Talk:Marcus Einfeld/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Marcus Einfeld. 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.

Archive 1

POV

This article is an absolute disgrace. Its one of the most negatively slanted on all of wikipedia. 80% of this thing is just unproven allegations, and the fact he has recieved a companion of the order of australia does not even rate a mention. This is one of the country's highest honors FFS. It should be balanced.I elliot 15:44, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Really? Eighty percent is a little harsh. Maybe sixty percent. Even less than that if you look at the claims that have been proven - his degrees for instance. He has not, to the best of my knowledge, received a Companion of the OA, but he is down as an Officer thereof. In what way is this not balanced? It does not make any claims that are untrue or unfair. The allegations are unproven, but the article does not claim otherwise. It looks pretty balanced to me. Of course if Justice Einfeld could explain to us all who exactly was driving his car the whole matter could be cleared up. He has promised and promised, but no luck so far. Lao Wai 16:43, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Um, clearly he has recieved a Companion considering that is one of the categories to which this article belongs. As for bias, just look at the subheadings. So many of them are alleged this or alleged that or 'criticism'. I wouldn't be using such strong language if he wasn't made a Companion. Since they don't give out Knights and Dames anymore. Companion is the highest honor in the Order of Australia.I elliot 05:20, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

I can fix that in a second. As far as I can tell, as of 2002 Einfeld was only an Officer not a Companion. Saying something is alleged is not bias. It is objectivity. OK, I'll remove the Companion claim and then you'll be happy - right? Lao Wai 09:38, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

And what is this? "His long-standing record of invoking the Holocaust to attack Right wing Australians and to engage in what has been called "portentous moralising" has left him especially vunerable to attacks on his moral integrity" with a reference to an Opinion page? Is the "criticism" section even required? It just seems to be a "why we hate einfeld" summary. To be honest, I had not previously come across this person before I clicked on the link from the "Companions of the Order of Australia" category page. Which is why I was rather bemused to find no mention of this tremendous honor, but large chunks criticising him in general, with much of that criticism based on as yet unproven allegations.I elliot 05:25, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Well I like to think so. No doubt it will go over the long run, but for people coming to this for the first time, they might not understand why the Murdoch papers in particular have a thing for Einfeld. It is a "why they hate Einfeld" section but not relevant for all that. Much of that criticism is not, I should point out, unproven. Some of the conclusions are but his degrees did come from a Mill, he wasn't a director of M&S according to the company and so on. Lao Wai 09:38, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Given that I've just wandered in to ask how much this $77 fine has cost Australia as a whole, on having read the article for the first time, I must say it's quite a spin issue POV wise. I don't particularly buy into half the article, I just figured some kiddies went defacing with POV tripe and it hadn't been corrected? 211.30.71.59 15:02, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Where is the POV? Point it out and I am sure someone will remove it. Lao Wai 15:21, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Defamation may result in legal action

Please note that defaming Justice Marcus Einfeld may result in legal action being taken against those responsible. Your IP addresses are being logged and will be given by the Wikipedia Foundation to Justice Einfeld's solicitors if they have a subpoena issued.

You are being very foolish in writing malicious and defamatory material about a great Australian. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Catstail (talk • contribs) 10:01, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

And that "you" would be addressed to whom exactly? What in this article is either malicious or defamatory? If Justice Einfeld wishes to sue he has but to ask and he can have my snail mail address too. I am more concerned about being accurate and fair. If you feel anything in this article is either please let us all know. That is what Talk Pages are for. Lao Wai 10:45, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Fair Comment

Until recent times Einfeld was a "respected" former Judge in Australia.

He was never a "great" Australian - that title is reserved for the likes of Bradman or Whitlam. Most Australians had never heard of him until recently, and even then most Australians would not know who he was.

Despite his undoubted achivements and talents, it has emerged that Einfeld has made various claims which are now being brought into serious doubt, and for which he has either failed to provide a satisfactory explanation, or has provided no explanation at all. This includes the fact that he has claimed not just one, but 2 doctorates from the US for which he paid a modest fee, but submitted no thesis!!!

It would not be balanced to merely mention his achivements, the current National media attention he is receiving in Australia is a result of his own actions and his responses to media inquiries.

If Mr Einfeld believes he is being defamed, he should start by issuing writs against all of the newspapers in Australia who have published these details about him, and if he won he would be very rich indeed. I suspect, however, he will not issue any writs, because then the newspapers will claim truth as a defence, and this might prove an embarassment for him. Remember that when Oscar Wilde sued for defamation he ended up doing hard labour in Reading Gaol.

This wiki article should be left as it is and not "cleansed" - let the truth emerge in the fullness of time. Oz Lawyer 12 Sept 2006 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Oz Lawyer (talk • contribs) 05:49, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Speeding Fine: A question

How much has the pursuit of this $77 fine cost the Australian tax payer? Not including the corporate funds poured into coverage of this matter, can anyone get an official guestimate as to how much money has been wasted pursuing a minor infringement? 211.30.71.59 15:00, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Does it matter? Personally I think the personal and professional integrity of a leading Jurist is worth investigating no matter how much it costs. But that is me. Where is the relevance to the article? Lao Wai 15:21, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

References For Education

What are the references for him claiming degrees from the two US institutions? It is not sufficient to claim that journalists were able to show that he claimed degrees from these institutions. A reference to the original report must be given. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.73.205.72 (talk • contribs) 08:11, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Moreover quoting the opinions of other prominent figures on the use of certificates from degree mills is more or less pointless. The reader of this article can decide their own opinion about this. It is also a journalistic style of writing which does not belong in wikipedia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.73.205.72 (talk • contribs) 08:33, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Solomon's island controversy

It should state here that Julian Moti is a prominent figure in the legal establishement of the Pacific Islands. To say he is a little know Australian legal academic misses the point. And it also tars Einfeld's reputation by association. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.73.205.72 (talk • contribs) 08:17, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Who's Who

There is no discussion here of where the blame for the false biography lies. Is it Eindfeld's fault or is it the fault of Who's Who? In fact this item is really about mud slinging - it is completly irrelevant if Who's Who is incapable of obtaining an accurate biography of Einfeld. That is their problem, not Einfeld's. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.73.205.72 (talk • contribs) 08:28, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Overall tone

This entire article reeks of bias. Most of it is devoted to recent questions of Einfeld's character, which surfaced because of the speeding ticket controversy. There is almost nothing here about his achievements. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.73.205.72 (talk • contribs) 08:28, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Non-working references, unsourced statements and POV sections

I have removed 3 external links which no longer work. I'll leave them here in case anyone knows what was originally at these links and so can supply alternatives:

In addition, many of the inline sources no longer lead to available webpages. I would sort those now, but as it currently stands the article is chock-full of weasel words, unsourced statements and egregious examples of WP:SYN. There's far too much 'investigation', far too little encyclopedia writing which is leading to undue weight being given to negative statements, many of which no longer have verifiability as the sources are defunct. CIreland 12:27, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The articles are no longer available on the internet but there is no reason to think that they were not cited as claimed, nor is it unreasonable to expect that people could look them up if they wanted. I see no investigation in this article at all. What I see is reporting of on-going allegations which in themselves are important and noteworthy. Lao Wai 15:18, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree that one could go and look up the printed article, but in that case references to those printed articles need to be provided. We can't claim defunct links as sources, especially when BLP concerns have been expressed. CIreland 15:37, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Provided? Well I am not mailing you my copy. The normal practice is that any reference only has to be a reference. Anyone can go and look The Australian or the SMH up for the appropriate dates. I agree that defunct links are useless, but a reference to the paper copy is as good as any other reference. Concerns about bias only seem to be raised by one person and I don't see how that can be sustained against the SMH. Lao Wai 15:47, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Concerns about bias only seem to be raised by one person. Oh really? | I raised concerns about this article months ago, so that suggestion is simply wrong. In fact you alone rejected allegations of bias back then, so a more accurate statement would be that concerns about bias only seem to be refuted by one person - you, Lao Wai. Its about time we dragged this article away from POV oblivion and brought it to up to some basic standard of neutrality, in spite of your opinions about the man, its no excuse to damage Wikipedia by attaching such an unbalanced article.I elliot 18:05, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I have removed the section Solomon Island controversy as it was unsourced (and never has been sourced as far as I can tell) per WP:BLP. If that weren't bad enough, it was full of phrases such as "It should be noted that...", "So it is natural that...." to name but two. CIreland 12:35, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Allegations regarding making a statement on oath is borderline original research in places (see WP:SYN) and contains far to many things that are 'claimed', 'alleged' and in some cases simply downright trivial. The minutiae of his driving record are unnecessary, a statement of the controversy and links to sources are all that are required. Consequently, I have considerably reduced this section. CIreland 12:57, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Controversy about qualifications has no working sources and is mostly about diploma mills in general rather than Einfeld in particular. The single source for the allegation (not currently cited in the section) is this attack pieces in from the Sydney Morning Herald which very one-sided and already overused as a source. Per WP:BLP#Reliable_sources I think this is insufficient and so I have removed the section. Further sources could justify its return as a judge's qualifications are obviously highly relevant. CIreland 13:10, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The SMH is hardly one-sided. Indeed if there is any one-sidedness it is because there is nothing to be said for the other side. Any number of other people have highly one sided news reports in their article. Martin Bryant for instance. The SMH is a mainstream respected leftist newspaper. To claim that it is biased against Justice Einfeld is absurd. I intend to put back anything alleged even if it is alleged in that one article. I can see no reason to doubt it as a source. Lao Wai 15:18, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

I wasn't intending to impugn the reliability of the Sydney Morning Herald which we should regard as an impeccable source. However, I do worry about using a single article as the source for the greater part of the negative aspects of the biography, espcially when that arcticle comes from the SMH's 'Opinion' section. CIreland 15:37, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

There have been dozens of other articles alleging similar things. I don't see what the problem is myself as any number of other articles do not rise above this level of proof - and mostly it is a claim that allegations have been made although Justice Einfeld has been charged with perjury now so it has gone a little beyond that. Lao Wai 15:47, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Collapse of Australian Legal Resources International contains another defunct source and a weasel-ish suggestion that he had taken advantage of travel opportunities. I have removed the unsourced parts and the implicit allegation. CIreland 13:16, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Alleged padding of Einfeld's curriculum vitae has one defunct source, more synthesis to lead the reader and is really an allegation of innaccuracy on the part of Who's Who. Consequently, I have removed the section. CIreland 13:25, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

It is not an accusation of inaccuracy on the part of WW as they have a policy of no research themselves and hence trust in their sources. They ask people to be included for a CV and they do not check it. This is well known. The defunct source is more of a problem but again, as with all these sources, the paper copy can be checked and there is no denying that when they are checked they will say precisely what they are quoted as saying. Lao Wai 15:18, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, Who's Who does do some checking but the principle problem is that information in Who's Who is frequently out of date if the subject of the entry does not make an effort to resubmit their details. Since the allegations in the section I removed were essentially about out-of-date claims, I treated this as a problem in the reliability of Who's Who and thus somewhat pushing the limits to use against Einfeld. CIreland 15:37, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The fact that is it "out of date" does not seem relevant to me as the point is that a lot of those claims were never accurate to begin with. How is it "out of date" to stop claiming someone was a board member of M&S when they were never a board member of M&S? Lao Wai 15:47, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The section United Nations Peace Award is unsourced and an implicit allegation without a statement as such (sourced or otherwise). Consequently, I have removed the section. CIreland 13:29, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Alleged insurance problems has one defunct source and so I have removed it in line with WP:BLP. CIreland 13:31, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Police investigation had one defunct source which I have replaced with a working source. The rest is unchanged. CIreland 13:37, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Plagiarism allegations is sourced but essentially trivial and amounts to an incident where the subject omitted attribution, was challenged for it, said it was a printing mistake and the challenger accepted the explanation. It exists simply to smear the subject using words such as 'allegation' and 'supressed'. Consequently, I have removed the section. CIreland 13:42, 10 June 2007 (UTC)