Talk:Revolution of Dignity/Archive 10

I’m no pro-russian and I support ukraine, but we must keep the neutral point of view. The title is obviously on the protesters’ side. I apologise for accidentally modifying the requested move. 89.122.39.11 (talk) 08:16, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

Um, still not working. 89.122.39.11 (talk) 08:17, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

This has been discussed previously; ultimately this is the

WP:COMMONNAME. — Czello ^(music

) 08:21, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

How do I know that

Maidan Revolution is not a common name? 89.122.39.11 (talk

) 08:25, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

You'd have to actively demonstrate that it's the more common name than Revolution of Dignity; the guideline I linked to talks about how to do this. — Czello ^(music) 08:29, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

Oh, you’re right. It is the most commmon name on Google Scholar. 89.122.39.11 (talk) 08:33, 2 July 2023 (UTC)

Is Google Scholar the correct metric to use? It goes without question that in a current political issue the publications bear a lot of bias. It would be better to use the name that was used for the events in the days when they unfolded and in the direct aftermath.

Also:

Admin Rsk6400 has simply removed this reply yesterday defaming it as trolling without further explanation. I strongly protest against such arbitrary censorship-like actions. 178.1.158.230 (talk) 09:33, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

There is no reason to put the word coup in quatation marks. It is stated clearly that this is the Russian point of view. Additional quotation marks are grammatically incorrect and just serve as an implication that this statement is wrong. Giving implications is not the purpose of a Wiki article.

Also, the admin Rsk6400 has simply removed this topic and another reply by me yesterday defaming it as trolling without further explanation. I strongly protest against such actions that are borderline censorship. This has no place here for this. There are issues with this article in my opinion and I want to discuss them. 178.1.158.230 (talk) 09:28, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

It's in quotation marks to demonstrate that it's a verbatim quote. — Czello ^(music) 09:29, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

Dear IP, I'm no admin, and if you think you have to discuss the basic rules of English punctuation, you are definitely in the wrong place. See

WP:TALKOFFTOPIC. Rsk6400 (talk

) 09:40, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

Dear Rsk6400,

you have explicitly defamed my rightful discussion points as trolling without any proof/explaination and removed them on these grounds, thus depriving me of the opportunity to discuss my concerns. Now, you are trying to ridicule them as simply a matter of punctuation, whereas it's clearly stated by me that this is a matter of bias expressed through the punctuation.

Such behaviour as yours violates the civilized discussion culture that is indispensable to an open encyclopaedia. And the circumstance that you might personally dislike some points that a brought up for discussion here is not a valid reaon to simply delete these topics. I hope I have made myself clear. 178.1.158.230 (talk) 10:27, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

Emphasizing the verbatim quote is unnecessary there since it is made clear that this is Russia's statement. Also, for some reason this is the only instance that a verbatim quote is being used in the summary, making it look like this is the only subjective point of view in the whole story.

The sentence should be reformulated as: Russia considers the events to be a coup d'etat. Or more instances of using a verbatim quote should be used in the outline, particularly in connection to naming the uprising and overthrow the Revolution of Dignity. In any case, the biased implication provided by the quotation marks has to be removed. 178.1.158.230 (talk) 10:06, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

Remember the November 2021 name change talk? Well, you guys forgot a tiny little detail. On Google Scholar, when searching “Revolution of Dignity”, there are not only sources about Ukraine, but about Tunisia, Egypt or Syria. All these sources count up to 847,000 results. However, for the “Ukrainian Revolution”, there are 320,000 sources. 105,000 are for “2014 Ukrainian Revolution”. We don’t exactly know the number of sources for the Ukrainian “Revolution of Dignity”. It may or may not be higher than “2014 Ukrainian Revolution”. I’ll let you guys decide. WikipedianRevolutionary (talk) 18:06, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

Is there an RfC discussion somewhere that dictates not adding the United States in the infobox as a "Supported by" party? If it's somewhere in the archives, it would be helpful if someone can find and link it here. Otherwise, I see no reason it cannot be added, since we already have a whole subsection in "Foreign involvement" dedicated to the US role. ADifferentMan (talk) 08:15, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't know of such an RfC, but since Russia alleges all kind of nonsense, Russian allegations are not notable in an article on real events, see

WP:FRINGE. Rsk6400 (talk

) 08:29, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

Hence the "alleged by Russia" disclaimer. Similar disclaimers are commonly used on conflict infoboxes, regardless of whether the allegation is true or not. ADifferentMan (talk) 08:35, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

MOS:INFOBOX says that "key facts" shall be summarized. A fringe theory never is a "key fact". And there is no serious historian supporting the Russian propaganda narrative that the Revolution of Dignity was a coup staged by the US. On the contrary: Andreas Kappeler, Serhii Plokhy, Timothy Snyder, and many others spoke out against it. Rsk6400 (talk

) 11:24, 27 July 2023 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: Going by that page's standards, the Russian allegation itself is a "key fact", regardless of whether the allegation itself is truthful or not. Again, hence the "alleged by" disclaimer. ADifferentMan (talk) 21:50, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

@ADifferentMan: Russian allegations have no right to be put on the infobox. WikipedianRevolutionary (talk) 11:28, 29 July 2023 (UTC)

@WikipedianRevolutionary: Allegations are regularly allowed in infoboxes. Template:War in Afghanistan (2001–2021) infobox is one such prominent example. ADifferentMan (talk) 09:54, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: Any response? Pinging again as I messed up the first one. ADifferentMan (talk) 03:48, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

No, I already said why I think that we can't add that allegation, and I didn't see that you replied to my points in any specific way. Rsk6400 (talk) 06:48, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: See my reply to WikipedianRevolutionary. I've addressed your points on the allegations issue several times. ADifferentMan (talk) 03:06, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: You didn’t reply to me. WikipedianRevolutionary (talk) 06:00, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

WikipedianRevolutionary, now I'm confused. To which of your comments should I have replied ? ADifferentMan, you didn't answer to my key point, which is about how we have to handle fringe theories. No editor is obliged to answer, especially not after they have made their points sufficiently clear. The aim of a talk page discussion is to improve the article, not to waste time. Rsk6400 (talk) 07:08, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

You said you replied to me, but you didn’t reply. “See my reply to WikipedianRevolutionary”. Yeah, no reply, but whatever. Doesn’t matter. WikipedianRevolutionary (talk) 07:15, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

@WikipedianRevolutionary: No, the @-sign means the person someone is talking to, not the person talking. I didn't write that, it was ADifferentMan who wrote that. Rsk6400 (talk) 08:16, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Ok! WikipedianRevolutionary (talk) 16:32, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: The discussion is about whether there is any reason not to mention the allegation itself in the infobox, not whether the contents of said allegation are true or not. I've repeatedly clarified above that it is normal to include allegations of a certain country's involvement by a relevant party. ADifferentMan (talk) 07:34, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

And I said that Russian allegations are not just "allegations" but they are fringe theories (in this case a conspiracy theory) and that we have certain guidelines that apply to fringe theories. Rsk6400 (talk) 08:20, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes, sure, this should not be included to infobox. Rsk6400 explained this well. My very best wishes (talk) 15:43, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

as Rsk640 said

WP:FRINGE has no business in the info box—blindlynx

19:31, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

• Vox, Russia backed Yanukovych in the crisis, while the US and Europe supported the protesters
• Jacobin, It’s an overstatement to say, as some critics have charged, that Washington orchestrated the Maidan uprising. But there’s no doubt US officials backed and exploited it for their own ends
• BBC, Various [US] officials attempting to marshal the Ukrainian opposition. Alaexis_¿question? 09:50, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Could we please finally stop throwing arbitrarily selected old pieces of news at each other ? The Revolution of Dignity took place nearly 10 years ago, and a lot of academic sources about it are available now. I read Andreas Kappeler's Kleine Geschichte der Ukraine (a Swiss historian, now professor emeritus from an Austrian university, both non-NATO countries), Serhii Plokhy's The Gates of Europe and The Russo-Ukrainian War (Harvard professor from a Ukrainian family) and am now listening to Timothy Snyder's Yale lectures (available online at YouTube). Neither Kappeler nor Plokhy (I didn't reach that point in Snyder yet) put enough weight on US-involvement to justify its inclusion here. BTW: Alaexis, WP doesn't distinguish between Russian and Western sources, but between reliable and non-reliable ones. Jacobin doesn't seem to be reliable. Rsk6400 (talk) 11:38, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

Re Jacobin, it's your personal opinion that it's not reliable, it doesn't reflect the community's consensus (see

WP:RSP). In general, I agree that we should use scholarly sources where possible. I'm pretty sure there are different opinions among scholars but I may be mistaken, so I'll check it. Alaexis_¿question?

12:08, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

This is basically going to devolve into a discussion about inclusion criteria isn't it? Even going off of the Jacobin—a clearly biased publication wrt Ukraine—source from ten years ago it would be absurd to equate western support and direct russian involvement. There's a reason that the tag is depreciated—blindlynx 19:25, 2 August 2023 (UTC)

No, I don't want to argue about the definitions. Instead I intend to show that a great many sources explicitly discuss the support provided by the Western governments.

• Power, Politics and Confrontation in Eurasia by
  Roger E. Kanet
  (p. 56, do read the examples they give too)

• Ukraine in Crisis, edited by
  Nicolai Petro
  , chapter Disparate narratives...

Note that Petro doesn't say which is the dominant position. In view of this we should mention the support. Alaexis_¿question? 18:49, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure about the others, but Petro clearly has no good standing among his peers, meaning he is not mainstream. Rsk6400 (talk) 19:06, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

From Petro's website: "From 2017-1019 I held the University of Rhode Island's biennial Silvia-Chandley Professorship of Nonviolence and Peace Studies." - Seems to mean that today he is not even holding a professorship. Rsk6400 (talk) 21:08, 4 August 2023 (UTC)

i am deeply concerned with equating support to mean 'saying it is a good thing' and support to mean 'sending in troops' which is exactly what the coarseness of an infobox would do—blindlynx 01:51, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

This article is about the Revolution of Dignity which took place on 18–23 February 2014. The takeover of Crimea happened a few days later and no other forces were sent before that. Alaexis_¿question? 18:05, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

How is 20th of feb ' a few days later' than 23rd of feb?—blindlynx 18:52, 5 August 2023 (UTC)

The takeover (specifically seizing the main administrative buildings and raising the Russian flag) took place on February 27 - see sources in Annexation_of_Crimea_by_the_Russian_Federation#Russian_takeover. Alaexis_¿question? 08:32, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

the operation stared the 20th

WP:FALSEBALANCE to claim that 'support' from Russian and the west were comparable—blindlynx

15:55, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Well, it was you who mentioned sending troops. The operation may have started on that date or even earlier but the actual troops only appeared and seized the buildings on February 27.

But it's irrelevant. There is no requirement for the support to be equal. As long as reliable sources say that it existed, we should report what they say. Alaexis_¿question? 18:05, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

There is one more scholarly source which talks about the influence of the US. I've collected all the sources below. I think by now we have enough RS to mention the support. Alaexis_¿question? 18:20, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

sources say more than just the word 'support' it is misleading to present the support as the same—blindlynx 19:27, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Sources

Scholarly

• Frontline Ukraine, Crisis in the Borderlands by Richard Sakwa p. 87

• Power, Politics and Confrontation in Eurasia by
  Roger E. Kanet
  (p. 56, do read the examples they give too)

• Ukraine in Crisis, edited by
  Nicolai Petro
  , chapter Disparate narratives...

Media

• Vox, Russia backed Yanukovych in the crisis, while the US and Europe supported the protesters
• Jacobin, It’s an overstatement to say, as some critics have charged, that Washington orchestrated the Maidan uprising. But there’s no doubt US officials backed and exploited it for their own ends
• BBC, Various [US] officials attempting to marshal the Ukrainian opposition. Alaexis_¿question? 18:20, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  On Petro, please see my comments above. Rsk6400 (talk) 18:45, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

  On the others, see my comments below. Rsk6400 (talk) 09:02, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Why is this not relevant? This comes from a book about the conflict in Ukraine. We already mention the official position on the leaked call expressed by the Department of State spokesperson (basically a primary source) and now I've added a scholarly secondary source which discusses it. Alaexis_¿question? 09:24, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

From the article about the author: "He is a commentator for RT" (a Russian propaganda outlet and a purveyor of disinformation and conspiracy theories, according to sources given in the RT-article). If we look at the "Reception" section of Sakwa's article, there is no indication of his being mainstream. Rsk6400 (talk) 11:17, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Sakwa is possibly the most prominent “pro-Putin scholar,”[1] and basing any evaluation on his writing is

WP:FRINGE. Why aren’t you interested in the scholarly consensus on this, instead?  —Michael Z

. 16:29, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

These arguments have no basis in policy. However I think we need an outside opinion here. Alaexis_¿question? 17:11, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

How have arguments based on

WP:FRINGE "no basis in policy" ? Rsk6400 (talk

) 17:29, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Blackwhite.  —Michael Z. 18:07, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

WP:FRINGE are both policies no?—blindlynx

19:49, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't understand the question. Diplomats are commenting current events, so what ? Explain your point. --Robertiki (talk) 14:06, 10 August 2023 (UTC)

I've linked an edit that removed some information. In my opinion it is pertinent and should be added to the article, which now only has the official reaction. This is hardly NPOV. Alaexis_¿question? 18:58, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

What was removed is According to Richard Sakwa, this called showed "the high degree of US meddling in Ukrainian affairs.”, citing Frontline Ukraine: Crisis in the Borderlands by

WP:FRINGE. He can be used as an example of the extremes of the range of views on Russia and Ukraine in Western academia, but certainly not to represent academic consensus.  —Michael Z

. 19:50, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Positive reviews of Sakwa’s book all seem to praise it specifically because it doesn’t agree with the academic and public consensus. An apparently objective review[2] states:

Sakwa’s book is openly polemical; the author acknowledges that it is “both personal and political” (xi). This determines the general thrust, selection of facts, and conclusions.

Richard Sakwa declares allegiance to the principle of “bourgeois objectivity.” If one was to follow in the footsteps of this type of jargon scrupulously, his book might be called an example of “Party literature.” . . . Sakwa represents those Western intellectuals and politicians who are pro-Russia and anti-American.

 —Michael Z. 20:06, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Plenty of infoboxes mention supporting nations/parties, as well as alleged supporting nations/parties (whether or not those allegations are true), usually with an "Alleged by X" disclaimer.

Should we include the United States mention, include with "alleged by" disclaimer, or not include?

ADifferentMan (talk) 09:26, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

• Include, since the infobox should summarise the article which has a section on the support by the US, and in line with multiple reliable sources which confirm this. Alaexis_¿question? 11:07, 7 August 2023 (UTC)
• Include with "alleged by" or Include is my first instinct, but I realize now that "support" isn't adequately defined in my head. Are we only counting support like materiel and cash? Lots of nations make general statements supporting democracy, does that count as support? If so, I'm sure we can find a whole bevy of nations to add to the list. TheSavageNorwegian 14:40, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

Y'all convinced me. Don't include. It's undue to say the US supported while leaving out the many many other government officials who also publicly supported. TheSavageNorwegian 01:51, 11 August 2023 (UTC)

• Don't include Including with "alleged by" would mean admitting that we have no RS to support the notion that it was supported by the US. That is forbidden by
  WP:FRINGE, as I pointed out above. Including without a disclaimer would need excellent RS, which we don't have. The sources mentioned by Alaexis in the preceding section are either old news sources or they are written by non-scholars (the Jacobin-text) or low-profile scholars. According to our article, the US support was of a different nature than the Russian involvement, and that is supported by a multitude of news sources and by high-profile scholars like Andreas Kappeler, Serhii Plokhy, and Timothy Snyder. Rsk6400 (talk
  ) 18:24, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  Precision: Maybe it's not correct to call Roger E. Kanet a "low-profile" scholar, but I don't see how the quote from his work should support the inclusion of "Supported by the US". Rsk6400 (talk) 18:33, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  Neither Sakwa nor Kanet are low-profile scholars, quite the opposite. He explicitly writes it was clearly supported by the West and proceeds to give examples. Alaexis_¿question? 18:48, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

  Re the Kanet quote: "The West" is a very broad term, it is surely not identical with "the US". Given the context of our infobox, "supported by" means "supported in a way similar to the Russian support of the government" - is this really supported by Kanet ? Re Sawka: "A commentator for RT" (from his article) says enough. None of your sources really works. Rsk6400 (talk) 09:01, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

  Comment on sourcing Since you brought up the same three historians elsewhere, I thought I’d mention that Snyder has made some …interesting patterns of comments on multiple topics. His page mentions a few of them. Also, I just started watching the lecture series that he posted on YouTube.

  No opinion on the infobox parameter. The last thing we need is another furball over such things.

  Cheers, RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 01:42, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

  On Tim Snyder, this piece is illuminating: "Putin, Trump, Ukraine: how Timothy Snyder became the leading interpreter of our dark times". A lot of his more dire predictions have proven correct, especially with regard to Ukraine. Even prominent critics like Sam Moyn have had to tip their hat. Not sure if you're referring to his history of Ukraine lecture series but that shit is excellent. Generalrelative (talk) 02:02, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

• Don't include per discussion in previous section [3]. Most of the corresponding section on the page is about Russia and not"alleged", but properly describing this in the infobox would be difficult. I am sure there was a diplomatic support of Yatsenuk by the USA. But it would be wrong to summarize in the Infobox as suggested. My very best wishes (talk) 19:53, 7 August 2023 (UTC)

• Don't include there is no way to provide enough detail in the infobox to avoid
  WP:FALSEBALANCE—blindlynx
  00:22, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Don’t include. Lawmakers and government figures from various countries supported Ukrainians’ self-determination and opposed their government’s anti-democratic, illegal, and violent actions, so why single out the United States? Nothing described in the relevant section on US support is anything like Moscow’s meddling with Ukraine’s government since 2010, much less its response by invading Ukraine and occupying part of it. Adding this would be

WP:UNDUE and halfway to Putin’s propaganda that the United States organized a coup in Ukraine (which is now under the heel of a US puppet, a satanist Jewish Nazi).  —Michael Z

. 16:22, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

Furthermore, there is a consensus to deprecate “supported by” being used with the belligerent parameter, at Template talk:Infobox military conflict#RfC on "supported by" being used with the belligerent parameter. This article’s Template:Infobox civil conflict is very similar, and the parameter in question is equivalent: “side1/side2/side3 the parties participating in the conflict.”

A write-in value of “supporters” is unsuitable for an infobox and contrary to

WP:INFOBOXPURPOSE, “to summarize (and not supplant) key facts that appear in the article,” “allowing readers to identify key facts at a glance.” “Supporters” is very vague, and inclusion of a state’s name can mean anything from some politician from a state made unofficial personal statements, to direct invasion by a foreign state’s military: the proposed content is not a key fact that can be interpreted accurately from the inclusion of a country name. If it should appear as a heading in the infobox, then please get consensus to alter the infobox template, and not add it ad hoc when there is no consensus to include it.  —Michael Z

. 19:18, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm glad to hear that. This kind of thing has been a source of conflict across numerous articles that I've had on my Watchlist. Generalrelative (talk) 00:45, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

• Don't include as UNDUE. As others have pointed out, reliable sources do not single out the United States as having any special role in supporting the protesters, beyond the moral support typically voiced by Western politicians and governments for pro-democracy movements. Generalrelative (talk) 19:00, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
• Administrative note. I've asked for more feedback at WP:NPOV/N as so far we haven't got much of outside view. Alaexis_¿question? 18:52, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

• Don't include per Rsk6400 and Michael Z. 208.87.236.201 (talk) 19:00, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

• Don't include because it would
  WP:FALSEBALANCE. Kahastok talk
  19:07, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
• Don't include. Infoboxes are great for clear-cut info, and not so hot for nuance. As it is, the body of the article is not particularly clear about alleged US support. Most of the subsection is spent on ambiguous statements from individual politicians and diplomats, and we get one sentence saying "The Russian government seized on this statement, claiming it was evidence the US was orchestrating a revolution." If there's more sourcing on this, it would be helpful to know what exactly the Russian government is claiming here. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 19:53, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
• Don't include Generally "Support by" is a poor addition not infoboxes, as infoboxes don't allow for explanation or nuance. Here the allegation appears espey weak. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 21:15, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Don't include "Support by" can mean very different things (cf. Russia also being in this category). With the potential for misunderstanding, it is rarely a great thing for the level of objective summary that an infobox requires. Chaotic Enby (talk) 20:21, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Discussion

Thesavagenorwegian, I understand your argument about non-US officials also supporting the revolution. Now that I think of it, most of the sources talk about "Western" rather than just US support. What would be the best way to present it in the infobox? Alaexis_¿question? 18:56, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

The problem, as I see it, is that you appear to be conflating moral support with material support. We only include verifiable reference to the latter in infoboxes. So the question is moot. Generalrelative (talk) 19:04, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Well, it was not just moral. The Jacobin article details the material support provided by the organisations like USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy. Btw that's not necessarily *bad*, mind you. Alaexis_¿question? 20:18, 14 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the reference. On the face of it your argument seems reasonable. But I took a bit of time to break things down and I don't think it holds up.

1. Note that the Jacobin article makes no claims about USAID or the National Endowment for Democracy specifically with regard to the Revolution of Dignity or Euromaidan. Here's the relevant quote:

   “External actors have always played an important role in shaping and supporting civil society in Ukraine,” Ukrainian scholar Iryna Solonenko wrote in 2015, pointing to the EU and the United States, through agencies like the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and US Agency for International Development (USAID), whose Kyiv headquarters were in the same compound as the US embassy. “One can argue that without this external support, which has been the major source of funding for Ukrainian civil society since independence, Ukrainian civil society would not have become what it now is.”

   That's a rather noncommittal and nonspecific statement, and it's really the strongest stuff the author has to offer.
2. The only claims that specifically relate to Euromaidan amount to US politicians posing for photos and handing out sandwiches:

   While it may be a long time before we know its full extent, Washington took an even more direct role once the turmoil started. Senators John McCain and Chris Murphy met with Svoboda’s fascist leader, standing shoulder to shoulder with him as they announced their support to the protesters, while US assistant secretary of state Victoria Nuland handed out sandwiches to them.

3. Claims about a group called "New Citizen" are perhaps the most compelling on the surface but get rather muddled when you look at the sources. An article in Financial Times is trotted out to state that New Citizen played an important role in the protests, but actually says nothing about how the group was funded. [4] For that, the Jacobin piece relies on reporting by Moscow-based journalist Mark Ames published in an obscure online magazine called PandoDaily. [5] The allegation is that Pierre Omidyar, founder of ebay and publisher of The Intercept, "co-invested with the US government to help fund regime change in Ukraine", but if you look at the claims in more detail both parties funded New Citizen in 2012, i.e. 2 years before the Euromaidan and the revolution. And New Citizen's total budget that year was around $500,000, of which just over half came from the US government. That is a tiny NGO and a tiny commitment from the US, and there is no evidence it was pushing for regime change at that time. All this is relying on reporting in the Kyiv Times (it wasn't "discovered" by Ames as Jacobin claims). [6] What I find dubious is that we would consider Ames or the Jacobin author reliable sources for interpreting a few hundred thousand dollars in US spending on a pro-democracy NGO in 2012 as state sponsorship for a regime change that occurred in 2014.

All things considered, I think you really have to squint at this stuff to arrive with the author of the Jacobin piece at the conclusion that this was a "US-Backed, Far Right–Led Revolution". It really was neither of those things. Generalrelative (talk) 00:08, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough. I still think we should not second-guess RS which explicitly describe it as support but the consensus by this point is clear. Alaexis_¿question? 08:11, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

It is the job of editors to evaluate our sources and not just use them uncritically. Jacobin is a

biased source, and accepting its conclusions without taking that into account would introduce the same bias to the article. Kahastok talk

16:33, 15 August 2023 (UTC)

EDIT: here’s a link to the decision, it takes a little bit to load https://reyestr.court.gov.ua/Review/114304164

2603:7000:B900:36EA:81F7:26AD:B247:AFAA (talk) 04:36, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

I agree. This is the part that concerns this topic:[7] "У межах даного судового провадження даних про причетність до такого поранення потерпілого працівників правоохоронних органів, а тим більше обвинувачених, не встановлено. Вогнепальне поранення було завдано ОСОБА_1852 з напрямку готелю «Україна», тобто з території, яка на той час не контролювалася правоохоронними органами. Даний постріл мав прицільний характер в скупчення людей".

Translated: "Within the scope of this court proceeding, data on the involvement of law enforcement officers in such an injury to the victim, and even more so the accused, have not been established. The gunshot wound was inflicted on PERSON_1852 from the direction of the "Ukraine" hotel, that is, from the territory that was not controlled by law enforcement agencies at that time. This shot was aimed at a crowd of people". Mhorg (talk) 00:06, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

Even a court decision is a primary source, drawing or implying any conclusions from it would be

WP:OR. Rsk6400 (talk

) 17:58, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

I agree. Presumably there are secondary sources reporting on this, especially in Ukraine. If someone who can read Ukrainian would like to find and present them that would be helpful. Generalrelative (talk) 19:13, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

i haven't seen any news coverage of this, but haven't had the chance to do a more thorough search—blindlynx 15:32, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

This development hasn’t been covered much as of yet, and I won’t speculate as to the reason for that. However, there is a secondary source now available which describes the court’s decision.

here’s the link: https://bnn.network/politics/courts-law/ukrainian-court-verdict-on-maidan-killings-a-challenge-to-the-dominant-narrative/ 2603:7000:B900:36EA:6161:4D3F:70:11E6 (talk) 19:26, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, this isn't the place to speculate. But thanks for supplying a source. Never having heard of BNN, I looked into it, and I have to say I'm not sure I'd consider it reliable. The "About" page has lots of words on it, but nothing that I could find about how editorial oversight works. Here are their editorial guidelines, which they describe as "stringent", but to my eye are far too vague to be considered credible. So I checked another article at random and found this gem of probing social analysis. I'm concerned that BNN may be a platform for the views of its founder,

Daily Mail-style tabloid journalism. Can you point to any additional information that might help us evaluate the source for reliability? Generalrelative (talk

) 19:59, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

the fact they quote 'no russian trace' which doesn't seem to be in the ruling and use archaic spelling doesn't inspire confidence—blindlynx 21:26, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

I understand your concern, but I will point out that the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) has been used as a source on this website and yet their founder’s views and affiliations seem to have played no role. We should be consistent. 2603:7000:B900:36EA:4973:3EA8:9219:44BA (talk) 01:09, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

Please explain what you mean by 'consistent'—blindlynx 14:49, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

I’ve had someone tell me that the affiliations and beliefs of the founder of ISW are irrelevant (he’s the husband of Victoria Nuland and a neoconservative). If that’s the case then why would the founder of BNN be scrutinized differently? 2603:7000:B900:36EA:443B:BB6B:C8FB:C893 (talk) 15:54, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

Sorry apologies, the founder of ISW is actually the sister of Robert Kagan (husband of Victoria Nuland). 2603:7000:B900:36EA:443B:BB6B:C8FB:C893 (talk) 15:57, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

It may well be that ISW is a poor source too. I haven't looked into it. In general, we like to examine sources separately and on their own merits (i.e.

WP:NOTNEWS and is meant to be behind the curve. Generalrelative (talk

) 16:39, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

That’s fair, I’d prefer a different source as well and will supply it if found. 2603:7000:B900:36EA:DCA6:FBE6:32FE:73D (talk) 17:28, 2 November 2023 (UTC)