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Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/Rape during the Bangladesh Liberation War/archive3

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Resolved issues from Squeamish Ossifrage

[edit]
  • From Background: "This was a matter of concern to the Bengalis who saw their nation undefended in case of Indian attack during the conflict of 1965, and that Ayub Khan, the dictator ruler of Pakistan, was willing to lose the East if it meant gaining Kashmir." The second clause doesn't follow the same structure as the first.
  • The second paragraph of Pakistani Army actions has a number of issues to my ear. You've got "punish" in quotation marks; are you citing that use to Jahan? If it's just Wikipedia's voice there, I think that's a tone issue. "Girls and women were also kidnapped and held in special camps where they were repeatedly raped and gang-raped." It seems like you're drawing an age distinction here, but I'm not sure you follow through with it in the rest of the paragraph, which makes this sound redundant or a little breathless. The same goes for the "raped and gang-raped" phrase; I think I know what you're trying to explain here, but I'm not sure it has the proper tone here. "Time magazine reported on 563 girls who had been kidnapped and held in military brothels; all of them were between three and five months pregnant when the military began to release them." Are these "military brothels" what you referred to previously as "special camps" (pipe-linked to rape camp, which redirects to war rape)? At least in my mind, a military brothel has a different meaning than a rape camp.
  • I think this is improving, but the prose still needs polish. I'm still not sure that the sources or the article itself draw enough distinction to make the "raped and gang-raped" duplication serve any purpose other than emotional effect. And the paragraph in general doesn't feel like its sentences are in any particular order. There are "[v]ictims of all ages" ... but then we get an cited age range three sentences later. And then there's this sentence: "Some some held in captivity committed suicide by using their hair to hang themselves, after this had happened the soldiers close cropped the womens heads." Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:44, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Parts of this are certainly improved. I'm not sure if the line about censoring efforts (and international outcry) belongs where you have it; it reads very out of place. And there's still that one line I've felt is questionable prose since the beginning of this... Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:06, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • International reaction: This is another place where the text defies the order of events. The Blood telegram was dated April 6, 1971, but it appears after a discussion of 1972 Indian responses, and after a mention of the newscast-enabled American popular support. Also, while I realize that many sources, especially governmental ones, will tend to deal with all war atrocities under the same blanket, this section is particularly problematic because it implies that some of these responses were reactions to war rape rather than to the general ethnic cleansing / genocide.
  • Somewhat better. Did news agency coverage and American popular support predate the Blood telegram? Sadly, I don't have time to spot check sources to answer the question myself. It seems weird that this is the order of events, but history has surprised me before. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 18:02, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I knew Blood was stifled (and fired, in fact), just wasn't sure on the timing of that versus the news reports. Dropping that objection; I'll probably revisit this section when/if I have a chance to do a closer prose audit. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:44, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • From Militias: This is one of the places where the order of text doesn't seem to make chronological sense. Here, for example, I'd reorder the four sentences "According to" / "These militias" / "Local collaborators" / "The term".
  • [From Aftermath]
  • "Many of the victims suffered from sexual infections and feelings of intense shame and humiliation, and a number were ostracised by their families and communities or committed suicide.[71][69]" This appears to be the only mention of sexually transmitted disease in the article, which I would think would be a significant concern under the circumstances and may be a 1b issue by its absence. Also, I'm not sure how I would reword this, but I don't think the current sentence reads quite right. Finally, to nitpick, the citations should be in numerical order (at least one nitpick is required, or this wouldn't be FAC!).
  • The "Many of the victims..." sentence is still concerning to me on prose style grounds. Oh, and those citation numbers are still in the wrong order. A cursory review of the journal literature doesn't reveal much more on the topic, but that's probably okay as Brownmiller is well-regarded. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 18:02, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • On the order of the cites, I dunno how to change that, same page numbers for different stuff. On "Many of the victims" I cannot for the life of me think of another way to phrase that, will keep prodding though. Darkness Shines (talk) 14:29, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "She interviewed a 16-year-old widow whose husband had been murdered in front of her before she was raped, making her pregnant." This is not compelling prose; worded this way, her husband's murder made her pregnant.
  • I would support deleting the following altogether: "Journalist Liz Trotta reported in 1972 from a village in the aftermath of the conflict. She interviewed a 16-year-old widow whose husband had been murdered in front of her before she was raped, making her pregnant." I don't think a single case is relevant to the article unless more firmly linked to a broader analysis. Also, it interrupts text that is otherwise broader in its discussion. hamiltonstone (talk) 02:23, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • That bit is gone now, I added a little more on Trotta. Darkness Shines (talk) 17:12, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why is Naib Uddin Ahmed's photo exhibition in this section? Photo exhibitions half a world away seem more a "media" topic than an "Aftermath" topic to me.
  • War crimes prosecutions: This section also seems a jumble in terms of the order of events. Some of the statements here seem off-focus for the article at hand, as well (Brad Adams comment, for example). And there are awkward phrasings. "He has denied all charges." This tense seems off. I'm sure he's continuing to deny them, but "He denied" surely would fit the order of events more closely? Abul Kalam Azad "was found guilty of murder and rape in absentia, and was given the death penalty." No, he may have been sentenced to death, but you cannot be "given the death penalty" in absentia. In general, also, the sources need to be checked to make sure that the convictions and punishments match the context they are presented in; I know that's not the case for Sayeedi -- although two of the counts on which he was convicted do in fact relate to war rape (as do two of the counts on which he was acquitted), the sentence of death was based exclusively on other charges.
  • I still might word the Sayeedi conviction sentence differently. Perhaps "...Sayeedi was found guilty on eight of the charges, including religious persecution, rape, and genocide and was sentenced to death by hanging for [whatever the two charges were here, I'm short on time to check]." Or something like that. There's also still some chronology issues, or at least it seems that way, with the sentences about the HRW. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 18:02, 17 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • The basic structural problem hasn't changed. Stepping through this passage in order: you introduce that there is a tribunal, Khan has concerns about it, the tribunal deals with Sayeedi, the HRW supports the tribunal, Brad Adams talks about the expectation of justice in the tribunal, the tribunal deals with a bunch of other bad people. The parts in italics are the problem; they belong in the general overview of opinions about the tribunal, up there with Khan's commentary. If, that is, they belong here at all; some of these comments aren't really germane to this article's topic (as opposed to the tribunal's article. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:44, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Pakistani government reaction: Why is this not in Aftermath? Why is it afterward? It seems jarring to read about 2013 convictions, then jump back to a 1972 governmental report.
  • [referencing]
  • Weiss is missing its ISBN number.
  • Books without ICBNs should have OCLC numbers when possible. I believe the Gotam work is OCLC 577628895, but the publisher information needs to be double-checked; I can't find a University of Michigan reprint of this New Delhi-published source on cursory inspection.
  • Missed at least one, but I found it for you. The International Commission of Jurists report is OCLC 842410. In the meantime, I'm 100% sure that the publication information on that Gotam source is wrong. The only connection between that source and the University of Michigan is that the digital copy held by Google Books was located at the University of Michigan; this was never published nor reprinted by the University of Michigan Press. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:44, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • The Hadden source is not properly formatted.
  • What is it referencing? I promise there's not an article in Time titled "Time, Volume 98". Also, Hadden and Luce are the creators of Time, but I am fervently assured that they did not write the article you're trying to cite here. If for no other reason, that's true because Hadden died in 1929 and Luce in 1967. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 17:44, 18 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • The Trotta source is missing ... something. Is this a web source missing a link? What is this?

[further comments]

  • I'm uncertain of the relevance of the "Bangla Desh" trade ad. Harrison's concert gets only a brief mention (and in a section halfway across the article), and without anything that I see closely tying that benefit concert to the problem of rape (as opposed to killings or to the refugee situation). Yes, those are clearly related topics, but it's original research to imply that the rape problem was also a motivating factor for the benefit concert in the absence of a source that makes that connection. Also, while it's not strictly your problem, I'm dubious of claims that that ad is fully in the public domain; while the ad itself may not have a copyright notice in Billboard, the photographed used in that advertisement has an in-ad attribution to the photo licensing company Popperfoto, who may very well have a registered copyright for the piece. If so, it is a derivative work not fully in the public domain. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 15:30, 21 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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