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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Religious opposition to the Harry Potter series/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted 01:59, 24 July 2007.

Religious opposition to the Harry Potter series

edit

This article has undergone substantial revision and a peer review since it was given GA status. I think it is now ready for FA consideration. Serendipodous 08:25, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Support - need response for the observations before i decide to vote

  • Concern - Will the article stay 'stable' between now and the release of the seventh and final book. Just a concern and i wanted to hear the nom's opinion before i withdraw the concern
The release of the final book is unlikely to change things substantially; a para or two might be added if it causes enough controversy, but the Harry-Haters bandwagon has pretty much left the station by now. Serendipodous 12:33, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Suggestion: The second line should explicitly state that the controversies covered in the article are legal and socio-religious in nature before dwelling upon legal issues
OK. Serendipodous 12:33, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Suggestion: Avoid starting sentences with 'Many' and 'however'. I think the lead can be re-worded better with some copyedits.

OK 12:33, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

  • Is the controversies limited to just legal and religious? I don't know a lot but was there any political, literary controversy with respect to the books. if so, please add the same to the article.
The problem, and this is one that this page has faced down recently, is defining the difference between "controversy" and "criticism". The Harry Potter page contains a number of criticisms of the books, from a variety of quarters, but, strictly speaking, none of these criticisms have necessarily become controversies. We decided to take the tack that a "controversy" was an active dispute, whereas a criticism was merely one person or group airing its opinion into space. Serendipodous 12:33, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Rowling, her publishers, and Warner Bros, the films' distributor, have both been accused and accused others of infringing on various copyrights." - sentence doesn't seem to be right. please re-word

Done. Serendipodous 07:35, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • "Nancy Stouffer" section: I have serious concerns on this section. When i read the section here, it leaves me with a lot of doubt on JKR's defense but when i read Nancy's wikipage - i realized that 'Larry Potter' did not appear in the 'The Legend of Rah and the Muggles' book and that his last name (potter) doesn't seem to appear in the original book. These details were left out of this article thus tending to make the section, anti-JKR.
Reworked; let me know if it needs anything more.Serendipodous 07:35, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • shouldn't reference [5] be moved into the para
Well, it's not really a reference; it's a link to the site. It doesn't really explain anything except that the site is there.Serendipodous 07:33, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • 4 redinks - either create atleast stub articles or remove wikilink: Connie Neal, Muggles for Harry Potter, KidSPEAK! and Rosman Publishing.
removed Serendipodous 07:35, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The article seems well-written and once my observations above are addressed, i shall vote on the article. -- Kalyan 12:27, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose, some of the prose is pretty clunky, especially in the lead, for example 'These controversies have been both legal and socio-religious in nature.' There are lot of dodgy words used in the article such as 'claim', 'noted', 'actually', 'countered', 'supposed' etc. Try to use more neutral ones. Finally, the article doesn't have a good worldwide overview, with the American perspective always taking prominence. The National Post spoof website is described as Canadian, whilst the Onion is not similarly described as American, for example.--Nydas(Talk) 10:46, 12 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Reworked lead; removed most contentious words (kept one "actually" since it is not used in the fashion decried in Wikipedia:Words to avoid). I also included several cues to people's nationalities. Serendipodous 21:18, 13 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm still concerned about the comprehensiveness of the article. Why does the Vatican play second fiddle to US fundamentalists, when it is obviously far more significant than Chick Publications or Focus on the Family? Has there never been any reaction from any other religious groups? Why is the American Library Association mentioned in three different places? Also, the prose is still not stellar.--Nydas(Talk) 23:06, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well no one in the Vatican has taken the books to court- yet. The ALA keeps track of banned books, and most of the book challenges have emerged in the USA. I've been looking for challenges in other countries but apart from that one Russian incident, I haven't found any. The Bishop of Durham did forbid the filmmakers from turning Durham Cathedral into Hogwarts, but that's not really a challenge. There was a recent case where a London teacher's assistant sued her school for discrimination, but again, that's not really a challenge either. Still, might fit. OK; I've added official criticisms from the Anglicans and the Orthodox. I love the line at the bottom of that Greek article: "Greece has no tradition of children’s books about sorcery and magic, a long-established genre in English literature." So, I'm assuming he's excluding The Odyssey? Serendipodous 08:28, 15 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I still think the section about US fundamentalists should come after the much more significant objections from the Vatican - and possibly other official objections. Book challenges seem to be a feature of the US education system; they're confined to unimportant towns, but they get as much attention in the article as the Greek and Bulgarian Orthodox churches condemnation of the books. I think there's been some condemnation in Russia as well. Sources may be hard to find, but would it be possible to find out anything about the effect of these criticisms? Book sales, official responses, that sort of thing. The Putin-Dobby controversy may also be worth discussing.--Nydas(Talk) 12:08, 15 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hm. After a quick purusal, I can't see any references to any actual litigation over the whole "Putin-Dobby" affair. One page pointed out that these "lawyers" never actually revealed who they were. As far as I can tell, no trial ever took place. To my mind, this has "urban legend" written all over it. Serendipodous 19:44, 15 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose for now. The article seems generally well-written but would benefit from a copyedit and fact check. Even just running it through a spell-check would help fix mistakes like "publically" and "religoious". I've done a bit, but don't have time to do more now. I'm more concerned about the factual accuracy of the various claims made, though. I've only checked two sources, but there were problems with both: we had one person's first name wrong, and our article's claim that "the Russian government ... publically complained that the film's depiction of Dobby the house-elf was a caricature of Russian president Vladimir Putin" is not supported by the source given. -- Avenue 14:31, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, either I'm completely blind or the site edited that page after the fact, but I'm pretty certain that's what I read. Seems a bit odd as it is now, like an irrellevant afterthought, so maybe it was altered. Anyway; on the bright side, spellchecked. Serendipodous 14:51, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've done a few more spot checks on sources, and haven't found anything else that's odd. It still seems to need a copyedit though. -- Avenue 22:56, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Per Avenue, a fact-check is in order: the National Post is not a satire site, but Canada's national conservative daily. I suspect this may be an embedded vandalistic prank. But that needs to be fixed and the whole needs a good going-through. semper fictilis 18:09, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Whoops. Odd thing is, I got this right in the other mention at the Parodies page; National Post has a satirical column, called "Post Morten" and the article appeared in that column. Made the change. Serendipodous 18:42, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. I just read through and noticed only one glaring problem. While I udnerstodd the intended meaning of this sentence after reading the citation, it is poorly worded and implies that somehow the ludicrousness of divination in Harry Potter is considered sexist. ("Also, the books tend to treat such practices in a very condescending, tongue-in-cheek manner, as ridiculous pastimes with little bearing on "real" magic, and have been criticised as a result for being sexist.") While there have been accusations of sexism, the link does not suggest that they connect at all to divination being "ridiculous" magic. —Cuiviénen 20:33, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Re Cuivienen: Fixed. Well whether the FAC fails or not I'm glad I managed to shake out the major flaws in this article. Serendipodous 22:46, 14 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • I wonder about the scope of the article. "Controversy" seems pretty broad. For example, some people have accused the series of being sexist - should that be included as a controversy over the series? (An example of what I mean: [1]) Another example: the criticism by Harold Bloom and A. S. Byatt of the Harry Potter series was well-publicized - should that be included as "controversy"? Right now the article seems to focus exclusively on legal controversies, which is fine, but perhaps the article should be titled "Legal controversy over the Harry Potter series"? zafiroblue05 | Talk 00:35, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The issue is one of samantics, and it is rather fuzzy, as a lot of samantics is. Basically, a controversy is a dispute or a conflict of some kind. AS Byatt or some other critic expressing their opinions, positive or negative, about the series isn't really controversy so much as criticism, and is thus included in the Criticism section of the Harry Potter article. I admit that it's a fairly pedantic destinction, but if we didn't make it this article would never end. Serendipodous 12:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have an idea how to clear this up. Not very nice though; perhaps a better idea would be to split this article in half; one article tackling the legal issues and one tackling the reliigous controversy. Serendipodous 13:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose I agree with the previous comment. This article is mixing up 2 different kinds of controversy (or disputes to use the new terminology which I don't think fixes anything). One is controversy over the actions of the author and publisher and the other is controversy over the content of the books. They really are not related. I would suggest having one article entitled either "Criticism of the Harry Potter Series" or "Controversy over the Harry Potter Series" that would have the religious stuff as well as the literary and feminist criticism from the Harry Potter article (which could then just have a criticism summary paragraph), and a 2nd article entitled "Disputes over the Publication of the Harry Potter Series" or some such that would cover the plagerism alegations as well as the restraining order stuff. I am sorry to be suggesting such a radical reorganization, but I think when you start spitting semantic hairs this way about the scope of an article it is a sign that you may have a fundamental problem with the organization of the material, and I really think you would end up with 2 better more focused articles. Rusty Cashman 08:54, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I dunno. I'm getting kinda tired of "criticizm"; if we look hard enough, we can find people criticising HP for anything at all. I had to fight off a contributor who kept on inserting the opinions of the John Birch Society that Rowling was a closet Communist. Others have claimed that she's a social conservative. A "criticism of Harry Potter" article would never end. And why should Harry Potter, of all the works of literature on Wikipedia, have an article specifically for listing the various reasons people think it's bad? If Harry Potter had been less financially successful, I doubt we'd see people clamoring to complain about it. These two sections have one thing in common: they both have resulted in controversy- ie, they both have resulted in disputes or arguments. AS Byatt or Ursula Le Guin expressing their own opinions as to how and why HP sucks is not cotroversy. Still, I've now split this article into two: Legal disputes over the Harry Potter series and Religious controversy over the Harry Potter series. Serendipodous 09:22, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Now that I look at what you have done I like having the religious controversy in its own article, and I think that one might be close to FA level. You have a problem with this FAC now because it is not clear exactly what is being voted on. I would suggest closing this FAC and starting a new one for Religious controversy over the Harry Potter series. Alternately you could clarify what this FAC was for now so that people know what they are voting for. As for whether "Criticism of Harry Potter" should ever be its own article that is purely a function of whether the criticism section of the Harry Potter article ever grows so large that it interferes with the rest of the article. One more minor issue. I think the new names are a little long. You might want to just go with "Religious controversy over Harry Potter".Rusty Cashman 18:28, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

SUPPORT i helped work on this and it is readable, clear and concise. --munkee_madnesstalk 15:40, 24 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Confusion. The article has been split into two, but the FAC is attached to neither. When the FAC is archived/promoted, GimmeBot won't know which article applies. Please clarify so the FAC page can be cleaned up and archived correctly; the FAC needs to be renamed and attached to one of the two articles. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:03, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Moved to Religious controversy over the Harry Potter series Serendipodous 16:09, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I believe I made all the changes to correct the FAC nom; please doublecheck that I made the correct change at WP:GA. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:39, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Looks great. It's listed under "Literature: Miscellaneous" Serendipodous 16:52, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose—1a. Look at the opening sentence:

"The Harry Potter book series by JK Rowling has engendered a great deal of controversy with various religious conservatives who maintain that her works contain occult or even Satanic subtexts, and have attempted to remove the books from schools or libraries for this reason."

    • Don't particularly like "engendered" here.
    • The meaning and function of "with" are unclear.
    • Her works have attempted to remove?
    • "Schools or libraries"?

Tony 09:46, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

OK. That's fixed. Anything else? Serendipodous 09:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, it was an example of why the whole text needs copy-editing, not just one sentence you can tick off like that. However, it has improved, I see. Why are dictionary terms—unpiped—been linked, such as "murder", "apathetic" and "tyranny". We do speak English, you know. And why, for the love of god, is "United States" linked, more than once, too. Such an obscure nation. Why is "witchcraft" linked in two successive sentences: likely to irritate readers. In this trivial overlinking, it fails the requirement for a professional standard of formatting. Tony 14:05, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OK. De-linked. Anything else? Serendipodous 08:49, 7 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Commment. Can't tell if it's biased against Christianity, or if the fundies are just making the rest of us look bad. If possible, can the lead image either be removed, or it's caption changed to show that it's from a fundie group, and not an ordinary denomination? I believe "conservative Christian" is misleading when it is something very distinct from fundamentalist Christianity, and the publisher of the comic is fundamentalist, and not conservative. Michael talk 10:36, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Any notable Christian voice to speak out for Harry would be welcome. I've included Connie Neal,John Granger, Peter Fleetwood and the Dean of Gloucester (not to mention Rowling herself), but if there are others, I'd be happy to discuss them. Serendipodous 22:05, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey [2] would be a good one.--Pharos 02:35, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I do believe that in the article you need to make a few things perfectly clear. 1), that there is a big whopping gap between conservatives and fundies, and 2) that almost all Christians will condemn Harry for occultism, etc, but other than the fundies, almost all will praise it for the good morals the books contain. These things need to be stressed to avoid giving the reader the wrong view or idea.
Be very careful with your wording. The article needs to be corrected in a few places with regard to this. I'll stay at 'comment' for now, but will be tempted to throw an oppose up if things aren't fixed. That said, if they're corrected to my satisfaction, I will support the FAC. Michael talk 03:20, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not qualified to make such distinctions; I don't know anything about the finer points of the Christian right, and I don't know how I could locate a secondary source that would back your claims up. I can't sub "conservative" for "fundamentalist" in all cases because there is no such thing as a "fundamentalist Catholic" (There may be Fundamentalist Orthodox or Anglicans I have no idea) Serendipodous 06:54, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Until all terms are accurate and clarified; "conservative" and "fundamentalist" are not interchangeable. Michael talk 07:02, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
They may not be interchangable, but not only Fundamentalists are opposed to Harry Potter. And I have no idea how I could possibly find a reliable source that asserts that "almost all Christians will praise Harry Potter for the good morals the books contain." How could I back that up? Serendipodous 07:05, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The caption for the lead image stated "Christian conservative" when this was obviously wrong. It only took me a few minutes to follow a few links and find that the comic was nothing to do with Christian conservatism, but the work of a fundamentalist nutjob running his own little company. With a glaring mistruth like this right at the start, how many others are there? There must be other instances of terms being used without qualification.
I request that all terms used throughout the article be checked to ensure that they are used in an accurate and neutral manner. Distinctions must be made, and if they cannot be (by a reputable academic source), than this article cannot become featured. The article is, essentially, a collection of opinion from various people from newspaper articles. How accurate is the opinion given? Is it from a minority, or is it widespread? Are there polls that provide evidence from the population at large? Indeed, Christian opinion in the article is nothing more than individual opinion, as I can't see anywhere where a Church has officially decreed an accepted line regards HP. Michael talk 07:21, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Are you basing your entire position on one line in a picture caption? Because if you are I would request that you read the entire article before coming to those conclusions. If I'm not allowed to use the phrase "Christian conservative", how should I describe the opinions of the Greek Orthodox Church, or the Vatican? Serendipodous 07:39, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As those of the Vatican, or the Greek Orthodox Church... Further up in this FAC there also problems regarding fact check, which was my point, and raised my ire as to the accuracy of it. Go through the article, check and double check every reference to ensure that the terms you are using are 100% correct. This is what I mean by "fundamentalist" and "conservative"; are you going by your references or just putting in a term that might *seem* right but are technically incorrect?
Then, look at the second point I made above, about the article being simply the opinion of people and not the church. There are so many holes there; no evidence is given of widespread Christian opinion, no polls are given, just quotes from various Christian leaders and notables. All the article is, is a collection of quotations from various leaders, and not the view of a Christian majority, or the church.
In addition, there's more to religion than Christianity; what's the Islamic, Buddhist or Hindu take on Harry Potter? Lots of holes here! Michael talk 07:50, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've looked for Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist objections to Harry Potter. As far as I can tell, there aren't any. This fad is strictly Christian. Google "Harry Potter" and "Muslim" and you'll get the opinion of a single Muslim commentator, and nothing else of note. I've also looked for polls, and I can't find any. I would consider conducting my own poll, but that would constitute original research, I believe. Serendipodous 08:07, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Google is not research. There's one of the roots of the problem. There isn't enough—indeed, in this article there isn't any—academic sources provided on the issue. It is simply a collection of quotations, that continue systematic bias (through a lack of non-Christian information). And I found two Muslim pages using Google, but, again, Google is not research. Michael talk 08:17, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Given your resources and way of research, you will not be able to easily satisfy my criteria, so this FAC will obviously fail. I know that the FAC director may overlook my qualms, but such a thing would be grossly inappropriate given that this article is built on a poor foundation (inaccurate terminology, non-academic sources, lack of information [polls, general view of religious populations], based on quotes, and systematic bias). Upgrading it to a FA would be reckless. Michael talk 08:21, 4 July 2007 (U:TC)
Well it's all well and good to dis the internet as a reasearch tool, but then, you could go off to your local library, find the October 1997 issue of the South Dakota Baptist's Monthly and use it as a citation, and I would never be able to verify it. At least with online sources others can check them. Google has a scholarly function, though in this case if you google scholarly articles, you get pretty much the same range of opinion you get with a normal Google search. Serendipodous 08:23, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I find it most amusing that the article is essentially structured OPINION, OPINION, OPINION, OPINION, OPINION, and then, in a little place somewhere, titled 'Evangelical support of Harry Potter' we have the FACT; thereby effectively debunking the rest of the article. How is this not imbalanced? All this negative comment from some Christians (opinion), when only 7% of the US population (fact) thinks negatively on the books. Absurd. Michael talk 06:19, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
So what are you saying? That something that has had a global impact out of all proportion to the number of people involved does not deserve to be mentioned? That's like saying that because Al-Qaeda make up a minute fraction of all Muslims, they don't matter. All of these opinions have been featured in news headlines. It may not be fair or representative, but that's the way the world works these days. Richard Dawkins doesn't represent the opinions of most atheists, but he's the guy who gets the air time. Serendipodous 06:24, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Dawkins is a man. This is a subject. Regards "fair and representative", you arguing against this? You have essentially a collection of quotes from a minority of religions and religious leaders, which is masquerading as though it is representative of a population as a whole. It's the type of nonsense that would be accepted in tabloid newspapers—not in an encyclopedia.
If you gave Dawkins the same treatment, you'd throw an article together about how, for example, a bunch of loudmouths from a particular religion or group raved on about him, then include a little bit somewhere: "only 4% of people disagree with Dawkins". Michael talk 06:35, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
What am I supposed to do? This article isn't just about American evangelicals. I can't put that statistic in the lead for the same reasons you cite; it would create a misleading impression that it was representative of the population as a whole. This controversy has been cited in the news and is worthy of encyclopedic entry. I will not delete it, and that's pretty much the only way I can answer your criticisms. So what would you do?Serendipodous 06:40, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would delete it until appropriate academic references become available to cover this topic in an accurate and neutral manner. That cannot be done, and it suffers from inherent and systematic bias because of the nature of the comments, the media frenzy, and the lack of academic sources. Find some statistics, a study, and rewrite from scratch. I've exposed gaping flaws, which you have acknowledged. I won't lie, I do believe it should be deleted. Michael talk 06:49, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Do you realise what would happen if this article were deleted? Every religious loony who's spent his life seeking devils under the bed will suddenly flood Wikipedia with his or her own take on this topic to fill the vacuum. I'd much rather have this article than someone claiming Rowling is a Satanist. Serendipodous 06:53, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This article shouldn't be a buffer zone against religious loonies. If POV-pushes start jumping onto HP articles and telling us that we're all going to hell, then it'll be semi-protected and they'll be blocked.
I am sorry to have ripped the article to bits, I am, considering the work that you have put into it. But you have understood the points I have raised. Michael talk 06:59, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This article is reporting a debate; it isn't about demographics. A debate between two people can be worthy of inclusion in the correct context. Not in a high school playground perhaps, but in a Presidential debate yes. In a debate you of course will presenting opinion, first one side, then the other. This debate is important and had wide-ranging consequences for literature, particularly in the United States. In that sense, it doesn't matter what percentage of the world's population is involved. EDIT: I just changed "Religious" to "Christian" because I don't think we're going to find other religious views on this, nor do I think they are notable enough to be worthy of inclusion. Serendipodous 10:11, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: Both of the images in use on the article are copyrighted, fair use works. Neither has a fair use rationale specifically for use in this article. This needs to be corrected, and the rationale must indicated why the image is of particular use to this particular article. --Durin 15:49, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: Well-written and well-sourced. Amusing pictures that fit within the theme of the article. This is definitely FA material. -- R'son-W (speak to me/breathe) 05:32, 7 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. Can I again remind the writer that my stance has not changed, and the flaws I have exposed remain unfixed (and that supporters have been keen to overlook and ignore). The article is glossy, beautiful; but a closer look exposes it.
Take, for instance, this sentence: "Various Christian conservatives maintain that her works contain occult or even Satanic subtexts". "Various" is technically wrong, because it isn't various—its a tiny minority (as statistics show); and it's not "conservatives", as many conservatives enjoy and like HP (as statistics show), its fundamentalists. The wording is essentially deceptive. Michael talk 06:35, 7 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Only among Evangelicals. There is no such thing as a Fundamentalist Catholic, since Catholics believe in Papal infallibility and thus accept the Pope's ruling on issues of religious law, whereas Fundamentalists consider the Bible the only authority on such matters. Yet Catholics have also criticised Harry Potter. I changed "various", but for the record, it doesn't mean "many", it means, "a variety of different kinds of". Serendipodous 07:11, 7 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, per Tony's prose concerns, and based on the three or four name changes since it's been at FAC, it just doesn't seem stable and ready for FA. I suggest stabilizing the article before going for FA. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:12, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
For the record, it is stable. It's current title has removed any and all objections that could possibly be raised about it. This being a controversial topic, I've had to bend myself in pretzels to accommodate every angle, and I doubt I'll ever please everyone, but, unless Michael gets his way and it's deleted, I don't see any drastic changes in its future. As far as Tony goes, well I'll take his concerns under advisement the moment he comes back and actually tells me what they are, since I've addressed all the concerns he's listed. Serendipodous 07:05, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose: Although this is a decent report (Serendipodous mentioned "reporting a debate"), I have serious doubts on whether this is a great encyclopaedic article. I get the impression that a strawman has been drawn and placed into the "opposition". I say strawman because the number of persons objecting to the series is small. Take, for example, the evangelical groups which one assumes are the core of the opposition. The article mentions Focus on the Family (a small non-profit org), three book burnings by small churches in middle America, and a low-budget video company. That's it? The rest of the "religious" groups tend to be somewhat worried about, feel neutral about, or even supportive of the series. In fact, one member of Focus on the Family supports the series as well as a major evangelical magazine. This looks more like an article searching for a controversy. --RelHistBuff 14:03, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The controversy exists. Just look at the headlines Laura Mallory generated last year. The number of people involved may be small, but as I said above, their impact is out of all proportion to their numbers. The books were the most challenged in US schools between 1998 and 2002. The ripple effect of this is still continuing today, though it has died down somewhat. Serendipodous 14:09, 17 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.
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