Talk:Twinkie defense

Snotty

I found the opening to be really snotty. The writer disparages the term Twinkie Defense as if to say those who coined the term have no point in their apparent contention the defense is a load of horsecrap and all the more contemptible for it having worked. --2600:6C65:747F:CD3F:FDDE:5369:4877:767A (talk) 00:55, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Biological?

The article describes the Twinkie Defense as refering to a biological component. In the usage I've heard it has always refered to ANY defense which people consider suspect. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.218.220.25 (talk) 18:33, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Change in Insanity Defense Laws

Not that this is really that big of a deal, but I would like to point out one thing about crediting the White trial with reform in California's insantiy defense laws. Another, and much bigger, trial, the trial of John Hinckley Jr. and his attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan, occurred in 1982. The outcome of that trial, which I am certain everyone is aware of, lead to a great deal of public outrage and federal as well as state reform of insantity defense laws. Given that Reagan was govenor of California, and that the reforming laws were passed in 1982, I would surmise that the law had more to do with the Hinckley verdict than the verdict for White. I am sure White's verdict played a part, but it just seems like a not guilty verdict being delivered for a man who shot the current president and former govenor would have more of an impact on the state legislature.

No, actually Proposition 8 really was more attributable to the Dan White case than the John Hinckley case. Prop 8 passed about two weeks before the verdict came in in the Hinckley trial. In fact, "Remember Dan White" was something of a rallying cry among some of those who campaigned for Prop 8. Mwelch 00:27, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh, well then...my mistake, and good to know. I've certainly never done any research into Dan White, I just wrote a research paper about Hinckley and assumed that given the year there was a correlation.

Misinterpretation

I can't help but think this article could benefit from some re-organization in terms of pointing out the actual etymology of the phrase. It is so blatantly misinterpreted in common reference that I think the article should have a separate section addressing this, as opposed to merely a one-sentence mention. Bullzeye 10:02, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and added the section. The reference is the Snopes urban legend page, which is already listed. Bullzeye 10:20, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Um... it already did point out the "actual etymology of the phrase". You know this, because you moved it further down the page. I honestly don't think moving it further down is a good idea, but I'm going to try keeping it in its current place and cleaning up the phrasing a bit to see if we can make the actual sequence of events clearer. -- Antaeus Feldspar 02:03, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Twinkie Image

Does having a picture of several Twinkies really enhance this article? Admittedly it's named after them but it's not ABOUT them. (note to self, sign in before editing) Howdoesthiswo 01:12, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually I think a photo would be quite helpful for the majority of folks who haven't a clue what one is. I'll see if one is available and do my best to write an appropriate caption that clarifies it's inclusion. Benjiboi 05:31, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Done. Benjiboi 06:06, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

My Cousin Vinny

I don't remember this part of that movie, and I've seen it dozens of times...

My mistake, it was actually from Trial and Error (film), which is filled with homages to My Cousin Vinny. Staxringold 21:33, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

"although the latter concept has yet to gain complete acceptance in the U.S. legal community." is hilarious. 67.174.91.20 07:27, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

LGBT?

How does this related to LGBT? It's in that category, and doesn't seem directly relevant. The article could use an explanation of why it is in that category, if there is a reason. - User:ZachPruckowski

Just had a look at the article - its not as explicit as it once was. If you follow the links to Harvey Milk and White Night riots, you'll have a better idea of how it is an LGBT issue. -Seth Mahoney 06:27, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm just coming at this from the perspective of someone who had never heard of the case. It does make sense if you follow the links in the article, but I feel like it ought to have some mention of it in the actual article. I don't feel confident enough to actually put it in myself. -User:ZachPruckowski

Ah, gotcha. Yeah, I agree - in fact, the article used to make the connection more explicitely. Dunno what happened to that. -Seth Mahoney 21:45, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Also, this article is related to gay rights because the gay panic defense is basically just a specific version of the Twinkie defense. These two articles should cross-reference eachother.--SeanQuixote | talk | my contribs 04:59, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Analogy

I think a lot of people have trouble even today understanding what the defense was really arguing, why they were bringing the Twinkies into it. I think they might understand it better if an analogy was drawn: If a particular person was known to care very deeply for his personal appearance, and to put great effort into his clothes and his grooming, then seeing that person show up somewhere poorly groomed and wearing ratty old clothes would be a strong indicator that there was something wrong -- no one would think that the clothes and the beard stubble were the cause of the person's problem, but it would be a good indicator that they were in some sort of distress, as they had clearly ceased to care about things they had been known to care about a great deal.

Can this analogy be added without being original research? -- Antaeus Feldspar 15:09, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Actually, according to one of the linked articles, White's abandonment of personal grooming was also cited by the defense as evidence of his depression. -- Antaeus Feldspar 14:25, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Chewbacca Defense

At the end of the "References in Popular Culture" section, there's mention of the South Park "Chewbacca Defense" bit. I thought that was more a reference to Cochran's defense of OJ Simpson and the "If the glove don't fit, you must acquit" line? Kai MacTane 17:54, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree, that was a direct ref to the OJ trial. --Diogenes00 21:32, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

It might be worth keeping as a "See also", though. -- Antaeus Feldspar 22:40, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Relevance of Milk's homosexuality

Regarding the assertion that Milk's homosexuality is important to note in this article because "it was because of his being openly gay that the murders occured and allegedly the reason the defense was employed."

1. It's a matter of opinion that Milk's being gay was the reason the murder occurred. Admittedly, it's a very widely held opinion (and indeed, my personal opinion is that it was at the very least a significant contributing factor in White's not stopping with Moscone, but rather moving on to Milk also). But it's still an opinion, so I'd have to object to a Wikipedia article assuming it as a fact. The immediate precipitating factor was that Moscone and Milk were blocking his re-entry to the board. Moscone was not gay. A friend of White's has quoted him as later admitting that he wanted to shoot Carol Ruth Silver and Willie Brown too. Obviously, neither of them was gay. But they were both instrumental in blocking him from getting back on the board, just like Milk and Moscone were. So it's easy to put forth the argument that even though White was personally homophobic, his specific reason for killing people was political opposition, not the sexual orientation.
2. And even more importantly here . . . I've never seen a single reference that suggests the reason the defense team chose for the diminished capacity defense was that Milk was gay. If that were true, I agree that would make the point relevant in this article. (And even then, it would need to be expounded upon in the article more than just the two word addition.) But there definitely needs to be a reliable source attribution before the article accepts that suggestion as true. To be honest, I'm not even sure that I follow how that suggestion even makes sense. What if Milk had not been gay? What if (just for the sake of example) he was straight and thus there was no argument that White had killed him solely for political reasons as indicated above? How/why would that cause his defense team to not try to used diminished capacity as his defense?

If there is a reliable source reference that discusses legal reasons why Milk's homosexuality might have made a diminished capacity defense more suitable, then that source should be cited and the concept fully explored in this article. Without that, though, there is nothing that indicates Milk's homosexuality is relevant to this specific article about this type of legal defense. It seems to me that it was White's best play regardless of Milk's sexuality. Mwelch 03:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Upon thinking about it some more, I actually can see a compelling argument for relevance given the widespread belief (as evidenced by the riots) that defense would not have actually worked had it not been for Milk's homosexuality. As I say above, I can't see that it affects the decision to try it, but clearly many felt and feel that homophobia on the part of the jurors made them more willing to buy it than they might have been otherwise. So that is valid point. But still, it's a point that would need to made in full in the article, not just with the two-word "openly gay" addition in front of Milk's name. Mwelch 03:38, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Generally agreed. I've tried to flesh out the section but not sure I've captured the "old boy network" idea that White was a former police officer and firefighter and was generally ostracized as a conservative fringe by the newly liberal board that had just taken control of the SF Board of Supes. San Francisco had just turned to district elections so each district voted for residents of their areas to represent them.

In the trial, (not sure if this info fits or is useful) it was pointed out that a cop or firefighter had unlocked a window or opened a door so (former-employee) White could enter with a gun. Benjiboi 21:34, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

"a cop or firefighter had unlocked a window or opened a door so (former-employee) White could enter with a gun"? That's a rather powerful assertion of wrongdoing, accusing some unknown party of premeditated assistance to homicide. Where is your citation? -- 192.250.34.161 15:54, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not writing the book so haven't dug through the trial transcripts or newspaper accounts of the trial, as I've stated "not sure if this info fits or is useful." If someone wants to dig for it then go for it by all means. Benjiboi 23:26, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I realized that the above statement "a cop or firefighter had unlocked a window or opened a door so (former-employee) White could enter with a gun" makes less sense unless you know that the assassinations occurred in San Francisco's City Hall and that all visitors had to go through a security check point and Dan White would not have been allowed through with a gun. The windows that were accessible from the street level were secured and, I believe, the only folks who had access to the window that was unlocked was police and firemen. White was both a former cop and fireman. Benjiboi 23:34, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

And from that you are making your own deduction that the only possible reason someone could have opened that window was so that Dan White could get in that way. -- 192.250.34.161 14:18, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Mwelch, I believe Milk's homosexuality is relevant to this article, up to a point. It's fairly easy to find citations that people thought that homophobia was the real reason for the unexpectedly light verdict and sentence, and this made them more prone to believe that the "Twinkie defense" had actually been offered as the purported reason, even though the facts show it was not.

But that is the limit of the extent to which it is relevant. Benjiboi keeps showing that he is less interested in the facts than in pushing his agenda by referring to the "atmosphere of why "twinkie defense" worked", ignoring the fact that it didn't. There is no need for the material he keeps trying to add specifying what the White Night Riots consisted of; that is what the article White Night Riots is for. There is absolutely no need for the material he keeps adding to the References in popular culture section, which I will quote here:

Execution of Justice is an award-winning ensemble play by Emily Mann chronicling the case of the People vs. Dan White which is cited to law students as one of the leading examples of a miscarriage of justice. White assassinated openly gay San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk and San Francisco mayor George Moscone in November 1978. The play has been made into a movie as well.

What does this material do?

• It repeats already-covered basics of the case, namely, that White killed Milk and Moscone and Milk was openly gay.
• It tells us that the play is award-winning and has been made into a movie, which is of no relevance since the play is not the subject of this article and the subject of the play is not even the subject of this article.
• It pushes Benjiboi's agenda by volunteering the (uncited) claim that "the People vs. Dan White ... is cited to law students as one of the leading examples of a miscarriage of justice." At least I hope that the sentence is supposed to mean that it's the case being cited as a miscarriage of justice, rather than the play. Who cites the case to law students this way? Is it at least people who get the basic facts of the case correct, such as that the argument that most people think was accepted either gullibly or corruptly by a jury was in fact not even presented to the jury?

What does this material not do?

• It doesn't say a single damn thing about the Twinkie defense. Which, I regret that we must remind some people, is the subject of the article.

If Benjiboi wants to improve Wikipedia's coverage of the Moscone-Milk killings and the events around them, he could easily start by finding reliable sources for White Night Riots. If he is merely trying to push an agenda, however, he will keep trying to push irrelevant material into this article. -- 192.250.34.161 15:11, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

He's certainly made his agenda clear now. -- 192.250.34.161 19:36, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes my clear agenda has been and remains a good article. You insisted that Milk's homosexuality had little or no relevance and because of your repeated deletions I have provided numerous evidence that you were indeed mistaken. Gutting out material you are not comfortable with or willing to allow for whatever reasons can be done on website or blog or articles you own and publish.Benjiboi 21:40, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes my clear agenda has been and remains turning this into The Moscone-Milk Killings, Part II: Because This Article Shouldn't Be About The Twinkie Defense When It Could Be A Rant Instead. There, fixed that for you. How many times does it need to be said? This is the article about the Twinkie defense. It is not the article about the Moscone-Milk killings. It is not the article about the Dan White trial. It is not the article about the White Night Riots. These things should be mentioned here only as they are relevant to the Twinkie defense. What part of this concept do you not grasp?

Your citations are shit and they only further show that you don't give a shit about a good article. Here, here's an example: "Noted forensic psychiatrist and psychoneuroimmunologist George Solomon testified that with the effects of the junk food diet White had "exploded" and was "sort of on automatic pilot" at the time of the killings." This is almost identical to a sentence that was edited out of the article months ago because it had nothing to do with the Twinkie defense; the phrase "with the effects of the junk food diet" was edited in by Benjiboi. Since this argues, contrary to what our RSes on the subject say, that the defense actually did argue that the junk food diet caused an abnormal state of mind, and that it was Solomon, in addition to or instead of Blinder, who offered that supposed testimony, we'd better have some damn good citations to back that up. And let's look at what citations Benjiboi offers:

• Temoshok, Lydia R. (Fall 2001, Vol 12, No. 3 (PDF part 1)). "George F. Solomon, MD Psychoneuroimmunology Pioneer". American Psychosomatic Society. Retrieved 2007-08-10. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help) (or at least that seems to be the citation Benjiboi meant, even though his poor reference editing actually cites the edit to the Carol Pogash article from the San Francisco Chronicle)
• Gazis-Sax, Joel (1996). "The Martyrdom of Mayor George Moscone". Tales From Colma. Retrieved 2007-08-10.

Let's even overlook for now the fact that "Tales From Colma", a site that gets just 250 Google hits, shows no signs of being an reliable source. Does either source support Benjiboi's inserted claim that George Solomon's "automatic pilot" testimony attributed White's state of mind to "the effects of the junk food diet"? Not only does it not do that, neither source mentions Solomon's "automatic pilot" testimony at all!!!

Benjiboi makes condescending reference to "Gutting out material you are not comfortable with or willing to allow for whatever reasons can be done on website or blog or articles you own and publish." Well, Benjiboi, when YOU have material that, despite being dressed up with what look like actual citations, is actually supported by no reliable sources, you can put that "on website or blog or articles you own and publish." If you try to put it on Wikipedia, it will be "gutted" for the very good reason that it's not up to Wikipedia standards.

The same goes for when you try to shoehorn in material that is unrelated to the actual subject and claim it belongs there just because you can make a chain of connections (i.e., "Execution of Justice" is about "People vs. Dan White" and "People vs. Dan White" is where "the Twinkie defense" allegedly originated and therefore "Execution of Justice" belongs in even though it has nothing to say about "the Twinkie defense"; "retaliatory police attack in the Elephant Walk Bar" came in response to "riot at City Hall" and "riot at City Hall" came in response to "sentence awarded to Dan White" and Dan White was supposedly got off by the "Twinkie defense" and therefore "retaliatory police attack in the Elephant Walk Bar" belongs in even though it has nothing to say about "the Twinkie defense".) How many times does it have to be said? This is the article about the "Twinkie defense", and it is not about anything else, except as it is relevant to that subject. -- 192.250.34.161 15:45, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I've asked for other's to look at the article for opinions. I will again state that the Twinkie defense was accepted because Milk was gay/gay activist. Because of the perceived injustice the White Night Riots happened and that was covered in a summary pointing to the main article. No one has disputed that Twinkie defense started anywhere but with the people v. White case, if you think that is true then please cite sources to support that material. If you think that Twinkie defense had nothing to do with Dan White then please provide resources to support that. Benjiboi 17:10, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

"I will again state that the Twinkie defense was accepted because Milk was gay/gay activist." And you will again mark yourself as trying to push propaganda and lies, because the Twinkie defense was not presented to the jury, much less accepted. Just because you prefer the popular myth where a cynical defense team said "Junk food made him do it!" and a homophobic jury said "That's a pitiful excuse but an excuse is all we need!" and rubber-stamped it, it will not change the fact that the defense team never said "junk food made him do it!"

You've done your best to cover up that fact. I've already documented how you falsely attributed to George Solomon specific claims about the "effects of the junk food diet" on Dan White and added false citations which only said that George Solomon had testified at White's trial, and in no way supported your false claims that Solomon said one word about White's diet. Do you have anything to say to justify that brazen act of falsification?

Apparently not, because you go ahead and engage in more acts of falsification. "No one has disputed that Twinkie defense started anywhere but with the people v. White case, if you think that is true then please cite sources to support that material. If you think that Twinkie defense had nothing to do with Dan White then please provide resources to support that." Thank you for confessing that you have absolutely no answer to my real challenges and have to set up straw men instead. No one has disputed that the myth of the Twinkie defense started anywhere but People vs. White, including me. No one has claimed that "Twinkie defense had nothing to do with Dan White", including me. What has been disputed and what you have been unable to defend is the idea that anything and everything which is related to People vs. White belongs in this article even though this article isn't People vs. White.

Is it possible that the jury was secretly biased towards White and against Milk for homophobia and/or other reasons and thus accepted defense arguments that they shouldn't have accepted including the primary thrust of the actual defense case, that White was in a state of diminished capacity due to depression? Yes, it's possible. Would the arguments (those arguments coming from RSes, that is) both for and against that theory belong on a page about Dan White? Yes. About Harvey Milk? Yes. About People vs. White? Yes. About the Twinkie defense? No. Only the fact that the perception of the jury being secretly homophobic and biased was undoubtedly a factor in people believing the untrue urban legend that "junk food made him do it" was offered or accepted as a defense, is relevant to this article. Why don't you try responding to that, instead of cravenly "standing up to" a straw man you set up yourself of "Twinkie defense had nothing to do with Dan White"? -- 192.250.34.161 14:43, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Indent reset. It's obvious you have a lot of experience with wikipedia and as such you should know better than to respond to other editors the way you have done to me as well as mass deleting material you believe isn't valid to this article. Because of your edits the article has been protected so I'm not able to edit it either and thus not able to reconfirm the citations for Solomon. Having stated that it does seem, at least on surface, that one or more is missing from my original research that would answer your accusations of me presenting falsehoods. I will also point out that you vehemently claimed that Milk's being gay had/has no place in this article and had nothing to do with Twinkie defense - all of which seems to have been shown to contradict your assertions. Benjiboi 20:51, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Article updated with references to clarify the extent of White conservativism and Milk's being openly gay and relevance to the subject. I didn't feel giving a lot of details about Moscone was needed nor did I cover the post-trial epilogue of White or his suicide. Another area that might warrant inclusion is the teaching of the People v. White case to law students as a notable miscarriage of justice. Not sure it's worth the effort though. Benjiboi 06:13, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Gay panic defense and cleaning up the "in popular culture" section

The "References in popular culture" section (as such sections frequently are) is a right mess. I suggest that we keep only those items which actually show how the myth of the "Twinkie defense" is perceived in the public consciousness.

Example of items which pass this test: Supreme Court Judge Antonin Scalia referencing it to draw a distinction between a lawyer who is 'competent' and the kind of lawyer desired by a defendant.

Example of items which do not pass the test: "The term was used in the 1991 Roseanne episode "Home Ec"." Does not in any way contribute to our understanding of the subject.

Where possible, we would be better served to create actual article text talking about the perception of the Twinkie defense myth in the popular mind, with the references as our citations, rather than just having a laundry list of 'it was used here in this episode then it was a throwaway line in that episode and --' In particular, I suspect there might be justification for a short mention of the "gay panic defense", since both are perceived as being excuses for homophobic violence and the link has been made in popular culture (see the item about The Laramie Project.) We would need to tread carefully to make sure we are engaging in reasonable interpretation and not original research, but I think this can be done. -- 192.250.34.161 16:10, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Suggested addition: the use of the Twinkie in the pedestal of Robert Arneson's 1980 bust of George Moscone. -- 192.250.34.161 21:11, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Request for comment: Twinkie defense content dispute

This article RfC is being initiated by Yksin (talk · contribs) per the Dispute resolution process. Please see WP:RFC, particularly the section on Request comment on articles, for information about this process.

Summary of dispute

• 192.250.34.161 (talk · contribs) maintains that much of the background information added to the article, particularly by Benjiboi, about the Moscone-Milk assassinations, about the White Night Riots, and to the "References in popular culture" section is irrelevant to the subject of the article. 192.250.34.161 maintains that Benjiboi's edits inaccurately represent as being true the popular media-driven myth that Dan White's evasion of a first degree murder conviction was based upon a "Twinkie defense." 192.250.34.161 maintains that Benjiboi has intentionally manipulated sources in order to prove this inaccurate claim. 192.250.34.161 has stated that "[Harvey] Milk's homosexuality is relevant to this article, up to a point" because perceived homophobia on the part of the jury in Dan White's trial "made [observers] more prone to believe that the 'Twinkie defense' had actually been offered as the purported reason, even though the facts show it was not." [1] I.e., according to 192.250.34.161: the Twinkie defense was never used -- it was a myth created by the media.
• Benjiboi (talk · contribs) has sought feedback at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies#Twinkie defense and in recent statements [2] [3] has indicated willingness to trim extraneous background information from the article. Benjiboi continues to assert that the "the Twinkie defense was accepted because Milk was gay/gay activist" [4] and maintains that 192.250.34.161 "vehemently claimed that Milk's being gay had/has no place in this article." [5]
• Benjiboi as well as other editors have warned 192.250.34.161 about violations of WP:CIVIL.

Disclaimer by Yksin

As initiator of this RfC, I have striven to be as neutral as possible in describing the dispute, while still getting across the gist of what the dispute is about. My apologies if I've erred or left anything pertinent out. I hope the parties to the dispute will make more complete statements of their positions below -- with civility, please. I don't have time to write my own statement now, but will later.

Relevant discussion

Beside the article talk page, discussion relevant to this dispute can be found at:

• Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies#Twinkie defense
• User talk:192.250.34.161#Twinkie defense edits
• User talk:192.250.34.161#Your ongoing incivility
• User talk:Yksin#Twinkie defense
• User talk:Jeffpw#Civility & User:192.250.34.161 (re: Twinkie defense)
• User talk:Benjiboi#Twinkie defense

Statements by editors previously involved in dispute

Please use subheaders for different statements, and use edit summaries. Please do not respond to statements here; instead, use the discussion section below.'

Statement by Ikiroid

Yesterday (or two days ago by UTC time) I came across a request made by Benjiboi for help at WP:AIV. At first, I told him this wasn't the place for such a request, but he insisted that he didn't want to block the other party, he just needed mediation help[6]. He was notified by another party to go to WP:DR, and meanwhile I put a full protection on the article in question. To specify, I had read through the above threads, and the full-page protection was really intended as a last resort, semi-temporary measure in order to prevent the involved parties from being blocked by 3RR. At the time I didn't feel that I should add my ideas to the discussion, because I hadn't really thought over any of it and the issue did have the potential to work itself out.

That was August 22. Over the next 30 hours or so I wasn't on wikipedia except for a brief edit to my user talk page. Judging by the time signatures, IP 192.250 left a note one hour after I logged off, explaining their view and reasoning of the situation. Essentially, 192.250 expressed their doubts over the reliability of the sources added by Benjiboi. They also questioned the scope of the article, and expressed disdain for Benjiboi's additions while not being specific. Their post is here, unmodified. I logged on to find that post and a note on this RFC.

To me, it is evident that this dispute is really a couple of disputes rolled into one. 192.250 has a problem with the quality of the references, and there is a difference between the two editors as to what happened in court. 192.250 states that the defense never utilized a "Twinkie Defense", and that it was only an idea put forth by a witness. Benjiboi and 192.250 are also in disagreement as to whether or not the victim's homosexuality is relevant to the issue. 192.250 also believes that much of the material concerning the case itself should be removed, as well any informaion on its social and cultural effects. There is another problem, too: both editors have veered away from discussing the content of the article, and each has expressed a suspicion that the other has some agenda.

If either party feels that part of my statement should be contested, I encourage you to help me clarify my perspective on my talk page of within the subsequent discussion. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 02:39, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Statement by 192.250.34.161

I am glad to see that these issues are receiving attention from people who wish to see this article improved in accordance with Wikipedia standards. My concern is that to expand an article is not necessarily to improve it; if we look at what Benjiboi has done to expand the article (what I will for convenience call the "Benjiboi version"), we see that the material is not always up to Wikipedia's standards and in fact violates some of Wikipedia's core principles. That is, I realize, a powerful statement, but given the evidence I do not think it can be denied.

The most serious violation of Wikipedia's principles in the Benjiboi version is the violation that information must be citable to reliable sources. To show how this principle was violated, I will first talk about the scope of the article, which is two-fold:

1. The "Twinkie defense" in the abstract: that is, all arguments put forth by some defense team somewhere, in reality or in fiction, that some biological or chemical factor reduces or removes the defendant's responsibility for their actions; and
2. The alleged incident that gave rise to the term "Twinkie defense": the defense argument allegedly proposed to and accepted by the jury in the murder trial of Dan White, that junk food caused the rampage in which he killed George Moscone and Harvey Milk. (I will refer to this alleged incident as "White's Twinkie defense" to distinguish it from the Twinkie defense in the abstract.)

In the version prior to Benjiboi's editing, the article described White's Twinkie defense as a "myth" or "urban legend", because that was exactly what our two major reliable sources on the subject said. Both sources tell the same story, though they differ in detail: the defense team argued that White was depressed, and enumerated several symptoms that showed his depression, just one of which was that he had gone from a health-food nut to consuming large quantities of junk food. The popular idea, that the defense had argued junk food to be the cause of White's state of mind, was false.

Obviously, if one wants to make the article claim instead that the popular idea was true -- that the defense team really did blame White's state of mind and his actions on junk food -- one had better have very good reliable sources for such a claim. I would even say that in such a case, your reliable sources need to address the fact that some have examined the popular idea and deemed it false -- not merely sources which repeat the popular idea with no mention that its accuracy has been challenged.

Benjiboi did in fact change the article to make it claim that White's Twinkie defense really had occurred. He started with a sentence from a previous version of the article:

"Another psychiatrist, George Solomon, testified that White had "exploded" and was "sort of on automatic pilot" at the time of the killings."

He modified this sentence with a description of Solomon's stature, and a specific claim that Solomon had specifically attributed White's state of mind to junk food:

"Noted forensic psychiatrist and psychoneuroimmunologist George Solomon testified that with the effects of the junk food diet White had "exploded" and was "sort of on automatic pilot" at the time of the killings." (emphasis added)

Clearly Benjiboi knew he was adding a claim that had not been there before -- that not only did White's Twinkie defense actually exist, but that it could be specifically attributed to George Solomon (rather than Martin Blinder, who our existing sources identify as the only defense witness who mentioned junk food.) Therefore, Benjiboi knew that he needed to add reliable sources which supported that claim.

Benjiboi did not add such sources. He did add two sources. The first source, found here, mentions only that Solomon testified in the trial of Dan White, and does not even specify which side he testified for. The second source, found here, mentions Solomon's testimony in only one sentence:

"In all the uproar about the "Twinkie Defense", something which Dr. George Solomon had warned about seven years previous went unnoticed: if Dan White did not receive a heavy enough sentence, he would kill himself."

In fact, this source contradicts Benjiboi's claim that White's Twinkie defense was real, and agrees with our other sources that it was a misunderstanding of what the defense had actually argued:

"Dr. Martin Blinder identified White's addiction to junk food as a signs [sic] of the disorder [depression]. In the outraged popular version of Blinder's testimony which followed the trial, Blinder was made out to say that the Twinkies had made White do it." (emphasis added)

Some may be able to construct and believe in a "good faith" explanation for why Benjiboi did what we have just seen that he did. No matter why he did it, however, the fact remains that he did; and having found that he did it once, we cannot assume that that was the only time he did it. We cannot assume that whatever Benjiboi inserted into the article with what looks like a citation that verifies the point in dispute is actually even addressed, let alone supported, by that citation. Which is one reason why, I will argue, that we must take as the last "good" version of the article the version before Benjiboi started his edits, and then

The second way in which the "Benjiboi version" does not adhere to Wikipedia standards is the issue of relevance. As much as I had hoped I could address this purely in terms of moving forward and identifying what should be our target for this article, I am afraid I have to clear up a misrepresentation that has been made about me first. Benjiboi made the assertion against me on this talk page that I had "vehemently claimed that Milk's being gay had/has no place in this article and had nothing to do with Twinkie defense". As with his claim about George Solomon's trial testimony, examining the actual facts of the matter shows the claim to be false. Here are my own words on the subject:

"... I believe Milk's homosexuality is relevant to this article, up to a point. It's fairly easy to find citations that people thought that homophobia was the real reason for the unexpectedly light verdict and sentence, and this made them more prone to believe that the "Twinkie defense" had actually been offered as the purported reason, even though the facts show it was not ... But that is the limit of the extent to which it is relevant."

It is unfortunate that I actually have to remind people that my statements about what I think is relevant, and not Benjiboi's claims about what I think is relevant, is where my position about what is relevant is to be found. But it seems an unavoidable evil in this case.

With that (hopefully) out of the way, here is my position on what is relevant:

• The subject of this article is the Twinkie defense: both the Twinkie defense in the abstract and the urban legend of Dan White's Twinkie defense.
• Actual facts with good sourcing which help to explain the Twinkie defense (either abstract or White's) are relevant.
  • Example: Justice Antonin Scalia described the kind of lawyer a defendant wants as "I don't want a 'competent' lawyer. I want a lawyer to get me off. I want a lawyer to invent the Twinkie defense. I want to win." This shows that the Twinkie defense (abstract) is not perceived as being a legitimate defense strategy; it is perceived as symbolic of lawyers who "want to win" more than they want to be "'competent'".
• Significant POVs on the Twinkie defense (again, either) are relevant.
  • Example: The POV that White's Twinkie defense is primarily a myth is supported by reliable sources, so it is definitely a significant POV and definitely relevant.
  • Example: Even the POV that White's Twinkie defense was presented to and accepted by the jury is relevant, even though our reliable sources indicate that this POV is mistaken, taking an urban legend for truth. Why is it relevant, if not true? Because the numbers of people who have believed it was true, and let it shape their perceptions of the judicial system, are significant.

However, here is what is not relevant:

• Anything which has nothing to do with the Twinkie defense except that it is connected to something and that something is relevant to the Twinkie defense.
  • Example: this section, repeatedly re-added to the article: "Discontent with the verdict and resulting sentence led to the San Francisco's White Night Riots with gays and Milk supporters rioting at San Francisco's City Hall including breaking in the glass doors and burning twelve police cars. Later that night a retaliatory police attack took place against the Elephant Walk bar in the center of the gay Castro neighborhood less than a block from Milk's camera shop and campaign headquarters. The incidents brought additional international attention to the assassinations and trial." Every single bit of this section is connected to the Twinkie defense only through People vs. White. To be honest, we don't even know if it has that much of a connection, because we have no way of going back and asking the rioters "Now, are you rioting because you specifically believe that the unexpectedly light sentence resulted from the defense arguing that junk food was responsible for the murders, or just from a general sense that such an unexpectedly light sentence must mean that some sort of miscarriage of justice went on?" This section adds nothing to our understanding of the Twinkie defense and thus does not belong in Twinkie defense.
  • Example: this section, repeatedly re-added to the article: "Execution of Justice is an award-winning ensemble play by Emily Mann chronicling the trial of the People vs. Dan White. The play has been performed worldwide and has been made into a movie." Again, another section whose only claim to relevance is that it is connected to People vs. Dan White.

I do not think that this is an unreasonable standard to adopt for relevance. If anything belongs in an article, as long as it is relevant to something else which is relevant to something else which is relevant to something else which is relevant -- well, then, pretty soon we might as well just make Dan White, Harvey Milk, Moscone-Milk assassinations, Twinkie defense, all just redirects to one huge article which covers it all. I mean, if the full extent of the White Night Riots belongs in Twinkie defense just because the Twinkie defense was allegedly used in People vs. Dan White, and the White Night Riots came from anger over the verdict in People vs. Dan White, then how can we possibly argue that there is any fact in Dan White which is not relevant to Harvey Milk, and vice-versa?

With this in mind, it's quite telling that Benjiboi felt that one thing which wasn't relevant to this article was the fact that White committed suicide within seven years of the murders.[7] Why? What the defense actually argued was that Dan White suffered from a deep depression. Suicide is dramatic evidence for that POV. Yet Benjiboi didn't think that was relevant? -- 192.250.34.161 21:30, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Note to those concerned with my identity

I have been admonished to focus on "content, not contributors". Very well. But if I may ask, why is it not a two-way street? Why is it that when Yskin and Celithemis and Ikiroid engage in excellent discussion of the issues of which claims are supported by sources, and which claims are not relevant to this article even if they are well-sourced, another editor feels free to accuse them of "editing the article to conform to the demands of an anonymous IP"? Are these editors now required to tailor their judgments about content in order to vex a particular contributor?

This same editor who made the accusation about "editing the article to conform to the demands of an anonymous IP" is displaying rather an obsession, not just with the fact that I am an anon, but also with the possibility that I am a "sockpuppet". Let me quote the nutshell description of the Wikipedia policy on "sockpuppetry": "Do not use multiple accounts to create the illusion of greater support for an issue, to mislead others, or to circumvent a block. Do not ask your friends to create accounts to support you or anyone else." I am doing none of those things; anyone who assumes that I am, particularly if the only "evidence" they have to offer is that I know my way around Wikipedia procedures -- as I would if, for instance, I had previously maintained a pseudonymous identity on Wikipedia but had had that pseudonym penetrated and my private life pried into and publicized for the purpose of discouraging me from further participation, and had chosen to retire that pseudonym -- is assuming bad faith.

If the policies of "content, not contributors" and "assume good faith" are to be ones that anons should obey, then surely they're ones that should apply to anons as well. -- 192.250.34.161 15:52, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Reply to Benjiboi's statement

I am not under the illusions that anyone is going to come along and revert Benjiboi's statement and tell him to please rewrite it as comment on content and not other contributors before reposting. I will simply say that if this had been a user-conduct RFC, rather than an article-content RFC, I would certainly have some things to say about the manner in which I was treated, which is what caused this whole fiasco to begin with.

As for the portion of the statement that addresses the article content, I have already said that I believe we should cast a quite skeptical eye on any information which cannot be shown to have any solid connection to the article subject but is merely argued to provide "context". Unless we have a reliable source that argues for such a relationship, it's hard to imagine an argument of this type that would not be prohibited original research. And, as I have already indicated, no matter what standard of relevance we agree on, it must be consistently applied in order to abide by WP:NPOV. I cannot imagine a standard of relevance under which Jonestown would be considered highly relevant context and be omitted only for time, and yet the suicide of Dan White would be considered "not needed" --but a reasonable person would infer from talk page statements that this is in fact being suggested as an appropriate standard. -- 192.250.34.161 16:45, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Benjiboi

This is the first RFC I've personally been involved in and I hope that a better article does emerge from the process. Having stated that the way I was treated by an editor who, by all accounts, apparently knows better and had no problems being civil to others has me reluctant to be involved in this matter although I obviously care about the subject.

As I've indicated in the past on this and many other articles I'm completely open to changes that improve an article and on this one was making a good faith effort to add context first to address why Milk's homosexuality was relevant and then to what the original Twinkie defense was, what it had become as well as context of socio-political, religious and cultural arenas in which the defense was accepted and the reaction. I didn't include the Jonestown murders/suicides because I was frankly tired from the hours I had spent doing the research I did do although that event was also intertwined in the atmosphere of this trial and local news.

As far as the Solomon testimony I thought I had included the right reference but now I'm not finding it. It would take me many more hours to hunt it down again and, frankly, this whole experience has left a bad taste but I wish anyone well who does want to sort it out. I read that someone got trial transcripts so that would be the best reference anyway.

To me Wikipedia should be a place I enjoy being a part of and contributing to. I hope no one is ever treated the way I was and with that I will have to step back from this article and simply wish all who do work on it my best wishes. Benjiboi 22:10, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Statements by outside observers

Please use subheaders for different statements, and use edit summaries. Please do not respond to statements here; instead, use the discussion section below.'

Outside statement by Yksin

Although I'm the initiator of this RfC, I consider myself to be an outsider to the dispute. I'm going to keep my comments fairly brief here, & save lengthier comments for discussion. I became aware of this dispute a couple of days ago after Benjiboi asked for feedback at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject LGBT studies#Twinkie defense. I took at look at the article & the talk page & replied with some feedback, basically to the effect that I felt that 192.250.34.161 had made some relevant points about much of the background information being too detailed & irrelevant to the article's subject of the "Twinkie defense." Another editor, Jeffpw (talk · contribs), later made similar comments, & based on that feedback Benjiboi has expressed a willingness to move some of the article's current content to other articles where it's more relevant. That shows to me that Benjiboi is willing to listen & to be persuaded by other's reasonable arguments.

Earlier today, then, 192.250.34.161 wrote to me on my talk page at User talk:Yksin#Twinkie defense & explained the issues s/he has with the articles content. I read the sources 192.250.34.161 pointed out, verifying that his/her account of them was accurate, & took another look at the article itself. This resulted in me being convinced that the article as it's presently written is inaccurate: (1) the sources cited do not back the assertion that Solomon blamed White's murders of Moscone & Milk on White's consumption of junk food; and (2) the "Twinkie defense" was not in fact used. Two reliable sources (Scopes & one of the San Francisco newspapers) make it very clear that the mention of junk food during the trial was very minor & was not the central basis of White's defense. Rather, the media picked up that minor mention of junk food & blew it up out of proportion, essentially in an attempt to explain a major miscarriage of justice (White should have been convicted of first degree murder, not merely "manslaughter") to an angry & uncomprehending public. I agree with 192.250.34.161 that this article should reflect the conclusion that these reliable sources make: the "Twinkie defense" is modern folklore.

Of course, 192.250.34.161 attempted to explain this before, on the article talk page. Unfortunately, s/he did it accompanied by so much incivility towards Benjiboi that the message never came through clearly. It only came through clearly to me after 192.250.34.161 wrote to me on my talk page. Why? It seems to me because 192.250.34.161 wasn't attacking me when s/he explained it to me. I was not being accused of pushing an agenda, of not giving a shit about a good article, of "dressing up" sources to claim they said things they didn't say, & other accusations that were made against Benjiboi. In other words, there was no assumption of good faith, & so ill will escalated. I'm sorry, but I don't blame Benjiboi at all for not getting what 192.250.34.161 was trying to explain, given that 192.250.34.161 was explaining it in such a hostile, combative way. And I don't believe that this matter would have gotten to the level of dispute that it has, had 192.250.34.161 explained to Benjiboi, with the same civility s/he used in explaining to me, what his/her issues with this article are. I don't get what is so difficult to understand about the very commonsense guidelines in WP:CIVIL or how incivility just makes it harder for everyone, whether they're targets of the attack or not, to stick to the real business at hand, which is writing good articles according to the principles of consensus that are so central to Wikipedia.

I was also disappointed to learn that another editor, Jeffpw (talk · contribs), apparently considers it to be completely okay to call an editor names behind his/her back, while simultaneously cautioning that same editor for his/her own incivility. (See User talk:Jeffpw#Civility & User:192.250.34.161 (re: Twinkie defense).)

Interjected comment from Jeffpw has been moved here.

Be that as it may, I'm now interested in putting the arguments of the past behind us, & getting on with the business at hand: creating a new consensus for this article based on Wikipedia's core content policies of WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, WP:VERIFY -- & while doing so, following Wikipedia's core conduct policies of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA. --Yksin 03:14, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Outside view from Measl

Note: As this comment seemed clearly related to the RfC, I've moved it here from its former location. --Yksin 16:16, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

First, I have never done one of these before, so if I screwed the pooch on formatting, I apologize in advance. I have just two points to make (other points were satisfactorily addressed elsewhere, so there is no need for me to rehash them) and one comment.

1. Sockpuppetry: I agree completely. Not only do I agree, but as I read through the entire editwar, I was continually amazed at this obvious puupet going unnoticed. 192 has an amazing grasp of WP:[JustAboutEverything] - why is this person nameless? It makes no sense unless you put the [obvious] puppet on.

2. Jeffpw. Despite your assertions to the contrary, you do not come across as "watching this whole affair from the outside looking in". Your words have a feel of "interested party", even though I agree with you.

3. While I feel for the great deal of work that was done by BenjiBoi, the original article was clearly superior for an unbiased and shallow definition. What I think happened here is Benjiboi wanted to put this in context - an admirable goal, as nothing exists in vacuo - but failed to keep the shallow original intact. Bejiboi's work, flawed as it may be, would be an excellent article unto itself regarding the "Twinkie Defense In Context". Perhaps as it's own article, possibly (I believe preferably) as a subarticle of the original.

Again, my apologies if I have messed any of this up by trying to insert my thoughts. Note that I posted this to both here and the administrator's page who locked this, as I don't know where it's really supposed to go.

Measl 03:54, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Discussion

Please use subheaders for different subjects, and use edit summaries.'

Jeffpw response to Yksin

Note: this comment has been moved from being being interjected into Yksin's statement, in line with RfC format to place respond to statements in discussion section.

Please don't distort my remarks, Yksin, and provide a diff so that others can make up their own minds about my actions (which are not relevant to this RFC in any event). I didn't call the anon IP an asshole behind his/her back. I said it in a part of Wikipedia where anybody involved in this dispute could be expected to read it. I suppose it would have been more politic to call him a WP:Dick, but not having drank the Wikipedia Kool-aid, my responses tend to be my own and not some jargon filled knee-jerk lemming like reaction. My apologies. Now if you wish to start a RFC about my comment and behaviour, be my guest. But your placing the paragraph above into this RFC not only is inappropriate, but also distracts from the main issue here. Jeffpw 06:57, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Okay, here's the diffs: Jeffpw cautions 192.250.34.161 on 192's talk page about civility; Jeffpw refers to 192 as an "anon asshole" at WikiProject LGBT studies here; Jeffpw again refers to 192 as an "asshole" on Jeffpw's own talk page. The fact that the first use of the term "asshole" was made in the context of a statement otherwise agreeing with some of 192's POV does not negate the fact that a personal attack was made. Your statement "I said it in a part of Wikipedia where anybody involved in this dispute could be expected to read it" in & of itself shows the relevance of your behavior to this RfC: you seem to have expected 192 to read it; and indeed, so 192 did, & commented about it to me on my talk page [8]. It wasn't me who interjected your incivility into this dispute: you did. I merely noted it. How much more do you want it to escalate? Both yours and 192's incivility should have stopped before, but since it didn't, it should stop now. --Yksin 07:31, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Escalate it to your heart's content, Yksin, though I repeat: your placing all of this here is distracting other editors from the RFC which you yourself created. While you may well get the last word in this petty squabble with me, it would be a Pyrrhic victory if it derailed the proceedings here. Jeffpw 12:03, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Reponse to 192's statement

Assume good faith. First, no, I don't believe that Benjiboi intentionally acted in bad faith with this article. At the same time, having gone through the edit history, I can see why 192 feels that way. This edit is the one where he added two sources to back up the claim about Solomon's statement at the trial that, as 192 has pointed out, do not at all affirm what Solomon is purported to have said. It does look an awful lot like a deliberate insertion of factual errors not backed up by the cited sources. Nonetheless I wouldn't assume that established editor like Benjiboi had done so intentionally, whose good work on Wikipedia I've run across several times. Errors like that do happen accidentally in the course of lots of edits & also of very large edits, such as that diff indicates, where sources can get mixed up by accident. To me it's altogether possible that Benjiboi inadvertently mixed up his citations when he was making that large edit. It seems much more productive to point out the error & ask him about it, rather than to jump to conclusion that he inserted an error intentionally. That said, of course facts need to be checked, & not only those facts added by any particular editor. I would prefer to get off the topic of any particular editors real or perceived offenses (I'm also talking about charges of incivility that I & others have made) & get on with where to go from here.

Two alternatives for where to go from here. Are there any other proposals of how to proceed from here to consider? Here's the two we have so far:

1. I stated below in my "goals" statement one means of changing the article, which is to start by moving extraneous material to other, more relevant articles, & to check thoroughly doublecheck the sources & facts with whatever remains, excising anything that can't be backed up by the sources. And then we can reevaluate where we are from there.
2. 192 has no proposed that we start by reverting back to the last version of the article before Benjiboi began editing.

NPOV. I agree pretty fully with what 192 said about what's relevant in this article -- ": both the Twinkie defense in the abstract and the urban legend of Dan White's Twinkie defense." I also appreciate the discussion of NPOV with regard to the "legend" aspect -- something that I missed what I said myself about the "legend" aspect -- that to be NPOV, this article needs to discuss the significant views published in reliable sources that describe the Twinkie defense purportedly put forth by Dan White's lawyers as a myth or legend; but also to discuss the significant views published in reliable sources that take the story of White's Twinkie defense at face value. In 192's words, "Even the POV that White's Twinkie defense was presented to and accepted by the jury is relevant, even though our reliable sources indicate that this POV is mistaken, taking an urban legend for truth. Why is it relevant, if not true? Because the numbers of people who have believed it was true, and let it shape their perceptions of the judicial system, are significant."

On this matter, I want to mention that I did some digging about in a Lexis database yesterday for what law journals might say about the Twinkie defense, & found at least three law journals that describe the Twinkie or junk food aspect of White's defense as having been a minor supporting detail for the overall defense contention that White was suffering from depression (of which his consumption of junk food was just one symptom), & that the depression was the source of his claimed diminished capacity. I found other law journals that tended to do as the popular media did -- take the Twinkie defense story at face value (i.e., Twinkies/junk food, not his depression, was the source of diminished capacity). So here's more sources for the article.

But the main point is, yes: regarding the "myth" of Dan White's Twinkie defense, there are two sides: one which says it's a myth, urban legend, folkore, or a meme that reproduced itself with extraordinary success (well, that meme stuff is my original research, actually, which can't be included unless some reliable source that said it can be found), & the other side says that the Twinkie defense really is what White's defense consisted of. Both sides, as 192 pointed out, need to have room in this article. And then the reader can decide which of the two claims is the correct one.

And then, since the meme -- regardless of whether based on myth or truth -- did take off, it continues to have currency in both popular culture & in legal discussion, as my bouncing about in legal journals proves. So I agree that that's the big other part of the article. --Yksin 06:33, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Blinder's and Solomon's testimony at trial

Source: Scallen, Eileen A. and William E. Wiethoff. (April 1998). "The Ethos of Expert Witnesses: Confusing the Admissibility, Sufficiency and Credibility of Expert Testimony." 49 Hastings Law Journal 1143 (University of California, Hastings, College of Law).

This law school journal analyzes the expert testimony in the White trial as a case study for their overall topic of the use of expert testimony in criminal trials. There was a total of five psychiatrists testing for the defense: Dr. Martin Blinder, Dr. Solomon, Dr. Jones, Dr. Delman, and Dr. Lunde (full names of the latter four are not given in the article). Only Dr. Blinder seems to have made mention of junk food in his testimony. Short of a full trial transcript, a good source on what was actually said at trial might be what the authors of this article used, Kenneth W. Salter, The Trial of Dan White (1991). I've made a request for interlibrary loan of this book.

On the overall defense strategy:

This expert testimony was the source of one of the trial's most memorable images and one of the most reviled examples of "junk science" - the "Twinkie defense," as the press referred to the testimony of Dr. Martin Blinder. This defense expert testified that when White became depressed, he ate large amounts of junk food - Twinkies, Coca-Cola, etc. Moreover, Dr. Blinder testified that when "susceptible individuals" like White consume "large quantities of what we call junk food, high sugar content food with lots of preservatives can precipitate anti-social and even violent behavior." However, what is now forgotten is that the defense did not rely solely on the "Twinkie" theory; four other psychiatrists also testified for the defense, uniformly agreeing that White suffered from depression to such a degree that he possessed diminished capacity at the time of the killing and could not premeditate or deliberate. (p. 1161)

I'm only including info on all of what they said about Solomon's & part of what they said about Blinder's testimony (not all of which was about junk food), but the article also discusses the testimony of the other three psychiatrists who acted as expert witnesses for the defense. I'm including everything they say about Solomon's testimony because one of the issues in the article right now is "what did Solomon really say? Did he say anything in his testimony about junk food?" The answer from this article seems to be no, or at least that it cannot be claimed he did based on this article, which is the most detailed source I've seen so far on what the defense's expert witnesses testified. From this article, it seems that only Blinder of the five psychiatrists talked about junk food, or at least he was the only one who seems to have identified White's consumption of junk food as having contributed to White's supposed diminished capacity.

Solomon's testimony on direct examination:

Later, during direct examination, Dr. Solomon invoked terms of his art - "a uni-polar depressive reaction" - to define Dan White's mental state, as well as explaining analogously "in laymen's terms" during cross-examination that the defendant "was sort of on automatic pilot" during the shootings. Without qualification, Dr. Solomon testified that Dan White "did not have a mental capacity, to maturely and meaningfully premeditate and deliberate." (p. 1162)

Later in the article:

The expert witnesses properly stressed the issue of causation, yet to a remarkable degree they also usurped the jurors' prerogative to decide matters of guilt and innocence. Ironically, Dr. Blinder, the now famous author of the "Twinkie" defense, opposed this use of psychiatric testimony.... Nonetheless, every expert witness for the defense contributed testimony vouching for the dynamic quality of emotional stability.

Dr. Blinder opined on direct examination that brutal changes in Dan White's world diminished his capacity for criminal guilt: "If it were not for all the tremendous pressures on him the weeks prior to the shooting, and perhaps if it were not for the ingestion of this aggravating factor, this junk food...I suspect that these homicides would not have taken place."

Turning this argument inside out on cross-examination, Dr. Solomon directed jurors' attention to the permanence in Dan White's behavior. His otherwise suspicious reloading of his gun after shooting George Moscone was explained away as "the sort of automatic action that he had always been taught." And yet, Dr. Solomon testified, Dan White "was out of control and in an unreasonable state" during the shooting as opposed to before. Asserting both poles of permanence and change, Dr. Solomon could be said to have exhausted the rhetorical alternatives but, more likely, he was responding less than adroitly to the pressure of cross-examination. (p. 1163)

I emailed this article to myself from LexisNexis, which is one of the databases my local university subscribes to. Law libraries might also have this journal, & there's also interlibrary loan. --Yksin 07:59, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

See also chapter 6 of Minds on Trial: Great Cases in Law and Psychology by Ewing and McCann (ISBN 019518176X). You can read this on Google Books, though you might need a Google account. On page 76, it specifies that only two expert witnesses mentioned junk food -- Blinder and the prosecution's expert witness, Dr. Ronald Levy. Based on this, I think the claim that Solomon did comment on the effects of junk food should be removed now. No source has been presented that says he did. A clear error of fact should not have to wait until September 1.

The Ewing & McCann book also quotes at length from the closing arguments, on page 77. These are the "two lukewarm paragraphs" that the Chronicle article refers to. The quotation shows that White's attorney did, in fact, float the idea that "preservatives and sugar... causes you to alter your personality somehow, or causes you to act in an aggressive manner". The reference was brief and heavily hedged, and there's no evidence that the jury paid any attention to it at all; Ewing and McCann call it "insignificant". Still, it was there, and we should say that. Quoting his actual words would be a good idea. —Celithemis 08:35, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the great info! Unfortunately the Google Books version of this book only has pp. 69-70 of the Dan White chapter available for viewing, & it's not searchable at Amazon; but it's available from a number of libraries for interlibrary loan (follow the "Find this book in a library" link from the Google Books page) for anyone who wants to verify what Celithemis just wrote. Celithemis: do I understand that the book includes Dr. Levy's exact words? If not, maybe Kenneth Salter's book The Trial of Dan White will include that quote, since it apparently quotes extensively from the trial transcript.

The pages of this chapter that are" available for viewing through Google Books include the authors' statement that the popular characterization of Dan White's defense (as recounted by Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, among others) as having been based on his mental incapacity as a result of eating junk food "while popular and widely recounted, is a myth" and that "the 'Twinkie defense,' as described by most, was never raised by Dan White or anyone else associated with his case" (p. 70).

I agree that the statement in the article claiming that Solomon commented on the effects of junk food should be removed now. --Yksin 15:37, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

In line with 192's issues of inclusion, I don't think every testimony should be included in the article. The relevant information in the resources above needs to be there, and perhaps an explanation that the Twinkie Defense was not put forth by the majority of the expert witnesses. In any case, these resources are a great improvement for the article. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 16:13, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

So let me get this straight: You're now editing the article to conform to the demands of an anonymous IP????? It may take me a while to wrap my mind around that concept. Please tell me that I have misunderstood your meaning. I am desperately trying to assume good faith here. Jeffpw 16:43, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I can't speak for Ikiroid, obviously, so I'll just speak for myself on this. What I'm doing is agreeing with 192 that only that which is relevant to the article's subject, which is the Twinkie defense, should be in this article. For my part, I'm not acceding to "the demands of an anonymous IP" -- using my own reasoning, I'm finding that much of his/her reasoning is persuasive. But deciding what is or is not relevant is a matter for everyone to decide through this discussion which is about trying to resolve disputes and create a consensus. If you disagree about what 192 or any other editor here considers relevant or irrelevant to this article, then by all means disagree, & explain your reasoning. It may be that you'll be able to persuade one or more of us to your view, at least if you can base your arguments on factual information about the article's topic itself, instead of on your feelings about this anon IP editor. --Yksin 17:05, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Jeff, I am not bowing to any demands. I happen to agree with some of 192's assertions regarding this article's scope. The fact that they write as an IP does not make any difference to me. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 20:20, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

<crosspost with Jeffpw during edit conflict. This is an answer to Ikiroid's post above.> No, it may not be necessary from the article to quote from any testimony or other statements at trial except that which directly discuss junk food. But, a summation of what other expert witnesses based on accounts from reliable published sources should be used. Also I would recommend that people go to the Google Books site & do a search on "Twinkie defense" -- there are some sources which do go into some depth about what the expert witnesses actually said, that do seem to support the view that the Twinkie/junk food material, if not the whole of the defense's "diminished capacity" strategy, played a major role even if it was only Blinder who explicated it. I found one account from a book about the press that says something about an attorney buddy of one of White's attorneys referring him to a book about orthmolecular theories of crime causation, & that that supposedly had something to do with why the junk food testimony got introduced in the first place. One source discusses how the emphasis at trial on psychiatric/psychological causes for White's behavior seemed to amount to an unspoken agreement by prosecution & defense teams to depoliticize the trial, particularly the aspects having to do with disagreements between Moscone/Milk & White about gay-related issues in the city. (Though this may not be directly relevant to the Twinkie defense article, it would certainly be relevant to the one on the Moscone-Milk assassinations.) This may be the same source that criticizes the prosecution for its failure to attack the junk food aspects of the diminished capacity defense, in spite of Blinder's "he was so depressed that the junk food binges exacerbated his irrationality" theory being based on highly questionable junk science. Anyway, I don't have time delineate the sources right now, but may be able to get to it in the next few days. Better if other people could take a look too. --Yksin 16:54, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

You can read more of the book than that online. Don't try to scroll to it, just "Search in this book" for a relevant keyword like "twinkies" and click on the pages in the search results. (This usually works for getting Google Books to cough up more content.) It does quote Levy's brief response to a question from the prosecutor about junk food.

I'm not saying we should quote the whole two paragraphs of Schmidt's closing where he talks about sugar, but quoting the most relevant bits will make our picture of the defense much clearer. I do agree with 192's concerns about inclusion up to a point, but how junk food was discussed at White's trial is much more centrally relevant to the article topic than, say, details about Milk's career. I think we can go into some detail, within reason of course. —Celithemis 20:27, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I went on to google books and I couldn't find anything except for short glossary definitions of "Twinkie Defense." Am I typing in the wrong thing in the search box? Anyway, I don't think we should dive into the LGBT politics too far here—mentioning the victim's homosexuality and the defendant's homophobia is good, but we need to stay in line with the Twinkie Defense itself. The Twinkie Defense was not an LGBT issue per se, as you have mentioned above. It did have repercussions that affected the gay community of San Francisco, but the defense itself was on psychological grounds.

On another note—due to all of the research being conducted here, I'm wondering if we should link this discussion on the page should be linked or moved to Talk:Moscone-Milk assassinations. As it stands, a lot of the information here concerns that and not Twinkie Defense. It bothers me that Moscone-Milk assassinations isn't linked in the article, except for a small spot in "See Also." The first thing under "History" should be

Main article: Moscone-Milk assassinations

Shall I change that? The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 20:20, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

(I hadn't seen this yet when I posted my last comment.) You can use this link for the book I was talking about, and I think this is the one Yksin mentions that suggests an agreement on both sides to depoliticize the case.

I definitely agree with adding the {{Main}} link. —Celithemis 20:41, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Obviously linking to the Moscone-Milk assassinations in some form is good. However, would using a {{Main}} link suggest to readers that the Moscone-Milk assassinations are a subtopic of the Twinkie defense, rather than the Twinkie defense being a subtopic of the Moscone-Milk assassinations? -- 192.250.34.161 13:29, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

No. The {{Main}} link under the History section would be to indicate "we're only going to very briefly discuss the background of the assassinations that led to the trial that led to the coining of the phrase Twinkie defense here, but if you want more info on those assassinations, go to that article over there." No implication whatsoever that "Twinkie defense" is a subsidiary of any other article. --Yksin 22:01, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually, even though {{Main}} is often used in situations like this, the {{Details}} template would probably be more appropriate. —Celithemis 22:42, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

That template works for me. Thanks, Celithemis. --Yksin 22:55, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Benjiboi and consensus

Alright, but I'm not touching the page until all parties are in agreement to what's going to happen. When everyone is at an accord with the goals section, I'll unprotect it and we can go from there. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 20:54, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

(unindent) That might be difficult, as it seems Benjiboi has taken a break to recover from the stress of this. He might be under the impression that he has until September 1 before the article is unlocked. By the way, I would be interested to hear what he has to say about the references. It could be that he did have the reference, but made a mistake inserting it. Perhaps one of you might want to try emailing him about how this is evolving? Jeffpw 21:04, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I attempted to contact him through email a few days ago. I have been checking my email for a response, but have received nothing. We really can't go anywhere here without Benjiboi's input. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 21:18, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree that I'd like to hear from Benjiboi. He also said on his talk page to me something about believing that the Solomon reference might've come directly from the trial transcript but that he didn't have time to go & dig up a trial transcript at the courthouse in San Francisco. I'm not sure if he ever actually saw the trial transcript, or just someone's account in a published source somewhere of what Solomon's testimony in the trial was. I definitely do not think he deliberately placed wrong info into the article. He has expressed, both on his own talk page & at the LGBT wikiproject talk page, the willingness & intention to move background material more related to the Milk-Moscone assassination or other articles to those articles. He has sought feedback from other editors & has been willing to listen to it, when it's not given to him in a hostile, personal attack way, which is what he was getting from 192. Anyway, yes, we need his input to proceed with any actual editing changes. If full protection is set to automatically expire on Sept. 1, as it is, then I say if necessary extend full protection until we can get Benjiboi's participation as well. --Yksin 21:50, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

At this point, we have the Ewing & McCann book making it clear that Solomon did not refer to junk food. We also have the law journal Yksin found, which discusses both Solomon's testimony and the "twinkie defense"; if he did mention junk food, it would be a strange omission for them not to say so. Against that is the possibility that Benjiboi might have seen some source for this claim, which he has not yet cited. However, note that in Benjiboi's comment on his user talk page, he never says that he personally read a source that supported Solomon's remarks -- much less that it was the trial transcipt. He refers to sources "that were there", and suggests that they were moved or switched, clearly referring to sources that were previously in the article. It is perfectly true that the article originally contained a source for the Solomon quotation, as can be seen in this version. At that time, though, the article did not claim Solomon said anything about junk food. I doubt whether Benjiboi, when he made that comment, had managed to see past 192's extreme hostility to understand that the question was not whether Solomon used the words quoted but rather, whether he was referring to junk food when he did.

I agree that Benjiboi did not insert wrong information deliberately, but most likely made a simple editing mistake under the pressure of a very heated edit war. It's unfair and infuriating that he's been driven away by 192's incivility. That said, full protection exists to cool down edit wars, not to save a place in the discussion for someone who has left. I hope Benjiboi will come back soon, but the accuracy problem with this article needs to be fixed whether he does or not. —Celithemis 23:50, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Celithemis, I share your frustration with articles that are fully protected (though I wish all articles were protected from the sometimes vicious whims of anonymous edits). However, the protection here will automatically expire on Friday. It should be possible for Ikiroid to tag this as "accuracy disputed" until it is unlocked. I think that's what should happen to most fully protected articles, in any event. Would that make the wait easier? Jeffpw 06:01, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

It would be just as feasible, and much more appropriate, to replace the sentence about Solomon with the correct original version. This has already been given far more attention than an uncited statement inserted into an article would normally receive; it's time to fix the error. If that happens, I'm not fussed about letting protection expire naturally, as long as it is not extended any further. —Celithemis 01:55, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Celithemis, before we restore the original version, I would like to be sure that everyone knows why we're restoring it. Otherwise, we're re-introducing problems with material that is not directly relevant to the Twinkie defense going into the article. If someone thinks that we're restoring Solomon's testimony on "automatic pilot" because it was part of White's defense & and the Twinkie defense was allegedly part of White's defense & and that's all we need, then we're going backwards.

Now, I can make an argument for Solomon's "automatic pilot" testimony being directly relevant: All POVs are agreed that the defense argued that White was in a state of mind where his capability to deliberate about his actions was diminished, and Solomon's testimony testifies to that state of mind. However, I would rather ask "what sourced facts do we have available that best convey to the reader the defense's main argument about White's state of mind?" and then restore the testimony from Solomon if it is determined to be the best to serve that purpose. -- 192.250.34.161 13:52, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think there's consensus anyway to "restore the original version" or, if there was, which version is considered to be the "original version." I think we probably could, however, get consensus now on removing or amending the statement in the People vs. Dan White section that says "Noted forensic psychiatrist and psychoneuroimmunologist George Solomon testified that with the effects of the junk food diet White had "exploded" and was "sort of on automatic pilot" at the time of the killings" for reasons we know by now: the sources cited doesn't back the claim that Solomon testified about junk food, & so far no one has found a source that does. WP:VERIFY says this claim shouldn't be in the article, period. So, I agree with Celithemis that this should be fixed as soon as possible. I also agree with Celithemis that full protection doesn't exist to save a place for an editor who has left -- I do hope Benjiboi comes back, but if he doesn't, work needs to go on anyway. I am, however, willing to give it more time, especially as I believe that we're still a ways away from having developed consensus on the article as a whole. I agree with Jeffpw that this article should be tagged with an ""accuracy disputed" tag until consensus is developed -- regardless of whether full protection is renewed or not. --Yksin 18:08, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Yksin, I don't think we are disagreeing on what to do to that passage. I am not saying revert the whole article to the version I linked to, but rather, take the sentence about Solomon from that version. This is the same as amending the sentence not to say that Solomon testified about junk food, and restoring a source that actually supports the quotation given. It's a very minor change.

192, I agree that the article will need to be fine tuned to best explain what the defense's argument was and how mention of junk food fit into that. This is simply a stopgap to fix the most glaring issue quickly. Removing the sentence for now is perfectly fine with me too, as long as one or the other gets done quickly. It is a step forward, because at least we will no longer be presenting an inaccurate fact; it's not intended to be the final state.

Full protection does not need to be extended until there is complete consensus on everything. Its purpose under policy is to prevent edit warring, and everyone here is showing willingness to collaborate, so there should be no edit warring. At this point, protection is hurting consensus much more than it helps, because it makes discussing concrete changes so much more difficult. Case in point: the amount of time and discussion being spent on one sentence about Solomon by people who all agree that it is wrong..... —Celithemis 18:39, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

That makes sense. I agree completely that it would be good to let full protection lapse. I still feel a "accuracy disputed" tag should be added. I did not assume that you, Celithemis, were proposing reversion to some particular prior version now. But I to state clearly that, in my opinion, it would be a bigtime sign of bad faith if anyone made such a reversion once full protection is lifted without much more discussion on this talk page having first taken place. --Yksin 19:11, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Sockpuppetry concerns

Responding to 192's #Note to those concerned with my identity and Measl's #Outside view from Measl, which seemed also to be responding to comments made by Jeffpw that I haven't seen made anywhere except Ikiroid's talk page (where Measl also posted his/her comments). -- Anyway, before getting too far into accusations or worries about possible sockpuppetry by 192, it might be a good idea for everyone to take a look at the actual official Wikipedia policy on sockpuppetry, particularly the lead and the section on legitimate uses of multiple accounts.

The lead says, in part:

The reason for discouraging sock puppets is to prevent abuses such as a person voting more than once in a poll, or using multiple accounts to circumvent Wikipedia policies or cause disruption. Some people feel that second accounts should not be used at all; others feel it is harmless if the accounts are behaving acceptably.

Multiple accounts may have legitimate uses, but users must refrain from using them in any way prohibited to sock puppets, and from using one account to support the position of another, the standard definition of sock puppetry.

I will worry about the possibility of 192 being a sockpuppet if & only if it can be shown that there is another account besides 192's that has been editing this article or talk page in a manner that seems to match 192's styles/concerns; or if it can be shown that 192's edit patterns match some other users edit patterns (same articles, same concerns, same votes on AfD's, etc.) elsewhere on Wikipedia. Otherwise, I'm concerned that 192 simply follow the same standards of assuming good faith, civility, no personal attacks, neutral point of view, no original research, and verifiability that people with named accounts are also expected to follow; but also that people with named accounts follow them as well. --Yksin 17:33, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I won't debate the issue with you, Yskin, though I observe you seem to be acting as the anon Ip's attorney now. I will simply respond to your statement that you hadn't seen me claim that anywhere but Ikiroid's talk page. You seem to forget that I discussed it on WJBScribe's talk page, in a message you read (you discussed the message, and your concerns bout my friendship with WJBScribe, in a message to Ikiroid). You may also have seen my concern about this (or at least an allusion to the issue) on the anon IP's talk page. I have been concerned about it--though not obsessed, as the anon IP incivilly states above--since I saw him behaving rudely enough to drive Benjiboi away from this project. Jeffpw 19:05, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, you're correct that I saw your concerns about possible sockpuppetry on WJBscribe's talk page & on the 192 talk page. However, what I was referring to when I said that Measl "seemed also to be responding to comments made by Jeffpw that I haven't seen made anywhere except Ikiroid's talk page" was Measl's statement reading "2. Jeffpw. Despite your assertions to the contrary, you do not come across as 'watching this whole affair from the outside looking in'. Your words have a feel of 'interested party', even though I agree with you." That was responding to something you said on Ikiroid's talk page, but not here -- which may have been a matter of confusion to other people here who had not read your comments on Ikiroid's talk page. -- Re: your "observation" that I am "acting as the anon Ip's attorney now": no, I am merely stating my opinion about the sockpuppetry allegations, based on what Wikipedia policy says. If you are concerned that 192 may be a sockpuppet, it's your privilege to have that concern. Based on my reading of Wikipedia policies, it's not a concern I share. Policy says "Some people feel that second accounts should not be used at all; others feel it is harmless if the accounts are behaving acceptably." I'm of the latter type. --Yksin 19:21, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I've read the essay, too, Yksin, and I do not feel it is harmless, at least in this case. It seems to me, especially since this anon IP has more or less admitted that they are an experienced editor, there is a chance they are trying to avoid scrutiny or circumvent policy. I further think they would not have been nearly as aggressive or uncivil to Benjiboi had they been editing under their registered account. In any event, I have stated my concerns at an administrative level. As a regular user there's not much more I can do. I'm moving on and am finished with this issue. Jeffpw 19:51, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Since your last edit summary said "I'm finished here," I realize you may not answer this. Nonetheless: first to state, WP:SOCK is not just an "essay" -- it's official Wikipedia policy. Second, I agree that incivility & personal attacks are unacceptable behavior. But that's the case whether the user is an anon IP editor or a registered user. I haven't seen that using a registered account make that much of a difference to one's ability or desire to be civil. We've been dealing with a rampantly uncivil user for two or three months at Battle of Washita River whose incivility & edit warring has been a major factor in at least two articles going on full protection for lengthy periods of time (one of them, The Holocaust, has been on full protection since August 3). That user's registered account sure hasn't stopped him from engaging incivility, personal attacks, trolling, etc. Since you have concerns about 192, it's good that you've registered them. For my part, I've registered my concerns regarding what I'm concerned about with 192's behavior: his/her incivility.

I'm not ready to impute motives about why s/he prefers to edit anonymously. His/her statement at #Note to those concerned with my identity implies that s/he might have previously had a registered account s/he retired because someone penetrated his/her identity & made trouble for his/her personal life, so that s/he retired that account -- as is anyone's right under the right to vanish. If that's the case, seems that 192 transferred to using the 192 anon IP as a form of changing username in order to protect his/her privacy -- also his/her right. I personally think it's a lot harder to protect one's privacy as an anon IP registered to a particular business or institution because, as the Wikimedia Foundation's privacy policy says, "It may be possible that the origin of this IP address could be used in conjunction with any interests you express implicitly or explicitly by editing articles to identify you even by private individuals." I told 192 as much on my talk page. But if 192 doesn't choose to get a registered account, that's his/her business, not mine. It should be pretty obvious to him/her by now that a lot of people don't trust anon IP editors; & since at least some users at that IP address engage in standard everyday anon IP vandalism, s/he might expect even to get blocked sometimes. Apparently s/he has decided to live with that. Doesn't make a lot of difference to me, so long as when s/he edits on this article & talk page, or the user talk pages of other people involved with this article, s/he follows the same Wikipedia policies that everyone is supposed to follow. Including you & me. --Yksin 20:41, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Goals

I think one of the first things we should do here is have each involved editor express their problems with the article, and what they want to see added or removed. Let's avoid referring to the other people involved, and just talk about the article itself. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 02:40, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Proposed goals by Yksin

Since I'm now involved, I'll contribute here. Goals that I see:

1. Move superfluous material to other, more relevant articles such as Moscone-Milk assassinations and White Night Riots. This would include those portions of the article which don't discuss the Twinkie defense itself or items directly relevant to it, such as diminished capacity. At the very least this would include most of the "Background to assassinations" section.

   And as mentioned above, we should add {{main|Moscone-Milk assassination}}. Any information mentioned here about it should also be in the respective articles, since we are doing this summary-style. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 20:52, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

2. Re: the Popular culture section, I agree with 192's suggestion earlier on this talk page) that "we keep only those items which actually show how the myth of the 'Twinkie defense' is perceived in the public consciousness." There's a lot of cruft here presently.
3. Reference check. Anything that cannot be backed by the cited sources needs to be removed or rewritten to reflect what the sources really say. E.g., as 192 has pointed out, this sentence -- "Noted forensic psychiatrist and psychoneuroimmunologist George Solomon testified that with the effects of the junk food diet White had 'exploded' and was 'sort of on automatic pilot' at the time of the killings." -- is not in any way backed up by the two sources cited in its support.
4. Then see where to go from there. --Yksin 17:41, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Proposed goals by 192.250.34.161

1. Check the citations of all material that has been added since this version. We know for a fact that at least one major claim was added with citations that did not support the claim; we cannot assume that was the only one.
   1. Even when the citations support the claim, we need to verify that the sources are reliable sources, and not merely private parties giving their own opinions.
   2. Since we are dealing with a matter -- the alleged first use of a "Twinkie defense" in the trial of Dan White -- where reliable sources have examined the evidence for and against it, and have judged it to be more urban legend than reality, any sources that are added to support a claim that it was real after all must show that they too have examined the evidence. (An analogy to show why this position is needed: The page on Tommy Hilfiger discusses and dismisses as an urban legend the claim that he expressed dismay on the Oprah Winfrey Show about blacks and Asians wearing his clothes. If someone wanted to claim that Hilfiger's and Oprah's denials were false and that Hilfiger really had made such remarks, it would not be sufficient to attribute the claim to a source which simply told the original story with no questioning of its veracity.)
2. Check the relevance of all material that has been added since this version. Check specifically whether it is relevant to the Twinkie defense and sheds light on the Twinkie defense, or whether it is only relevant to something else, which is in turn relevant to the Twinkie defense.
   1. Be especially wary of anything which has been justified as "context" or "background". Either an actual connection to the Twinkie defense supported by reliable sources can be made, or it can't. Remember that original research includes "a synthesis of published material serving to advance a position."
   2. If material proves to be well-sourced and well-written, but not relevant to the subject of the Twinkie defense except through some other subject, we may examine the existing article for that other subject and see if the material can be transferred to that other article.
3. Whatever standard for relevance is decided on, make sure that standard is consistently applied, to follow the principle of NPOV. i.e., if it's decided that everything relevant to People vs. White is relevant here (a decision I am not recommending, only offering for argument) then the fact that Dan White killed himself less than two years after his release from prison is certainly as relevant, if not more, than the fact that a band out there named itself after two words spoken by a witness for the defense.
4. Improve the references in popular culture section by removing those entries that don't tell us something about the Twinkie defense. Merely telling us it appeared on an episode of one show or another tells us nothing except that the Twinkie defense has entered common folklore, and we do not need multiple examples to source that point.
5. After all the above, carefully examine the article at that stage to see if anything is missing which should be there. This includes discussion of Harvey Milk's homosexuality, but it must be remembered that discussion of Harvey Milk's homosexuality is not the goal. The goal is a good article on the Twinkie defense.
6. See where to go from there. -- 192.250.34.161 19:29, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Straw polls

For creation of straw polls to get an idea of where consensus might be forming, & where disputes still exist.

Straw poll on alleged Solomon "junk food" testimony

I would like to initiate a straw poll on about the statement in the People vs. Dan White section that says "Noted forensic psychiatrist and psychoneuroimmunologist George Solomon testified that with the effects of the junk food diet White had 'exploded' and was 'sort of on automatic pilot' at the time of the killings." I propose that the sentence be removed because:

1. The sources cited -- "Myth of the 'Twinkie' defense" & "The Martyrdom of George Moscone" -- do not back up the claim that Solomon said anything about junk food in his testimony, nor have we thus far been able to find any source which verifies a claim that Solomon testified about junk food. If such a source can be found, the statement can be added back at that time.
2. the sources cited do not contain the quotations about White having "exploded" or being on "sort of on automatic pilot." Other sources exist which verify those quotes; if it's decided later that those quotations from Solomon's testimony are relevant, that portion of the sentence can be added back with the proper sources. --Yksin 18:39, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

---

Please register that you support or oppose the proposal. You can also abstain or propose to modify the proposal. This straw poll is intended as a means to gauge if we are approaching consensus on this topic, rather than as a vote; see Wikipedia:Straw polls.

• Support. By WP:VERIFY, the claim that Solomon testified about junk food shouldn't be in the article, period, unless the claim can be verified. (I.e., the trial transcript.) The "exploded" & "sort of on automatic pilot" quotes, if they are to be in the article at all, need different sources which actually contain these quotations. --Yksin 18:45, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

• Support. —Celithemis 18:49, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

• Support. -192.250.34.161 21:12, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Note from the Outside loooking In

Note: As this comment seemed clearly related to the RfC, I've moved it there, to #Outside view from Measl. --Yksin 16:16, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Proceeding

Well, there's no edit war. Which is good. But there's also been no substantial progress, which is not good, because the article is still in a very bad state.

I understand that this may be an unpopular proposal, but I would simply ask that people assume good faith, and realize that it is a serious proposal that I have considered carefully. I think that we should return to this version, and then ask which of the changes made after that version were good changes, rather than continuing to regard the current version as the base for future improvement.

I realize this proposal will sound too drastic to some. I assure you that I have spent several days trying to find some alternative which would render the same benefit but in an easier series of steps. I returned to this proposal only reluctantly, when I realized that the problems with the current article were simply too large. If it were only the problems with WP:RS and WP:VERIFY, then I would say "let's start with the article as-is and remove the material that is poorly sourced." If it were only the problems with WP:NPOV, then I would say "let's start with the article as-is, and correct the problems with tone and balance." If it were only the problems with relevance, then I would say "let's start with the article as-is, and gently prune away that material which wanders too far away from our actual subject." But after much hard thought, I simply don't think we can do that. The problems are too deeply intertwined and if we try to address them one at a time, inevitably a lot of effort is going to be put into rescuing material that just can't be rescued.

If we have the energy and determination between us to do a complete job, then we can certainly do the complete job of salvaging anyt material worth salvaging just as well as we could do the job of removing any material that is poorly sourced, biased, or irrelevant. If we cannot guarantee that the job will be completed, however, I think it better to leave some possible improvements for future editors to discover and execute than to leave in place material that never should have gone in in the first place. If anyone disagrees, then I ask them to propose their own plan for addressing the problems of this article. -- 192.250.34.161 20:20, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Support with modifications. After thinking about this for awhile (& not just today, but since you first proposed it awhile back), I think I generally support this proposal. My reasoning: because a large proportion of the stuff added since needs anyway to be removed to articles to which it's more appropriate (e.g., Dan White, Moscone-Milk assassinations); Benjiboi himself (who added a lot of this material) pretty much acknowledged this. I suggest:

1. Revert to the version you suggest (from May 2007).
2. Ensure that that version is fully & accurately sourced.
3. Create a sandbox (as a sub-page of this talk page) containing the article is it exists right now, for evaluation of what's been added since the May version. From the sandbox, decisions about what should be incorporated back into this article, & what needs to be moved to other more appropriate articles, can be made through discussion on this talk page.
4. In order to prevent misunderstandings & hopefully to promote/increase trust & assumptions of good faith between editors, substantive changes to the article should be discussed on the talk page first; & when edits are made, edit summaries should always be used.
5. Editors should make a commitment to refraining from commentary on other editors or their presumed motivations whether on the talk page or in edit summaries. Focus on content (in line with Wikipedia's content policies), not on personalities.

Can we give this a few days for discussion before actually acting on it? --Yksin 21:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Any comments? It's been five days since this proposal & my modified proposal were put forward. Are there any comments from other editors? Or should we just proceed? Also wondering if 192 had comments about my proposed modifications. --Yksin 00:07, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I would just go ahead and do what you want here, Yksin. You and the anon have made certain that the primary contributing editor to this article, Benjiboi, will no longer edit here, and I have no interest in collaborating. I am removing this article from my watchlist now, and it is a matter of complete indifference to me what turn it takes. Happy editing. You won. Jeffpw 06:16, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Yskin -- I support your modified proposal, and I apologize for my lateness in replying to it. Two points that I would like to suggest might be clarified (I do not think they would be considered modifications of your proposal, but you or others might disagree):

1. Because of the issue of questionable sourcing, the decision to move material from the sandbox to some other article should be discussed on the talk page just as moving it from the sandbox into this article should be.
2. "commentary on other editors" should not be construed so as to bar acknowledgement of the editing behavior of those editors. In other words, it may be out of line to speculate as to why a particular editor chose to use an undergraduate term paper as a source, or whether that particular editor knew that undergraduate term papers would be very unlikely to meet the policy on reliable sources, but it would be allowed for other editors to note that that particular editor had used an undergraduate term paper for a source.

It is my hope that we may have sufficient editors who are interested in fixing the article to move forward with fixing it. -- 192.250.34.161 14:50, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Replying to 192.

Commentary on other editors. My intent with the stipulation about "refraining from commentary on other editors or their presumed motivations whether on the talk page or in edit summaries" is about civility & avoidance of personal attacks, both of which are central Wikipedia user conduct policies, included under the Five pillars of Wikipedia. So, for example, an edit summary such as As already discussed on talk page, material is UNSOURCED WITH FAKE CITATIONS, IRRELEVANT, or BOTH. Would work with honest editor on this issue but see no signs that Benjiboi is one. goes beyond making a point about problematic content/sources, by also making a personal attack on another editor. An edit summary saying removing material added by Benjiboi; as stated on talk page, sources provided seem unreliable, irrelevant, and/or don't support the claims asserted gets the point across, without making a personal attack, thereby leaving room for discussion instead of promoting conflict.

Re: your high school paper example: an edit summary saying rm material added by User:Whomsoever; his/her supporting source was a high school paper, which is not a reliable source seems fine -- it acknowledges which user added the problem source, without attacking that user or casting aspersions on his/her presumed motivations.

There obviously was some conflict in the past, with problems on both sides (not just yours), which has damaged trust, possibly irrevocably, between you on one hand & Benjiboi on the other. And so, Benjiboi has chosen to stay away from working on this article, and Jeffpw has chosen to blame me as well as you because of my agreement with you on content issues (& in spite of my criticism of you on user conduct issues). Okay, well... not much I can do about that. I can't change the past of how work on this article happened, but I can ask that all future work on this article be conducted in an atmosphere of civility & commitment to the full scope of Wikipedia policies -- content policies and user-conduct policies alike.

Questionable sourcing. I think that all sources should be verified, whether in the May 2007 version we are discussing reverting to or in the sandbox version (article as it currently exists). Only after all info in either version is verified through source checking, etc. -- which also means removing material that can't be verified by reliable sources -- should work proceed from there. That's my feeling. After that has happened with the sandbox version, then the purpose of any discussion on this talk page would be to determine what if any of that material should go back into the main article. Of course we an also discuss which other articles it might better go in, but I don't think discussion on this talk page can be considered as the final word on what material can be in other articles -- that's finally up to the editors on those articles (which may or may not include some of us), & whatever consensus they develop on the talk pages of those articles.

I should mention that since reading a good lot of Salter's The Trial of Dan White, I think that an article specifically about the trial itself would actually make a good & notable, constructed as a combination of a sort of play by play of the trial (brief summaries of trial testimony by various witnesses), framed by the kind of background & aftermath info Benjiboi worked up for this article. I've mentioned the possibility to Benjiboi, & he seems interested in the idea, though he's not made an absolute commitment to himself working on it. You, 192, seem to trust that I'm committed to an accurate representation in that or any article of what reliable sources say; I'd ask that if such an article is created & Benjiboi takes part it in, that you give him some space. As you know, I disagree with you that he has ever intentionally edited in bad faith, but it seems better for the sake of avoiding conflict for the two of you to stay away from each other.

However, I realized that I've stacked up a few commitments to various articles, & I'm confusing myself. So... I'm in the process both of organizing my work & then working on the various articles I've made a commitment to on Wikipedia. Right now I'm more actively working on Battle of Washita River, as those commitments are of longest standing. But I will return to this article, & possibly also work on a new article on the trial overall, as soon as I can. --Yksin 03:36, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Sandbox

Per discussion above, the article version as of 1 Oct 2007 has been placed in the Sandbox for verification & movement of material deemed to belong in other articles, to those articles. --Yksin 02:43, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Reverting to version as of 31 May 2007

Also per discussion above, the article is being reverted to the version as of 09:33, 31 May 2007. Work will continue on the article from that status.

Please use edit summaries to explain your edits when making them in order to help prevent confusion & conflict, & if disagreements do develop, please discuss them here on the talk page with civility & an assumption of good faith -- which generally works better than namecalling & edit warring. Thanks. --Yksin 02:43, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

New sources

I'm adding this section for discussion of new sources that might be helpful in improving this article. --Yksin 22:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

The Trial of Dan White by Salter (1991)

A few days ago I mentioned Kenneth W. Salter's The Trial of Dan White (1991) as a possible source for more info on what was actually said at Dan White's trial. I made an interlibrary loan request at the time, & received it a couple of days ago. I haven't read it yet, but I've looked at it: it's essentially a casebook that's suitable for study in a law school, but it's not a technical, lawyerspeak book & is suitable for a general audience too. Mainly, it's a nearly complete transcript of the trial, in which the only stuff that's been edited out (according to the compiler) is repetitive testimony & the stuff that was kept away from jurors (such as conferences between attorneys & judge about what was admissible evidence, etc.). So it's as complete as you're going to get of a full trial transcript short of visiting the courthouse yourself & paying megabucks for a complete transcript. There's also questions for discussion, in a separate section of the book. So, this will be an excellent reference for what exactly was truly said about junk food at trial, as well as what the other expert witnesses who testified on diminished capacity but did not mention junk food. Since this book is not available online, but others may also want to see it, I encourage you to see if you can get it in your local library or through interlibrary loan. Here's its record at Worldcat. --Yksin 22:18, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Quotations in references

I have just removed a number of lengthy quotations that were recently added to existing references. Quotations can be worth including in references when seeing the exact phrasing of the cited source, or exact details in the cited source, can clarify the point that was being cited. However, that isn't the case for any of these three quotations; they don't add anything to the understanding of the points in question. -- 192.250.34.161 14:41, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

The twinkie defense as myth

The intro to this article should make it clear that the twinkie defense is a myth - no one claimed twinkies made them do it, despite popular belief. So many people believe this is the case, that the first thing in the article should say it isn't.

216.57.220.63 22:38, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Trivia items removed from article

I've moved here the following items that were in the "References in popular culture" section. I believe that some of them can still be integrated to show significance but it's going to have to be done carefully to avoid original research. -- 192.250.34.161 16:29, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

• The Dead Kennedys satirized the White verdict in their reinterpretation of "I Fought the Law". Jello Biafra, the lead singer of the now defunct Dead Kennedys, summarized the defense in his 1989 spoken word album High Priest of Harmful Matter − Tales from the Trial as a precursor to his own trial for distribution of harmful material to minors.

• The term was used in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Episode #1-11 "Out of Mind, Out of Sight". Cordelia Chase used it to disparage Shylock's famous "Hath not a Jew eyes?" speech during a class discussion of The Merchant of Venice. The speech is from Act III, Scene 1.

• The term was also used on the TV show Curb Your Enthusiasm, season 5 episode 4 - "The Kamikaze Bingo" - in which it was humorously used to point out that an old woman's cheating at bingo in a nursing home could not be excused by high levels of medication.

• The term was used in the 1991 Roseanne episode "Home Ec".

• In the 1996 film The Truth About Cats & Dogs, Dr. Abby Barnes (Janeane Garofalo) discovers that her friend Noelle (Uma Thurman) was unable to clear up a case of mistaken identity with a man both are interested in. Noelle: Maybe it was all the cake he fed me. Dr. Abby Barnes: What is that, the twinkie defense?

• In the 2006 film Half Nelson, a student recites a report about the White case, intertwined with video from press coverage of the trial. He concludes his report, "This came to be known as the Twinkie defense," then looks to the left, laughs, and says, "Is that for real?"

• In the 2000 Law & Order episode "Thin Ice", characters reference the Twinkie defense during a discussion of a homicide defendant asserting a psychological defense of "sports rage".

• In the X-Files episode "Sein Und Zeit", Skinner mentioned that Mulder was using a "Twinkie defense".

• A similar defense appears in the film Trial and Error, when an expert witness is called to testify that sugar in the Twinkies the defendant had eaten is chemically similar to cocaine, so the defendant's actions should be treated as if in a drug-induced state.

Like a good editor, I wanted to read this page before adding, so in case these references are considered appropriate and re-introduced in the future, I wanted to point out another L&O episode which ridiculed the concept; in "Castoff" a sadist killer tries to claim that too much violent TV and movies caused his behavior, prompting Jack McCoy to argue against allowing testimony to same, stating "...he might as well claim that moonbeams or Twinkies made him do it." The defense lawyer in said episode in fact references Antonin Scalia's remark prior to proposing the defense... Enigmatic2k3 (talk) 19:39, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

References

Woodall

I've just removed the following sentence:

The "twinkie defense" was described in detail in Massachusetts Mut. Life Ins. Co. v. Woodall, 304 F.Supp.2d 1364, 1377 n. 7 (S.D.Ga. 2003).

I removed it because:

• I'm not certain that it's even true; the only reference I can find that even suggests that the "twinkie defense" was described in Woodall was http://www.law.arizona.edu/journals/alr/ALR2005/vol472/Lewis%20Final%20Note.pdf, where Woodall and the "twinkie defense" are described in the same footnote but the connection is not spelled out, and Woodall is implied to be a case where genetic factors, rather than ingestion of any substance, were argued to be a causative element of the crime.
• Even if it's true, the sentence as given gives us no idea what role the description played -- minor, major, critical, for the defendants, for the plaintiff -- it does not enhance our understanding of the subject.

-- 192.250.34.161 16:37, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

(understatement)

In the quote from "Myth of the 'Twinkie defense'", there is the line "dislike (understatement) of homosexuals." Although "(understatement)" is in the quote from this article, I believe that it was added by Carol Pogash, the author of the article, to the quote from Herb Caen.

To be clear: it appears that Mr. Caen said "dislike of homosexuals." and Ms. Pogash added "(understatement)."

This Wikipedia article claims to be quoting Mr. Caen, so the editorial comments of Ms. Pogash should not be included.

I did not remove the offending parenthetical because there is a note in the text not to. Could somebody find out whether it belongs or not and proceed accordingly? 71.207.65.170 (talk) 19:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

I've removed the "(understatement)" as it seems very unlikely that it is part of the original quote. It is fairly obvious that it is an editorial comment by Ms. Pogash and should not be included in the quote. If (and only if) somebody can demonstrate otherwise, it should be returned to the text. Rugbyhelp (talk) 08:10, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

It's pathetically easy to verify that "(understatement)" is in fact part of the original quote. It's a hilarious commentary on the state of Wikipedia: some self-righteous editor comes along, finds a correct quote, and without even attempting to verify it, turns it into an incorrect quote. "I don't actually have any facts on my side," he says, "I am just altering direct quotes based on my idea of what's 'fairly obvious.' However, I am the only one allowed to do this; if you want to restore the quote to the version that is actually supported by citations" (as the version which omits the parenthetical is not) "you must provide even more citations, and of course there is no reason to think I will accept them any more than I accepted those we already had." Five seconds with Google allowed me to find a printed reference from 1979 which contains the Caen quote in its unmutilated form - oh, but I'm sure "Rugbyhelp" will inform us that it's "fairly obvious" that Carol Pogash must have gone specifically to that 1979 reference and copied their version of the quote without ever checking it against the original. -- 192.250.175.26 (talk) 12:56, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Improbable legal defense

This bit seems problematic and not well supported by the article. In fact, what was referred to as the Twinkie defense was successful. An excusatory defense? I'm not sure what the phrasing should be, but I find the opening paragraphs rather misleading. It worked, it was derided by some in the media and seen as showing a biased result, and it resulted in changes in the legal process. Whether it is "improbable" or not seems to be a matter of opinion. Lot's of legal defenses are improbable. That doesn't seem to be the key to what this phrase means or its notability. ChildofMidnight (talk) 04:23, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

General Article

This defence was characteristic of a time when all sorts of bizarre defences were being used. That time appeared to have passed. Shouldn't it be incorporated into a general article on that situation? Also while the rule now seems to be that this type of thing doesn't happen there are exceptions. See http://news.ninemsn.com.au/world/7964673/us-man-claims-caffeine-insanity Yeenar (talk) 01:11, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

It was quite prominent in its time and for years afterwards. I see no need to merge. AnonMoos (talk) 20:47, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

No Mention of Diabetes in Support of the Twinkie Defense

I find it odd there is no mention of diabetes in this article, considering the widespread epidemic of diabetes in the modern century, and the prevalence of high sugary soft drinks, candies, candy bars, and other junk foods (such as twinkies) in the modern diet. Many people who have become diabetic from this modern diet, do not know it... and even if they do, they unable to quit their addictions to this highly toxic food.

In a layman's term nutshell, diabetes works like this; your brain does not have any fat or food stores in it, and so is highly affected by the amount of glucose in your blood. When you eat something excessively sugary, or a food with a high glycemic index, your blood sugar spikes. High blood sugar levels is damaging to the bodies cells, so your pancreas stops releasing blood sugar from your stored fats. Your pancreas releases insulin, telling your body's cells to fix the problem, and take up more sugar. You feel energized on a sugar high, until the glucose in your blood stream runs out, and then you crash... it takes quite a while for the pancreas to respond and start releasing stored energy again... the "sugar blues". Your brain is not getting enough glucose, and starved for energy, it becomes hard, if not impossible, to make decisions. Your judgement becomes extremely flawed and impaired.

Being and feeling fatigued is an awful state to be in, so you reach for another convenient sugary soft drink or snack to feel the high again. Which works, but when it wears of again, you crash. So you reach again for more soft drinks or sugary foods. And the cycle loops in a vicious cycle. Eventually your cells become so insulin resistance, you are diabetic. It doesn't take long.... binging for a couple of months on soft drinks as a teenager will do it.

If you are diabetic, and you do not know it... while you are on a sugar low, your judgement and ability to function properly is drastically reduced and impaired. Simple decisions become difficult. Often your decisions are flawed. You feel tired, fatigued, and can not concentrate.

One could argue that if someone was on a sugar low, and made very flawed decisions which lead to injury or a crime, that they were responsible because they drank or ate something which lead to that state or condition of impairment... similar to a drug user using drugs.

The counter argument would be, that would be true if there were warning labels on these fake foods... that they impair judgment. Obviously they are not, and the food industry needs to be held accountable for selling toxic fake foods with a high profit margin at the expense of the public's sanity, cognitive function, and health.

If you knew drugs or high amounts of sugar impaired your ability to function, and you did them anyway, you would be responsible. However, there would be mitigating circumstances, such as your inability to quit... as drugs and sugar are highly addictive on their chemical effect on their brain.

Other diseases, and conditions, obviously, impair judgement and brain function. The ancient roman legal system, upon which modern law is founded, makes an unjust assumption that the human brain is some how independent and apart from the body, and always functioning at a near optimal capability... and so every individual must be held to the highest moral standard for the accuracy of their judgements, at every moment... which is just total hogwash. The truth of the matter is the brain, is very affected, sensitive, and dependent upon the current environment and state of the human body in which it resides. A body poisoned by toxic foods, infections, poisons, failing health conditions, and so on, is going to highly affect ones ability to think properly, straight, or even anywhere near optimal levels. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.226.11.248 (talk) 17:36, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

Neologism tag

The article bears a {{neologism}} tag, so I will address the question of adequate sources that discuss and define the term rather than merely mention it, especially since there is so much myth associated. There is no question that the term is in usage. Two newspaper articles mentioned it one week before I initiated this thread.[9][10] As for sources discussing the case in detail, a brief search yielded chronologically:

• Pepperdine Law Review 1987
• SF Gate 2003
• Book 2006
• Book 2010
• BBC News 2015
• The Crime Report 2017

I'm not going to make any immediate unilateral decision, but I think there is sufficient evidence of usage and adequate sources to remove the tag. BiologicalMe (talk) 16:11, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm going to remove it. Anyone could still take this to AfD if in doubt, but I don't think they'd get very far. --BDD (talk) 18:04, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Lead sentence

I'm concerned the first sentence in the lead is unnecessarily complicated and hard for a lay-reader to comprehend. Thoughts? It currently reads: ""Twinkie defense" is a derisive label for an improbable legal defense as commonly understood; it is perhaps also a sardonic label in reference to a secondary aspect of an actual legal defense, among the better informed, concerning the prospect of conflation in the minds of some future jury between a bad, sugary diet as evidence of declining psychological function and a sugar rush as actively exculpatory (due to the more of the same cognitive foibles that so quickly lead the common public to misunderstand the issue in the first place)." Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 12:59, 9 November 2022 (UTC)