Saturday, September 28, 2013

Rothbard's Wiki Vandalized!

An EPJ reader emails:

Please take some time to read Rothbard's wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Rothbard.

Vandals have attempted to smear Rothbard by associating him with white supremacists and overemphasizing otherwise insignificant political musings.  They've attempted to associate him with David Duke, the KKK, and opposition to Martin Luther King.  For example, his "political activism" section is incredibly selective in its information.  The Wikipedia term for this is "undue weight", meaning the bulk of his work is deliberately omitted to skew the reader's impressions.

Of all the people Rothbard opposed, they put Martin Luther King?  How about Milton Friedman?  Of all the people Rothbard was influenced by, they list David Duke?  How about Hayek?  This is clearly a malicious attack.

I believe your readers can help clear Rothbard's name.  Check the Wayback Machine for an idea of what this page should look like:http://web.archive.org/web/query?type=urlquery&url=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FMurray_Rothbard&Submit=Go+Wayback%21

20 comments:

  1. Oh for fuck's sake! Can't these morons criticize without ALWAYS falsely accusing people they don't like of "racism"? Fucking cowards.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hmmm. the bottom of the new page reads: "This page was last modified on 28 September 2013 at 15:17." Interesting how the emailer just happened to notify you of an apparent change on the same day as that last update.

    Here is the Talk page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Murray_Rothbard

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Obviously someone is trying to fix the page after reading this post...that was the point genius.

      Delete
  3. There is nothing wrong with the article.

    "Why isn't it OK to have been Klansmen?" - Murray Rothbard
    http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch5.html

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In context:

      "They said in the 60s, when they gently chided the violent left: 'stop using violence, work within the system.' And sure enough it worked, as the former New Left now leads the respectable intellectual classes. So why wasn't the Establishment willing to forgive and forget when a right-wing radical like David Duke stopped advocating violence, took off the Klan robes, and started working within the system? If it was OK to be a Commie, or a Weatherman, or whatever in your wild youth, why isn't it OK to have been Klansmen? Or to put it more precisely, if it was OK for the revered Justice Hugo Black, or for the lion of the Senate, Robert Byrd, to have been a Klansman, why not David Duke? The answer is obvious: Black and Byrd became members of the liberal elite, of the Establishment, whereas Duke continued to be a right-wing populist, and therefore anti-Establishment, this time even more dangerous because 'within the system.'"

      I would not be surprised if this little piece of shit troll Jerry Wolfgang edited the wiki page himself. Also, I'm done with EPJ, since RW has refused to ban this obvious troll, and the fact that RW let this one through is the final straw.

      Delete
    2. Don't be hasty- Wolfie is an important troll, and at the same time an impotent one as well.

      He forces us to see ourselves the way most liberals see us, and learn to deflect their criticism. I'm glad RW hasn't banned him!

      Fitz

      Delete
    3. Jerry, weren't you in the Flying Club of Munich with me back in the day?

      Delete
  4. Out of context:

    "They said in the 60s, when they gently chided the violent left: "stop using violence, work within the system." And sure enough it worked, as the former New Left now leads the respectable intellectual classes. So why wasn't the Establishment willing to forgive and forget when a right-wing radical like David Duke stopped advocating violence, took off the Klan robes, and started working within the system? If it was OK to be a Commie, or a Weatherman, or whatever in your wild youth, why isn't it OK to have been Klansmen? Or to put it more precisely, if it was OK for the revered Justice Hugo Black, or for the lion of the Senate, Robert Byrd, to have been a Klansman, why not David Duke? The answer is obvious: Black and Byrd became members of the liberal elite, of the Establishment, whereas Duke continued to be a right-wing populist, and therefore anti-Establishment, this time even more dangerous because "within the system.""

    ReplyDelete
  5. Looking through the talk page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Murray_Rothbard) and revision history (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Murray_Rothbard&action=history) reveals that the Rothbard article has been slowly but systematically trashed over the past six months by two editors calling themselves "Steeletrap" and "SPECIFICO".

    ReplyDelete
  6. You mean professional hater Jerry Wolfgang took the words of someone he hates out of context? I refuse to believe it!

    ReplyDelete
  7. This is bullshit.

    So I changed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Rothbard#Torture_of_criminal_suspects to include a direct quote from https://mises.org/rothbard/ethics/twelve.asp . The previous section was blatantly inaccurate.

    Highly recommend others do the same. There's still lots more to correct.

    ReplyDelete
  8. FYI, here's what it used to say:

    "In The Ethics of Liberty,[77] Rothbard seeks to derive an "inclusive and deductively correct legal order from a minimal set of rationally justified principles."[78] Turning his attention to suspects arrested by the police, Rothbard states that "the whole point is that we don't know if these are criminals or not", and concludes that police may be permitted to beat and torture a suspected criminal in order to gain information, provided that the suspect is subsequently found guilty of the crime. For example, Rothbard wrote, if the police torture an individual who has been arrested on suspicion of murder, the police "have only ladled out to the murderer a parcel of what he deserves in return; his rights had already been forfeited by more than that extent." In the event that the suspect is not found guilty Rothbard states that the police would then be guilty of criminal assault of an innocent person.[77] Gene Callahan examines this position and concludes that Rothbard gives no consideration to the widely held belief that torture is inherently wrong, no matter who the victim. Callahan goes on to state that Rothbard's scheme gives the police a strong motive to frame the suspect, after having tortured her.[78][need quotation to verify]"

    I don't have time to do all of this. Everybody pick a lie and correct it. Going forward, If someone can alert the editors that this bullshit is going on it would be desirable.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Note to commenter regarding Wolfgang. I hope that RW lets him stay. His comments are so entertaining and the responses to his comments can be quite informative and astute but some of the responses to Wolfgang's comments are below the level of conversation that I have come to expect here at EPJ. Those name calling comments should be moderated.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. How would we learn the lessons of name calling, if we are not allowed to call names?

      Delete
    2. Jerry, we know it's you. You don't have to call yourself anonymous.
      (I say with a hint of irony.)

      Delete
  10. Let's not forget that Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger were total whores for Stalin at all times.

    In 1945, Woody said that Stalin couldn't be tricked because we was too scientific for them.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/bob_roddis/1782637838/in/set-72157601838894170/lightbox/

    All their peace songs from after the Hitler/Stalin pact until Hitler invaded the USSR got melted down as they then wrote and sang "let's go to war" songs.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/bob_roddis/1782637832/in/set-72157601838894170/lightbox/

    But somehow it's ok for Springsteen to "celebrate" Woody Guthrie.

    http://www.nj.com/entertainment/music/index.ssf/2012/03/sxsw_springsteens_keynote_addr.html

    Finally, what is so wrong about convincing jackass racists to renounce fraud and the initiation of force?

    ReplyDelete
  11. Someone should post the anti Semitic quotes of Keynes on his wiki entry. And Jerry Wolfgang is a troll obviously but he is replying the neo con and liberal views, so it gives you a chance to smack that down as people so on every blog entry where he comments. We don't need to be like the ny times and censor posts critical of krugman.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Jerry Wolfgang's posts are not "critical." They are outright lies and distortion and just straight up trolling. Big difference.

      Delete
  12. It seems to me that the folks in any/every private area could/would have the type of rules they want and agree to, whether they be rules about a) criminal procedure; b) religion, sex and nutrition; c) sharing of property; etc...

    Other than the substantive prohibition upon the initiation of force against those with whom you are not in contractual privity, isn't AnCap almost entirely procedural?

    Rothbard: The fact is that libertarianism is not and does not pretend to be a complete moral or aesthetic theory; it is only a political theory, that is, the important subset of moral theory that deals with the proper role of violence in social life.

    http://mises.org/daily/2616

    ReplyDelete
  13. ATTN READERS: we need the help of anyone who is Wikipedia savvy. I don’t know much about editing Wiki articles, but here are the major problems I see with the page:
    The Wiki has been blocked until tomorrow afternoon by an admin (Adjwilley). One of the offending vandals (SPECIFICO) is trying to persuade the admin to prolong the block for a week to 10 days: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Adjwilley#Rothbard_Protection. Obviously, SPECIFICO wants this crap to remain up as long as possible.
    The top of the page has serious issues regarding Rothbard's supposed intellectual influences. Rothbard is an intellectual giant in economics and political philosophy. It is laughable that these nobody politicians (McCarthy and Duke) were any sort of influence on him. Harry Elmer Barnes is controversial and therefore selectively added as well. Rothbard never even commented on any of Barnes’ controversial work. In reality, Rothbard stood on the shoulders of economic and philosophical giants like Hayek, Menger, Aquinas, Schumpeter, etc.? Where are they?
    Martin Luther King is listed as “opposed” by Rothbard. WHAT? Rothbard wrote like 2 lukewarm sentences on MLK in the article cited. Didn’t Rothbard oppose Friedman? Galbraith? Rothbard opposed a lot of people on very high intellectual levels, but MLK? Seriously?
    On influence: Rothbard influenced many important economists, for example, Block, Woods, Salerno etc. However, the page tries to skew the reader’s impressions by only listing 3 individuals: Hans Hoppe, Gary North, and Ron Paul. These individuals, while influenced by Rothbard, just happen to be the only Rothbard followers who may be known for something politically incorrect, thereby playing into the frame job on Rothbard.
    Overall the article lends undue weight to anything Rothbard ever wrote on race, racial politics, racist politicians, ANYTHING to imply to a casual reader that Rothbard was a bigot. In reality, Rothbard made HUNDREDS of contributions to humanity from his books, lectures, correspondences, and even movie reviews. Considering that Rothbard was such a prolific author, he is an easy target for this sort of misrepresentation.
    There are misleading and irrelevant images of David Duke and Strom Thurmond in his “political activism” section. Since Rothbard was an incredibly prolific author it is a total sham that of all his works, about 15% of his page is used to give the impression he is some kind of bigot because he wrote a single article on a single aspect of contemporary American politics, right wing populism.
    They are also misrepresenting his views on science and evolution by citing a quote from Lew Rockwell, trying to portray Rothbard as some kind of anti-science right-winger. This quote is inappropriate on this page because (1) it is not a quote from Rothbard, (2) it is likely to be taken out of context, and (3) Rothbard is NOT known in any sense for his criticism of evolution or science.

    ReplyDelete