Talk:Donald Kaul

Why I changed this page.

I read the op-ed piece by Donald Kaul. Found and read the wiki. With regards to this gun ownership section it seemed to me that it was not objective at all. Stating that Kaul was joking is not objective. It was an op-ed. He opined, he stated. While it may be tongue in cheek, we do not know for sure. Implied humor? Implied violence? Maybe. Maybe not. But that would be entirely subjective on the part of the reader of the original piece. If we really want to know, we should ask Kaul whether or not he was joking. Tpseudo (talk) 19:11, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

The statements were made, they are in print. It's what he stands for. He is notable as a Pulitzer nominated writer.-Justanonymous (talk) 22:26, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

Exactly. Not satire. Not humor. Opinion. Op-Ed "Opposite the Editorial page". Tpseudo (talk) 14:44, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Oh yes, this was an Op-Ed, the satire section is in a different part of the paper entirely so there could be no confusion on that. Mr. Kaul's words should be factually described in the article as well as the context. Thank you for your help. -Justanonymous (talk) 19:24, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for yours. I am keeping an eye on this as well. It does seem to be developing some clarity from the original.Tpseudo (talk) 20:22, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Lynching

I removed the word lynching from the article. Nowhere does Mr. Kaul state that he would kill although dragging human beings with chains from a pickup truck does many times lead to horrific death and it is an grotesque extrajudicial criminal act of a very vile nature. Lynching generally is also carried out by a mob and involves hanging (the lynching of someone's throat). Also the word has many racial overtones that we likely want to avoid here. It's combative phrasing so I removed. Discuss here before re-adding. -Justanonymous (talk) 17:14, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

We also have to be extremely careful in what we add to this page. It has to be WP:BLP. We have to be extra careful that we only note actual facts, we should not minimize or amplify the statements of the person in any way. Mischaracterizations are not appropriate in Wikipedia and least of all on a BLP page. Facts only. -Justanonymous (talk) 17:18, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

James Byrd was lynched in that manner, although I know what you mean.--Mike - Μολὼν λαβέ 18:18, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Thank you Mike, the horrific case of Mr. Byrd was the stomach turning criminal tragedy that came to mind when I first read Mr. Kaul's article. Mr. Byrd was black and his mob assailants white which further led to the attribution of lynching. But Mr. Byrd was executed while Mr. Kaul didn't advocate the explicit murder of our elected leaders, although by the time you tie someone to a vehicle and drag them around, you pretty much have zero regard for human life and you're very likely going to wind up with a horrific tragedy even if you do that for only 30 seconds. The horrific nature of what was proposed by Mr. Kaul can be lost given the popular media where we see heros dragged around by horse, cars, trains etc and they just miraculously get up - the reality is much more horrific in real life and sadly much of the gut wreching context is lost. For all we know though and out of an abundance of good faith, Mr. Kaul might have envisioned dragging in the sense of Harrison Ford on some movie set (hard to imagine) so given that this is a BLP, I'd rather us not inflame the statement and we should afford Mr. Kaul every benefit of doubt here and afford the reader of the article the opportunity to make up their own mind. The Byrd case was horrific though and I wish we'd just cleanse ideas like that out of our prose, especially by pulitzer nominated authors - regardless of editorial freedom one might aquire due to age - it has no place in civil discourse. -Justanonymous (talk) 18:44, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

"We also have to be extremely careful in what we add to this page." Agreed. And that is exactly why I edited it. Politics and/or ideology should not enter into a factual BLP. Tpseudo (talk) 20:22, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Not Satire

Several anonymous IP editors have tried to cast the work of Mr. Kaul as satire. Please stop attempting to characterize the work as satire. Satire is a particular type of writing that is published in a specific part of a newspaper. Mr. Kaul's work was published as an op-ed an opposite the editorial which is in a very particular way. We're trying to be very precise here and we're attempting to be completely fair to what Mr. Kaul wrote without embelishment either positive or negative. This is a biography of a living person and we have to be 100% factual. Please don't use softening words like irony, satire, etc in the description. Likewise please don't use combative words like lynching. Please don't mistate or mischaracterize what the author wrote, he never advocated "murder" or anything like that. Let's be 100% fair to the author here. I know it's politically charged but the Wiki is about facts. Thank you all for the help and hard work. -Justanonymous (talk) 01:30, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

As a side note to the editors trying to soften or harden Mr. Kaul's words, we truly do not know Mr. Kaul's intentions with his piece. He might not want editors to soften his prose or to harden it, those decisions to "spin" Mr. Kaul's work stem from a editor's personal tastes and bias. You might think you're doing Mr. Kaul a favor by casting his work as satire when in reality you might be going against his wishes. Let's just be fair to his statements and be 100% factual without embelisment (detracting or adding), let's not marginalize nor amplify. If Mr. Kaul decides to revise his statements at some point, then at that point we can add his meaning. Please just leave it at the facts only.-Justanonymous (talk) 03:38, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

Actually, I must correct myself, Mr. Kaul did advocate murder in his strong prose. Murder of those that opposed gun control but not explicitly elected leaders.-Justanonymous (talk) 15:07, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

The statements were made in the vein of satire and cannot be understood separated from the article and context without labeling it as satire. By not doing so we are doing a disservice to anyone who happens on this article and wants to know his views. He does not want Republican leaders dragged through the streets. It was said in a satirical manor. He has said it himself in a subsequent piece titled "Deploying Satire at My Own Risk." http://otherwords.org/deploying-satire-at-my-own-risk/ --GD (talk) 21:04, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

I fixed it. In the future, please don't simply revert the entry on the page when more work needs to be done. New information released through a clarification piece yesterday, predates this thread of discussion -- and must be put into the context of the article and it also needs to be cited correctly in the biography so that the reader is not confused. Initially, many people did not know this was intended as satire because this did not appear commonly in the satire section of a paper and also because of the polarized politics of the gun debate. Hence there was a very strong reaction by some groups. It is worth noting the chronology of how this occurred and how it has been clarified in a subsequent piece by the same author. Please help me keep the article straight, it takes a lot of work. Merely, reverting without adding the references, chronology, etc, just creates confusion and forces rework. Appreciate the link to yesterday's article by Mr. Kaul, that helped.--Justanonymous (talk) 21:49, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. To clarify, the whole piece wasn't satire. The part at the end was. Unfortunately, it was quoted and taken out of context to mean that he was serious. --GD (talk) 22:40, 5 January 2013 (UTC)