Wikipedia Sucks!

Just listening to some "war propaganda" which mentioned a fellow I never heard of named Bat'ko Makhno
I encountered a massive original research paper on Wikipedia owned by a single person Grnchst.

I read through some of Makhno's original writings spanning 1917 on... the late disbandment of serfdom 1861+/-, peasantry, WWI, the Reds and Whites, breakup of Austria Hungary 1914-18 ... the internal political jockeying between Lenin (Stalin), Trotsky, and others. the fight to win the ear of Rural Peasants w - a rip roaring confusing time.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestor_Makhno

On Britanica he is only mentioned in the context of an article on Anarchism

In the south, N.I. Makhno, a peasant anarchist, raised an insurrectionary army that used brilliant guerrilla tactics to hold a large part of Ukraine from both the Red and the White armies, but the social experiments developed under Makhno’s protection were rudimentary, and, when he was driven into…


In 2003 Wikipedia gave Makhno a bit more attention then Britanica but was still very concise perhaps 500 words.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... id=1356341

Starting in January up to now, it looks like a single Wikipedia user (Grnchst) and perhaps an army Sock Puppets have gone Blayt crazy on the topic.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Grnrchst
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... on=history

This single person even spun off supporting articles to his research paper.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... on=history

About 500 words down the current version hits the main point of the concise Britannica and 2003 Wikipedia reference.

Makhno considered the Bolsheviks a threat to the development of an anarchist Free Territory within Ukraine, he entered into formal military alliances twice with the Red Army to defeat the White Army.



Other more concise sources on the subject
http://www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/di ... Nestor.htm
https://spartacus-educational.com/RUSmakhno.htm

My point here is that Very strange stuff is occurring on Wikipedia

FWIW: this is not unusual for a specialist area. WP usually handles it badly (IF AT ALL), until one or a small group of obsessed amateur experts shows up and starts grinding. Makhno really is a very obscure figure in Bolshevist history, and being Ukrainian made him even more obscure--until Grnrchst showed up in 2020, then Russia decided that Crimea was not enough.

Have a sample of the garbage that was fought over in 2014-15 during the Crimea/Donbass and Euromaidan conflicts. I have posted this list before. There is just too much crap to keep track of. Someone SHOULD have written more historical content like Makhno's article at the time, but NOOOOO, they were Russia fanboys and Russia haters and Ukrainians and assorted tourists fighting over insuring content bias in the associated articles. Did not give a crap about "ancient history" like Makhno.

A PARTIAL list, much of which has been merged/deleted/chopped down:

• 2014 Ukrainian revolution (T-H-L-F-C)
• Euromaidan (T-H-L-F-C)
• Timeline of the Euromaidan (T-H-L-F-C)
• 1 December 2013 Euromaidan riots (T-H-L-F-C)
• 11 December 2013 Euromaidan assault (T-H-L-F-C)
• 2014 Euromaidan regional state administration occupations (T-H-L-F-C)
• International reactions to the Euromaidan § Solidarity demonstrations and protests (T-H-L-F-C) (later deleted)
• International reactions to the Euromaidan (T-H-L-F-C)
• Domestic responses to the Euromaidan (T-H-L-F-C)
• Anti-Maidan (T-H-L-F-C)
• List of people killed during Euromaidan (T-H-L-F-C) (repeatedly nominated for deletion, unsuccessfully)
• 2014 Crimean crisis (T-H-L-F-C) (merged into "Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation")
• International reactions to the 2014 Crimean crisis (T-H-L-F-C)
• 2014 Hrushevskoho Street riots (T-H-L-F-C)
• 2014 Ukrainian Regional State Administration occupations (T-H-L-F-C) (merged into below)
• 2014 Euromaidan regional state administration occupations (T-H-L-F-C)
• 2014 Odessa clashes (T-H-L-F-C)
• 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine (T-H-L-F-C)
• Timeline of the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine (T-H-L-F-C)
• List of individuals sanctioned during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine (T-H-L-F-C) (later renamed "List of individuals sanctioned during the Ukrainian crisis")
• Donetsk insurgency (T-H-L-F-C) (later deleted)
• Donetsk People's Republic (T-H-L-F-C)
• Siege of Sloviansk (T-H-L-F-C)
• Kramatorsk standoff (T-H-L-F-C)
• Mariupol standoff (T-H-L-F-C) (later renamed "Battle of Mariupol (May–June 2014)")
• Donetsk status referendum, 2014 (T-H-L-F-C)
• Ukrainian Insurgent Army (T-H-L-F-C)
• Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine (T-H-L-F-C)
• Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (T-H-L-F-C)
• Svoboda (political party) (T-H-L-F-C)
• Ukrainian presidential election, 2010 (T-H-L-F-C)
• War in Donbass (T-H-L-F-C) was 400k bytes long for a time in 2017; editwarring contined
• Timeline of the war in Donbass (T-H-L-F-C) (later chopped into more than 50 different articles by 2017; all exploded in length, many were listed at the top of the Long pages list)
• Denial of the Holodomor (T-H-L-F-C)
• Plus related biographies and other materials.

Try searching for "battle of Mariupol". Hilarious. (?)

We should congratulate Grnrchst, I suppose. Nestor Makhno is now one of the longest biographies on English Wikipedia (134k bytes and growing). After Grnrchst disappears, it will get shorter and shorter, and stands an excellent chance of being AFDed.

So we have a wiki-idiot grinding

on a very obscure figure in Bolshevist history

and it sort of dawned on me to look at a very relevant influence on current events and found Wikipedia mostly blank on the subject; Russian-Feudal and then Soviet Law (or even current law in Russia)

A summary;

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Soviet-law

Almost nothing (and nothing meaningful) for a topic that is very very important and relevant to today;


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_th ... d%20others.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Ru ... 20to%20Art.
Why is it important;

IMHO Prior to 1860! when people were serfs; one guy say Peter the Great (from a land empire) could take territory from a seagoing country (Sweden); conscript serfs to build strategically important port city on what was worthless swamp-land now called St Petersburg.

One strong leader could conscript and order pliant ZEKE's around to his objectives.
A bit later the Bolsheviks instituted their own "legal system" really "legal systems" melding state objectives, ideology, professional practitioner judges, party members, collectives, and local citizens. Much of the system was "pre-revolutionary" with Soviet ideals and structure imposed upon it. It had roots in serfdom - the "law" was not fully codified or unified until the early 1960's.

Watching some videos from everyday people in Russia it is all about consumerism with the law (arbitrary) and decision making in the firm hands of a single leader (and his support structure -- Oligarchs vs. Boya Duma same thing.) The people are totally irrelevant and unnecessary to the regime (they are serfs).


Yeah, The history of Russian Law is a complex thing that gets no coverage on Wikipedia even though it is more relevant (by miles) than a very obscure revolutionary figure History is repeating differently once again.

There are so many parallels between today and Soviet and pre-soviet Russian history.