Burma (Myanmar) is persecuting its native Moslems so badly that they are fleeing to China. From The Economist, June 30th 2007, p.68:

Why isn't there more on Wikipedia about this?

Option 1: They are sucking up to China so much that they don't want to write anything that offends them.

Option 2: They are so pro-Jewish that they wouldn't dare write anything pro-Moslem.

Option 3: They can't read Chinese/Burmese so nobody really understands.

Or perhaps Option 4: Because you aren't writing it.

Stuffed if I know.

I don't believe that one for a minute. There wouldn't be anything remotely anti-Jewish in castigating Burma (or China).

I don't think that there is an over-riding religious bias in Wikipedia. There has been as much hoo ha over Jews being favoured as there has been Jews being discriminated against, Christians being discriminated against, and Moslems being discriminated against. All that being considered, its reasonable to suggest that there is no major religious bias.

Well, you can exclude the first two right away. Why would anyone suspect an ulterior motive? Wikipedia is a work in progress. There's a long, long way to go.

Brown people persecuting other brown people just isn't sexy enough to draw much attention. You'd have to be a real nut to try to pin this one on the Jews.

Brown Jews?

Some of the most horrific racial genocide has been by and against people who, to most of us white folk, all look pretty much the same as each other.

And of course religious genocide by two people of religions that we know fuck all about doesn't really mean fuck all to any of us.

Do you really think that anyone gave a fuck about Iraq's genocide of the kurds? Come on, they're all brown fucks, we couldn't give a shit. Or how about the Shi'ites and Sunnis having their big old war and suppression? Nah, who cares. We couldn't give a shit about any of that until we discovered oh yeah they've got oil, so let's grab it.

Has anyone cared one iota about what is happening in Niger or Uganda or Fiji? I haven't heard anyone much caring about it.

And while we do care about Zimbabwe here in Australia, I can bet that Americans don't know a thing about it. Because quite frankly the only reason that Australians know is because Zimbabwe plays cricket. Americans don't play cricket, ergo they couldn't care less.

So yeah, not sexy enough.

Wikipedia's coverage of any given subject is based on whether there are any volunteers that are willing to write about it or if there's anyone on the project that is even knowledgeable of the subject at all.

Maybe there's a Burmese WP out there that details this more? Maybe the Arabic WP has something on it, but I only understand English and some Spanish (being the ignorant American that I am. )

I do read the BBC website and read about things going on in Africa, but what can anyone really do about Robert Mugabe? I doubt military action is even an option for those concerned with what's going on there. The international community can't even get enough nations to help out in Darfur, let alone take on Mugabe except through sanctions.

We should also be telling China to leave Tibet alone, but economic and foreign relations seem to have trumped human rights.

If there is any group more unfairly despised on WP than WR it is Muslims. The sources of this treatment are varied and include at least the following:

• pro-Zionist cabal elements represented by Jayjg and SlimVirgin and now organized Hasbara elements;
• neo-con types who war against "Islamo-Fascism" and pro USA "War on Terror", with a huge following of nationalistic Neanderthals and "Christian Zionists" and Bushie Crusaders of the Mango kind;
• nationalist Hindu and Anglo-Indian elements which are a huge and often overlooked force in en.WP inflamed over Pakistani relations, communal violence internal to India and especially Kashmir;
• a more minor element of right wing European anti-Muslims concerned with immigration, anti-multiculturalism, recent history related to Bosnia, and Turkish EU membership. En.WP is probably not their principal WP.

I'd be interested in the who are major players in the later two groups.

I think that Burma does not touch directly on any of these groups. It might be geo-politically important to India, but I do not know about the details of these relations. What I think is more important is WP is a hostile place for Muslim generally. They are demoralized and discouraged from editing. I participate in an Anti-War group that has significant Muslim-American participation, largely out of concern for relatives in Iraq. I once (prior to developing a critique of WP) suggested they edit relevant articles. They expressed concerns and related experience that I at the time thought was based on their misunderstanding WP. They, in fact, did not misunderstand anything at all.

Also I think we need not characterize the Myanmar Regime's oppression of Muslims as "Buddhist." The regime does try to exploit Buddhism the way many totalitarian nationalist regimes use the religion of a majority of the population to strengthen their hold. But there is nothing Buddhist about their conduct. Also leading pro-democracy/anti-regime activist such as Aung San Suu Kyi have been Buddhist and the organized Buddhist community has been a base for the opposition.

Moslems are hated worldwide, thanks to the US PR in relation to 9/11.

It will be recorded historically as the religious persecution of Moslems, when people look back at it 20 years from now (assuming that it ever ends).

So instead of pinning it on the Jews, you two would like to blame "neocons" and the U.S. for the poor quality of a Wikipedia article about Burma. Sounds like you're still interested in scapegoating.

Firstly, would you please stop insinuating that people on this board ever accuse "Jews" of anything. Some people on this board might accuse Israelis or zionists (who as I assume you know, consist of a lot of people who are not Jewish including people on this board BTW) of attempting to turn Wikipedia into an Israeli history book which is pretty much what has been going on. And secondly I don't think anyone suggested that the reason the Burma article was lacking was because of "the Jews"...

edit... OK I see Blissy wrote something ...I can't see how putting that information would be particularly "pro-Muslim", more like "pro-democracy"....

No. I am asserting that Muslims suffer from bigotry permitted and encouraged by a dysfunctional social networking community ran by competing cabal warlords. Some of their motives are transparent and others murky. There are a number of centers of influence that have a unique confluence that falls upon Muslims.

To say that I am "scapegoating" people from the most privileged sectors of a highly entitled society for the benefit of a group much put-upon in our society seems pretty much ass backwards.

I don't think that there is much argument that Moslems are the most heavily discriminated against group, in terms of race or religion, anywhere in the world right now, especially in the USA where their discrimination is the harshest.

That being said, I don't have a clue why this article wasn't written.

How about some more obvious, less conspiratorial reasons? (in list format since we all like lists)

1) Wikipedia is written largely by Western writers
2) They don't write about Burma because they don't know or they don't care
3) Stories of Burmese killing each other are not as interesting as other stories are to the average Wikipedian
4) News coverage of Burma has been spotty because of the government and because much of the terrain is remote and inaccessible.
5) The world's billion+ Muslims, who probably should care, are too preoccupied with Israel-bashing to notice a few mosques being razed here or there.
6) Contributors who come onto Wikipedia spewing tired crap about zionists and neocons get their asses handed to them pretty quickly, before they get a chance to settle in and write articles about less contentious topics.

It must be some sign of Wikipedia's success that people would be surprised we didn't have an article on that topic and would ponder possible ulterior motives for its absence. Maybe you didn't get to spend enough time as an editor before they banned you to understand why it's not there. There are two possible reasons for its absence: laziness/disinterest and deletionism. Deletionists, to give them a little credit, tend to have a soft spot for articles on things like this, though, so that leaves laziness/disinterest.

I'm glad you're not jumping to conclusions about the article, but I don't think you mean what you said about the United States. Muslims in the U.S. are among the safest and freest in the world. Try being a Muslim in Russia, China, or Burma if you want some idea what real discrimination is.

Spoken like a true believer in fairness and NPOV. You just made the Muslim case. Go do some "ass handing."

People who show up with less than 90% of their brains enfeebled by hate tend to be welcomed. Humorless thugs who flip the table every time a certain situation doesn't fit their ridiculous worldview tend to get frustrated and leave.

I tend to agree with Everyking. As I said first off, I think that this is just simply disinterest. Now, on the other hand, if someone were to write it and it was wiped, that's another matter entirely. Anyone here able to write it?

Ah, America land of the free, led by a retarded warmongering racist and de facto dictator. It's just unfortunate for those Muslims who dared to live in Palestine where Zionists decided that too many of them weren't really compatible with their Jewish state (it's funny how they hate that term BTW as if they weren't actually Zionists or Zionism was in fact something other than setting up a colony for Jews in Palestine). You know it actually would be a lot easier to just give Palestinians some money and let them come and live in the US but of course then they might become successful and gain influence in US politics and we wouldn't want that would we.

I was wondering how long it would take to move from Burma to Israel.

Actually Guy, Israel has been alluded to throughout this conversation so I don't why you are seeming to single me out. It was Blissy who started the (dubious) link by claiming that because of a pro-Jewish bias the Burmese article was ignored and then Emperor started stirring things supposed Zionist paranoia and Israel etc., so I and GBG are merely responding to his off topic rantings in kind.

Jorge, fair point. OK - please everyone, stay on topic.

I was trying to make the point that an overall atmosphere that inhibits Muslim editors exists on WP. Pro-Zionist admins and POV pushers is part of this, but not the only factor. I identified other factors. Also from my experience with the anti-war group with Muslim participation I would say that there has been a general concern that Muslim political participation is subject to monitoring and harassment by the intelligence community, with the ultimate risk of arrest or even disappearance for lawful political activities. A documented concern that WP may have an influential admin who was involved in the long term incarceration of innocent Muslims can not help matters. That this admin has a close working relationship with another with a history of abusive Checkuser activities should about do it.

If WP was interested in allowing fair participation by Muslims, the would have to fully address the issues raised by SlimVirgin's possible involvement in intelligence activities. Don't hold your breath.

Let's see if I understand your fear. Muslims would like to participate more, but they are afraid to do so because an agent named "SlimVirgin" could find out who they are and frame them for an act of terrorism. Is this correct?

I don't really have an interest in this, and get sick to death of talking about Jews. I was trying to avoid it going off topic, because I think its stupid that Jews keep getting either blamed for everything or said that they are victims of everything. Sometimes it quite simply has nothing to do with Jews. It gets very boring.

Rantings is a bit harsh too. What have I ever done to you?



Actually, if we take on board SlimVirgin's "List of Jews" arguments, she suggested that we should list less Jews, in case somewhere like Stormfront might accidentally list someone who was not a Jew, and attack an innocent person. This suggests that SlimVirgin is something of an anti-semite. And SlimVirgin has never, ever, said that she is Jewish. Also note that many of SlimVirgin's closest on-wiki friends are Muslims who push strong pro-Muslim agendas.

The whole thing doesn't really make sense to me in terms of Jewish bias though. I think that that is a ruse made by SlimVirgin to hide what she is really doing. I don't think that she is working for Mossad. I think that she is trying to pervert truth, but not because of any racial or religious bias, its because of a political bias which she hides behind these pretend biases.

We all should stop talking about Jews and indeed its tempting to have a Jew-free week.

Hooooooooold on. I was talking about Emperors rantings not you Blissyu2.


Hold on again- I'm not sure that SVs closest wiki friends are Muslims. I think it's pretty simple to be honest, SV pushes a pro Israel agenda with Jayjg and other lesser minions and that's all we need to know. The reason SV didn't/doesn't like people making lists of Jews is also not some indication of secret anti-semitism it just because she thought it was either (i) distasteful as being reminiscent of Nazi lists, or (ii) she thought people were "outing" people as Jewish who weren't known to be such but I seriously doubt that that was the case as most Jewish publications/websites usually point out who has the tiniest connection with Jewish people anyway.

Because the mass ignore about it, and their community is not vocal enough to make its voice heard in the media etc., which includes Wikipedia. You take those two factors and it answers your question pretty much accuratly.

There are lots of Zionist editors that indeed do edit in an anti-Muslim fashion, but that is simply a result of them editing for their own cause, i.e. Zionism. Then there are editors who are simply there to make anti-Muslim/anti-Islamic edits such as Karl Meier, Matt57, Sefringle, Prester John, and Arrow740.

This isn't what you're looking for? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Myanmar