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	Secret Societies (inactive)
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This is a true mess.

Too many untutored hands have ruined what might had been an excellent article.SLY111 (talk) 14:25, 24 January 2008 (UTC)SLY111 It's really not that bad, I'm working on it here and there. Adding some cited parts and what not. I'll try to improve a couple of things every now and then. I have already made the intro slightly better. Beam 20:07, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

This article is not here to be a banner for Free Speech

Too many people are using Misplaced Pages to speak their minds and present what they believe is true. Misplaced Pages needs to be controlled by public relations firms and state agencies. Please delete everything here that shows S&B to be an evil organization. Just because they fly the international symbol of piracy as their banner, that doesn't give people the right to speculate on their motives. Order must be maintained. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.109.195.126 (talk) 21:46, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Deletions

Eventually, I plan to delete material in the article which isn't cited. Please provide citations, thanks. Silly rabbit (talk) 04:30, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Architecture section...

is anyone able to get anything out of that? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.58.118.167 (talk) 22:12, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Bones and the Intelligence Community

We need to delete this I mean the whole section relies on one CIA press release...I mean do I really have to point out the obvious conflict of interest that arises? Read this section it has no place on wikipedia. I'm going to go ahead and delete it in a couple days unless someone gives me a credible source.

Need a Section on Basics

It seems that this article is lacking a section on the true basics of the society; what the society generally does, who is eligible to be a member, the society's place on Yale's campus, etc. Most of this information is available from the Yale Daily News and Alexandra Robbin's Secrets of the Tomb, both very reliable sources. I am willing to write this up. -societyalum

That would be great. DO IT. Tanner9461 (talk) 16:43, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Location of the Tomb

The article seems to imply the Tomb is on the Yale University campus. So do related articles on Misplaced Pages, like the on on Geronimo. But a Yale spokesman said in a recent NY Times article that the Tomb is in fact not on the Yale campus. Can someone clarify this? --C S (talk) 19:01, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Great observation. I can only give you my opinion about it but I have read most of the books, including Sutton's. This thing has been brewing for generations. The Tomb has been reported for almost 100 years(by the books and other RSs)to have lots of stolen stuff inside it,including lots of Yale University property (valuable historical paintings etc.). The University has never made any attempts to do anything about it(maybe because so many S and B alumni have held high administrative and faculty positions at Yale) which could put them in a difficult legal position if it's ever proven that the Tomb actually does have a lot of products of robberies and theft, especially University property and real Nazi stuff. This is the very first time that I know of that Yale has distanced itself from the Skull and Bones and,in fact, Yale's culture and history has embraced the group since its inception. It now looks as if Yale is trying to hide behind some technicalities: specifically that the group is a corporation which Yale now says is not "affiliated" with Yale and the Tomb sits on private land owned by that corporation. For so many generations the coincidence theorists have been maintaining that S and B is just a harmless fraternity where the alliances begin and end at Yale, this distancing by the University might help remove that particular falsehood about the "animal house" nature of the group.Abbarocks (talk) 01:53, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

sorry, my answer is much too long. Abbarocks (talk) 14:56, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Um -- what about the question? Collect (talk) 15:31, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Insertion of Clark quote

The NYT article used as a cite for the lawsuit makes a straightforward statement comment about Ramsey Clark and the fact he does not have any hard evidence for the suit. One editor keeps deleting this -- and this is also a 3RR warning on that removal of RS, fully cited and unquestioned material. It is not POV to cite the NYT article for sure. Thanks! Collect (talk) 21:38, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

You don't seem to have an understanding of NPOV. Just because we use a RS for something does not mean we an include everything from it and still maintain NPOV. Currently the way the section reads, it says Geronimo's family is suing Skull and Bones but their lawyer "acknowledges he has no hard proof". This is hardly a NPOV way of stating things. And yes, I'm well aware of 3RR having had a longer familiarity with Misplaced Pages practices than you. I expect you may yourself be in danger of breaking 3RR if you keep this up. --C S (talk) 21:44, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Since you insist on the quote and I'm not willing to fight on it longer, I am going to flesh and balance out the section to be more representative of an NPOV. I hope your own reasoning will keep you from removing this material, as I will use only material from the NYT article. --C S (talk) 21:46, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Collect insists on inserting the quote from Clark, the lawyer representing the Geronimo family. His/her reasoning is that it is already in a source used in the article and that since Clark is mentioned, his "view" should be mentioned. However, in context of the NY Times article that the quote appears in, it's not at all clear this is his "view". It's not as if he went out and said "I have no hard proof". Rather, it seems he was pressed on the matter ("Clark acknowledged he has no hard proof") and he responded fairly. But obviously he must believe the case has merit to pursue it. In addition, it's unclear why Collect is insisting so strongly that Clark's "view" should be included. There are other "views" that are just as important as his. Why put in a quote in such a manner as to convey a bias that the lawsuit is frivolous? Perhaps Collect would be happier if we improved the article to source more of the NY Times article, including other views mentioned. --C S (talk) 21:39, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually now we have RS in the form of a Cecil Adams article on the topic. Opinions correctly ascribed per WP:V and WP:RS to boot. I trust you will enjoy it. Collect (talk) 21:54, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

You must be joking. Your recent edit is lousy. Not only does it give undue weight to Cecil Adams (who is not a stellar source of information to begin with), but it seems to have been in cavalier fashion with no respect for NPOV. You apparently have read WP:V and WP:RS, but you seem to have forgotten about NPOV. --C S (talk) 22:00, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

You could have responded above (now below as you moved sections about). The sentence is an EXACT quote from the NYT article. No paraphrasing of any sort, and the meaning is quite clear. As I was not the reporter, all I can do is do what WP says should be done -- quote the cited material, which is what I have done. And his view is primarily important as he is identified as the lawyer involved in the prior sentence in the article. Thus his opinions are relevant. And note that I did not use the word "frivolous", the NYT did not use the word "frivolous" and so one editor is seeing POV where none can be found. Collect (talk) 21:50, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Your rephrasing his acknowledgment as his "view" is disingenuous, as I've explained. In any case, I have done as you have done. Cited the material accordingly. And I've included the other views which the NY Times considered important to balance out their article. Whether or not you intend a POV is irrelevant. I think anybody that reads the NY Times article and then reads the section as you made it would see there is a big difference in how the story is presented. --C S (talk) 21:57, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

You should change the attibution of the unnamed "expert" to "Alexandra Robbins, the author of “Secrets of the Tomb” (Little Brown 2002), a book about the society."

(ec) I've made a call for 3rd parties to look at this at the NPOV noticeboard. You are of course free to make comments there too. But since it's an NPOV noticeboard, your comments will need to discuss NPOV which so far you've been avoiding doing. Also, please keep the discussion in one place, as it's confusing otherwise. I didn't purposely make another section at the same time as you to be confusing; it happens when two people use the "add section" function at the same time. --C S (talk) 22:20, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

What is the POV of the NYT article? Seems that it is a simple news article -- are you saying the NYT is pushing a POV here? As for accusing me of avoiding discussing anything -- I have discussed everything raised here. Over and Over. And "add section" for an EC does not reverse order. Collect (talk) 22:50, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't know what the POV of the NYT article is, but, as I said, it's clear that your abbreviated two sentence version was not anywhere close to it. You've yet to utter the acronym NPOV (despite being adept with others). It seems to me you haven't discussed the NPOV issue of your edits.

As for "add section", I have no idea what you mean. My edit was made less than a minute after yours, which is why my section (written at the same time as yours) appeared further down the page. However, when I pushed the add section tab, you had not yet created your section, so please don't try to blame me for somehow purposefully avoiding responding in the appropriate section. --C S (talk) 23:19, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

I "abbreviated" nothing. I took the salient full contiguous sentences and used the same cite as had been there. Collect (talk)

You abbreviated the article with your one sentence insertion. You chose that one sentence out of all possible sentences. Then you defend your edit by saying that it somehow reflects the NY Times noted reliability and impartiality. That's a dubious kind of game playing with quotes. You made an editorial decision. I believe it was not adhering to NPOV standards. You keep arguing against this criticism by saying but I'm just saying what the New York Times said! But you aren't. You're only saying a bit of what they said and by doing so there is the chance of bias, is it not?

Rather than hiding behind the New York Times, why don't you simply explain why your edit is not introducing a bias? Before your edit, there was a factual description of the lawsuit. Afterward, we find a sentence saying the lawyer acknowledges he has no hard proof. Nothing else. Nothing to put his remark in context or explain why the Geronimo family would pursue the case. This is clear undue weight. You could have resolved the addition by adding even more and expanding. You chose not to. And I decided if we keep the quote, I would expand it myself. Then you chose to make another clearly POV edit. This is where the article stands. --C S (talk) 23:41, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Collect has been ignoring NPOV not only here but in other articles as well where he also consistently takes a combative posture . He's wasting a lot of people's time, including mine. Abbarocks (talk) 01:57, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Try using WP:AGF. Collect (talk) 02:15, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

As opposed to WP:DUCK you mean? --WebHamster 14:57, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Opening quote in history section

That Robbins quote seems like a huge violation of NPOV. Robbins has an important POV to be included in the article, but that purple prose doesn't seem like something Misplaced Pages should give its imprimatur to. THF (talk) 10:47, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Missing section

There is absolutely nothing in the article about the fight to make Skull and Bones coeducational -- which is surprising, given that it was one of the most notable events in the group's history. THF (talk) 10:51, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

 Done THF (talk) 15:57, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Symbolism

What the heck are the mentions of the SS and poison symbols for? Was there a reason for this, or is this just someone's original research or attempt to smear by association? (For one thing, Bones predates the SS, and there's no reason to think the SS was copying from a boy's club in New Haven.) THF (talk) 15:56, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Trading with the Enemy Act violations

None of the sources in this rant of a paragraph have anything to do with Skull & Bones. It has thus been removed as a violation of WP:SYNTHESIS and WP:COATRACK. The accusation that Skull & Bones controlled the conspiracy is unsourced; unsourced fringe conspiracy theories don't get Misplaced Pages play. THF (talk) 17:01, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Maybe there is a misunderstanding here.The inclusion of this event is not meant to accuse the Skull and Bones organization of officially sanctioning the Trading with the Enemy activities. For one thing, the organization never officially sanctions any activities at all except maybe its initiations. The inclusion of theTrading with the Enemy seizures is based upon the RS identification of the primary owners and managers of the companies seized as being Skull and Bones members. If one is to argue that such an event under the control of members of such a group should not be included in an article about the group, then one could equally argue that an article about al Queda should not have any mention of the 9/11 attacks. Abbarocks (talk) 23:06, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

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