by scientific evidence. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 14:41, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Responding to AT, the more relevant thing about those two accounts is a) no edits beyond this talk page and b) no rational for a split aside from "I totally know it shouldn't be split, 'cause I just know." Tagging them is arguably appropriate. In response to Ceasar Tort, the Incan child sacrifice and the Ritualized child abuse articles (which I haven't looked at yet, so take it with a grain of salt), calling it child abuse is projecting into the past the modern conception of child abuse. Is it appropriate to lump Incan child sacrifice with SRA? I don't know - in Incan times, it was mainstream and culturally acceptable to kill kids in the context of these rituals. By our definitions and modern ideals, it's horrible and wrong. But then, it was mainstream. Comparatively, SRA has never been mainstream and culturally any form of abuse of children is horrific and wrong. Putting the two together is suspect in my mind.
Regards the new pages, Cesar's bold creation will have to be reviewed, and it's not like we can't re-merge if it's decided that the pages should be put back together. So let's work from now. WLU (talk) 14:54, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
  • "In response to Ceasar Tort, the Incan child sacrifice and the Ritualized child abuse articles (which I haven't looked at yet, so take it with a grain of salt), calling it child abuse is projecting into the past the modern conception of child abuse."

This has already been discussed at length here.

  • "Regards the new pages, Cesar's bold creation will have to be reviewed, and it's not like we can't re-merge if it's decided that the pages should be put back together. So let's work from now."

It makes as little sense to merge Ritualized child abuse with SRA, as it makes to merge this article with Child abuse, Child sacrifice or Infanticide. All of these are huge historical subjects that no serious scholar ever questions. On the other hand, SRA is a controversial 1980s and '90s phenomenon in some Western countries. Merge the two articles is like merging claims of sexual "experiments" & abuse during UFO abductions with Child sexual abuse. —Cesar Tort 22:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Tort, you are consistently insulting other editors by facetiously comparing their arguments to belief in UFOs, "flat earth" theory, etc. Please AGF. I'm a phd student researching organised abuse, and I've never come across an author who conflates Incan child sacrifice with "ritualized child abuse" before. You aren't exactly on firm ground yourself. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 06:05, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Surely killing a young Indian boy in real life is not abuse; but being flushed down the toilet and abused in sewers, taken into an underground cavern beneath the McMartin school, flying through the air and seeing giraffes and lions, is seriously abusive, and your phd dissertation rests on very firm ground indeed :) Cesar Tort 06:29, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

In reply to WLU, I feel the tags were unnecessary because the two authors did have something to add to the debate. Both say more than simply that they disagree. One states in part " As a psychotherapist, I have never read a single case history, nor a documented article, where one human being was treated for "satanic ritual abuse panic." The other states "If Wikipedia is going to be taken seriously in this arena, then all voices must be heard together. Splitting the information will just water down the knowing and expression of truth." Abuse truth (talk) 05:10, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
As an editor, I think that a personal opinion without a source is worthless. And I believe in verifiability, not truth. Trying to write a 'true' article on wikipedia will not work because truth is subjective. My time was wasted by reading, and now re-reading, those comments. The editors have not edited wikipedia elsewhere, show no evidence of being familiar with policy or guidelines, and wikipedia is not a democracy. There input is not helpful, but we've wasted a bunch of time talking about it. WLU (talk) 14:48, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
I do agree that it is better to have a source to back an opinion. But much of what is talked about on talk pages is opinions and interpretations of sources and policy. IMO, it was useful to hear from a psychotherapist on the topic. Abuse truth (talk) 04:34, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm not asking for anyone's opinion. The fact that said person has psychiatric experience is irrelevant to this discussion, since it cannot be sourced, and it may even be original research. If you can give me quotes from peer-reviewed scientific journals then that might actually be useful. It doesn't matter that anyone feels particularly strongly about his subject. Strong feelings are irrelevant to the discussion, which should at all times be fact based and supported by unquestionable sources. The example that Wikipedia uses is quantum theory, which was highly controversial at the time it first appeared. Since it was not supported by sources that were taken seriously it would not have even been included in Wikipedia until it was. SRA is certainly in this bracket. If information comes out in the future indicating that it is confirmable then this can be confirmed on this page about SRA. Until then we must state that this is not scientifically verifiable. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 14:21, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi J.StuartClarke. Your quantum mechanics example is brilliant as to RS in physics.
However, those books on SRA which will be published in the near future cannot be counted as RS. One is authored by a proven loonie, however academic credentials he may have. The other, by a psychiatrist.
A few psychiatrists are notorious for extreme gullibility in believing the UFO abduction or SRA tales that their patients tell them in private. No criminologist or law enforcement professional will ever take these tales seriously without forensic evidence. The same can be said of sociologists or religious studies academics that have researched SRA. No forensic evidence, no RS.
That's why peer-reviewed literature should be the sole criterion to re-write this article as soon as it's unlocked. :)
—Cesar Tort 14:36, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
To put it another way, a way which is not quite so offensive to Noblitt among others (nudge, CT, nudge), the publisher is more important than the person. If it appears in a peer-reviewed journal, that means it has some acceptance among some minority (or majority) and therefore the issue becomes how representative is the journal. Not the author. If it's wildly unacceptable to the mainstream, we'll see it in the form of letters and rebutting articles. WLU (talk) 14:39, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
In response to Clarke's point above, providing an overview of a particularly controversial configuration of child sexual abuse, like SRA, is not analoguous to the establishment of a "scientific fact".
Unlike a quantum particle, you cannot demonstrate the existence of form of child sexual abuse in a laboratory. Child sexual abuse is a practice or behaviour, and it is therefore subject to a range of interpretations and understandings according to social, psychological and criminological theory. There are no "unquestionable sources" in such a field of inquiry, only more rigorous ones, and less rigorous ones.
There are numerous examples on this page in which children have been sexually abused by multiple perpetrators in a ritualistic, "satanic" context. The "existence" of this behaviour has been attested to in a court of law, and it is consistently encountered by clinical, forensic and child protection workers. The question as to whether this behaviour can usefully be destribed as "satanic ritual abuse" might be a useful one - contesting that this behaviour ever occurs is representative of a very small proportion of the literature and, I think, it is directly contested by the verifiable facts outlined on this page. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 22:55, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Sources that treat SRA as a global Satanic conspiracy

Latest comment: 16 years ago15 comments7 people in discussion

I would like to request that supporters of the "split" provide us with substantive lists of written sources that treat SRA as a "global Satanic conspiracy".

If SRA is to be primarily defined as a belief in a "global Satanic conspiracy", then surely editors will be able to demonstrate that such an extreme definition is, in fact, held by the majority of people who have used the phrase to refer to actual events of abuse.

Even in the late 80s and early 90s, most of the literature that I'm aware of that uses the phrase "satanic ritual abuse" (or a variant e.g. "satanist abuse", "cult abuse") does not make any claim regarding a "global Satanic conspiracy" e.g.

- Boyd, A. Blasphemous Rumours: Is Satanic Ritual Abuse Fact or Fantasy? An Investigation. Glasgow, Fount Paperbacks, 1991.
- Driscoll, L. and C. Wright "Survivors of Childhood Ritual Abuse: Multi-Generational Satanic Cult Involvement", Treating Abuse Today, 1, 4, Sept/Oct 1991, 1991, 5 - 13.
- Gould, C. "Satanic ritual abuse: Child victims, adult survivors, system response", Claifornia Psychologist, 22, 1987, 1.
- Greaves, G. "Alternative Hypotheses Regarding Claims of Satanic Cult Activity: A Critical Analysis" in D. Sakheim and S. Divine, Out of Darkness: Exploring Satanism and Ritual Abuse New York, Lexington Books, 1992, 45 - 72.
- Hill, S. and J. Goodwin "Satanism: Similarities between Patient Accounts and Pre-Inquisition Historical Sources", Dissociation, 2, 1, 1989, 39 - 44.
- Kent, S. A. "Deviant Scripturalism and Ritual Satanic Abuse Part One: Possible Judeo-Christian Influences", Religion, 23, 1993, 229 - 241.
- Kent, S. A. "Deviant Scripturalism and Ritual Satanic Abuse Part Two: Possible Masonic, Mormon, Magick and Pagan Influences", Religion, 23, 1993, 355 - 367.
- Sakheim, D. K. and S. E. Devine, Eds. Out of Darkness: Exploring Satanism and Ritual Abuse. Lexington Books, New York 1992.
- Snowden, K. K. Satanic Cult Ritual Abuse. Richmond VA, Richmond Psychotherapy Associates, 1988.
- Tate, T. Children for the devil: Ritual abuse and satanic crime. London, Metheun, 1991.
- Van Benschoten, S. C. "Multiple Personality Disorder and Satanic Ritual Abuse: The Issue of Credibility", Dissociation, 3, 1, 1990, 22 - 30.

These authors include sociologists, clinicians, psychotherapists and journalists, none of whom is a "conspiracy theorist" or uses the term SRA to refer to a "global Satanic conspiracy".

Could editors who believe that these authors are not representative of the use of the term SRA during this period (80s, early 90s) please provide a list of sources who do use the term SRA to promote belief in a "global Satanic conspiracy". --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:16, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

  • Please provide direct quotes justifying the claims you make here. Simply giving a random list of sources (many of which can't be checked without great time and expense) is not particularly helpful. Above, I provided a number of definitions of SRA that were given in reliable scholarly sources. All three definitions specifically used the term "widespread"; isolated incidents of ritualized abuse therefore don't meet the criteria for SRA. Bottoms, Shaver, and Goodman specifically mention the intergenerational claims, and Frankfurter specifically cites Michelle Remembers, which takes the strong conspiracy POV, as a seminal work in spreading the SRA panic. I have provided direct quotes in a section above, and it is your turn to do the same.
  • Furthermore, I do not think that focusing on the field of psychiatry is going to provide fruitful results. Psychiatrists are primarily concerned with the mental states of their patients, and only secondarily with whether the statements are actually true or not. Furthermore, most of them have no sociological or criminological training. We should rely on people in directly relevant fields like sociology, comparative religion, and criminology. We also should not quote from defunct and discredited journals like Dissociation which was devoted to the "treatment" of a "disorder" that does not exist. *** Crotalus *** 06:13, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
"Widespread" does not mean "global Satanic conspiracy". "Intergenerational" does not mean "global Satanic conspiracy". Basing your argument on Frankfurter's reference to a single source is clearly an example of undue weight.
All of the sources that I've provided use the term "satanic ritual abuse" (or a close equivalent) to refer, simply, to the ritual abuse of children that involves "satanic" performances or iconography. They are not referring to a global Satanic conspiracy at all.
If you are going to claim that "satanic ritual abuse" should be defined as a "global Satanic conspiracy", why can't you provide a few sources that actually use the term in the way you describe? --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:26, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
If you are going to claim that the term SRA was used to refer to a "global Satanic conspiracy", you are going to need to provide some sources that actually use the term that way. I've just provided you with a dozen sources that use the term SRA, and do not refer to a global conspiracy. It seems to me that your claim has no basis in fact. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:26, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
I think whatever direction the page takes, there should definitely be some discussion of the beliefs in the 80s and 90s that the abuse was widespread and conspiracy-heavy. Part of the reason it was believed to be a panic was because it was thought to be something you couldn't protect your children from. The panic/conspiracy aspect is a valid part of the cultural phenomenon; how this perception changed over the years is also valid, if hard to justify. Note that the non-scholarly sources, news reports and tv specials are in my mind, valid evidence that there was a portrayal of events in a global, fear-mongering context and judicious use of primary sources could be good here (though not as good as a secondary description and discussion!). That the beliefs later evolved to be less conspiracy heavy is valid if sourced, though I think it's more of a fizzle than a change. I think the consensus is more that SRA was portrayed as a conspiracy (as well as global, multigenerational, breeding and kidnapping children, murder, etc.) rather than actually being a conspiracy. If the popular media portrayed it as a global conspiracy, but the scholarly work debunked or denied it as such, so much the better - a media and popular freak-out with 'evidence' comming from recovered/confabulated memories and no real supporting evidence is pretty much my gut understanding of things. WLU (talk) 20:08, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
The question is: Who portrayed SRA as a conspiracy theory? Seems to me that the sources that portray SRA in such a way are the "skeptical" sources - Frankfurter, Victor, Loftus, Ofshe, et al. The people who actually work with sexual abuse survivors use the term to mean something much less extreme, but their beliefs were systematically misrepresented by "skeptical" authors. In short: It may well be that the extreme/conspiratorial definition of SRA was constructed by the "sceptics" to be used against psychs and health professionals, and not by the professionals themselves. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:26, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I would love to see this topic covered! And, as we all know, this is wikipedia and we need sources. Sethie (talk) 20:09, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

The claim that "We also should not quote from defunct and discredited journals like Dissociation which was devoted to the "treatment" of a "disorder" that does not exist."
is absurd and extremist. Dissociative disorders have been extremely well documented in the literature and it is very rare if not nonexistent to find a reliable source that will state they don't exist.
The journal of Dissociation is online at https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/dspace/handle/1794/1129
It is on the University of Oregon Scholars' Bank website.
It is the journal for The International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation. Abuse truth (talk) 06:06, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
What was the editorial oversight on Dissociation? Why was it not MEDLINE indexed? What was its impact factor? How often is it cited favourably by the key researchers in the fields? Why is it considered discredited? Why did it cease publication? What changes occurred when it switched from Dissociation to JTD? What do serious scholars think of the previous, and current incarnations of the journal? These kinds of questions will be key in determining if Dissociation can be considered a reliable source or not. WLU (talk) 15:15, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
These are important questions and another is who published and distributed it. Most academic journals are published by one of the large houses, e.g. Taylor and Francis. This is independent of them being journals of particular learned societies. Itsmejudith (talk) 15:39, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Good point - JTD is published by Haworth. Apparently JTD is now pubmed indexed, which is good. But dissociation will be trickier unless JTD's previous incarnation is indexed as well. Who published dissociation? WLU (talk) 15:57, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
With all due respect, the quality of "sceptical" sources is never assessed so rigorously. Why is it that posting a peer-reviewed article by a tenured professor is like pulling teeth (should that professor take SRA seriously) whilst "sceptical" references come from random websites and "paranormal" publishing houses?
I'd like to see some balanced editing on this page. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 23:29, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

The editors advocating for the split have been unable to produce any sources that actually refer to SRA as a "global Satanic conspiracy".

In contrast, I've provided sources from the 1980s that use the phrase SRA to refer to organised and ritual abuse in a variety of contexts, including abusive family networks, "child sex rings" and cults. They make no statements regarding "global Satanic conspiracies".

Eleland is now claiming that the basis for his "SRA panic" is not in published literature at all, but rather, pamphlets, TV shows, sermons and other ephemeral sources. He has yet to substantiate any of these sources, or explain why we should give them more weight then the psychological, sociological and criminological sources that I've provided.

In the absence of any sources to support his position, it seems to me that Eleland's suggested "split" is not an accurate representation of the historical record. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:58, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I concur with Biaothanatoi above. There appears to be no consensus in the literature regarding a definition of SRA and RCA, even among the skeptical sources. For wikipedia to conclude on any set definition would be OR. However the page could have a section on this, showing the different defintions in the literature. Abuse truth (talk) 22:23, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Rational skepticism

Latest comment: 16 years ago18 comments5 people in discussion

The page is currently under the religion wikiproject, I'm bringing it up under Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rational Skepticism#Satanic ritual abuse to see if anyone there is interested. It's not really a religious phenomenon, and there's a certain amount of overlap between the projects anyway. Should be interesting... WLU (talk) 01:46, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Section break

Yich this is getting long. I don't see Lacter's addition as helpful simply because it's a massive dump. There's no evaluation of sources and individual comments by Lacter, and editors may disagree with the conclusions reached and the reliability of sources. Lacking the ability to edit the page, there's no real way to integrate sources one-by-one. I can paste an equally long pronouncement and list of references, that doesn't make my position right. WLU (talk) 14:33, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

I would respectfully disagree that the information provided by the editor wasn't helpful. The sources given are a starting point for researchers to evaluate their content and if appropriate, add these to the page. It would have been more helpful if urls to abstracts would have been given however. Abuse truth (talk) 04:28, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Advocacy sites are not reliable sources. The Journal of Psychology and Theology is a suspect one for most claims I would think. Is Kent published in a reliable source, or just a random website? I see a lot of second and third string jornals here, the newest reliable source being from 1999 and is about beliefs, not corroboration. WLU (talk) 22:39, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Kent is clearly RS. Kent, S. A. "Deviant Scripturalism and Ritual Satanic Abuse Part One: Possible Judeo-Christian Influences", Religion, 23, 1993, 229 - 241.
Kent, S. A. "Deviant Scripturalism and Ritual Satanic Abuse Part Two: Possible Masonic, Mormon, Magick and Pagan Influences", Religion, 23, 1993, 355 - 367.
Kent, S. (1994). "Diabolic Debates: A Reply to David Frankfurter and J. S. La Fontaine". Religion. 24 (4): 361–378. Retrieved 2008-01-29. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
In regard to WLU's comment about DID (MPD), the DSM says that people with Dissociative Identity Disorder often report that they have experienced severe physical and sexual abuse, especially during their childhood. Reports by people with Dissociative Identity Disorder of their past physical and sexual abuse are often confirmed by objective evidence. People responsible for the acts of sexual and physical abuse might be prone to distort or deny their behavior.
WLU also states "Ritual abuse is treated as a contagen by many sources, a fear-based mind virus that spread in absence of proof of a world-wide conspiracy." This is at best conjecture. There is no evidence or proof that this occurs. And most of
Ellenlacter's sources are from peer reviewed journals. Compare these sources to the ones being discussed at the bottom of this talk page used by skeptics, like skepdic.com and Aquino's Phoenix Publishing.
It appears that once again those skeptical about the existence of SRA are using two different measuring sticks to measure the data on the SRA page. For those that back their own beliefs, it appears that almost any source is good enough. For those that disagree with the skeptics, even peer reviewed journals are sometimes not good enough. Abuse truth (talk) 05:56, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


No primary sources that treat SRA as a global Satanic conspiracy?

Editors here have been unable to provide any primary documents from the 80s or early 90s that treat SRA as a "global Satanic conspiracy".

Eleland is now advocating for an article about "Satanic ritual abuse panic" based on "television reports, sermons, pamphlets, and the lecture circuit", however, he has yet to provide any references to these sources, or explain why this approach would not constitute undue weight or original reseach by synthesis.

Meanwhile, I've provided numerous academic sources from the 80s and early 90s that use the term SRA in a balanced and considered fashion.

Crotalus and Eleland's failure to substantiate their argument for a "split" calls into question the reasonableness of their position, particularly in light of how strongly they hold to it. Why do they believe what they do, given that they have no evidence for their beliefs? And why are they pushing their POV onto this page, if they can't substantiate it? --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:50, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

It's old discussion, but I think the global conspiracy should be mentioned, but within the context that it is one version, one public perception and portrayal, of the SRA phenomenon/panic, and in the greater context the only demonstrated proof of SRA is the existence of isolated incidents. SRA does occur (in that children are abused while robes are worn, pentagrams drawn and satan mentioned), but there's no link between them beyond cultural memory. There is a spectrum of SRA beliefs, from completely non-existent on one end, to a global, media/government/judicial/police controlling conspiracy on the other. It would be nice if this could be described (with sources natch). WLU (talk) 17:58, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
It would not only be nice but necessary since mass conspiracy beliefs was a mark of SRA (unlike ritualized child abuse where the conspiracy claims are missing, let alone a worldwide conspiracy). —Cesar Tort 18:13, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
This is Wikipedia. You need a source that demonstrates that most people who use the term SRA believe in a "mass conspiracy". At the moment, you have zip.
I support WLU's argument that this page should support a range of definitions. It seems to me that the few people that believe in a "mass Satanic conspiracy" called SRA are an extremist fringe (evidenced by some writing on the net) rather then representative of most people who use the term. Certainly I've provided numerous academic references that use the term SRA without meaning a "global Satanic conspiracy", and these sources are, by Wikipedia standards, more notable then the fringe extremists. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 04:21, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Believe in mass conspiracy has been so widespread among SRA buffs that you yourself wrote about:


as has been pointed out to you elsewhere in WP.

—Cesar Tort 18:48, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Developing a concurrence of opinion as to where the page should go now

Latest comment: 16 years ago31 comments10 people in discussion

I am introducing this new thread in the hope that editors will be able to come to some sort of compromise solution on the more recent changes made to the page. IMO, an important part in this process would be the curtailing of the name calling and ad hominem attacks that have gone on in the past. A mutual respect would need to be developed between all sides of the debate for this to work. There are several recent changes that have been to the page without consensus. Hopefully compromise solutions can be worked out over time on all of these. Abuse truth (talk) 22:33, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

I strongly, strongly, strongly recommend that this article be renamed Satanic ritual abuse hysteria. Satanic ritual abuse panic is not preferable. I note that an article named Ritualized abuse of children already exists, and therefore creating another article titled Ritualistic abuse of children is unnecessary.

I also strongly suggest that this article, renamed Satanic ritual abuse hysteria, link to Little Rascals Day Care Center. Michael H 34 (talk) 21:33, 16 February 2008 (UTC) Michael H 34

I strongly oppose these suggestions. While there might have been a media hysteria about this topic, renaming the article in the way suggested is pushing the POV that this is hysteria and nothing but hysteria - a POV I do not share, as there are cases like this, though as far as can be reasonably seen not as part of a dark worldwide conspiracy, it still can take conspirative and obscure forms for obvious legal reasons. While the hysteria is well documented (and pushed) in WP, it seems that the wider field of reality rarely if ever is mentioned anywhere because some try to routinely purge any reference which does not fit their POV. All tales of such happenings need to be taken 'cum grano salis', but be represented without bias in the title. --Gwyndon (talk) 04:09, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
I would also strongly oppose any naming of this article to anything other than Satanic Ritual Abuse. However, I would like the page to very clearly state that we can find no serious peer-reviewed sources that support its existance. Despite this I would agree that changing the title name to something including the words panic or hysteria are certainly taking things rather far down a very specific POV. We must be open minded, but also mindful of the lack of scientific evidence for SRA. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 21:29, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
With all due respect, we have "serious peer-reviewed sources" that treat the ritualistic abuse of children in satanic contexts seriously. Such sources have been published in every journal relating to child sexual abuse and child protection, and I've posted them here numerous times. For example, the prestigious publication "Journal of Child Sexual Abuse" has the following articles on ritualistic, satanic abuse:
- Counselors' beliefs about ritual abuse: An Australian study
John Schmuttermaier, Arthur Veno. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse. Binghamton: 1999. Vol. 8, Iss. 3; p. 45
This article found that approx 30% of sexual assault counsellors in Melbourne, Australia, had encountered a client with a history of ritual abuse, and that the vast majority of counsellors believed such a history to be indicative of serious victimisation.
- The end of the sidewalk: Where do I go from here?
Barstow, Donald G. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse. Binghamton: 1996. Vol. 5, Iss. 4; p. 125 (6 pages)
This article provides an account of a clinician's difficulties in his work with ritually abused clients.
- A clinical sample of women who have sexually abused children
- Faller, Kathleen Coulborn. Journal of Child Sexual Abuse. Binghamton: 1995. Vol. 4, Iss. 3; p. 13 (18 pages)
This article provides an overview of clinical work with sexually abusive women, a significant proportion of whom were found to be sexually abusing children within the context of ritually abusive perpetrator groups, and whom had histories of ritual abuse themselves.
This is a small sample of the peer-reviewed material that treats "satanic ritual abuse" seriously. And as for "scientific" evidence, there is the forensic evidence from dozens of convictions and numerous child protection interventions around the world. I've posted those court cases here on this page. You'll find that the authors who adopt an extremist "sceptical" POV, far from being the "majority" view as claimed by some editors here, are very few, they are rarely in clinical practice, and they are usually connected to activist groups such as the False Memory Syndrome Foundation. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 22:44, 17 February 2008 (UTC)


I agree with the editors above that believe that the article title should not be changed. "Sometimes the article title itself may be a source of contention and polarization. This is especially true for titles that suggest a viewpoint either "for" or "against" any given issue. A neutral article title is very important because it ensures that the article topic is placed in the proper context. Therefore, encyclopedic article titles are expected to exhibit the highest degree of neutrality.” I also agree with Biaothanatoi above. Several editors working on this page adopt an extremist position that SRA does not exist, define SRA in a way to eliminate many sources that would verify its existence and only present sources to back their own POV. While this may be somewhat acceptible in a debate, it is definitely not acceptible on a wikipedia page. Wikipedia pages must be NPOV.
Though it may be impossible to develop a full concurrence of opinion on this subject, I would hope that a mutual respect can be developed for differing points of view and that this mutual respect can be translated into the editing process of this page. Abuse truth (talk) 23:23, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
AT, you've got to stop pasting vast tracts of info on this page. References here need to be short and concise, or else the flow of dialogue is derailed. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 23:31, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
Sorry about this. I agree. Abuse truth (talk) 23:34, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
I am not denying that ritualised child abuse occours. However, none of the sources that you have come up with can identify a specific Satanic context. Obviously ritualised child abuse occours, which is why, I assume, C.Tort set up that page. However, none of the scientific articles state that there is Satanic Ritual Abuse, as oppose to Ritual Abuse. Your source "From the Inside out" states on its website that:
We accept as fact the existence of ritual abuse and mind control.
We accept as fact that it is possible to get free.
We accept as fact that DID/MPD is not equal to nor caused by demonic possession.
We accept as fact that nature of ritual abuse and mind control is such that survivors may encounter the demonic in their healing process and therefore need to be equipped for spiritual warfare.
We accept by faith that there is one true God who created all things and who reveals himself to us in Holy Scripture in the form of many personalities and in the person of his son Jesus Christ and who now indwells us and manifests himself to us in the person of the Holy Spirit.
We believe that true inner healing is accomplished only by Jesus Christ and that freedom is achieved through truth.
It is not a scientific source. As for the only other source that mentions Satan, the article by Van Benschoten, this actually states that "professional literature on the topic of satanic ritual abuse is nearly non-existant."
We need completely flawless sources for the existance of Satanic Ritual Abuse to be proven, rather than the already proven Ritual Abuse. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 02:37, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
You'll note that the article by Van Benschoten is over 15 years old, and was originally posted by me as an example of early professional literature on SRA. Her statement that there is no "professional literature" on SRA was true at the time, but is not true now.
In a previous post, I noted that your parallel between quantum physics and SRA had serious limitations e.g. Unlike a quantum particle, you cannot demonstrate the existence of form of child sexual abuse in a laboratory. I also emphasised that child sexual abuse is a practice or behaviour that is undertaken in a range of contexts, and this behaviour is subject to a range of interpretations and understandings according to social, psychological and criminological theory.
There are court cases in which children have been subject to sexual abuse by multiple perpetrators in a ritualistic, "satanic" contexts. This form of abuse has sometimes been called "Satanic Ritual Abuse". I've suggested elsewhere that this page do two things:
(a) take a social constructionst approach to the use of this term, which includes a range of definitions by a range of different people for different reasons over time,
(b) provide some overview of the occurence of "satanic ritual abuse" e.g. "ritualistic abuse and satanic rituals have been found to be a feature of some cases of sexual abuse".
Philosopher [Ian Hacking] would call "satanic ritual abuse" a "human kind", which means that it is a term that refers to a dynamic concept that changes over time. Human kinds" are distinguished from "natural kinds" e.g. "granite" is a "natural kind" because the rock is not effected by the name that we call it, or how we use the term "granite". It's just granite. In constrast, when the term SRA was coined to describe a type of sexual abuse, the term then influenced different peoples behaviour, which influenced the way we understood the term term - something that Hacking calls the "looping effect".
So whilst I agree that this article should rely on solid, peer-reviewed sources, claiming that the "existence" of SRA has not been "proven" by a "scientific source" seems to conflate "human kinds" with "natural kinds". The "existence" of satanic/ritual sexually abusive behaviour has been attested to in a court of law, and surveys suggest that this behaviour is infrequently, but consistently, encountered by clinical, forensic and child protection workers.
As I said above, the question as to whether this behaviour can usefully be destribed as "satanic ritual abuse" might be a useful one - contesting that this behaviour ever occurs is less useful and, I think, such a claim is directly contested by the verifiable facts outlined on this page. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 03:04, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
In reply to user J.StuartClarke I did cite two sources on SRA. I will repost them here. "In 1993, Boon and Draijer described the clinical phenomena of 71 Dutch DID patients. Follow up data on this cohort of patients indicate that 38.8% of the patients (N = < 27) had mentioned some form of SRA in the course of treatment (Boon & Draijer, 1993b). These patients lived in different regions in the Netherlands and they were treated by 19 different clinicians (Boon and Draijer 1993b). In this study, spontaneously given accounts of SRA and drawings on the subject showed a striking resemblance to those of North American patients (cf Young et al. 1991). [Onno van der Hart, "Reports on Ritual Abuse in European Countries: A Clinician’s Perspective," 1998]" Abuse truth (talk) 05:08, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
I hate to be annoying, but I should point out that books are not peer-reviewed. As for Biaothanatoi above, I do understand that these are not experiments that could be reproduced in a lab. However, just because this is not a naturally occouring issue does not mean that we should lower the bar for proof. No serious peer-reviewed journal has been brought forward. I do accept that the books and non-peer-reviewed sources above are useful, however, they cannot be said to constitute absolute proof. An article in a journal with similar standing to the Lancet, Science or Nature would be an unquestionable source. The publishing of a book does not guarentee that the contents are true. (Also I do realise that my quantum physics example wasn't perfect, but it was the one that wikipedia used...) I do not find the sources unquestionable that point to satanic abuse occouring. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 13:23, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

I want to take issue with JStuartClarke about impeachability of scientific peer reviewed journals such as Nature. Publication in Nature, for example is neither necessary nor sufficient to do anything other than claim the legitmacy offered by the white coat of science. The examples are many. N-rays (found not to exist after all), Herbert Dingle ( a spurious aattack on relativity published in Nature) the Miller experiements (experimental evidence found to be falls refuting relativity) are all episodes of publication in leading journals where the results were false. So publication in Nature for example is not sufficient to guarantee truth. But in the case of Satanic ritual abuse which would seem to be a legal matter it would aalso hardly seem necessary either. The porblem is of course that it is difficult to believe that human beings can organse themselves to enage in activity of this general nature. Is it possible can we believe that people might actually found a school for Downs children with the express purpose of using them as sexual objects the idea being that with disability the children can't be understood and complain? In addition it is all too frequent that the charge of unscientific is brought in when claims feel threatening either emotionally or politically. Occupational health and safety activists have for years argues that safety depends on the balance of probabilities not on so-called scientific proof. I personally believe that the vidence is overwhelming that people are capable of and do organise themselve to terrorise children sexually and physically using so-called Satanic rituals. But then as Max Planck once wrote (1949, Scientific Autobiography, p.33) "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, anda new generation grows up that is used to it". Joseph Schwartz 86.136.8.125 (talk) 22:59, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

There are several problems with the above statement. One, while I myself do not rule out the possibility of such events taking place, there is a question whether, bluntly, any pervo yahoo on the street who likes kids can call his actions "Satanic rituals" and have us describe them as such. There are also several cases of such abuse which have been found to very likely fail credibility on the basis of showing all the signs of being, more accurately, false memory syndrome. And wikipedia's guidelines and policies to indicate that peer-reviewed sources are those which are preferred as per WP:RS. Also, it would hardly be the first time if modern individuals who committed "atrocities" blamed their behavior on "Satanism". As per the Hellfire Club page, while there were allegations of the group being "pagan", I don't see yet any explicit evidence there that they saw themselves as Satanists. So, in effect, part of the problem here is whether we take the word of at least potentially biased outsiders that a group is "Satanic". If we were to do so, we would clearly be violating wikipedia policy of WP:NPOV. Also, such statements as the above, "is it possible to believe people might do...", are really irrelevant to the subject. What we require is reliable sources that it has in fact been done, and for the reasons given. Unfortunately, in many of these cases, the only evidence available is from parties who are not necessarily reliable as per our policies. And, if there isn't clear evidence that the allegations are accurate, then we have the potential difficulty of violating wikipedia policy of WP:Undue weight. And, regarding the allegations regarding probability vis a vis proof, that's fine for them. We have different policies and guidelines. Making statements on the basis of perceived "probabilities", particularly when there isn't reliable evidence saying such things are "probabilities", are not necessarily relevant, and could, conceivably, even be in violation of official policy of WP:OR. John Carter (talk) 23:40, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
I should also like to point out that I'm well aware of the problems that have occoured with papers being published in peer-reviewed sources. However, these are few and far between given the number of articles published. Submission and acceptance by a peer-reviewed journal remains a standard test of a theory's worth and veritability. The Lancet, Nature and Science are among the most respected journals in the world, and until something that has passed their peer-review can be disproved it is generally accepted as verifiable, although, of course, science is a system of continous review. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 02:19, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Don't get me wrong. Accuracy and an NPOV is a very difficult problem for SRA in Wikipedia. But an appeal to the so-called scientific literaure hardly seems relevant in essentially a criminal matter. After all we don't appeal to the scientific literature for an NPOV in a biography of Jerry Fodor (say). Rather an appeal to the scientific litertaure represents a shifting of the responsibility for truth elsewhere. This is not a solution. And an inistence on scientific journals and peer review to me represents a disgusied form of denial, as I say time honoured, as in the case of occupational health and safety. Is asbestos safe to install or not? How to decide? Does SRA occur or not? How to decide? Joseph Schwartz 86.136.8.125 (talk) 07:56, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

I feel that this is a scientific issue, as well as a legal one. It is an issue that encompasses a great many scientific disciplines, the most obvious being psychiatry. It is a scientific matter in that people must ask, in a disciplined manner, if it occurs in satanic contexts, why it would occur and why it most often only appears after lengthy periods of time, among other questions. These are all scientific questions. Whilst I do accept that the court cases are important, they cannot be used as evidence to back up a scientific theory. We need psychiatric, medical and other such evidence that can be confirmed. I understand that SRA is often considered to be a non-scientific issue, since it does appear, to a certain extent, to be more of a sociological issue. However, whilst it does encompass some of this area, it encompasses sufficiently large areas of science to warrant the production of peer-reviewed sources. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 16:50, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Regards AT's two sources cited regarding SRA, if this is the best proof you've got, then there's little here. Boon and Draijer described 27 patients (incidentally, 27/71 is 38%, not 38.8) who mentioned some form of SRA in the course of treatment. First, what was the treatment? Was it repressed memory therapy? Was there hypnosis involved? Second, was this confirmed by the police, forensic evidence, or anything besides the patient's testimonies? And the resemblance of SRA and drawings isn't really convincing either - leading questions, the Internet, and I remember reading something about a checklist of symptoms used by social workers to 'diagnose' SRA. If the page is to portray SRA as a reality, as something that's beyond isolated incidents, actual proof in reliable sources is required. The best we can do with this is 'patients reported SRA'.
One thing I think the page is lacking is a discussion of the possibility of using recovered memory therapy and leading questions to induce false memories in regards to satanic ritual abuse. It must be out there, does anyone have any reliable sources on this? It's definitely part of the social and scientific debate but we do need a source for it. WLU (talk) 17:51, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

section break, arbitrary

There was an unsourced section about it in a previous incarnation of the article.[5] Sourcing it would not be difficult at all. —Cesar Tort 18:07, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Ugh, that falls greviously afoul of BLP (or not, isn't she dead?) and isn't sourced at all - it could not go on the current page. Anyone feel like setting up a sub page to work on a draft? Even just a list of sources would be helpful.
Wow, that old page really was atrocious. Two references and 15 external links. Yick. WLU (talk) 19:12, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
Just create that subpage within my user page or yours and I'll be happy to type sections of the sources I have so that you may pick up and rephrase them for the article. (And make a link in this talk to that subpage). —Cesar Tort 19:46, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
linkety link link link. WLU (talk) 19:59, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>The point is that the science is a social process and is no particular guarantor of neutrality or even truth. In fact the scientific literature is as far as possible from a NPOV because it is paradigm bound. Papers that deviate from the prevailing paradigm are ruthlessly discriminated against. This was Kuhn’s point.

It is fruitless to appeal to the scientific literature to arbitrate the existence or not of SRA. The journals Science and Nature are research journals in the natural and biological sciences almost exclusively. And while it just might be possible to see a clinical paper describing the treatment of survivors of SRA in the Lancet, Science and Nature are hardly sources to look to for unassailable evidence of SRA.

But is there such a thing as unassailable evidence? Ludwig Fleck(1981, Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact, Univ Chicago Press) describes the painstaking process of the establishment of a scientific fact.

But what is a scientific fact ? My name is Joseph Schwartz. This is a fact. Is it a scientific fact? And here we are into the ideology of science, science as myth in our culture. A scientific fact is presumably certain and unassailable as in the advertising slogans for drug x “It is a scientific fact, x works faster than any other leading brand”. An appeal to science is an appeal to a mythical certainty. In the case of SRA such an appeal evades the responsibility to sift the evidence we have in front of us. Instead it appeals to a mythical non-existent authority to arbitrate the matter. For example consider the Rodney King beating in 1991. Has Wikipedia maintained a neutral NPOV? It seems so to me. But there is no scientific literature supporting the argument that the acquittal of the four cops triggered the LA civil rebellion, the worst in LA’s history.

SRA challenges most of us, particularly we are middle class and reasonably protected from violence and atrocities. But atrocity is a fact of modern life. Is it really so difficult to believe that people exist who would band together to abuse those vulnerable in our society? On the contrary, isn’t such abuse the rule rather than the exception as the long campaign against police brutality shows? Joseph Schwartz86.136.8.125 (talk) 16:00, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Spaced and formatted for readability and per WP:TALK. There's nothing here worth replying to. WLU (talk) 16:09, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
Ditto. But I would reply to Joseph Schwartz's phrase anyway: "to sift the evidence we have in front of us".
Evidence?? For criminologists there's no forensic evidence for the 1980s and 90s SRA craze. Haven't you read the article? Can you cite a peer-reviewed mainstraim criminology journal which endorses the reality of SRA? —189.145.190.2 (talk) 18:32, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
Pepinksy, H. "A Struggle To Inquire Without Becoming an Un-Critical Non-Criminologist", Critical Criminology, 11, 2002, 61 - 73. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 04:26, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
You are citing a single article. Without an URL or at least an abstract we cannot know what it's about. Furthermore, even if Pepinksy believes in SRA, I said "a peer-reviewed mainstraim criminology journal which endorses the reality of SRA", not an isolated article. —Cesar Tort 04:54, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
You asked for peer-review, you got it. You asked for criminology, you got it. Now you want an entire journal - do you mean an entire issue of a journal? Or do you mean the "journal" itself? What do you mean by that? You want to hear the editorial board chanting "SRA is real" all at once?
It's fascinating watching editors set their own arbitrary standards of "proof" here, and then, when it's met, make it higher/broader/larger or just shift it somewhere else. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:27, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
You are not listening to me. I repeat for the third —and last— time what I said: "a peer-reviewed mainstraim criminology journal which endorses the reality of SRA".
That does not exist. You cite a single article (without internet reference or abstract to check and see the accuracy of what you wrote above) and expect us to believe that that means the community of criminologists endorses SRA? It's indeed fascinating watching how an editor sets his own standards of logic...
—Cesar Tort 06:06, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
And my point is that journals don't "endorse" reality. They publish articles. I don't get the impression that you are familiar with the function of academic journals. And your reference to a "community of criminologists" somewhat escapes me - is this a village somewhere that I'm unfamiliar with?
Why is it that Abuse Truth was targetted with such force whilst Cesar wanders around, spouting crap and generally wasting other editors time? --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:30, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure that journals deny reality, but that's a different point. However, the main issue is that they don't just publish articles. They, if the journal is a peer-reviewed one, get a team of specialists in the appropriate field to evaluate said article for factual accuracy and whether what is being written about can be verified. They are a very basic and widely used benchmark for scientific accuracy. I admit that they have sometimes made mistakes, but these are extremely rare, and have not altered the fact that being published in a peer-reviewed journal is viewed, not just by scientists but by Wikipedia, which is important in this case, as being a litmus test of an article's veritability. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 13:27, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

The "debunking" sources for Michelle Remembers

Latest comment: 16 years ago12 comments5 people in discussion

Can we start applying the same standards for "sceptical" sources as we do for "non-sceptical" sources?

The "debunking" sources for Michelle Remembers includes one journalistic treatment that at least deserves a mention, followed by references to:

- "Kerr Cuhulain", the "Preceptor General" of the "Officers of Avalon", published by such luminary houses as Llewellyn Publications, whose featured book is currently "The Case for Ghosts: An Objective Look at the Paranormal".
- A journalist from the Fortean Times, a magazine about paranormal phenomena in Britain.
- Michael Aquino, who was quietly processed out of the military after allegations of satanic ritual abuse involving him, and his wife, were settled by the army for a substantial sum.

Whilst editors demand that sources that treat SRA survivors seriously are "unquestionably" credible, they are providing multiple references to "paranormal" publications and books written by people accused of serious crimes against children.

I can't imagine a better illustration of the bias that dominates editing on this page. Can we have some balance here?

--Biaothanatoi (talk) 23:04, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

  • Further up on the page, I cited two peer-reviewed books from Oxford University Press justifying the claim that Michelle Remembers is generally considered unreliable. We don't need to resort to the Fortean Times to support this, and I would have no problem with relying solely upon reliable published sources. That isn't going to change the underlying fact, just the citations used to support it. Also, I'd like to see some substantiation for your charge of serious criminal activity by a living person. If you can't support it, it cannot stay on Wikipedia, even on a talk page. Please refer to WP:BLP. You can't just fling around accusations like that without substantial proof in reliable sources. *** Crotalus *** 01:09, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
The issue is not the critique of Michelle Remembers per se, but the fact that five sources have been used to back up the critique and four of them are dubious, whilst elsewhere you, and other editors, demand "unquestionable" sources for "non-sceptical" statements.
I made no charge against Aquino. I stated the facts: Allegations against him were made in the Presidio case, those charges were settled by the Army, and Aquino was processed out of the army. He would later be questioned in relation to other instances of ritual sexual abuse, in which there were convictions, and where children picked him out of a line-up. These facts have been in the public domain for twenty years. They do not constitute allegations against Aquino, but they do call into question his credibility as a source on child sexual abuse. I'm suprised that you are unaware of Aquino and the Presidio case.
There are a range of books which address the Presidio case, and the clinican who treated the sexually abused children, Ehrensaft, published a follow-up study in the American Journal of Orthopsychiatry in 1992. If you are interested in popular sources, then you might want to read "New Twist In Presidio Molestings, Edward W. Lempinen, Robert Popp, 30 October 1987, The San Francisco Chronicle, p1" and "Satanist Accused in Child Sex Case, Erik Ingram, The San Francisco Chronicle, 17 May 1989, p24. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 01:46, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Parity of sources applies - if we've got good sources debunking them, we use them. If they deal more with the cultural phenomenon than the factual reality of events, Fortean and Skeptic's Dictionary are adequate sources. WP:REDFLAG - debunking Michelle remembers doesn't take much as it's an entire book of extreme claims (got it from the library yesterday; a skim through the final chapters and Satan and Mary, Mother of God, has appeared several times each). The sources to debunk do not require extreme reliability. Really, MR requires independent corroboration to be used as a source because it's so just fucking crazy.
Regards Aquino, there's no real proof I've seen of the allegations, and let's face it, SRA accusations were tossed around like t-shirts at a rock concert.
Parity of sources says we don't need much to debunk MR. WLU (talk) 01:46, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Incidentally, those popular sources are pretty hard for anyone to access - print from half a decade before the internet got going aren't really accessible. This is a bit better. And as a final point, this page is about SRA, Aquino is not a topic. So let's drop it. Credibility is given by publisher, not by author. On creationist pages, creationists are cited, despite lacking any scientific credibility. We can cite people who might not be neutral, disinterested parties. In fact, we do it all the time. You don't study something like this unless you are interested in it, whether it's because you were accused of a crime or because you were abused as a child or you are interested in the history of your cult. WLU (talk) 01:56, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Michelle Remembers is a red herring. The reason why it has been given such prominence in "sceptical" accounts of SRA is because it's not a good source, and, using the ost hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy, "sceptics" argue that, because Michelle Remembers was an early SRA claim, therefore it is the source of all SRA claims.
Your proposed test in relation to assessment of credibility - disregard the author, focus on the publisher - is an approach I've never heard of before. I would suggest to you that a person who has no expertise in the study or treatment of child sexual abuse, other then being accused of sexual abuse, is not a credible source on child sexual abuse. I would hope that this is not a controversial statement. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 02:15, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
No, the reason Michelle Remembers is given such prominence is because it's seen as the kicking off point for the SRA hysteria. If you doubt my interpretation of WP:RS or WP:V, you can re-read those pages, or you can bring it up on their talk pages, or on the various noticeboards. I could be wrong, that's how I see the policy playing out. Incidentally, someone with no expertise on the study of child sexual abuse would be strongly motivated to read up on it - being accused of CSA in a court of law definitely whets the appetite for the literature. Which is extremely controversial over SRA, and it's easy to see that there is skepticism. WLU (talk) 12:40, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Most of the skeptical sources for MR are poor. Aquino's book is not a RS. If "credibility is given by publisher" then his book's publisher (http://www.phoenixpublishing.com/) is not RS either. It is a publisher of Wiccan books. And there have been serious criticisms of skepdic.com on wikipedia. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Skeptic.27s_dictionary
IMO, it should not be used as a reference or EL unless we absolutely need to use it as one. IMO, the theory of Parity of sources applies does not apply here. "If an article is written about a well-known topic, it should not include fringe theories that may seem relevant but are only sourced by obscure texts that lack peer review." SRA is a well-known topic. And if MR is well-known enough to start some unproven "hysteria" that lasts for a decade around the world, then the fringe theory concept does not apply there either.
I think the skeptics of the concept of SRA need to stop using nonreliable sources to back their claims. These skeptics need to start applying the standards that they use when judging sources and data of other beliefs to themselves. Abuse truth (talk) 05:33, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>Michelle Remembers isn't so much a poor source, as it is a non-source full of unsubstantiated, wildly extreme, supernatural allegations. Seriously, Satan himself shows up in the book. Given this extreme of a claim, the parity of sources required to show it's a false, ridiculous fantasy is extremely low. Michelle Remembers might require a highly reliable source to prove it is true or to discuss the literary and cultural implications of the book, but to demonstrate that it's not an accurate, factual summary of events that really happened doesn't take much. In order for the book to be proven true, you would have to first prove that a) God exists b) Jesus exists c) Mary, the mother of Jesus exists (and speaks French) d) Satan exists and e) Jesus, Mary and Satan all arrived in Vancouver in the 50's to respectively torture and save some 5 year old girl for no apparent reason. The Daily Mail article is more than enough to blow any interpretation of factual accuracy out of the water, the rest are just context and icing on the cake. Again, it is the factual accuracy of the book that is important for this page, because this page discusses in part, the factual accuracy of the SRA allegations kicked off by MR. WLU (talk) 17:34, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Agreed Michelle Remembers does not even remotely qualify as a reliable source for the purposes of inclusion. Having said that, if the book can be proven to meet notability requirements, a separate page on the book itself might be reasonable. And I would very much request that Abuse truth perhaps observe a bit more closely the guideline of assuming good faith. Seeking to insure content which does not even remotely qualify under WP:RS guidelines, like Michelle Remembers, is included with any particular weight, has nothing to do with any existing bias of others, but is seemingly more based on following wikipedia policies. If Abuse truth can point out in multiple reliable sources that that book served as an instigator of then it could be mentioned. I would also urge Abuse truth to read the WP:Fringe theory guidelines more closely. Several different Kennedy assassination theories have been given credence by any number of people for several decades now, and they all still qualify individually as fringe theories. John Carter (talk) 14:54, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Book is definitely notable, and has it's own page Michelle Remembers, where both I and AT are active editors. WLU (talk) 15:01, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
I am confused by John Carter's comments above. I agree with WLU that the book is notable. However, I am not the editor that originally included any of the material on MR. Nor do I agree with much of the paragraph as it is written. Carter does make an interesting comment above though "point out in multiple reliable sources that that book served as an instigator of then it could be mentioned." It does appear that many of the statements made in the section are not RS's and these claims perhaps should not be included. Abuse truth (talk) 23:50, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Changes to page

Latest comment: 16 years ago17 comments7 people in discussion

Per old discussion, changes have been made:

  • The list of allegations deleted, and the list of satanic ritual abuse allegations placed in see also
  • The phrasing of SRA and the courts adjusted to reflect a more neutral phrasing that does not assume the allegations are true
  • Since there is a a very RS and a dubious source justifying the statements, I removed the dubious source and left the academic text in
  • The Church of Satan rule on not harming children has been moved out of the lead

Turns out my library has a copy of Framing abuse, so I might get it to look into the text it justifies. The book summary doesn't mention the US by the way, just the United Kingdom, so it's possible any reference to the States might be bogus, I'll have to see.

If I might make a suggestion, a good place to start might be to review the sources on the page and determine if they justify the text they accompany, and slowly weed out the less reliable ones. There does indeed appear to be a fairly extensive discussion of SRA in many reliable sources, so let's build on those.

WLU (talk) 11:31, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

I wish that, per current disccussion, you had not made these changes, or rather other changes. But as I am not a peer-reviewed RS per se, I will not engage in a discussion I left because of some POV pushing 'guy' and his pals. I'm happy that in general the SRA discussion seems erudite and well-mannered nowaday, and that at least two editors are still active in showing that scientific and other medical expertise is available on the side of those stating that SRA has been experienced. --Gwyndon (talk) 17:20, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
  • "scientific and other medical expertise is available..."
As stated many times, unlike ritualized child abuse there's no forensic evidence for SRA claims such as the paradigmatic McMartin case. —Cesar Tort 17:30, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm not sure what changes you are referring to Gwyndon, from what you posted in an above section, you were opposing the page move. I haven't moved the page, these are changes that were more-or-less agreed on previously in discussion. If you have comments that you think will impact or inform the limited changes I have made, please post them so we can discuss. WLU (talk) 17:34, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
Rational for my recent edits
I have made three changes to the SRA page. Two are restorations of changes originally made by editor WLU without consensus.
1) I have changed "from existence of SRA remains unclear, with varying degrees of proof, corroboration and testimony found when investigating claims made by individuals disclosing SRA"
back to:
"The existence of SRA is believed by social workers, therapists, members of law enforcement, government and the general public, with varying degrees of proof, corroboration and testimony by individuals disclosing SRA."
I have made the above change because I believe the original version was more NPOV and more accurate to the sources.
2)I have added the Specific Cases section back to the page as it originally was. There was no consensus for its entire deletion. Several editors did not agree to this or want it. If it is to be deleted because of a not agreed upon definition of SRA as a "conspiracy theory" then I will fight its deletion. It if is to be edited down some because some think that the SRA page is too long with a link to a full page as the section exists now, then I would be open to compromise on this.
3)I have changed the phrase in the MR section to "though the book is now considered by some to be untrue." IMO, it is OR to assert otherwise. I am willing to discuss this also.
Remember that with edits 1) and 2) I am only restoring the page to what it was, before it was changed w/o consensus. Abuse truth (talk) 04:50, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
1) Your version is unjustified. WLU's seems closer to matching the sources.
2) The Specific Cases were split off to a subpage, not deleted. Pay attention.
3) That one seems appropriate, although "by most credible researchers" is probably more accurate. I'll put that one back. — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 09:06, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Further, the cases placed undue weight on allegations that were not corroborated, and in many of those cases the 'satanic' element were the minority of the accusations, making it suspect whether there was any significant involvement such that it's justified in calling them cases of SRA.
Your addition of social workers, therapists, etc. also placed undue weight on a minority of opinions, and further, not all members of those groups believe in SRA. If it were to be universal and this could be demonstrated, that might be a worthwhile revision, but there is doubt in all of those groups. Portraying entire professions as believing that SRA is unambiguously real is original research and a violation of WP:NPOV. That statement was justified by two references - a privately published paper by Noblitt, meaning he could not pass a peer-review board and neither was it published in a set of conference proceedings after the fact, meaning he does not have the support of his peers in his conclusions. This places an incredible amount of undue weight on a very suspect source that is borderline unreliable, particularly for a statement about several groups of occupations, representing an enormous group of people. The second source is a paper published by a single state's government, which is now a dead link and wayback doesn't seem to have a copy. Anyone save a copy? Wayback does seem to have some documents, here's some pages [6] (one case of satanic RA, couched as 'cloaking crimes in ritual), The majority of those interviewed indicated that they believe that ritual crime is possible and probably is occurring. This same group of leaders could not produce any clear evidence to support their beliefs, and state that they just, "feel that it's possible." (speaks for itself), there are many isolated instances of ritual abuse of children perpetrated either by individuals or small groups, and sometimes those people have used at least the trappings of Satanism or other religious or "magic" orders in the course of the abuse. What hasn't been corroborated is the multitude of reports of abuse "survivors" claiming to have been party to human sacrifices, sexual abuse of young children, torture, and other atrocities committed by well-organized groups which pervade every level of government, every social status and every state in the country. The lack of prosecution of such reports does not mean the the reports are fictitious. (note that this document is over 12 years old). A second report is unarchived, but here's a wonderful 'rebuttal' from Jerry McMullin, that reeks of conspiracy mongering - 'No!!! They didn't find it because they are too powerful/part of it/they didn't look right/pick your apologetics'. Whatever. The key conclusions were a) one couple abused their children ritualisticall and b) a non-satanic organization, possibly with Christian roots with a name like Zion, molested kids. [7]. This is all very thin for a statement like 'social workers, cops, therapists and the general public believe in SRA'. Very thin.
As for MR, are there any sources that consider it factual? Consider that MR itself is not a source, certainly not a reliable one, and is full of extreme claims. WLU (talk) 12:35, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
I wish to support the majority view that the material which was recently restored should not be included in this article, but kept in the other article, as wikipedia guidelines and policies indicate that material should not be redundantly included in multiple articles. If the content exists in a separate article, then there is no reason whatsoever for it to be included here as well. John Carter (talk) 14:12, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
My replies to the above comments:
In reply to Arthur Rubin:
1) I have morphed all three versions of ours, AR's, WLU's and mine (AT's) to get this
"though the book is now generally considered by some to be untrue"
If we say more than some, it is OR. There has been no poll taken on how many people believe this. We do know some have, so using some is the most accurate phrase we can use. No source I have seen has disproven the entire book. Therefore, it would be OR to say "completely."
2) I am paying attention. There was no consensus developed to split off an entire section to a different page. I am open to a compromise on this issue. A smaller section due to the length of the SRA page with a link to the new cases page would be okay with me.
3) Using the phrase "by most credible researchers" is OR. I have morphed the original phrase with WLUs to get this:
"The existence of SRA remains unclear and is believed by social workers, therapists, members of law enforcement, government and the general public, with varying degrees of proof, corroboration and testimony by individuals disclosing SRA."
In reply to WLU:
The convictions in some of the listed cases should be sufficient corroboration of the charges. I would disagree with this statement about Noblitt's paper "meaning he could not pass a peer-review board and neither was it published in a set of conference proceedings after the fact, meaning he does not have the support of his peers in his conclusions." This is only conjecture, we don't know the real reason why it is not published yet.
I have a copy of the Utah study. It describes ritual groups as psuedo-satanists, generational cults and "fringe" forms of satanism. The task force submitted "points of evidence from local and national sources." This included the "successful prosecution of cases of child abuse which contain indisputable elements of ritual abuse." "Independent identification, by victims unknown to each other, of the same perpetrators." and "Independent detailed reports, in many different states and foreign countries, of identical acts of ritual abuse." Noblitt's paper cited "Chronology of Ritual Abuse Convictions - Data Accumulated and Reported by Newton (1997)" "Michael Newton (cited in Noblitt, 1998a) accumulated data on criminal convictions in the U.S. where allegations of ritual abuse of children were made. He found cases of 145 defendants who were sentenced."
Whether there is a source that considers MR as factual is not important. IMO, it is OR to state more than the sources can back. As editors, we aren't allowed to draw conclusions based on a data base or the lack of one.
In reply to John Carter: From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:Content_fork "Articles on distinct but related topics may well contain a significant amount of information in common with one another." If both articles have related topics, their content may overlap. Abuse truth (talk) 04:30, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

<undent>Reply to AT. 1) If you are talking about Michelle Remembers, WP:REDFLAG. Polls do not determine moves, consensus and policy do. 2) There is policy to support the spin out of the individual cases (undue weight is placed on the evidence by having a long list of mostly unverified claims in which the satanic aspects of the abuse are suspect; placing the articles in the page supports a synthesis that SRA is a real, world-wide problem; lists are ubiquitous feature of wikipedia; have I missed any?), to date I have seen no policy reason to keep it here. If one side of the disagreeing parties have no policy-based reasons to keep the page, then it's merely subjective preference and therefore their opinion on the matter has no real weight. Feel free to take this to WP:DR or a WP:RFC if you'd like, which will almost certainly come down on the side of moving out the list of cases. 3) As replied above, not all of those bodies uniformly believe that SRA exists, and this sentence is justified by extremely tenuous sources. 4) Convictions for what? Satanic ritual abuse? Or child sexual abuse? We acknowledge that child abuse with elements of satanic rituals have occurred. That is why there is a full, separate article on them. There's no need to repeat. 5) Nobblitt's paper is privately published, see WP:SPS. If what he says is widely accepted, it should be easy to find other, more reliable sources. If he's a lone voice in the wilderness, he shouldn't be cited here at all in a self-published paper. WP:UNDUE - If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts; If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents; If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority, it does not belong in Wikipedia (except perhaps in some ancillary article) regardless of whether it is true or not; and regardless of whether you can prove it or not. If it gets published in a reliable source, then we source that. Until then, it is not a good choice. 6) I wouldn't mind a copy of the Utah report to read through it more carefully and possibly mine it for sources, could you mail it to me? 7) What is the actual citation for Newton, 1997? We have neither Newton nor Noblitt 1998a. If Noblitt cites Newton, we should cite Newton, not Noblitt. Google scholar turns up nothing, google itself turns up I believe the privately published Noblitt paper again, which lacks a full citation. A lot of people cite Noblitt citing Newton, but none I have found cite Newton himself. The only evidence I can find is the privately published conference presentation we already have on the page, which I do not find to be a reliable source, which does not not provide a citation for Newton. In fact, looking over the Noblitt manuscript, the Noblitt 199a that Noblitt himself is citing is privately published. Newton's data is useless to source anything, based on the third hand citation we have, that is impossible to track down, funnelled through no less than two self-published sources. This should be removed, if you disagree, take it to WP:RSN and see what they think.

The comments by multiple editors point to your ongoing reverts being firmly against WP:CONSENSUS. Please do not revert again without having convinced the other editors of an acceptable compromise. WLU (talk) 15:05, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

I have made several edits to the page.
I have made the same minor edits to MR that I made before. They were reverted by AR stating "No reasons given for change." The reasons were on the talk page above. I will repeat them here.
I have morphed all three versions of ours, AR's, WLU's and mine (AT's) to get this
"though the book is now generally considered by some to be untrue"
If we say more than some, it is OR. There has been no poll taken on how many people believe this. We do know some have, so using some is the most accurate phrase we can use. No source I have seen has disproven the entire book. Therefore, it would be OR to say "completely."
Using the phrase "by most credible researchers" is OR. I have morphed the original phrase with WLUs to get this:
"The existence of SRA remains unclear and is believed by social workers, therapists, members of law enforcement, government and the general public, with varying degrees of proof, corroboration and testimony by individuals disclosing SRA."
I believe these should be acceptable edits, since they have combined the opinions of several editors.
About the MR section, the way I read "Exceptional claims require exceptional sources" WP:REDFLAG is that if a source wants to make an exceptional claim, then an exceptional source is needed to back this. I don't read this as allowing editors to drop the bar to bring in weaker sources. "Exceptional claims in Wikipedia require high-quality reliable sources; if such sources are not available, the material should not be included." I do not believe that this guideline applies in this case.
Noblitt's paper is IMO RS. This was only discussed briefly above, with no consensus, yet the paper was removed as a source. Below find evidence of why I believe it is a RS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SPS#Self-published_sources_.28online_and_paper.29
"Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications."
Noblitt, J.R. (1995). Psychometric measures of trauma among psychiatric patients reporting ritual abuse. Psychological Reports, 77(3), 743-747.
Noblitt,, J.R. & Perskin, P. (2000). Cult and ritual Abuse: Its history, anthropology, and recent discovery in contemporary America; Revised edition. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers.
Reviews of the book above by the APA and AJP:
http://www.psychservices.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/52/7/978 which is copywritten by the APA. "Psychiatr Serv 52:978-979, July 2001 © 2001 American Psychiatric Association" It concludes: "The authors explore the similarities between the experiences of Noblitt's patients and experiences reported in other cultures around the world. They carefully distinguish between satanic cults and contemporary neopagan and Wicca practices. Also discussed are the challenges presented by the media and skeptical practitioners. Although the writing is uneven at times, anyone who is interested in the topic of cult and ritual abuse will find this book worth the time to read." The author of the article is well-published and reputable. "Dr. Fletcher is assistant professor of psychiatry and director of the behavior sciences research core in the Graduate School of Nursing at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester."
The review in the "American Journal of Psychotherapy" (Summer 1996; 50(3) p383) stated:
Whether or not one believes in MPD and/or Ritual Abuse, this book provides one with what is probably the most comprehensive and reasonable review of the subject that has appeared up to now. The primary author, James Noblitt, provides us with a personal historical review of his experience with MPD. Starting out as an "unbeliever", he provides case histories of patients that led him to believe in the reality of the syndrome and to develop expertise in its therapy. This in itself would make the book of value. However, even more significant is the manner in which he introduces us to the problem of ritual abuse. Describing himself as a "secular psychologist," and specifically repudiating any belief in Satanism, he describes case after case of sexual abuse of a ritual nature - ritual in the sense that it is surrounded with cultic practices. He documents the similarity of such practices from widely seperated parts of the country; and even on an international basis. because he writes from a non-fundamentalist and non-religious point of view and because he sees riutal abuse in a wider context than Satanism as such, he provides the reader with both important information and a perspectie that is clinically helpful ... They also discuss their negative experience with police agencies and the FBI, pointing out that contrary to generally accepted opinion, the FBI has never published a study stating that there is no evidence of organised cult or ritual activity associated with sexual abuse in the United States ... Of the many books on this sunbject that I have read, this is perhaps the most helpful and is highly recommended to those who deal with these problems whether or not they believe in ritual abuse."
Also, Noblitt is a professor and even the Director of the Psychology program at Alliant International University -- not a position easily attained.
I have restored the two references to the paper for now pending discussion. These were deleted w/o consensus.
I have also restored a much shortened version of "specific cases" section. (which was deleted in its entirety w/o consensus). I hope to make this a bit larger, but I do believe that it should be mentioned in at least two paragraphs on this page, with a pointer to the other page. I would be happy to e-mail the Utah report to you. Please send me your e-mail address. Abuse truth (talk) 04:05, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Noblitt's status as an RS is in dispute, and should remain out of the article until consensus is obtained.
I've tried yet another comprimise for Michelle Remembers.
The specific cases were split off, not removed, and probably should remain split off.
— Arthur Rubin | (talk) 08:42, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Noblitt's book may be a reliable source (though should be used carefully given the concerns about it raised in the linked pages below) but discussing it here is a red herring since it is not being disputed. His self-published conference paper is, in my opinion, not a RS, particularly for the information it attempts to justify. If he can't get the paper published in a peer-reviewed source that means he is the only one in mainstream academia that supports his conclusions. Take it up on one of the noticeboards if you'd like, engage the larger community and see what the response is. And for the love of fucking God, the list of cases was not deleted against consensus. We do not need complete agreement to make edits, particularly when the 'opposing' parties have no real points to make beyond 'I want it'. Right now the only reason I can see you giving for the return of any form of the list of allegations is 'there was not consensus'. Well, it was opposed by you and from my reading, no other dedicated contributors. Your reasoning here seemed to be 'but it does exist'. We're not disputing this, we're discussing if it's appropriate to have a list in the main article. We're not trying to delete the information, just place it on a different page so it doesn't look like a WP:SYNTH to prove that SRA is real and a big problem. The old use of the cases placed undue weight on the individual cases, representing a tiny minority of all crimes, making press because they are salacious, in addition to being in some cases tenuously related to actual satan worship. If you have further issue with this, take it up at DR or any of the other various ways of getting an independent opinion. Or cite a policy or even a guideline to support a reason for including the very long list of cases on this page. And please stop repeating 'deleted without consensus' because a) there was considerable agreement bar perhaps you and biot and b) it wasn't deleted. You have not expressed a reason I can recall beyond 'I want it' for keeping the list in. 'I want it' is not a policy, guideline or even an essay. Seriously, how many times must it be repeated and how many times must you be reverted before you realize it? See WP:DE, disruptive editing can get you blocked. WLU (talk) 16:23, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

←I have a quick suggestion. I've not had time to do much editing lately, so I can't help with this directly, but perhaps this idea will be of use. I suggest keeping the specific court case info in the separate list article, however, to give it at least some weight in this article rather than have it simply listed in the See Also section.

That could be done by adding additional info to Satanic ritual abuse #SRA in the courts, with a paragraph summarizing an overview of the number and kinds of cases that have occurred, and in what territories. Then at the top of that section, there could be a {{Main}} link to list of satanic ritual abuse allegations to give sufficient attention to the split-off list. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 21:37, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm not averse to having the list linked as an in-line wikilink, that would give it more prominence. I think any analysis and summary with numbers should be done with extreme care (more accurately, I don't think it should be done at all). The list contains many allegations, fewer charges, and in many of the cases the 'satanic' aspect of what is more often simply abuse, is often tenuous, minor, unconfirmed, and doesn't impact the sentencing. I'll make a change in a sec per your suggestion. WLU (talk) 21:48, 22 February 2008 (UTC)


I looked at the latest version of the MR quote and believe it is a good compromise. I do not however believe that many of the sources that back it should be in there. Noblitt's paper is far more RS than most of the sources for MR #4 - 8 on the page. I have tried to explain this several times and bia actually showed this previously on this page, but possibly due to the heat of the discussion, other editors appear to have missed this.
This statement I made below was also apparently ignored:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SPS#Self-published_sources_.28online_and_paper.29
"Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications."
By the above, Noblitt is definitely RS. I will list only a few of his contribution to the literature. Psychometric Measures of Trauma Among Psychiatric Patients Reporting Ritual Abuse (1995). Psychological Reports, 77, 743-747. Cult and Ritual Abuse: Its History, Anthropology, and Recent Discovery in Contemporary America, Revised Edition. (2000) with Pamela Sue Perskin. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishing. Psychopharmacology Update column for the Dallas Psychological Association monthly newsletter. (2005 - 2006) A monthly column informing the community of professional psychologists of various aspects of psychopharmacological interventions as well as updates regarding legislation to advance opportunities for prescriptive authority for psychologists. Appreciating diversity in academic settings (Spring, 2006) with James Noblitt. Texas Psychologist.
It is stated above that we do not need complete agreement to make edits on the page, but when I make an edit I am accused of going against consensus (which actually never existed, since consensus means we all work out an agreement). IMO, the right way to have dealt with the deletion of the section would have been to bring it up on the talk page and then hammer out an agreement, even if it took a while. And actually I did state why I wanted the section on the page. It is because the cases, some with convictions, are cases of SRA or at least have elements of SRA in them. I will wait awhile before re-adding Noblitt's paper back in as a reference. I like Jack-A-Roe's idea: That could be done by adding additional info to Satanic ritual abuse #SRA in the courts, with a paragraph summarizing an overview of the number and kinds of cases that have occurred, and in what territories. Then at the top of that section, there could be a {{Main}} link to list of satanic ritual abuse allegations to give sufficient attention to the split-off list. I also see the WLU agrees with only part of this. In the spirit of compromise I will add a bit more and hopefully all editors will at least agree to the spirit of this. Abuse truth (talk) 23:39, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
The section wasn't deleted. It was moved to a subpage. I would have to see what happens to see how it could be improved. Jack-A-Roe generally has good ideas, but you misinterpret everything said, even from those who generally agree with you.
I don't think Noblitt, himself, qualifies as a expert. There are too many people, even among the "believe the children" grouping, who think he doesn't adequately research his statements. Still, it's possible.... — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 23:53, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Archived

Latest comment: 16 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I've archived the talk page; even with archiving, it's still 48K long, which is pretty lengthy. If there are issues I archived, please post a summary with a link to the archived discussion of points rather than replacing either the entire archive, or the whole section. And please keep posts short (I am referring specifically to Ellen Lacter - long posts are extremely aggravating, particularly when they repeat information already on the page).

Two reminders:

  1. Wikipedia is a work in progress. The page has a lot of editors, so a massive re-write is not a good idea. Adding sources and text one-by-one makes for digestible chunks.
  2. Please remain civil. I'm talking about YOU, skeptics, including ME. The page is aggravating to edit and discuss about, let's all take a deep breath. Including me. My wikistress is up because of this page and I know it is affecting my talk page comments on both this and other pages. WLU (talk) 17:54, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Kitzinger

Latest comment: 16 years ago5 comments3 people in discussion

Regards reference 46, Framing abuse by Kitzinger, I got the book out of the library yesterday. In the index, and on a brief flip through there is no mention of satan, satanic abuse, ritual abuse, the United States, religion, religious leaders, the satanic panic, courts, judicial systems, guilt, or anything else that really supports the sentence "In America and Britain journalists framed the charges against the defendants as evidence of a moral panic and mass hysteria; child protection workers and social workers involved were bound by their professional codes of confidentiality and unable to comment on the specifics of the cases" There is focus on two cases - Cleveland and Orkney, both in the UK. Based on my reading, the main focus of the book is on how the media's portrayal of the cases affected the public's perception of the event years later - not on guilt or innocence (though there is discussion on how the media left out and selectively reported details that were more convincing of the guilt of the parents. If anyone on this talk page has read the book or is responsible for placing the text on the page, could you refer me to the page number (and chapter in case we have different versions) so I can verify? Right now I'm tempted to excise the statement for having a) nothing to do with the U.S. b) nothing to do with the outcome of court cases and c) nothing to do with satanic ritual abuse. If nothing else, it would allow the most nuanced, hopefully most neutral, portrayal of the book's contents. Kitzinger appears to be very carefully saying nothing about the suspects' guilt or innocence, but I admit it is a cursory flip-through. Got some other scholarly books from the same section in the library, some of which discuss SRA specifically, hopefully I'll find time to read them. WLU (talk) 12:45, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I don't mind it's pretty interesting. I've read the prologue and skipped the methodology - SRA is mentioned, twice, in passing. Basically "S/RA was part of the times (reference, date; reference, date). No analysis. But interesting book and pretty quick to read so if it does come up I will attempt to modify or represent the source (or leave it as is if it is already fairly represented). There is an extensive discussion of Orkney, but no discussion of SRA to date. WLU (talk) 14:43, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
To address WLU's concerns: (a) The scope of Wikipedia is broader then America. There have been a number of high-profile "SRA" cases in Britain, and her book talks extensively about these controversies. (b) The topic of SRA is broader then the question of "guilt", "innocence", or specific court cases. It's strange to read you arguing that the public's response to SRA is irrelevant to this article, given your preference for "moral panic" theory in relation to SRA. (b) As WLU states, the book refers specifically to controversies over organised and ritual abuse, including SRA. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:13, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
But does it explicitly use the phrase "satanic ritual abuse" or some close derivative thereof? If the answer is no, then we can't use it. Doing so would be original research. We can't infer what an author might have meant. Moreover, I still have concerns about the fact that this book was published by a fringe publisher and written by someone who is not a sociologist or criminologist. *** Crotalus *** 11:26, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Utah report

Latest comment: 16 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Reading through the Utah report from the archives and the RT analysis, I'm unconvinced on the report for a couple reasons. One, it's no longer available. Two, the overall statement was that proof was found. Their proof appears to be the testimony of three individuals, who were indeed abused when extremely young, with memories of robed figures, candles, altars and sacrifices, in addition to the physical and sexual abuse.[8] Three cases recalling information from a very young age. RT says there was basically no evidence, despite convincing testimony. People believed in SRA, but on no factual basis as there was no evidence found. Out of 225 cases investigated over two years, only 1 had merit (that's roughly 0.44%). The Zion abuse was ritual, but unrelated to satanism. Reports of victims appear to be based on recovered memories, which the APA refuses to commit to either way [9]. Allegations based on recovered memories are in my opinion, absolute bullshit and should not be considered evidence. Evidence is forensic, not memories that can only be accessed via hypnosis and never verified. Using one controversy as evidence of another is ridiculous. WLU (talk) 15:32, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Noblitt's book

Latest comment: 16 years ago10 comments6 people in discussion

Skeptic's dictionary popped up these links regarding Noblitt's book Cult & Ritual Abuse: Its History, Anthropology, and Recent Discovery in Contemporary America [10] and [11]. Haven't read yet, but they feed the fire. WLU (talk) 15:57, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps we should consider that in this and related topics, many of the sources have activist or personal agendas other than pure science. That applies to sources on both sides of the debate. While Noblitt may be involved with an advocacy organization, so are those members of the advisory board of the FSMF that are quoted here and there in this article and others regarding abuse memory issues. Since there are questions about reliability of sources, but on the other hand, some of the questionable sources have been published by third parties, it seems we need to include the sources, but if there is criticism of them, we can include that also, if it's WP:V itself. That way, the reader can see the whole conflict and make their own determinations of who to believe or not.
Personally, I know not much about SRA, but other areas of the abuse-memory science debates I have read a lot about, and in those areas I've seen these same conflicts going on and on, in the actual scientific literature, with arguing between respected researchers over years. It's unlikely that we'll figure this out on our own, so to find a bona-fide NPOV approach, I suggest we present all the sides, including reliably published criticisms of each side by the other when that is needed. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 21:46, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Advocacy matters less than the reviewer - Noblitt's paper is irrelevant as self-published. The links above point to caution with using the book and some extra sources. I agree with everything you say, actual reliable sources for both sides should be sourced. WLU (talk) 00:12, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
The glowing review of Noblitt and Perskin's book from the Journal of Child Sexual Abuse was reproduced here last year. I'm concerned that you think that the "Masonic Info" review is worth a dime. The entire piece is ad hominem, scurrilous and consistently misrepresents the views of the authors. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 04:51, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
Checking whether an author accurately represents his professional qualifications is not an ad hominem. It appears the book was relatively well-reviewed in Psychiatric Services ([12]) as well. I admit that I don't remember exactly what Noblitt and Perskin were being cited for. On the three points it's being cited on currently, it seems reasonable. <eleland/talkedits> 11:42, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
Noblitt and Perskin are fringe conspiracy theorists. Didn't Noblitt revise an edition of Michelle Remembers, or didn't both relate her story as if it were real in Cult and Ritual Abuse? Caution is a must when handling these authors. —Cesar Tort 22:21, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
Caution is, it seems, a must when looking at what POV some people try to keep out of this SRA article, with biased statements like this, who at the same time pretend to be neutral judges on the block of someone who tries, very hard and very civilly, to contribute to this page - something I stopped a long time ago, for some editors seemed to feel they 'own' this page, and that being 'sceptic' means every fringe sectarian and self-published website is credible as long as it is negative concerning *this* topic. The amount of arguments and sources and links user "Abuse truth" brings are in direct relation to what some editors demand - it takes ten scientists for a pro, while one wiccan will suffice for a "contra" argument. And of course some will neither accept the ten scientists not the dozens of professionals who, out of experience with the topic, accept it as a rare and dubitable fact, but a fact nonetheless. While I welcome the civil way, WLU handles his part, please welcome the civil way and effort that those two editors bring into this topic who are sceptic of some 'sceptics' and less sceptic on the extistence of the topic the article is about. The block of a user should not be based on the bias of editors (admin or not) who prefer not to have that users contributions because they conflict with their own world-view (or POV). Just my 2 € cents. --Gwyndon (talk) 05:12, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Please read the archived talk pages. It has been discussed that if, as per WP policy ("extraordinary claims require extraordinary sources") this article were restricted to peer-reviewed journals and academic publications, it would be far more skeptical than its present incarnation.

I guess the "scientists" you mention are psychotherapists? Some mental health professionals are notorious for believing stuff like the sexual abuse during UFO abductions that their clients tell them. That's why, following policy, we must restrict the article to sources by sociologists and criminologists. As to psychiatry itself, I still have to see an American Psychiatry Association report endorsing the reality of SRA.

By the way, WLU is on wikibreak.

—Cesar Tort 05:39, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Cesar, it is a clear violation of Wikipedia policy to excise all psychological and psychiatric literature on a topic, particularly on such facetious grounds as "some mental health professionals believe in UFOs".
I'm appalled that Abuse Truth has been banned whilst you continue your blatant NPOV edits without censor or comment from our fellow "objective" editors. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:12, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
  • "blatant NPOV edits"
Of course: my edits are NPOV. Is this a compliment or do you want me to behave like our POV-pusher friend? :)
—Cesar Tort 05:31, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Carl Sagan

Latest comment: 16 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

Carl Sagan discussed the SRA panic in The Demon-Haunted World.

Sagan then goes on to discuss Lanning's report (Investigators Guide to Allegations of Ritual Child Abuse) at length. He calls it "a highly skeptical FBI report on the general subject of satanic abuse." So it isn't just OCRT that believes that this is indeed an FBI report. If there is evidence to the contrary, I would be interested to see it.

I'm not generally in favor of citing Sagan on this article, since his specialty was not criminology or sociology. But Biaothanatoi and the other believers can't have it both ways. Either we stick to peer-reviewed academic sources in relevant disciplines, or we don't. And if we don't, then Sagan is certainly a lot more prominent than most of the people being cited here now. *** Crotalus *** 11:39, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Well, insofar as SRA was a cultural phenomenon (or rather, for the sake of scrupulous fairness, SRA gave rise to a cultural phenomenon, whether or not there was anything to the core claims), and Sagan was a significant voice on the interaction between science, culture, and pseudoscience/paranormal beliefs, he's a valid source. As I have been saying for a while now, I think it's important to segregate discussion of the core claim that ritualized child abuse is or was a serious problem in modern Western societies, and discussion of the cultural or social implications of the SRA scare. <eleland/talkedits> 11:42, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
I've never advocated for an article that does not address the concerns of skeptics and people who don't take SRA seriously. In fact, I've posted more links to serious 'skeptical' sources then any other editor before or since. These comments are just another example of Crotalus' inability to AGF in relation to editors that he doesn't agree with.
Post Sagan if you think he adds anything to the article, although I can't seee how. We already discuss the study that he quotes at length. --Biaothanatoi (talk) 05:18, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
Biao, have you considered the apparent contradiction in repeatedly, vehemently insisting that everyone else is incapable of assuming bad faith? Doesn't that seem to you like an assumption of bad faith in itself? <eleland/talkedits> 05:44, 28 February 2008 (UTC)
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