Talk:George Pell

The song described Pell as "scum" and a "coward"

@Errantios: I see you have restored the statement that the song described Pell as scum and a coward. See your diff.

We hae been down this road before on the George Pell article. During sentencing, Pell's defence counsel, Robert Richter (lawyer) famously conceded that Pell's convicting was no more than a plain vanilla sexual penetration case. This quotation was inserted in the Pell article, possibly in an attempt to have Wikipedia show that even Pell's lawyer conceded Pell was guilty. In March 2019, the matter was put before the Wikipedia community in a Request for Comment. The outcome in May 2019 was that the quotation was removed from the Pell article and moved to the Richter article where it still resides. See the Request for Comment at Talk:George Pell/Archive 2#Request for comment about coverage of some of the actions of Pell’s barrister.

Even though Robert Richter was a prominent member of the court that tried Pell, and his statement was factual and supported by reliable published sources, the Wikipedia community decided that the words spoken by Richter did not belong in the article devoted to George Pell. If the Request for Comment in 2019 is considered a precedent for resolution of the question about Minchin's comments that Pell is scum and a coward, then Minchin's comments should reside in a Wikipedia article on Minchin, but not one on Pell.

The Wikipedia community came to a wise conclusion. Any statement that can be considered anti-Pell can be matched by another statement that can be considered pro-Pell. Then there could be another anti-Pell statement, and another that is pro-Pell. The article then becomes the battle of the quotes. As it stands at the moment, the Pell article contains few quotations. Quotations by the trial judge, the court of appeal, and the High Court can be seen in the article and have an obvious legitimacy. Quotations by other individuals are much less valuable. Wikipedia is not a collection of quotations; it is written by volunteers who specialise in writing from a neutral point of view, and free of plagiarism.

We can therefore proceed in either of two ways. You could revert your recent edit and remove the comment that Pell is scum and a coward. Nothing more then needs to be done. Alternatively, if you don't remove the comment attributed to Minchin you are likely forcing the Wikipedia community to re-visit the Request for Comment of March 2019, in the hope that you can persuade the community to repudiate its earlier decision and experiment with a battle of the quotes. I initiated the Request for Comment in March 2019 and if necessary I will do so again because I don't want this article to again become the battle of the quotes. Dolphin (t) 07:00, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

The two matters do not seem comparable. Richter's words do not "show that even Pell's lawyer conceded Pell was guilty", for three reasons: (1) they mean only that the allegation of an act had been straightforward, and do not by themselves refer to guilt; (2) they were spoken at the sentencing hearing, after guilt had already been decided; and (3), given that there could have been an appeal (as indeed there would be), Pell's counsel could not have intended an admission of guilt. Errantios (talk) 13:23, 17 January 2025 (UTC)

This discussion thread has now been open for 4 weeks. Wikipedia has some significant policy and guidance on the matter of quotations and their inclusion in the mainspace. Perhaps the most important policy is found at WP:Neutrality. “This policy is non-negotiable …”

Perhaps the most important guidance is found at WP:Quotations and neutrality: Ask yourself — if this quotation was rewritten to be a direct statement in the Wikipedia "editorial voice", rather than a quotation, without changing its essential message, would it be acceptable under Wikipedia policies and guidelines? If the answer is "probably not", this is an indication (though not a proof) that the quotation might not be appropriate for inclusion in Wikipedia

The sentence presently under discussion states The song described Pell as "scum" and a "coward". We must ask ourselves: If this was re-written to state “George Pell is scum and a coward” would it be acceptable under Wikipedia policies and guidelines? Clearly it would not be acceptable as it violates the policy of neutrality.

The word “scum” in the context of the Tim Minchin song was first inserted in February 2016. See the diff. This was more than 6 years before Pell died so, at the time, Pell was a living person and the policy related to biographies of living persons was applicable. Applying the pejorative “scum” to a person is perceived to be an insult. Incorporating it into Wikipedia in a biography violated the policy of neutrality. The edit should have been reverted urgently in accordance with the policy related to biographies of living persons. After Pell died in 2023 the need for urgency was reduced but the standard of writing required to comply with the policy of neutrality did not change.

The word “coward” in the context of the Tim Minchin song was first inserted in July 2017. See the diff. This was more than 5 years before Pell died so, at the time, Pell was a living person. Applying the pejorative “coward” to a person is perceived to be an insult. Incorporating it into Wikipedia in a biography violated the policy of neutrality. The edit should have been reverted urgently in accordance with the policy related to biographies of living persons. After Pell died in 2023 the need for urgency was reduced but the standard of writing required to comply with the policy of neutrality did not change.

The guidance at MOS:LABEL includes Value-laden labels – such as calling … an individual a 'racist, sexist, terrorist, or freedom fighter, …  – may express contentious opinion and are best avoided unless widely used by reliable sources to describe the subject, …   The guidance at WP:NN-QUOTE begins with Editors should take care to avoid letting quotations, especially from unreliable sources, into an article in a way which has the effect of driving a coach and horses through the neutrality policy - or worse still, the biography of living persons policy.

The policies at WP:BLPSTYLE include Do not label people with contentious labels, loaded language, or terms that lack precision, unless a person is commonly described that way in reliable sources. Is the pejorative “scum” a contentious label? Does it lack precision? Clearly the answer is yes to both questions. Is the pejorative “coward” a contentious label? Does it lack precision? Clearly the answer is yes to both questions. Do the lyrics of the song by Tim Minchin constitute a reliable source of information about George Pell? Clearly not.

I will restore the sentence to the wording in use prior to insertion of the word "scum" in February 2016. Dolphin (t) 11:51, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

You ask: "Do the lyrics of the song by Tim Minchin constitute a reliable source of information about George Pell?" Your answer "Clearly not" is plainly correct. However, the material you have removed did not purport to provide "a reliable source of information about George Pell". It reported Minchin's words with reference not to their accuracy but to their ímpact. Your replacement, "strongly-worded", imho does not sufficiently explain the impact. To revert your restoration would be edit-warring, so let us see what others may think. Errantios (talk) 23:49, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

If Minchin’s song and his choice of words had a sufficient impact to justify being mentioned on Wikipedia, surely the place for that mention is in the article on Tim Minchin. Why would the song and its impact be reported in the article on George Pell?

In my statement above I attempted to clarify, explain and substantiate my positions by including blue links to Wikipedia policies and guidance, and direct quotations in green. You haven’t done that. Can we assume that everything you have written is based on nothing more than your intuition; and your ideas are entirely unsupported by any policy, guidance or essay? In future, please support your views by mentioning the Wikipedia policies and guidance that you are relying on. Dolphin (t) 05:02, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

I began with your question and answer that summarise your conclusions from applying the policies, so there was no need to go back over the policies as such. Then I said how policies on description were not relevant here. I said that the issue here was impact - and the impact had to do with Pell far more than with Minchin. Errantios (talk) 11:02, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

I’m still curious as to how you propose to suspend the non-negotiable policy of WP:Neutrality so the words scum and coward can be inserted into the Pell article in a way that applies them to Pell. Dolphin (t) 14:40, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

I've said nothing of the sort. Errantios (talk) 21:10, 15 February 2025 (UTC)

National Redress Scheme findings

In January and February 2025, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and other outlets reported major findings against Pell by the National Redress Scheme. I added a section to this article, with references to the ABC and The Guardian. Another user has properly removed the section, since both the ABC and The Guardian have deleted their stories. I restored the section, with a reference to a still current story in the Sydney Morning Herald. Curious, however, as to what had happened with the ABC and Guardian stories, I found in The Australian (paywalled, but I accessed it through a library) a report on 7 February that these stories had been withdrawn, although standing by their content, because unexpectedly their publication had become criminally liable owing to an unnamed pending court case. In these circumstances, I have considered it prudent to remove the section again. For one thing, the Sydney Morning Herald story might be withdrawn. No notifications of findings from any inquiry appear on the website of the National Redress Scheme. Errantios (talk) 21:45, 9 February 2025 (UTC)

I have restored the wording around the National Redress Scheme. When reliable sourcing is taken offline, the proper action is to fix the linkrot by adding an archive, not to take down the relevant wording. Please review WP:LINKROT. If the sourcing was taken down due to legal action in Australia, Wikipedia is not subject to such orders as Wikipedia is hosted in the US. If your summary of The Australian's sourcing is correct, there are no concerns regarding correctness or factuality of the removed reporting, thus the sourcing remains valid. Please review WP:NOTCENSORED. Melmann 15:51, 17 February 2025 (UTC)

The report in The Australian states that some sources have retracted their stories and in one case physically removed the publication from sale. As I read that report, a court may have issued a suppression order and added that the making of the order be itself suppressed (that can happen in Australia). Yes, in principle WP is not subject to Australian courts, but I recall that one such order claimed to apply to publication overseas. An order would apply to me as author, since I live in Australia. Errantios (talk) 20:53, 17 February 2025 (UTC)

If you feel that you are bound by an Australian court order, then you should consider recusing yourself from editing this article further. I am not bound by any such order, nor is Wikipedia, thus I have restored it with appropriate sourcing in-line with project's policies and laws that apply in the country where the project is hosted.

Could you link to or otherwise source The Australian reporting you refer to, stating that the correctness or factuality of the previous reporting is in doubt? If there is such reporting, I will likely at least add a note stating so in the relevant section, in effort to maintain balance. Melmann 10:28, 18 February 2025 (UTC)

As I have said, the report in The Australian appeared on 7 February. That is all the sourcing I can give, since The Australian newspaper is paywalled and I have accessed it through a subscribing library. The correctness or factuality of the previous reporting is not in doubt. The report in The Australian of 7 February states that the original authors stand by their content. I don't think I need to formally recuse myself, but will of course confine myself to what I might be able to support—including anything pertinent that may appear in The Australian, although I am not a regular reader thereof.

On now checking via my library, the latest in The Australian appears to be on 12 February: Dennis Shanahan, "PM to take no action over ABC's Pell breach". Shanahan reports that on 31 January the Department of Social Services wote to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) (and similarly to the magazine The Monthly): "The (Redress) Act makes it a criminal offence for anyone to obtain, make a record of, use or (make a) disclosure of protected information except where authorised in very limited circumstances. It is clear there has been an unauthorised disclosure of protected information to the ABC.” The department requested “that the ABC considers removing this article and video from its website, and not using this information in the future. The department takes the protection of information provided or obtained for the purposes of the scheme very seriously and will take whatever steps it considers necessary to achieve this. ... Given the ABC have received this information in circumstances that constitute a criminal offence, the department requests the ABC considers removing the article and video from publication, including its website.... We also request that the ABC considers not using this protected information in the future."

So it seems that there is a claim to statutory protection and not a court order, although the DSS would be likely to seek one if the ABC (and The Monthly) did not comply—as they have and Shanahan reports that no action is to be taken against the ABC. (He actually says nothing about the Prime Minister.) The Sydney Morning Herald (which I do read regularly) has not said anything more. It is still not clear what information the DSS deems to be protected by the act. One could suppose that the media concerned are taking legal advice on what if anything they are allowed to publish about this award. Errantios (talk) 11:55, 18 February 2025 (UTC)

My view of WP:LINKROT is this covers links which inadvertently cease to work. It doesn't specifically cover what happens when an article is intentionally withdrawn from publication. So in effect, by leaving any material, this becomes original research with no citations. Now, it does look like there is an alternative citation that can be used, so that should be used to support the section as appropriate. WP:NOTCENSORED is also not a blank cheque to publish information that may be the subject of criminal liability. I propose that the dead links be removed swiftly Lt Costis (talk) 06:39, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

There is no indication that the reporting was withdrawn for correctness or factuality. We do not know why it was taken offline, for all the reliable information we have it could be a technical glitch. If it was withdrawn due to Australian laws or court cases (which we do not know for a fact), those do not apply to Wikipedia, which is hosted in the US. The practice wiki-wide is to fix the linkrot, not to remove the wording, which is what was done. Unless the publications issue corrections, errata, or in other way distance themselves from the reporting, the sourcing and the wording should stay. I oppose its removal unless there are new developments in terms of material facts surrounding this reporting. Melmann 07:29, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

The reports in The Australian on 7 And 12 February (above) make it clear that the stories were withdrawn for a legal reason and that their factual accuracy was defended. My internet connection is faulty just now, but perhaps another editor could find the links to these (and maybe later) reports and add them – noting that they are paywalled (for which I think there is an icon). Errantios (talk) 12:44, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Lt Costis edits to the lead

I reverted what I saw aa an inappropriate deletion by Lt Costis. I had written an explanatory Edit summary but it somehow disappeared and my edit got incorrectly marked as minor when I posted it. I don't know how that happened. Sorry.

The deletion by Lt Costas was inappropriate because it removed from he first paragraph mention of one of the major reasons Pell is notable. The content doesn't need sourcing because it's in the lead, which is a summary of sourced content from later in the article.

The content isn't controversial either. Pell is. But so long as we source content correctly, it's fine. HiLo48 (talk) 07:21, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Hi HiLo48, I respectfully point out that near the top of this talk page, it includes the statement "The subject of this article is controversial and content may be in dispute." So, there does need to be some care taken with additions/removals from this article. I also removed the original sentence as it looked poorly worded as well.

It starts as "He was accused of sexual abuse charges both before and after his death (his conviction was quashed on appeal in 2020)."

A more neutral and informative sentence might be: "Since 2002, he had often faced recurring accusations of sexual abuse, although none were ever upheld in a court of law".

The above can be considered a fair summary, should it be necessary to include it. Lt Costis (talk) 07:36, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Emphasising the "none were ever upheld in a court of law" bit overlooks the decision of the National Redress scheme. That's NOT "fair". It's just avoiding stating a major truthful negative about Pell. HiLo48 (talk) 07:48, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

It's meant to be a summary and is accurate (the scheme is not a court of law and its outcome was disputed). What I wrote was meant to be a starting point for a suitable alternative in the lead, not the end result. Lt Costis (talk) 07:56, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

Any negative comment about Pell will ALWAYS be disputed, whether justified or not. That's a major difficulty with anything in this area. HiLo48 (talk) 22:32, 21 February 2025 (UTC)

I think (a version of) this proposed second sentence in the opening paragraph would improve the article. I agree that omitting this mention from the first paragraph removes one one of the two major reasons Pell is notable.

Note though that it's not accurate to say that "no [allegations] were ever upheld in a court of law". The allegations were upheld in 2018 in the County Court of Victoria (which found him guilty on five counts of child sexual abuse of two boys), and were upheld in 2019 in the Court of Appeal of the Supreme Court of Victoria (which upheld the prior convictions).

It would be more accurate to say "his sexual abuse conviction was quashed on appeal to the High Court of Australia" Errolhunt (talk) 01:28, 26 February 2025 (UTC)

National Redress Scheme Burden Of Proof

Errantios reverted my edits regarding the burden of proof used by the Scheme and I want to discuss it further here.

From the SMH article: "The government scheme has a lower burden of proof than the criminal justice or civil court systems, and awards compensation on the basis that abuse occurring at an institution such as the Catholic Church was “reasonably likely”.

Another article states it as: "the redress scheme, which takes 'reasonable likelihood' as its burden of proof, whereas a civil case in a court of law requires a 'balance of probabilities', which is much harder to prove."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-01/survivors-warn-claimants-could-be-worse-off-under-redress-scheme/9822658

Page 13 from the linked document below also briefly mentions how the burden of proof is lower than the Civil standard.

https://www.nationalredress.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/2024-09/national-redress-scheme-a5-flipbook.pdf

So, I think there is sufficient data that supports the edit that adds context to the findings from the scheme. The scheme was designed with applicants as its focus and as an alternative to the court systems (which have stronger rules of evidence and procedural safeguards, such as opportunities to challenge evidence etc). Lt Costis (talk) 03:05, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

The article already says all that. HiLo48 (talk) 03:48, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

Lt Costis, thank you for this research - which I had wanted to do but at the moment could not. Using your info, I have amended the article accordingly. Errantios (talk) 10:27, 22 February 2025 (UTC)

Mentioning sexual abuse in intro

I think it's misleading to "bury" the sexual abuse allegations against Pell in paragraph 4. The two most famous /notable pieces of information about Pell are #1 his rank in the Catholic Church and #2 the sexual abuse allegations.

The page as currently written lists 16 separate (minor / ie, not particularly notable) facts about Pell before mentioning notable item #2. (Or, if reading on a mobile device, 30+ facts) I'm sure it's not the intention of editors, but it *looks* like the sexual abuse information is 'buried'.

I think in para #1 the current opening sentence could usefully be followed by a sentence such as this: "He was accused of sexual abuse charges both before and after his death (his conviction was quashed on appeal in 2020)." with refs as used in current para #4.

There might be a better phrasing of this sentence, or better refs.

RE this revision https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=George_Pell&diff=1276866636&oldid=1276865752 Errolhunt (talk) 01:17, 26 February 2025 (UTC)