Talk:2005 Cronulla riots/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: hamiltonstone (talk) 01:01, 17 March 2010 (UTC) I will review this. It may take some time, but I thought I would identify one significant issue up front: with the exception of the Strike Force Neil material, the article relies completely on news media reports. It is now over four years since the riots took place, and there are scholarly articles that either directly or indirectly discuss the riots, their media portrayal, the causes etc. I don't think an article about the riots can really be adequate unless it draws on this literature. One example of such an article appears to be listed in the (overly long and cluttered) external links section, but it should be being used as a source. There should not be any media articles listed under external links, nor unreliable sources or minor relevance. A link to a photo gallery is appropriate. hamiltonstone (talk) 01:01, 17 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Examples of possible sources:

TASA conference paper on media portrayal
European Journal of Cultural Studies article - this is just the abstract - the full article will need to be tracked down.
Australian Institute of Criminology paper on the subject
Australian Journal of Anthropology article (abstract only) on the subject
probably crucial People and Place article about the riots

And I expect this just scratches the surface. These peer reviewed sources should probably be preferred over newspaper reports if they cover the same ground. hamiltonstone (talk) 01:09, 17 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for reviewing it. Due to the real world getting in the way I won't be able to fully go over the article until Monday at the earliest, but I'll certainly take a look at the above links, I also plan on adding the following links in: Strike Force Neil 1 Strike Force Neil 2 and Strike Force Neil 4 as 3 is already included in the article; these links are additional Strike Force Neil sources and will (if possible) replace any other links.

I have no problems butchering the external links section.

How about the article structure itself? Is that up to scratch? Does it flow properly? Do you think any sections should be moved together or split apart? Sanguis Sanies (talk) 04:47, 17 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have one issue with this article. The lead paragraph is a bit ambiguous - Upon reading I gained the impression that the entire crowd of 5000 started out peacefully, then all got drunk and then all engaged in violence. The lead should clarify that it was a small subsection and not the entire crowd that participated. I'd also like to see more about the aftermath - nearly five years has gone by and I'd like to know what local/state/federal actions have occurred (my original motivation for coming to this article). Apart from that, the article is good. 59.101.22.163 (talk) 02:17, 27 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Changed the lead a bit, I'll expand the police/government response part to include new powers (there are already several sources I can draw from). Sorry this is taking so long folks, but real life keeps getting in the way; normally I'd be done by now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sanguis Sanies (talk • contribs) 08:41, 27 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Again, profuse apologies to all for the continued delay. I think that the article as it stands meets GA Standards, particularly the concern over 2b, if this was an FA article I would agree, but since it's "only" GA I'm not overly concerned. I've read and gone through the above sources and they add either; nothing new, or nothing that can be kept within NPOV. An "over-reliance" on media reports is not bad as they contain many of the raw facts that wikipedia strives for. I think that the article as it stands is GA compliant.Sanguis Sanies (talk) 22:48, 1 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

My concern is criterion 3(a) ("it addresses the main aspects of the topic"). The riots were a critical social and political event of the period, extensively discussed in the scholarly literature, in terms of the evolution of Australian socio-cultural life at that time. Some articles tie the incidents back to race relations, but also to federal government policy on immigration and similar issues. I wouldn't be surprised if the literature also uses the events in analysis of Australian media regulation and defamation law (though i'm not sure). I'm just not clear how the main aspects of the topic are addressed if none of these analyses are considered. BTW I'm not sure about your point about the media reports and "raw facts" - they also may contain "raw errors", something later material hopefully sifts out. In this regard I'm glad you've been looking to make more use of the strike force docs. hamiltonstone (talk) 11:44, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think I'm done with this article. I'm not overly concerned about the "evolution of Australian socio-cultural life at that time." I tried to add info about what government legislation was passed, but the only ones I could find were not RS. I can't add anything more too this article, if others want too by all means, but my work here is done. Hamilstone can pass or fail this as is. Sanguis Sanies (talk) 08:15, 9 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. I can see arguments both ways; I'm asking for a second opinion. There are some prose problems in th article (which i din't bother to raise, as i saw the coverage issue as the main one). I'll work on some copyediting while we wait for some more eyes on the article. Cheers, hamiltonstone (talk) 03:31, 12 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

3rd opinion

No progress is being made, no edits since 12 April. I recommend failing this nomination now. The nominator can ask for community re-assessment at WP:GAR or sort out the outstanding issues and renominate at WP:GAN, where the queue is down to less than 20. –– Jezhotwells (talk) 00:14, 20 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

On closer examination...

Actually, there are other problems.

There is excessive reliance on opinionated journalists (specifically Sheehan) for factual events - serious ones, that if true should be in other reports as well, and in court reports or the police report. Sheehan reporting a conversation with an anonymous local as though it was fact? That isn't adequate in such a contentious and serious event.
There is confusion in the narrative - events that Sheehan appears to be attributing to December 12 are included in the WP article as occurring on December 11.
The prose was poor. I've tried to pick up most of these problems.
Why are just two "attacks" - Dan and Jake Schofield - included in the "attacks" seciton, when there were obviously other assaults (on both "sides")? And who is Jake Schofield? We have context for who Dan is, but not Jake.
One of the last passages in the impacts section turned out to be about Terrigal, not about Cronulla at all. I have fixed this for accuracy, but the article offers no explanation of why Terrigal was involved, why there was a police lockdown etc etc.

Regards, hamiltonstone (talk) 04:15, 12 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

2nd reviewer

At present I think the article is not quite GA standard:

The Sydney Morning Herald is the only serious reporter I'm seen has. How good is the reputation of The Age? While ABC News Online may be good, the reports used here were "in real time", and therefore mistakes are likely. And official reports, beside with verbose, usually protect their politicians and officials.

(interjection from first reviewer) The Age is fine - same standard as SMH. I think the Strike Force Neil reports are OK, unless there is a contemporaneous reliable source contradicting them. hamiltonstone (talk) 11:29, 13 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with hamiltonstone that the article needs content from academic sources - not just to beef up the current sources, but because the academics have a longer perspective (e.g. on decreasing tension in the following period) and more depth of analysis.
- I can send you Latta's Cruising: "'Moral Panic' and the Cronulla Riot" - if you email via WP, that will give me your email and I can send. I'm afraid I can't access Hartley & Green's "The public sphere on the beach"
- Search for Cronulla riots at Scholar Google looks promising, and a few are free PDFs. --Philcha (talk) 09:22, 13 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
lead still ambiguous, and will needed to be updated from new points in main text. --Philcha (talk) 09:22, 13 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

3rd opinion

No progress is being made, there have been no edits in 8 days. I recommend that this nomination be failed now. The nominator can take this to WP:GAR for community re-assessment or sort out the outstanding issues and re-nominate at WP:GAN. –– Jezhotwells (talk) 00:20, 20 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

CRIME??

THIS IS FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND ONLY..!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.71.110.234 (talk) 06:31, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
- Talk pages are NOT a forum for discussing the article's subject, they are for discussion about how to improve an article. Andrei.smolnikov (talk) 03:38, 6 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]