This is an archive of past discussions about Lynching in the United States. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
This article on the history of lynching in America has been hijacked by liberals to overwhelmingly emphasize, in every minute gruesome detail, white on black lynching, minimize and discount white on white lynching, and totally ignore black on black, and black on white lynching. It has many, many references to the race of black victims and the race of the white perpetrators, along with the vast majority of photographs depicting dead black victims, cherry picked for their shock value, with minutely detailed horrific descriptions posted to elicit outrage in the viewer. Photographs of any of the victims of those who were lynched and the horrific details on how they met their end is swept under the rug. It would greatly benefit 'subjective' editing. However, since this is the PC Victimist's Sacred Cow and political Ace-in-the-Hole, subjectivism, unless it is the lock-step 'politically correct subjectivism', will simply not be allowed.
Not that it matters here, but for what it is worth (and here it won't be worth much if anything at all), an excellent book that has a truly subjective historical view of lynching in America is the following:
'Lynching: History and Analysis', by Prof. Dewight D. Murphey.
For those of us who have read it realize just how politically biased this Wikipedia article is.
While abuse and the lynching of innocent blacks occurred for reasons of racial animus, the majority were not. This was how much of early America (just as in many villages in Africa today) dealt with crime in their communities. Many of these places were small tight nit communities in which everyone knew everyone else, including the accused, well enough to have a far better knowledge of guilt or innocence than some liberal bleeding heart apologists 100 years after the fact.
Funny I never here liberals get all hot and bothered over the supposed innocence of the many whites who were lynched during the same period, or the many whites and non-black minorities who were/are lynched by some blacks in the present day. Or even the many blacks who are lynched by fellow blacks in Africa now!
When looking at history out side the PC filters, far more white were lynched in the history of Europe than blacks in the United States. And far more whites were lynched in the history of United states than blacks. When you take the following non-PC facts into consideration:
1. The excepted number of blacks lynched as compiled by the NAACP and the Tuskegee Institute deals with the years 1882 and 1951 at '4,730 people were lynched in the United States: 3,437 Black and 1,293 White'. Those were the years in which the highest number of black lynching were recorded. What isn't mentioned is that prior to black emancipation few blacks were lynched as they were protected private property, and that the vast majority of people lynched from the creation of this country as a nation and up to black emancipation, were white.
2. In the Western Frontier the vast majority of those who were lynched were white. Numbers are considered greatly underestimated due to the lack of records and interest at the time (people didn't get all upset when white criminals were done away with to even care. The fact that they were permanently removed from society was good enough for most). Papers would often report lynching of white desperadoes without mentioning their names while giving scant details.
3. It has been estimated that black criminals murder and lynch more (truly known innocent) whites every two years than blacks that were ever lynched in the last 100 years. When multiplying that number over the past 50 years we are looking at 10's of thousands of white men, woman, and children who have been murdered and lynched, some in the most horrific ways imaginable. Their photos along with horrifically detailed descriptions on how they died will never be allowed here.
"People often resorted to lynching because the competent authorities were a long ride away and justice would brook no delay. Prof. Murphey reminds us that President Andrew Jackson himself sanctioned the practice when he recommended to Iowa settlers that they lynch murderers. Likewise in Kansas, a New York Tribune correspondent reported in 1858 that "[t]here is a very general disposition to pass over the hopelessly useless forms of Territorial law and corrupt Federal courts, and try these parties (i.e. horse-thieves) by Lynch law."
Prof. Murphey notes that contrary to current assumptions, blacks also formed lynch gangs, mostly to lynch blacks, but sometimes to lynch whites:
In Clarksdale, Tennessee, blacks lynched a white in 1914 for raping a black woman. The authorities later ruled that this was justifiable homicide.
In 1872 in Chicot County, Arkansas, armed blacks broke three whites out of jail and shot them to death.
Nor was lynching by any means a sport in which any black was fair game:
In Tennessee in 1911, four white men hanged a black man and his two daughters but for no good reason. This outrage roused the ire of the community; the whites were tried and two were hanged." -Thomas Jackson, excerpt, review of 'Lynching: History and Analysis', by Prof. Dewight D. Murphey.
But why is such a lopsided and emotional view of only one side of the history of Lynching in America allowed? Prof. William J. Bennetta of the Text Book Legue, explains:
“Wherever multiculturalism goes, it brings Victimism with it. Victimism is an integral part of the multi-culti ideological package, and its practitioners, whom we may call Victimists, have two principal concerns: They invent fake stories and images that are intended to bring sympathy, admiration, glory and political advantage to groups of people who have been officially designated as Victims by the multi-culti establishment; and they strive to disseminate their fake stories and images in the guise of “history.”
The Victims are always groups, not individuals. This isn’t surprising, because all multi-culti ideology revolves around tribalism, the rejection of individualism, and the doctrine that a person’s primary identity is his group identity — i.e., the tribe to which he belongs.
In practice, all the principal tribes turn out to be racial or quasiracial groups, which are defined in terms of their real or imaginary ancestries.
Among the racial groups represented in the population of the United States, two have not merely been certified as Victims but have also been selected for especially lavish treatment by the Victimists. These groups — Amerindians and American blacks — figure prominently in the multi-culti version of “American history,” where they are sanitized and glorified beyond recognition, and are depicted as the hapless prey of evil white men.
Sanitization is an indispensable part of this endeavor, because certified Victims must always be depicted as innocent, righteous paragons of humanity. The sanitization process consists largely of hiding or denying any facts which show that the Victims had victims of their own, whom they slaughtered, displaced, subjugated, enslaved or exploited." -Prof. William J. Bennetta, EXCERPT from ‘The Textbook Letter’, from July-August 1998.Historicalhonesty21:02, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
-- Ahem --
'...Trial juries in the southeastern United States were typically all-white and would not vote to convict lynchers. Often juries never let the matter go past the inquest...'
Perhaps -- but that the sole example provided concerns events in Port Jervis, New York doesn't exactly support the claim. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 76.199.136.135 (talk) 06:43, August 23, 2007 (UTC)
This talk page is getting hard to manage, and that’s because it is at least 728kb. I suggest that we follow the talk page guidelines, which recommend archiving when it exceeds 75 KB. There are several ways to achieve this purpose, and for me, it seems that the automatic mode is the best for a talk page like this one, which does not need too much attention, but it is still busier than most. What method do you suggest? Historiador (talk) 07:39, 30 November 2015 (UTC) Reformatting paragraph Historiador (talk) 07:41, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
I set this up yesterday but it didn't work for some reason. I archived the individual sections one-by-one looking for blacklisted links but didn't see any (that stops the archive bot). It is fixed for now but may need tweaking down the road. — Berean Hunter(talk)13:23, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Before reverting changes done by an IP address, I would like to gauge sentiments about this issue among people working on this article. The changes I am referring took away Adam Hudson’s suggestions that the police’ current treatment of Black men suggests similarities to lynching. The first issue I have against the change is that the sentence that was deleted did not say anything wrong. It only made reference to Hudson's suggestion. The source, differently to what the IP user commented, it is reliable: it is the main place where Hudson writes from.
Moreover, Hudson’s suggestion is a topic that has been widely discussed among experts, empirical and academic publications, some of which I noted below. Among experts, there is already a consensus about the existence of a correlation (though no consensus about its meaning or its manifestations). To ignore the discussion of this connections in this article is to either ignore the reality of the discussion or/and to side with a mostly non-academic camp of it—none of these steps are part of WP’s mission (to ignore or to side).
Some of the sources:
1- Embrick, David G. "Two Nations, Revisited: The Lynching of Black and Brown Bodies, Police Brutality, and Racial Control in ‘Post-Racial’Amerikkka." Critical Sociology 41, no. 6 (2015): 835-843.
2- Cooper, Hannah LF. "War on drugs policing and police brutality." Substance use & misuse 50, no. 8-9 (2015): 1-7.
4- Smith, Selena. "The Modern Day parallel of Racist Police Murders to Lynching." In 143rd APHA Annual Meeting and Expo (Oct. 31-Nov. 4, 2015). APHA, 2015.
5- Butler, Paul. "Stop and Frisk and Torture-Lite: Police Terror of Minority Communities." Ohio St. J. Crim. L. 12 (2014): 57.
In a nutshell : The IP removal is spot on, yes, but in ignoring (or discriminating against) a discussion that is going on among scholars and journalists. My argument is that the sentence that was deleted made a necessary point, which is to simply say that there are key people talking about the relationship between lynching and current police brutality, that this is not an inconsequential topic of discussion. To claim otherwise is to try to block the sun with our hands, is to say that these discussions among experts, journalists and scholars are not taking place, is to show our biases on this topic, and ignore what is actually going on in the debates. The sentence was not claiming that the journalist mentioned was correct, or that the relationship between police brutality and lynching actually exists. It was simply informing that it is a current topic of conversation. I am not suggesting that we make bigger claims than what the sentence tried to convey. Simply, to restore it or to write another one that describes and informs that journalists and scholars are discussing and investigating the links between current police brutality and lynching.
@Berean Hunter: I appreciate your response to my request for opinions. Allow me to offer what could be a more adequate response to your arguments than the paragraph I submitted above:
1) I don’t know who inserted the sentence in question, but in no way was introducing a Fringe Theory to this article. It only informed that a journalist had suggested that lynching continued as police brutality and other form of vigilante activities: “Adam Hudson suggests that lynching continues veiled under the mask of police brutality and less publicized vigilante actions.” To inform that people are discussing the relationship between lynching, police brutality, and other forms of less public of vigilante activities is not the same thing as to say that it really exists.
2) If discussions of this topic were a Fringe Theory, then, why is it that empirical and academic work is awash by it? How many citations of books and articles is required to realize that this is not a marginal topic? I suggested 5 works above. Let me offer you some more from reputable academic journals, and quote from them:
a. About how the topic is at the center of ongoing research, look at how these researchers introduces their work: “This article investigates the association between past lynchings (1882 to 1930) and contemporary law enforcement responses to hate crimes in the United States.” King, Ryan D., Steven F. Messner, and Robert D. Baller. "Contemporary hate crimes, law enforcement, and the legacy of racial violence." American Sociological Review 74, no. 2 (2009): 291-315.
b. In regards to the connections that existed and exists between police brutality and lynching: “Though it is not widely known, half of the 5,000 lynchings that occurred in the first half of the 20th century were characterized by the active involvement of law enforcement, chiefs of police, and sheriff's deputies, not simply by handing the victim over to the mob or helping to cover up the incident. In almost all of the racial riots of the century, police stood idly by during white on black attacks and often participated in the maiming directly. The antilynching activists fought for "law and order" and for federal oversight of police. They saw local police brutality and lynching as close cousins, campaigning against both together and often referring to the former as "police lynching."” Weaver, Vesla M. "Black Citizenship and Summary Punishment: A Brief History to the Present." Theory & Event 17, no. 3 (2014).
c. About how the history of lynching is closely related to current police brutality: “In fact, race scholars such as Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Joe R. Feagin, Michelle Alexander, and countless others have noted that one could look at modern day race practices (and the need for racial spectacle) as old perfume repackaged in a new bottle. Thus, the legitimacy given to police agencies represents a rearticulation of slavery and Jim Crow era practices specifically designed to socially control people of color (Alexander, 2010; Bonilla-Silva, 2001). These modern day lynchings serve today in much the same way that they did in the past—as a way to illustrate and high- light white supremacy and emphasize minorities’ place in a racialized social system. As people try to make sense of the escalation of police brutality and violence on poor people and people of color in a supposed era of colorblindness, one thing is clear—that social scientists and sociologists, in particular, have failed to take a central role in helping to reshape a nation that continues to control and punish minorities for the color of their skin and/or their non-European phenotype.” David G. Embrick, “Two Nations, Revisited: The Lynching of Black and Brown Bodies, Police Brutality, and Racial Control in ‘Post-Racial’ Amerikkka,” Critical Sociology 2015, Vol. 41(6) 835–843.
d. Are they not researching and writing about what the deleted sentence was referring to? This is, thus, real, not a fringe topic, nor the pet peeve of a few journalists. It is at the center of sociological and historical research today. I can provide you with many more recent works on how the connections between police brutality and lynching are at the center of many studies. Just let me know how many do you need, but a simply search in your library databases or a visit to your librarian would help much too.
3) We are not to judge if these people are making “metaphorical comparisons.” As an encyclopedia editors, we only report what they are talking about.
4) To say, “none of these speculations are lynchings, period” is not only to ignore what they are saying, but also to simplify it and to silenced them all. To quote one of these authors: “Now, to be sure, police brutality and the shooting of unarmed blacks is not lynching in the way it was practiced in the early part of the 20th Century.” None of these writers are as simplistic as you implied. They have more to convey than simply saying there is a recurrent theme on these acts. To ignore the fact of their conversations just because we do not see the relationship, or because it makes us uncomfortable or because it does not align with the way we see the history of lynching is to pass judgment on what they are doing and to attempt to erase their work out of reality. And yet, they not all agree, which is the beauty of open conversations. We should make this also clear.
5) By informing about the connections that writers are finding between police brutality and lynching this article is actually complying with WP's Neutral Point of View. The sentence that was deleted informed the reader about a journalist’s comments, and it did so without prejudice.
6) The phrase “open a can of worms” implies a plea to avoid controversies, but what controversy would this generate? It is not that this WP article would argue a point or another. It would simply inform about the discussion and about the scholarship on the topic. It is not taking any sides, if there is any to take. To imply that there would be unexpected problems because we provide relevant information is to think that it is better if we ignore the issue. It is not surprising that when the phrase “open a can of worms” is invoked, it is often related to the yearning of keeping knowledge hidden rather than in the open.
7) To reiterate: I am not suggesting that at this point we open a section or a subpage on this issue, but that we restore the sentence that was eliminated or rewrite it to reflect the long conversations about these issues, without animosity and discrimination. Historiador (talk) 10:25, 30 November 2015 (UTC) Fixing Prose Historiador (talk) 11:12, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Yeah, I'm not swayed. Your link about discrimination is to the WMF's employment policies and has nothing to do with anything here. If there is discrimination then it is already in the article because it has most spotlights on racial incidents already but leaves off many of the standard lynchings of criminals...in other words, it isn't strictly a racial issue but the article has been curated very nearly that way. WP:COATRACK - after you open the can of worms of allowing the first statement about modern police brutality then they will begin to expound and grow . If you want to compare those modern incidents to lynchings (which they are not) then do the comparisons in the police brutality article. I categorically reject your #3. They are making comparisons to lynching but that isn't the subject they are talking about. I see these additions as going to an off topic tangent. Wrong article. Just because they choose to compare wildly varying incidents to lynchings is their hyperbole. It is exaggeration. Not a good idea to take the article in that direction at all. I believe that we shall have to wait for other editors to enter the discussion. — Berean Hunter(talk)12:38, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
The topic is sensitive, but this is not a contest of wills. The purpose of these pages is to offer arguments and also to pay attention to what others say. I am only asking to leave a line the way it was, or to rewrite it to convey its meaning better. I am not suggesting we take this article anywhere. It is being taken somewhere already by deleting a sentence. I might have given you the wrong link about discrimination (it reads similar to what I was looking for), but the case is the same. You discriminate against sources and are coming up with ideas of your own by stating that journalists and scholars working on these issues are wrong and exaggerating things. They might, but the work of encyclopedians is to report what people do and what they say. It is no surprise that Hudson brought this issue up. It is in the literature. Of course that lynching is what the scholars I cited are talking about. I quoted from their works above. Look again at Embrick's title where "lynching" and "police brutality" is at the heading; read the introductory sentence of Baller, King and Messner's work where they state, clearly, their work is about the links between lynching and police brutality; re-read Weaver's work where she makes the linkage central to her work. Thus, I ask that the sentence is restored.
You mentioned that the article currently "spotlights on racial incidents already but leaves off many of the standard lynchings of criminals...in other words, it isn't strictly a racial issue." If you believe that non-racial lynching is ignored, bring it up. And if you feel that non-racial lynching was the "standard," show scholarship and evidence to back you up. Numbers would help. But do not clean out, delete what others have written supported with sources (in this case, I am offering an even broader and deeper set of sources to back up the sentence that was deleted).
This WP article is NOT an essay about what you or a narrow group of people thinks it is lynching in the US, but about what others have written of lynching in the US. If you feel it is tilted too much in one direction by ignoring other scholarly works, then, suggest them, and let's include them, but you do not fix it by eliminating what other wikipedians wrote about what journalists are saying about it. As I have shown here, it is not only a journalist talk, and yet, if so, we are not to ignore them. The way you suggest we take this article violates the basic rules of an encyclopedia by curating the article to read as an essay, the way you think it is, and not how a multitude of writers and specialists have written about it. Again, I am asking to restore a sentence that might have been here in this article for some time already, because it reflects a reality of the subject. It does not ignore what others say. Even if you would be writing an essay, you should have to consider what others think about it. So, if you believe that people as Hudson, Embrick, Weaver and others are exaggerating, cite the other camp too, but do not silence them. A line would take care of this issue. Historiador (talk) 17:34, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
The Above discussion: police and lynching
Closed by mutual consent
Hello! I was invited to comment on this discussion by Dennishidalgo who chose me because I'm an active editor. I'm a librarian and I try not to act in bias on Wiki or in my job. However, I should disclose that I have a liberal bent, which you can easily tell from my userpage or my edits. I'll try not to let my "liberal cooties" poison the discussion. LOL
That said, I spent time reading the information that Dennis provided and it looks sound. There seems to be significant reason to revert the edit. Plus, he's looking to revert a sentence from the article, not write an entire WP:COATRACK. There are already sections that involve police complicity, such as here in the article itself.
I have to suspect that there are racial motivations for not wanting to include modern police tactics and lynching. It's a sensitive subject, true, but we don't live in a post-racial world and if police are unlawfully working together against non-whites either in the past or today, that should be mentioned. Five articles is a good start to show that it's not fringe. Also, the term "Driving while Black" is a good anecdotal place to start realizing that people aren't treated equally in the U.S.
Anyway, I'm not trying to ignite the discussion, I think that both of you have made good points and have kept the talk page area civil and that is awesome. Megalibrarygirl (talk) 22:01, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Hi, I would like to add my two cents. Though I am new to writing in WP, I am a long time user and a scholar who works on matters of race. Like Megalibrarygirl, I think this should not be an issue for debate. The material here presented shows to me that there was no good reason to delete the sentence. It seems that the editor who is supporting the deletion is fearful about the slippery rope, but the path the article takes is always dependent on the editors. Anyhow, the article, as it stands today, should be reorganize with a more clear objective in mind. The sentence, or the theme in the sentence, is not disruptive.Ivettedez (talk) 22:28, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Noted. Megalibrarygirl was canvassed and then managed to use bad faith with "...I have to suspect that there are racial motivations for not wanting to include modern police tactics and lynching". Nothing in what I said has anything racist. Same trump card, just a different group. Infer someone is a racist/homophobe/anti-feminist/anti-whatever because you don't agree with them and chill the discussion? That is an awful shitty thing for you to do. Try reading my reasons below and then get your canvassed ass off this page or we will be taking this to another level:
(re to Dennis from above to prevent breaking conversation) I haven't deleted anything in the article. :) I'm arguing to not add it back. (Speaking in general and not about the specific authors that you have presented) We can indeed discriminate on sources when it comes to quality and vetting. That is one of the reasons that we have RSN. We do not try to include everything that people write. We should consider giving due weight to topics and subtopics. Sometimes that means that certain things aren't mentioned at all. "...but the work of encyclopedians is to report what people do and what they say." I disagree, it is the work of reporters to do that. The encyclopedist's job is to report on article subjects in an objective way, sticking to the subject. These incidents/writings above are not about lynchings and to add them is to water the meaning down in inaccuracy. Comparing police brutality to lynching might belong in the articles on police brutality but here, it is off-topic and if you put the one little sentence in then you are likely to see that expanded and blown out of proportion by recentism...and then you will see me deleting as clearly off-topic. I would like the article to stick to the subject. If you were working off of an outline to write this article, you wouldn't have a section where you list what people compare to the article subject. Lynching has a very specific meaning usually involving a mob and not the individual or three. Common sense applies here. These aren't lynchings.
If a modern scholar/author/historian were to write about a specific serial killer and compare the mutilations of a victim as if they were hanged, drawn and quartered, you might include that in the article on the serial killer but you don't include the comparison in the article on that form of punishment. It doesn't belong in the latter. Key problem with the police brutality comparisons is that they aren't being done by groups usually. That isn't the only problem here but it is key.
@Berean Hunter: No, I have not read about Denny yet. I am curious what you meant with "you are about as welcome as a fart in church" in your edits' comments. And no, @Megalibrarygirl: was not canvassed and she did not use bad faith. She is one of three editors whom I asked for advice regarding this discussion we are having, which is to follow WP suggested steps to avoid controversies. I picked these editors randomly and wrote exactly the same to all. So, please, do not react so strongly to someone who took valuable time from her schedule to read the articles I suggested, and to follow a thread like this one. It is intimidating.
@Berean Hunter: Regarding your comments about discriminating on sources, of course, I follow your point, and I take those comments as common sense. But that was not my reference, and I hope you do not think of my suggestions as simplistic. I meant you were discriminating against valuable and key works that make the links between police brutality and lynching their center of research. By ignoring them, you are pushing away work that is important and relevant to the topic. I suggest that before claiming marginality for these authors, you should become familiar with the body of literature about the subject. And you asked if an outline of this article in the form of an essay would include these authors, of course they would be in. Recentism is not a case that applies here. My only contention is that you are wanting to keep a sentence out of the article which makes a clear reference to this type of conversations. It is not about expanding it, but about being complete and fair. You make references to what would happen if we keep the sentence here, but there is nothing to tell about it. It was there, I don't know for how long, and nothing wrong happened, and if it happened. Bringing this sentence back will make this article more fair and complete, not prone to recentism or any other similar disease :). Historiador (talk) 01:19, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
@Berean Hunter:, I wasn't trying to make anyone upset or to claim that you were racist. The fact is, there is a certain slant going on in a lot of the threads above and the topic that Dennishidalgo is adding is racially charged. Now, you may not want it added because of the slippery slope or because you feel the article is too slanted and biased towards race or liberalism to begin with. That doesn't mean you need to accuse me of having bad faith. There are lots of reasons to consider race and not all of them have to be negative, so please don't jump to conclusions, or swear at me. Megalibrarygirl (talk) 01:39, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
"I have to suspect that there are racial motivations for not wanting to include modern police tactics and lynching." <== That is the first accusation here and is a clear cut case of bad faith. It means that you no longer assume good faith because you believe that you understand ulterior motives are at work here. I have sat at the legal negotiating table as well as the business negotiating table using terms like good faith, bad faith and impasse years before Wikipedia ever existed so I think I'm qualified to make that judgment. Trying to suggest that anyone like myself who might be discussing something here must have this as a motive is immediately chilling and upsetting...a veiled personal attack which is how it landed. Since I'm the only one in the position of an adversary in the debate here that infers me...I'm not jumping to conclusions. The fact that you were canvassed (and yes, Dennis it is called stealth canvassing) means that you need to back away now Megalibrarygirl. No offense but things haven't improved since your arrival. These actions have derailed this discussion which at least had been going on cordially. — Berean Hunter(talk)14:47, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
Re-@Berean Hunter: We should find a different place to talk; we may be expanding to the article’s detriment. I have been meaning to lie low for a while on this subject, but staying silent after your interventions seemed as the same as supporting your comments. What I will now say is bold, but in no way intended to be rude nor harsh. I respect your dedication to WP and I am grateful for the many times you have helped me and others around me. But these points are necessary to express only because what has happened in this page.
First, I am distressed by the way you have taken user:Megalibrarygirl’s interventions, even when she tried to lighten the atmosphere and ended her first intervention praising both of us for keeping the conversation civil. She came for a second time, but to apologize and clarify that her intentions were good. On the other hand, you admit that you are reading her phrase “racial motivation” to mean just one thing, that which may be offensive, even when she clearly told you that this was not her intention. But she is correct. “Racial motivation” also means conversations about race and around race, the use of racial concepts, categories, and the framing of an issue through the paradigm of race. I can understand how for the sake of convenience in a court of law and in legal transactions this phrase has been narrowed to a single meaning, but that is not the only one used out in the world—particularly in my world. I had to ponder for a while and look up the phrase in other contexts to make sense of your interpretation. The ways I use the noun race, the adjective racial, and the adverb racially are rarely to involve others with racism. In my speech and in that of many others I know, the word racist has not the same value that it has in society at large, and rarely we seek to simplify life by pointing to someone and calling it racist. So, I did understand her differently. As user:Megalibrarygirl explained in her defense, it was not her intention to call anyone racist. Moreover, she explicitly and correctly referred to the topic we are discussing as “racially charged,” and this is the source of her phrase: “racial motivation.” I take her to mean that the consideration of race is a big factor in our debate. In her second intervention, she explained this point further. With the intention of illustrating other ways of thinking, allow me to offer two other applications of the phrase: 1) The reason editors working with this article may not want to link police brutality to lynching is because it would imply that police brutality happens because racism and they may want to keep the topic of race out of the police behavior because it is a sensitive topic (racially motivated); 2) the fear that racial topics would “open a [racially motivated] can of worms" in WP (heated interactions on the topic). Perhaps the first one relates to her view more closely since she also wrote “Driving while Black,” which is a reference to how racial prejudice influenced police's enforcement of the law. Do you see accusations of racism to you or to any other editor in these interpretations of the phrase? One of them means racial motivation for the police actions and the other means a concern with how the topic would unravel in WP. I am not saying there was no way you would have thought the way you did; I am saying that there were others ways to understand her use of the phrase, and the one she meant was not to offend anyone here.
Second: You were incorrect when you charged me of canvassing. The term is used in Wikipedia to mean the unsavory recruitment of votes for electoral campaigns and/or to tilt a discussion in one’s direction. But I did nothing of that. You jumped into conclusions when you saw that user:Megalibrarygirl chose to join the discussion, and made your mind about it without leaving space for doubts about your judgment (I hope you are not infalible). What I did was to consult and began preparing to follow the suggestions from this page: Dispute resolution. More specifically, I was preparing to take this step: outside help. But I never took it, if taking it means to ask for intervention (and not simply for advice). I would not have asked for intercession without letting you know. Never I asked other editors to enter the discussion to favor me nor did I ask them to find ways to tilt the debate to my side. I did two things: 1) I asked for advice and 2) sought to warn others about a possible heating up of the debate. I chose the editors for their years of experience, their participation in arbitration and the frequency of their contributions. None I knew. This is what in fact I wrote (verbatim) to all when I requested help:
Greetings,
I am writing to report a possible controversy over the deletion of a sentence in the WP article about Lynching in the US. For now, the debate is between another editor (Berean Hunter) and me (Historiador). Only two. And it is just beginning. But it reflects what appears latent in the article's history.
At this point, I am contacting you and two other experienced editors to warn about the potential controversy and to request advice. My plan is to follow the Wikipedia:Dispute resolution's suggestions. I have provided arguments and sources in the Talk Page, and will lay down [sic] for a while. If my points are not considered fairly, I will then move for other editors' assistance. The last resort would be to post the case in the Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard.
As in the title and the text, I announced I would seek editors’ assistance if my points are not considered fairly. I had hopes that our debate would work out in the end. Unintentionally, however, I left out from the title I sent to user:Megalibrarygirl the phrase in the parenthesis, which may explain why she chose to join the discussion right away. However, the content of the message was clear about my intentions of no intervention yet. Please, do understand why I would seek advice. You have many years of experience dispuiting and arguing in WP, the record makes reference to your style, you are familiar with the WP rules and know them like the back of your hand, and was beginning to show with me no desire to collaborate, or compromise. On the other hand, I began the discussion asking for views rather than to quickly revert the deletion. I wanted to make up my mind, and gauge the editors’ vent before exercising my right. I think that is called good faith. And differently from you, I have never been on debates of this type in WP. Recently, I disagreed with other editors, but quickly backed off after two others posted arguments in opposition to my view (and not because I agree, but because I believe in the spirit of consensus).
To recap: 1) I regret that we are debating about manners and forms which distracts from the issue originally driving the discussion, that feelings have already been hurt, but glad that we are not calling us names, and still in talking-terms. 2) I did not ask for immediate mediation or intervention at that point; 3) I did ask for advice regarding my actions and sought to warn about a possible escalation. 4) I wrote my message and its title to make clear that there was no problem yet, but that I wanted to know if I was following the correct path (seeking advice). 5) Your hurried accusations, however, are intimidating. As you wrote to user:Megalibrarygirl it is difficult to talk freely when someone else has poisoned the air with distrust. In plain words: I believe you approached user:Megalibrarygirl rudely (you just threw her out of the conversation as if you owned the page) which is against WP good practices, and have wrongly accused me of canvassing. Historiador (talk) 18:51, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
Thank you, Caballero1967 for clarifying my position. I do regret that my words caused controversy. I am also upset that Berean Hunter chose to shut down the conversation over their hurt feelings at a perceived attack. I chose to comment here after being invited to offer my opinion. I commented because after reading the discussion and the page itself, it seemed clear to me that there was no COATRACK issue with adding the sentence back in. I think that in order to move forward, you should both focus on just that issue and perhaps seek expert review of the article.
This is my first time being asked to intervene in a discussion and I apologize for any hurt feelings. That said, I'll bow out as long as I am no longer personally attacked as a promoter of "bad faith" or labelled a "stealth canvasee." I love working on Wikipedia and I do respect that Berean Hunter's feelings were hurt over a perceived slight. Nevertheless, a perceived attack is different than an actual attack against a person. I'm sorry my words were misinterpreted, but I've clarified and I apologize now for not being more clear. I hope Berean Hunter can accept that. I ask that you please do not resort to personal attacks any longer, Berean Hunter: I do operate in good faith and try my best to help and I feel bad that my efforts have resulted in a mess. Again, my apologies for the misunderstanding. Megalibrarygirl (talk) 19:12, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
Sigh* Somehow, it seems really hard to accept an apology when it contains a couched accusation of personal attacks. :/ There aren't any and I invite encourage you to ask any admin you know if you think there are. I don't have sore feelings and I don't hold grudges anyway. I do appreciate the efforts to clear things up. I think for now that I'm going to step back from this article and take at least a week away in the interest of de-escalation of drama. If the tables were turned Dennis and it were me, I would have waited a week or two after we initially disagreed so that there would have been ample time for the other editors that already have this on their watchlist to possibly respond. There is no need to rush over this issue. If after waiting for that time there were no other editors joining then I would have left notes on the talk pages of regular editors that have previously edited here for the last year or two. I will say that as threads approach TLDR, there will be fewer and fewer editors willing to jump in. I suggest collapsing this subthread as "Collapsed by mutual consent" if you agree. Other editors may join if they can avoid this mess. — Berean Hunter(talk)14:10, 2 December 2015 (UTC)
@Megalibrarygirl: From my position, you are a mega-help. You took the time to read the material I submitted, and your conclusions helped me see I was not alone. Thanks.@Berean Hunter: Thanks for your most recent presence among us. You are correct. With experience in these matters comes a better sense of time. Yet, I also followed good judgment by seeking advice. I agree to collapse this subthread if @Megalibrarygirl: has no objection either. Historiador (talk) 08:48, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
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I just wanted to note, as to readability and overall feel of accuracy, that this article needs some major work done.
Unfortunately, I lack the knowledge or time to fix this whole thing. Perhaps someone can put one of those banners that solicits help to build a better article at the top of the page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.182.24.159 (talk) 09:16, 7 July 2016 (UTC)
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Given that blacks were victims of lynchings by a rate of many times that of any other ethnic group, it seems inappropriate to have a photo of a lynched non-black man leading the article. I suggest another be put in its place.Parkwells (talk) 18:32, 2 February 2017 (UTC)
Even though blacks were disproportionally the targets of lynchings, to exclude photos of the lynching of others would encourage a misrepresentation of history.MarkSonntag (talk) 15:01, 23 February 2017 (UTC)
Unbalanced article
Lynching and political violence have a much bigger role in American than just its manifestations against blacks. Well documented, in easily available sources, are the attacks that were carried out against Mormons.[1]. From my readings, I am aware, (but it is extremely hard to find documentation), that the political violence that became common in the South of the post Civil War period was used in at various times and places in the Antebellum South as various white factions battled each other for control of their states.MarkSonntag (talk) 15:07, 23 February 2017 (UTC)
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I think this section should be flagged for a re-write, potentially using the main article on disenfranchisement. Many of its statements lack citations, and some lines make no sense, especially in the intro section. For example: "Thousands of workers were brought in by planters to do lumbering and work on levees." This sentence is a stand alone paragraph, with no explanation or citation. Perhaps someone else knows why its there, or what the original author meant? Also, the next paragraph, discussing rates of lynching seems poorly written and alongside the preceding paragraphs focuses heavily on the Mississippi delta and neglects the rest of the South or US.
CaptainEek (talk) 06:52, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
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Up to a few years ago there was an internet website of a collection of lynching pictures from the book of the same name of "Without Santuary". This website no longer exists..however while it did about twenty of the pictures were unknown as to circumstances...through research about a dozen were updated as to circumstances...a link to notes is at https://civilwartalk.com/threads/a-post-civil-war-legacy-lynching-warning-graphic-accounts-and-pictures.118468/
For example one postcard printed in a Midwest state stated the victium was lynched for killing a policeman named Collins...in fact the slain officer was Charles Collis of Springfield Oh in March 1904!
Note: As before the website is no longer online so please use the book in companion with these notes
I've never been involved this way with infoboxes before, but there are so many I think they merit their own infobox. Other opinions? deisenbe (talk) 18:01, 14 May 2018 (UTC)
Purpose?
The opening section contains the line "The purpose was to enforce white supremacy and intimidate blacks by racial terrorism".
But later it is said that some blacks lynched other blacks; many whites were victims too. And other races were also victims.
So the first line above cannot be wholly true. Indeed it cannot even be mostly true, since later in the article it says that most victims were accused of some actual crime e.g. murder or rape.
Suggest changing the line to: 'In many cases the underlying purpose is now believed to have been to enforce white supremacy and intimidate blacks by racial terrorism'. Cassandra — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.74.33.85 (talk) 20:47, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
The photographs
The photographs should be taken down and replaced with other images. One of the main ways lynching operated as a systematic rather than individualized form of racial terror was in photographs. The continual reproduction and circulation of images of Black pain was meant to re-terrorize the Black American community and extend individual events into a visual form of terror. More information can be found here https://eji.org/racial-justice/legacy-lynching. The recent Legacy of Lynching exhibit by the Equal Justice Initiative, despite focusing intensely on the history of lynching from a visual perspective, chose not to redisplay any images of lynched people as an act of respect and in efforts to not further racist visual culture; the Wikipedia article should do the same.
71.224.209.70 (talk) 04:15, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
What sort of photos did the EJI use? What would you have us replace the images with? You mention racial terror against blacks, although they were the majority of lynching victims they weren't the only ones: would you have us remove only images of lynched blacks, or would you have us remove all photos of folks being lynched?
While systemic bias is something Wikipedia is concerned about, our articles are not censored. The article presents the very real and very horrific truths of lynching, and of a very dark time in American history. There has been disagreement about photos on this page in the past, but as was concluded here: it is important that folks get the unvarnished truth. Removing photos of the atrocities does a disservice to history and understanding. Captain EekEdits Ho Cap'n!07:38, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
I agree that photographs are useful for demonstrating the "horrific truths of lynching," however, do we need so many in this article to make that clear? If readers want to see more they can use the Commons categories to find them. Jaireeodell (talk) 17:47, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
Commons files used on this page have been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons files used on this page have been nominated for deletion:
I think these should be merged under the heading of Bibliography. I can't see any purpose served by having two sections. Comments? deisenbe (talk) 12:09, 16 February 2019 (UTC)
When did lynching become not just lynching?
Hi, I am not from America and am looking into this topic for a report at school. When did lynching become "more than just hanging"? There is a weird quotation in the article stating that "Lynching is more than just hanging" that goes unattributed to anyone speaking. THe citation for it is 2019. And 2019 seems to be the year when this article has been changed to turn lynching into any and all murder against black people in the US. Can someone clarify for me when lynching became used for more than just lynching? Because outside the US the word lynching is synonymous with hanging. Extra judicial killings are called extra judicial killings, extra judicial killings by hanging are called lynching. I'm trying to understand when the word changed in the USA because it seems to be very recently adapted. Is there any older source for this prior to the one that is used in 2019? THank you. --121.210.33.50 (talk) 22:01, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
Too-narrow treatment
While this article does an estimable job of treating lynchings of black men as a terror phenomenon after the Civil War, it pays almost no attention to any other variety of lynching, such as of suspected lawbreakers on the frontier (accused cattle rustlers, for example) or of Mormon polygamists (such as Joseph Smith) before the flight to Utah. What is the reason for this omission? It seems almost intentional. --Piledhigheranddeeper (talk) 18:05, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
Piledhigheranddeeper, Such items could be talked about, although I would opt they stay shorter. Most sources and books about lynching focus on the main issue, which was the lynching of black men. As we note, others were lynched, and we do discuss that. But we're not trying to give a false balance by giving non-black lynchings undue coverage. If you could recommend some sources and other incidents to add, we could find a way to incorporate them in a choice manner. Captain EekEdits Ho Cap'n!⚓19:38, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
As a Brit with no horse in the race (no pun intended) it does strike me that the sentence which reads: "The purpose was to enforce white supremacy and intimidate blacks through racial terrorism" is both subjective and misleading.
Firstly 25% of lynching were of non-African Americans. Secondly the later assertion that one third were 'wrongly accused' implies that two thirds were guilty of serious crimes. And thirdly many of the individual events now categorized as 'lynching' might be equally-well described common murders.
It follows that motives must have been mixed, and that no single blanket explanation can be true. And we certainly cannot read the minds of people long-dead.
It might therefore be better to qualify the sentence, perhaps something like: "Today it is widely believed that the underlying reason for many, perhaps most, lynchings was to enforce white supremacy and intimidate blacks through racial terrorism". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.13.79.121 (talk) 13:57, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
Pfeifer-referenced section
There are issues with the paragraph that cites Michael Pfeifer.
First, let's address the easy one: the use of "bellum" is a romanticizing whitewash of the American civil war - a conflict that's increasingly and properly recognized as having been instigated to preserve the economics of white supremacy.
Second, it's a gross mischaracterization to ascribe to post-civil-war lynching a general motivation *other* than white terrorism of emancipated slaves. The notion that, in the post-reconstruction South, white complainants were routinely denied justice against African American defendants is laughable (which is not to say that, during reconstruction, whites suffered routine injustice at the hands of their former slaves).
Third, ascribing the decline in lynching to a "renovation" of the death penalty is another grotesque whitewash of what, for African American men, is more justly described as institutionalized lynching. The statistically significant (read *huge*) divergence between whites and African Americans in terms of judicial outcomes puts the lie any other interpretation.
Finally, it would seem prudent to include the perspectives of at least one prominent historian from the African American community, rather than relying solely on a white guy from the whitest corner of the country.
The segment in question:
'According to Michael Pfeifer, the prevalence of lynching in postbellum America reflects a lack of confidence in the "due process" judicial system. He links the decline in lynching in the early twentieth century with "the advent of the modern death penalty": "legislators renovated the death penalty...out of direct concern for the alternative of mob violence".' Jmsebold (talk) 02:18, 29 December 2019 (UTC)
I'm not familiar with Pfeifer's work and so will not speak to it. Antebellum is literally a Latin word that means "existing before a war". It is debatable whether the best way "to preserve the economics of white supremacy" was by waging a brutal, expensive, years-long civil war that killed hundreds of thousands of White men.--Mox La Push (talk) 05:39, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
Do we need this many pictures of actual lynchings?
→ I agree. I came here trying to get information about the legal history of it as a concept, and I can't read because it's surrounded by incredibly distracting disturbing imagery. I can understand wanting them prominent so that readers can truly appreciate the horror, but it also seems to completely undermine the rest of the article by making it so difficult to actually read as a result. Is there a way for wiki to like blur NSFL images until mouseover or something? 100.19.136.107 (talk) 22:02, 10 October 2019 (UTC)
Hah! I am on a school computer, you have no idea how paranoid I was skimming the article trying to dodge gore pics worried I was going to get in trouble! Blurring NSFL pics is a good idea though I wish they had something like that for people using it for school work. --121.210.33.50 (talk) 22:03, 3 November 2019 (UTC)
I came to the talk page to bring this up. It's pretty nonstandard - other articles about inherently graphic topics like hanging, flaying, crucifixion, and impalement all use artistic depictions as their leading images, with photographs mostly within the body of the article. Having so many graphic pictures at the very top of the page is pretty dehumanizing and reminds me of, say, how news coverage of police violence (at least in America, where I am) overuses footage of black people being killed on camera. Luiysia (talk) 21:09, 21 June 2020 (UTC)
Hate crime versus lynching
I think the murder of James Byrd Jr. is a hate crime but not a lynching because nobody accused him of a crime. I think for a murder to be called a lynching it has to be extrajudicial punishment or vengeance for something the victim was accused of doing.
Lynching is murder, but it's a specific type of murder. In my opinion, it is more eloquently explained in the lede of List of lynching victims in the United States, and somewhat better than this article in the lede of Lynching. It isn't just murder, it's the cooperation of a group of people to carry out some system of "justice" or "order", where they have self-appointed themselves as the means to that justice rather than relying on the legal system. Because often an entire community was involved, there was no way that community could expect to give an honest trial of their peers in this sort of murder. Jacona (talk) 21:25, 19 January 2021 (UTC)
Lynching in the USA
The Wikipedia article states that Teddy Roosevelt was an anti lynching advocate. This is false. In 1891 he openly condoned the lynching of eleven Italian immigrants who had been lynched in New Orleans after having20:54, 19 January 2021 (UTC)71.233.55.162 (talk) either been found not guilty or had their cases dismissed for lack of evidence in the murder of a local police chief.
The anobymous editor is talking about the March 14, 1891 New Orleans lynchings, an article which already mentions Roosevelt's approval. To quote the main article:
Monday we dined at the Camerons; various dago diplomats were present, all much wrought up by the lynching of the Italians in New Orleans. Personally I think it rather a good thing, and said so.[2]
Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 4 February 2019 and 3 May 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Rurbina1.
@Nettless: While I was busy tidying up this really chaotical article, I didn't see that you restored the Myrdal source. Instead I thought that I had forgotton to delete some instances of it. This just as an explanation for why I reverted you without giving an adequate answer to your concerns.
You are probably right that Myrdal's book was influential at the time it was published. But after it, nearly 80 years of intensive research passed. Many results of this research (e.g. the complete debunking of the concept of different races, the connections between slavery, the Lost Cause mythology, and white supremacy) were unknown to Myrdal. In short: Over time, Myrdal has become a primary source (see WP:PSTS). For an estimate on how many victims were "falsely accused", we need newer sources (which would probably give even higher numbers for innocent victims, given that some prominent cases have been re-investigated). The idea that lynchings served as a "disciplinary device against the Negro group" is so well established that Myrdal is just a repetition. If you know of a good secondary source for the importance of Myrdal's book, we could (and should) add it to the part dealing with resistance against lynchings. --Rsk6400 (talk) 12:07, 18 February 2022 (UTC)
First of all, thanks for attempting to reorganize this long page.
I would disagree that this source has become a primary source, it's being used to quote useful statistics and information from other notable sources, such as the Tuskegee Institute, about lynchings which peaked over 50 years before this book was published. I would disagree that the researched concepts you mentioned are completely unknown to Myrdal. If there's another source estimating the number of false accusations, that should be added too but I haven't come across any. This source is very influential. It was cited in Brown v. Board of Education and is used as a reference in numerous recent sources used on this page. For example it's cited in at least two sources in the Statistics section: Robert W. Thurston (2013) and Robert A. Gibson. Nettless (talk) 18:05, 19 February 2022 (UTC)
(1) According to WP:RSAGE: Especially in scientific and academic fields, older sources may be inaccurate because new information has been brought to light, new theories proposed, or vocabulary changed. Concepts of a biological differences between the races were not finally debunked until the 1990s. About the rest, I didn't say that it was totally unknown to Myrdal, but that "many results" were unknown to him.
(2) I don't know of any WP guideline that says that we should keep a source because of its historical value. We keep statements because they are relevant and verifiable by reliable sources.
(3) You didn't answer to my point about cases re-investigated.
@Deisenbe: Your comment really confuses me, since you don't seem to have followed this discussion. I cut duplicates and poorly sourced statements. See the discussion above and my edit summaries: They never mention the length of the article. The headline of this section refers to a maintenance tag that was placed here long ago (not by me) and has been removed since (not by me). Rsk6400 (talk) 14:37, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
Apologies for the delayed response. WP:RSAGE doesn't say older sources should to be removed. It even says "sources of any age may be prone to recentism, and this needs to be balanced out by careful editing." Myrdal is being used to quote statistics attributed from other notable sources, so I don't see the point in removing it. You could find a newer source to quote the Tuskegee Institute's statistics but that seems pointless. Regardless of that, I want to keep it because it's a reliable source used for verified and relevant information on this topic, and I'm not advocating to keep Myrdal simply because it's of historical value. Nettless (talk) 18:48, 1 March 2022 (UTC)
Spectacle lynching
The postcards section would benefit from some context. Postcards are a byproduct of spectacle lynching, which has been discussed in several sources:
Harding, W. (2017). Spectacle Lynching and Textual Responses. Miranda. Revue Pluridisciplinaire Du Monde Anglophone / Multidisciplinary Peer-Reviewed Journal on the English-Speaking World, 15, Article 15. https://doi.org/10.4000/miranda.10493
Wood, A. L. (2011). Lynching and Spectacle: Witnessing Racial Violence in America, 1890-1940. Univ of North Carolina Press.
Hale, G. E. (1998). Making whiteness: The culture of segregation in the South, 1890-1940 (1st ed). Pantheon Books.
Planning to add a section that details lynchings that occurred in the Midwest since there is a section on the West. Will also move the text about Minnesota into the Midwest section instead of in the West. Willowhist (talk) 17:22, 31 March 2022 (UTC)
That is what it says in the "Justifications of lynchings" section. Are you looking for some change in the article? This page is for discussing improvements to the article. - Donald Albury19:51, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
Actually, some lynchings were of people who had been convicted in court. In such cases, the lynchings themselves, however, were done outside of any legal process. In some cases, one of the stated motives for a lynching was to prevent a convicted felon from possibly obtaining a reversal of conviction or sentence on appeal. Donald Albury12:46, 18 January 2023 (UTC) Edited 12:50, 18 January 2023 (UTC)
[1] I think it's possible this might be inaccurate and possibly a bit WP:WEASEL. To my recollection, the book makes it quite clear that Tom was killed trying to escape. Would you please quote the passage that supports your claim here? Thanks. DN (talk) 21:18, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Please stop removing the cited source.
The quotes you "couldn't find" are all there...the rest of that section is not a "quote".
Quotes from the article that are in the pages mentioned...[2]
"legislators renovated the death penalty...out of direct concern for the alternative of mob violence" -look at page 8 near the bottom
He links the decline in lynchings in the early 20th century to "the advent of the modern death penalty"- look at the bottom of page 7
Pfeifer also cited "the modern, racialized excesses of urban police forces in the twentieth century and after" as bearing characteristics of lynchings - beginning of page 8
This is so dishonest. First of all, I didn't say I "couldn't find" the quotes, literally never used those words. Secondly, the beginning of page 8 reads "comitatus, which gave the sheriff the authority to call upon all physically able men to assist in capturing felons. Elites accepted, sometimes grudgingly, that under such a corporatist constitutional arrangement, commoners might occasionally turn to collective action to seek restoration of what they perceived as their customary rights. Crowd actions often took the form of rituals of misrule, performances that inverted social rank or gender in holiday processions or in charivari that temporarily overturned social arrangements in order to reaffirm conventional political or gender arrangements such as gentry domination of the polity or benevolent patriarchal control of the household (in correction of the aberrant behavior of cuckolds, wife-beaters, overly headstrong wives, or newlyweds of disparate ages)." 90.64.40.128 (talk) 14:53, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
The last paragraph at page 7 reads "Though early modern crowd violence sometimes took on antiauthoritarian implications, seventeenth- and eighteenth-century crowd actions were rooted in a hierarchical conception of society as a corporate body linking gentry and plebeians in an English commitment to and participation in a “rule of law” that reputedly distinguished Englishmen from most Europeans. Such an understanding of an encompassing, participatory rule of law linked members of English and colonial American communities in institutions of criminal justice that included attendance at public punishments such as the pillory and the scaffold. Public spectacle executions meted out a “bloody code” intended to convey the consequences of serious crimes and the majesty of legal authority in a monarchical, hierarchical society. Around the British Atlantic, grass roots criminal justice was also manifested in the “hue and cry” communal apprehension of criminals and, increasingly in the eighteenth century, the posse"
The last paragraph at page 8 reads "A collective murder similarly inspired by legal and political anxieties occurred in Edinburgh in September 1736. Captain John Porteous had ordered militia to fire on a crowd that rioted at the gibbet after the hanging of a smug-" 90.64.40.128 (talk) 14:56, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Dear IP, you used the word "I", implying that you are DanielFried. If that is so, you have to make that transparent. You should also read about edit warring. And please avoid words like "dishonest", see WP:AGF and WP:TPG. Rsk6400 (talk) 15:23, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Is it not possible that this is a good faith mistake? I.e. you are both right because you have different versions or printings of the book? I ran into this issue on some Civil War Articles: there were multiple versions of a book and the pagination was different between the paperback, hardback, and the second edition. CaptainEekEdits Ho Cap'n!⚓16:50, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
I may have misunderstood DanielFried regarding what he meant by quotes, but the content is clearly quoted from the source (see my original post) [3]. They are not "quoting" the text I referenced, in fact, it doesn't even look like they are looking at the right book, but it's all there. I have pointed out where the quotes are from if someone wants to look, but they seem to want to remove the source regardless for whatever reason. I've tried to AGF, but now they are casting WP:ASPERSIONS. I feel it is a waste of my time responding to them at this point. DN (talk) 18:17, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Someone more trustworthy can now delete the [citation needed], it's not needed anymore imo. I'm not ever touching this article again, this was interesting to say the least. DanielFried (talk) 18:27, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Someone more trustworthy?...I may have misunderstood what you meant, but I was never dishonest. I think you need to take a look at WP:CIVIL before you attempt any further edits at all. DN (talk) 18:47, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
Mistakes do happen to the best of us, but of course lack of experience is not a reason to be hostile. Thanks for helping to clarify the chain of events CaptainEek. DN (talk) 20:26, 27 February 2023 (UTC)
1. each adds new information and/or documents a significant event—clearly captioned and in context
2. images of dead bodies & other highly graphic content is kept below the fold
4. max 4-5 such images, at most ~40% of total images in the article
This article has no fewer than 18 startling photographs of lynchings/lynching victims, with two above the fold. Little or no new info is added by each photo and most are captioned with (at most) the victim's name. Of the ~15 so other images in the article, 10 are photos of other violence or illustrations of lynchings.
This is a trauma porn gallery. For relevant issues, see:
I'd like to remove most of the lynching photos and provide better context around the ones that remain, and use a different picture above the fold, aligning the article with wikipedia norms standards. Wanted to raise it here first given the significance of the change & sensitivity. Dpj aok (talk) 12:57, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
The subject is horrifying - but I don't think we should hide what happened. Wikipedia is not censored. Denying the holocaust is wrong, and this article bears a lot of similarities, atrocities to man by other men over differences of race and ethnicity. — Jacona (talk) 17:11, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
This picture depicts a white mob hanging a black but it also shows the presence of an Asian man in the background partaking in the lynching as well. 98.166.9.22 (talk) 21:33, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
It is fruitful when history is truthful and I believe ethnicity is important. The picture have identified a black man being hanged. It doesn’t make sense not to identify the men in the picture who are during the hanging. 98.166.9.22 (talk) 23:28, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
We have reliable sources identifying the ethnicity of the victims of the lynchings. We almost never have reliable sources identifying the ethnicity of individual perpetrators. Assigning an ethnicity to an otherwise unidentified person in a photo on the basis what you think they appear to be is original research, which we do not allow in Wikipedia. Donald Albury00:52, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
Of course researchers have always identified the victims and no one has ever wanted to identify the perpetrators but rest assured after showing this photo to several people the Asian man has clearly been identified. Ethnicity matters and these people see what I see. Horrific things that were done to blacks came from all sorts of people.I will continue to inform my colleagues with this information. Please research your history regarding Asians living in the south and the roles they played during this time period. 98.166.9.22 (talk) 16:55, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
98.166.9.22, please, by all means, provide reliable sources. Until you do, all we know is some anonymous person said something vague on the internet. — Jacona (talk) 22:04, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
I think the article and photos should stay. It is history. But look closely at the photos because it also depicts who is during the lynching. 98.166.9.22 (talk) 22:17, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
Please provide me with reliable sources that what I am saying is not true. I am very familiar with the history of Georgia and what was done to blacks during this period. 98.166.9.22 (talk) 22:24, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
98.166.9.22, it is not at all clear what you’re saying. I think you’re saying “one of the perpetrators looks Asian to me” (an anonymous poster on the Internet). Cool, glad to know that someone has an opinion about some, even though they won’t even directly say what they mean. — Jacona (talk) 22:31, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
@Berean Hunter: Thanks for your most recent presence among us. You are correct. With experience in these matters comes a better sense of time. Yet, I also followed good judgment by seeking advice. I agree to collapse this subthread if @Megalibrarygirl: has no objection either. Historiador (talk) 08:48, 3 December 2015 (UTC)
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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 4 February 2019 and 3 May 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Rurbina1.
