This article was written with a lot of help from Johnuniq, who also created the map. Ekem wrote the complications section.
Today's featured article, 6 February 2015
Female genital mutilation (FGM) is the ritual removal of the external female genitalia. Typically carried out by a traditional circumciser with a blade, the practice is found in Africa, Asia and the Middle East, and within diaspora communities around the world. UNICEF estimated in 2016 that over 200 million women and girls in 30 countries were living with FGM.
Known for its incarceration of London's debtors, the Marshalea prison in Southwark looked like an Oxbridge college and functioned as an extortion racket. Prisoners unable to pay the jailor's fee faced starvation, thumbscrews and skullcaps; during a warm spell in 1729 eight to ten prisoners died every day. The brick wall that marked the prison's southern boundary is all that remains of what Charles Dickens called "the crowding ghosts of many miserable years".
The Brown Dog affair was a controversy about vivisection. In 1903 researchers at University College London were accused of having performed an illegal dissection on a brown terrier dog—anaesthetized, according to the researchers; struggling, according to feminists who infiltrated the lecture. A statue in the dog's memory—"Men and women of England, how long shall these things be?"—led to the Brown Dog riots of 1907, when medical students clashed with suffragettes, trade unionists and the police.
The Holocaust was the World War II genocide of the European Jews. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators murdered some six million Jews, around two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population. The murders were carried out in pogroms and mass shootings; by a policy of extermination through labour in concentration camps; and in gas chambers and gas vans in German extermination camps, chiefly Auschwitz, Bełżec, Chełmno, Majdanek, Sobibór, and Treblinka in occupied Poland.
Night (1960) is a work by Elie Wiesel about his experience with his father in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps during the Holocaust. In just over 100 pages, Wiesel writes about the death of God and his own disgust with humanity, reflected in the inversion of the parent–child relationship as his father declines to a helpless state and Wiesel becomes his resentful teenage caregiver. The book's title derives from the Jewish tradition of starting a new day from nightfall. "Everything came to an end," Wiesel wrote. " ... And yet we begin again with night."
Konzentrationslager Auschwitz was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland during World War II. Of the estimated 1.3 million inmates, at least 1.1 million died, 90 percent of them Jews. Prisoners were killed by gassing, starvation, working conditions, beatings and medical experiments. Primo Levi wrote of the camp's liberation in 1945 by the Red Army:
They did not greet us, nor did they smile; they seemed oppressed not only by compassion but by a confused restraint ... It was that shame we knew so well ... the shame the Germans did not know, that the just man experiences at another man's crime; the feeling of guilt that such a crime should exist, that it should have been introduced irrevocably into the world of things that exist ...
Joel Brand (1906–1964) was a rescue worker who became known during the Holocaust for his efforts to save Hungary's Jews from deportation to Auschwitz. Brand was asked by SS officer Adolf Eichmann to broker a deal between the SS and the Western Allies to exchange one million Hungarian Jews for 10,000 trucks. The deal was thwarted by the British government, to Brand's great distress. He told an interviewer: "An accident of life placed the fate of one million human beings on my shoulders. I eat and sleep and think only of them."
Rudolf Vrba (1924–2006) escaped from the Auschwitz concentration camp as a teenager in April 1944, and co-authored the Vrba–Wetzler report with fellow escapee Alfred Wetzler. The report was one of the earliest detailed descriptions of the mass murder taking place inside the camp. Publication of its material is credited with having saved hundreds of thousands of lives by halting the deportation of Hungary's Jews to Auschwitz.
The Vrba–Wetzler report was an early account of the mass murder taking place inside the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland. It contains a detailed description of the gas chambers and an early estimate of the numbers being killed.
The Sonderkommando photographs are four blurred photographs taken secretly in August 1944 inside the Auschwitz concentration camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. Alberto Errera, an inmate, took two shots from inside a gas chamber and two outside, shooting from the hip. The Polish resistance smuggled the film out of the camp in a toothpaste tube.
Interessen‐Gemeinschaft Farbenindustrie AG was a German chemical pharmaceutical conglomerate that was formed from a merger of six chemical companies—including BASF, Bayer, Hoechst, and Agfa—and seized by the Allies after World War II. Described as "the most notorious German industrial concern during the Third Reich", IG Farben relied on slave labour from concentration camps, including 30,000 inmates from Auschwitz.
The Auschwitz Erkennungsdienst was a kommando of SS officers and prisoners who photographed camp events in the Auschwitz concentration camp. The Erkennungsdienst also took photographs of inmates, including gassings, experiments, escape attempts, suicides, and portraits of registered prisoners when they first arrived. The Erkennungsdienst took the 193 photographs that came to be known as the Auschwitz Album, which included images of Hungarian Jews in 1944 just before they were gassed.
The Kanada warehouses were storage facilities in the Auschwitz concentration camp where the stolen belongings of prisoners, mostly Jews who had been sent to the gas chamber, were sorted before being sent to Germany and to other camps. Known as "Kanada" because they were viewed as the land of plenty, the warehouses were sources of goods that inmates who worked there could use to save their lives.
The Kastner train consisted of 35 cattle trucks that left Budapest on 30 June 1944, during the German occupation of Hungary, carrying around 1,700 Jews to Switzerland. The train was named after Rudolf Kastner(left), who negotiated with Adolf Eichmann, the SS officer in charge of deporting Hungary's Jews to Auschwitz, to allow the passengers to escape in exchange for gold, diamonds and cash.
Ezra Pound (1885–1972) was an American poet, a major figure of the early modernist movement, an antisemite, and a fascist collaborator in Italy during World War II. Working for literary magazines in London in the early 20th century, he helped discover the work of contemporaries such as T. S. Eliot and James Joyce. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, after moving to Italy, he expressed support for Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini.
The American poet Ezra Pound recorded or composed hundreds of broadcasts in support of fascism for Italian radio during World War II and the Holocaust in Italy. Containing deeply antisemitic and racist material, the broadcasts were transmitted to England, central Europe, and the United States.
Study 329 was a clinical trial conducted in North America from 1994 to 1998 to study the efficacy of the SSRI anti-depressant paroxetine (Paxil, Seroxat) in treating depressed teenagers. The study became controversial when it was discovered that the article reporting the trial results had been ghostwritten by a PR firm hired by the drug company, which had downplayed the negative findings. The controversy strengthened calls for drug companies to disclose all their clinical research data. New Scientist wrote in 2015: "You may never have heard of it, but Study 329 changed medicine."
The Austrian psychoanalyst, Wilhelm Reich (1897–1957), was one of the most radical figures in the history of psychiatry. After working with Freud, he became a controversial figure, massaging his patients, arguing that mental health depended on "orgastic potency", and insisting he had discovered a life force, "orgone", which he said others called God. Moving to America, he built orgone accumulators for his patients to sit in, triggering stories about sex boxes that cured cancer.
Christian Science, a new religious movement, was developed in the 19th century in the United States by Mary Baker Eddy (1821–1910) and described in her book Science and Health (1875). Christian Scientists believe that spiritual reality is the only reality, that the material world, including sickness and death, is an illusion, and that sickness should be healed by prayer alone. Between the 1880s and 1990s the avoidance of medical treatment led to the deaths of several adherents and their children.
The Life of Mary Baker G. Eddy and the History of Christian Science (1909) is a highly critical account of Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science. Although attributed to a McClure's researcher, it appears the articles were the first extended work of the novelist Willa Cather (left). According to David Stouck, the portrayal of Eddy contains "some of the finest portrait sketches and reflections on human nature that Willa Cather would ever write".
The White House Farm murders took place near the English village of Tolleshunt D'Arcy on 7 August 1985, when Nevill and June Bamber, their adult daughter and her six-year-old twin sons, were shot and killed inside the Bambers' farmhouse. It became one of England's most notorious criminal cases. The surviving member of the immediate family, Jeremy Bamber, was given five life sentences and has protested his innocence ever since.
PC Keith Blakelock (1945–1985) was a British police officer who was murdered during rioting in north London. The violence broke out after a black woman died of heart failure during a police search of her home. Forced back by rioters, Blakelock stumbled and fell, and was surrounded by a crowd. He was stabbed over 40 times and left with a six-inch-long knife embedded in his neck up to the hilt. Police and fire officers ran back into the crowd in an effort to save him, including his sergeant, who was awarded the George Medal.
Ian Tomlinson (1962–2009) collapsed and died on his way home during the G-20 London summit protests. A week later The Guardian obtained footage showing a police officer strike him on the leg and push him to the ground, moments before his death from an abdominal haemorrhage. The officer was charged with manslaughter, but was acquitted. Tomlinson's death sparked an intense debate in the UK about the relationship between the police and public.
Muhammad al-Durrah (1988–2000) was a Palestinian boy who was shot and killed in Gaza during the Second Intifada. Muhammad and his father were caught in crossfire between Israeli and Palestinian forces, as France 2 filmed their efforts to protect themselves. The footage became controversial because of the way it was edited, leading to a protracted dispute about who had fired the fatal shots and even whether the al-Durrahs had been shot at all.
Laura and L. D. Nelson were an African-American mother and son who were lynched in Okemah, Oklahoma, on 25 May 1911. They were arrested after L. D. shot and killed Okemah's deputy sheriff, who had arrived at their home with a posse to investigate a cow theft. Three weeks later, a 40-strong mob kidnapped them from the jail and hanged them from a bridge. Hundreds of sightseers gathered the following morning, and photographs of the bodies were sold as postcards.
Madeleine McCann disappeared on 3 May 2007, days before her fourth birthday, from an apartment in Praia da Luz, Portugal. She and her siblings had been left asleep while her parents ate in a tapas restaurant 50 yards away. The parents checked on the children throughout the evening until Madeleine's mother discovered she was missing at 22:00. Her disappearance became what one newspaper called "the most heavily reported missing-person case in modern history".
Veganism is the practice of abstaining from the use of nonhuman animal products. The term vegan was coined in England in 1944 by Donald Watson of the British Vegan Society to mean non-dairy vegetarian. Ethical vegans reject the commodity status of nonhumans and the use of animal products for any purpose, while dietary vegans eliminate them from their diet only.
Other editors wrote the "philosophical and political views" section.
Roger Scruton (1944–2020) was an English philosopher who specialized in aesthetics and political philosophy, particularly in the furtherance of traditionalist conservative views. Known for having helped to establish underground academic networks in Soviet-controlled Eastern Europe, Scruton was described in 2014 as "England's most accomplished conservative since Edmund Burke".
The Jan Hus Educational Foundation, founded in 1980 by Oxford philosophers, ran an underground network in communist Czechoslovakia, organizing seminars and smuggling in books. Several philosophers were detained by the Czech police and Roger Scruton was expelled. The dissident Bronislava Müllerová watched him walk across the border: "There was this broad empty space between the two border posts, absolutely empty, not a single human being in sight except for one soldier, and across that broad empty space trudged an English philosopher, Roger Scruton, with his little bag into Austria."
Sabri Khalil al-Banna (1937–2002), known as Abu Nidal, was the founder of Fatah—The Revolutionary Council, a militant Palestinian splinter group. Its operations included the Rome and Vienna airport attacks on 27 December 1985, when gunmen opened fire on passengers in simultaneous shootings at El Al ticket counters, killing 20. Patrick Seale wrote of the shootings that their "random cruelty marked them as typical Abu Nidal operations".
From the late 1980s, organised child sexual abuse continued almost unchallenged in the northern English town of Rotherham, South Yorkshire. The first prosecutions took place in 2010, and in 2014 an independent inquiry established that at least 1,400 children, mostly girls aged 11–15, had been abused between 1997 and 2013 by a network of Pakistani-heritage men. In 2015 the government dissolved Rotherham Council as "not fit for purpose" and replaced its elected officers with appointed commissioners.
Chelsea Manning is a former United States Army soldier who was convicted in July 2013 of violating the Espionage Act after releasing the largest set of restricted documents ever leaked to the public. The material included two videos of air strikes in Iraq and Afghanistan, 250,000 diplomatic cables, and 500,000 classified army reports. The publication of the cables was widely seen as a catalyst for the Arab Spring that began in December 2010.
Lemmons was the home of novelists Elizabeth Jane Howard and Kingsley Amis on Hadley Common, Hertfordshire. Jane and Kingsley lived there with several relatives, including Kingsley's children, Philip, Martin and Sally. Several of the family's novels were written at Lemmons: Kingsley's The Green Man (1969) and The Alteration (1976); Jane's Odd Girl Out (1972) and Mr. Wrong (1975); and Martin's The Rachel Papers (1973) and Dead Babies (1975).
In Bad Pharma (2012), the British epidemiologist Ben Goldacre argues that "the whole edifice of medicine is broken", because the evidence on which it is based is systematically distorted by the pharmaceutical industry. Pharmaceutical companies, he writes, finance most of the clinical trials into their own products; routinely withhold negative data; conduct trials on small groups of unrepresentative subjects; fund much of doctors' continuing education; and plan or ghostwrite apparently independent academic papers.
Hulda Stumpf (1867–1930) was an American Christian missionary in Kenya who was murdered in her home, probably because of her opposition to female genital mutilation. Colonial opposition to the practice made it a focal point of the independence movement, and Stumpf's death served to highlight the dangers missionaries faced when trying to stop it.
Lizzy Lind af Hageby (1878–1963) was a Swedish feminist who moved to England in 1902 and, as a result of the Brown Dog affair, became one its most prominent anti-vivisection activists. Co-author of The Shambles of Science: Extracts from the Diary of Two Students of Physiology (1903), Lind af Hageby co-founded the Animal Defence and Anti-Vivisection Society and later ran an animal sanctuary in Dorset. She spent her life linking feminism and vegetarianism, working with a group of women who challenged the male medical establishment's attitudes towards women and nonhuman animals.
Val Plumwood (1939–2008) was an Australian ecofeminist philosopher known for her work on anthropocentrism. She spent her academic life arguing against the "hyperseparation" of humans from the rest of nature, which she called the "standpoint of mastery": a reason/nature dualism in which the natural world—including women, indigenous people and nonhumans—is subordinated to anything associated with reason.
Peter Hayes is a British Holocaust historian. The author or editor of ten books, Hayes is professor emeritus of history at Northwestern University, and chair of the academic committee of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. He is regarded as the leading scholar of the history of industry in Nazi Germany.
Jan Grabowski is a Polish-Canadian historian at the University of Ottawa, specializing in Jewish–Polish relations in German-occupied Poland during World War II and the Holocaust in Poland. Co-founder of the Polish Center for Holocaust Research in Warsaw, he is best known for his book Hunt for the Jews (2013).
Jeremiah Duggan (1980–2003) was a British student in Paris who died after running in front of several cars on a dual carriageway during a visit to Wiesbaden. His death became controversial because he was attending a recruitment course organized by the LaRouche movement, an international political network. Protracted litigation by his parents resulted in a second inquest, and in 2012 a court in Frankfurt ordered German police to reopen their investigation.
Charles Poyen (died 1844) was a French mesmerist, an early practitioner of hypnotism). Mesmerism was named after Franz Anton Mesmer, a German physician who argued for the existence of a fluid that fills space and through which bodies could influence each other, a force he called animal magnetism.
The feminist philosophy journal Hypatia became embroiled in a dispute in 2017 that led to the online shaming of one of its authors. The journal had published a peer-reviewed article in which the author argued that society should accept transracialism, just as it accepts transitioning to a new gender presentation. When the article was criticized on social media, scholars associated with Hypatia urged the journal to retract it. The controversy exposed a deep rift within the journal's editorial team, as well as within feminism and academic philosophy.
Vivienne Haigh-Wood Eliot (1888–1947), first wife of the American poet T S Eliot, was regarded either as his muse or as a femme fatale who enticed him into a disastrous marriage. They separated in 1933, after which Eliot shunned her, hiding from her and instructing friends not to tell her where he was. Her brother had her committed to an asylum in 1938, where she remained until she died nine years later, a year before Eliot won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
St Edward's Passage is an alleyway in Cambridge, England, lying between Peas Hill and King's Parade. Excavations indicate that it dates to the 13th century. The entrance of St Edward King and Martyr is located on St Edward's Passage. Calling itself the cradle of the English Reformation, the church contains the original pulpit from which the reformers Robert Barnes, Thomas Bilney and Hugh Latimer preached. During midnight mass there on Christmas Eve 1525, Barnes delivered the first sermon in which a reformer accused the Catholic Church of heresy.
The Glasgow effect refers to the poor health and low life expectancy of Glaswegians compared to the rest of Europe, a disparity that poverty alone does not appear to explain.
Epistemological Letters was a hand-typed physics newsletter about quantum physics that was sent out to a private mailing list between 1973 and 1984. It was created because academic journals were reluctant to publish articles about the philosophy of quantum mechanics, especially anything that implied support for action at a distance.
The Haidbauer incident took place in April 1926 when Josef Haidbauer, an 11-year-old boy in Otterthal, Austria, collapsed after being hit on the head during class by the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, who was working there as a teacher. Wittgenstein was summoned to appear in court. It is not known whether he was exonerated or whether his wealthy family was able to make the case disappear.
John Baptist Grano (c.1692–c.1748) was a trumpeter who was imprisoned for a debt of £99 in the notorious Marshalsea prison from May 1728 to September 1729. He kept a diary of his 480 days there, now housed in the Bodleian Library in Oxford, describing his friendships, love affairs and adventures as he struggles to buy his freedom.
Jack Sarfatti is an American physicist specializing in the relationship between quantum physics and consciousness. Working outside academia, he argues that mind is crucial to the structure of matter, that retrocausality is possible, and that physics—the "Conceptual Art of the late 20th Century"—has replaced philosophy as the unifying force between science and art.
Brian David Josephson is a Welsh physicist and professor emeritus of physics at the University of Cambridge. Best known for his work on superconductivity, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1973 for his prediction of the Josephson effect, made in 1962 when he was a 22-year-old PhD student. In the early 1970s he took up transcendental meditation and turned his attention to issues outside the parameters of mainstream science.
Animals, Men and Morals: An Inquiry into the Maltreatment of Non-humans (1971) is a collection of essays on animal rights, edited by Oxford philosophers Stanley Godlovitch, Roslind Godlovitch and John Harris, one of the early publications in the 20th century that argued for animal rights. A review of the book by Peter Singer in the New York Review of Books is credited with triggering the rise of the modern animal rights movement.
The commodity status of animals refers to the legal status as property of most nonhuman animals. Animals regarded as commodities may be bought, sold, given away, bequeathed, killed, and used as commodity producers: producers of meat, eggs, milk, fur, wool, skin and offspring. Their exchange value does not depend on their quality of life.
The Spanish City was an amusement park in Whitley Bay, north east England. Dire Straits immortalized it in their 1980 song, "Tunnel of Love", which was thereafter played every morning when the park opened.
DJ Cassidy is an American DJ and record producer. With his trademark boaters, cricket sweaters, bow ties, color-blocked tuxedos and 24-carat-gold microphone, Cassidy is known for his work at celebrity functions, including the 50th birthday party and 2009 inauguration of President Barack Obama, and the 2008 wedding of Beyoncé and Jay-Z.
Derryck Gleaton, better known as DSharp, is an American violinist, DJ, singer and producer based in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Known for his colored violins, he writes his own music and performs cover versions of popular songs, focusing on hip hop, electronic dance music and classical pieces.
Robert H. Lustig is a paediatrician specializing in neuroendocrinology and childhood obesity. He came to public attention in 2009 when one of his medical lectures, "Sugar: The Bitter Truth", went viral on YouTube.
Bernard Williams (1929–2003) was an English moral philosopher. Described as an "analytical philosopher with the soul of a general humanist", Williams was sceptical about attempts to create a foundation for moral philosophy, arguing that it had to reflect the complexity of life.
Mattress Performance (Carry That Weight) was a work of endurance art by Emma Sulkowicz, conducted as her senior thesis for her visual arts degree at Columbia University. Begun in September 2014, the piece involved Sulkowicz carrying a 50-lb dorm-type mattress wherever she went on campus.
Germaine Greer is an Australian writer and one of the major voices of the second-wave feminist movement. A radical feminist, her goal is not to achieve equality with men but to assert difference, and to insist on it "as a condition of self-definition and self-determination". Famously contrarian, she has been described as someone who "doesn't get into trouble occasionally or inadvertently, but consistently and with the attitude of a tank rolling directly into a crowd of infantry".
The mass sexual assault of women in public has been documented in Egypt since 2005. In May that year security forces and their agents were blamed for using it during political demonstrations in Tahrir Square, Cairo, as a weapon against female protesters. The behavior spread, and by 2012 sexual assault by crowds of young men was regularly seen at protests and religious festivals.
Ceci N'est Pas Un Viol is a work of performance art by American artist Emma Sulkowicz consisting of a website, eight-minute video, introductory text and comments section. Released on 3 June 2015, the video shows Sulkowicz having sex with an anonymous actor in a dorm room at Columbia University. Named after René Magritte's "Ceci n'est pas une pipe", the film illustrates the shift between consensual and non-consensual sex.
Marion Scott Stevenson (1871–1930) was a Scottish missionary with the Church of Scotland in British East Africa (Kenya) from 1907 until 1929. In 1929 she coined the term "sexual mutilation of women" to describe female circumcision, practised by the Kikuyu people, Kenya's largest tribe. The Kenya Missionary Council followed suit and began referring to it as sexual mutilation. It is now widely known as female genital mutilation.
Women's Sunday was a suffragette march and rally in London on 21 June 1908. Organized by Emmeline Pankhurst's Women's Social and Political Union to persuade the Liberal government to support votes for women, it was the largest demonstration held in the UK to that point. Up to half a million women and men from all over the country marched to Hyde Park in seven processions carrying 700 banners, including one that read "Not chivalry but justice".
The Battle of Downing Street was a march of suffragettes to Downing Street, London, on 22 November 1910, four days after Black Friday, a suffragette protest that saw the women violently attacked by police. Around 200 women marched on Downing Street, smashing windows. Several swarmed around the Chief Secretary for Ireland who was left with a slipped kneecap. He did not want to prosecute; he wrote to the Home Secretary, Winston Churchill: "[L]et the matter drop but keep your eye on the hags in question."
Katharine Birbalsingh is the New Zealand-born founder of Michaela Community School, a free school established in 2014 in Wembley Park, London. In 2017 she was included in Anthony Seldon's list of the 20 most influential figures in British education. Birbalsingh told a Conservative Party conference in 2010 that Britain's education system is broken because "it keeps poor children poor".
Jane Zielonko (1922–1982) was the Polish-American translator of The Captive Mind (1953) by Czesław Miłosz, winner of the 1980 Nobel Prize in Literature. The book examines collaboration and disssent in the Soviet Union under Stalinism.
Founded in 1936 as the Smithfield Packing Company in Smithfield, Virginia, and now a wholly owned subsidiary of WH Group of China, Smithfield Foods is the largest pig and pork producer in the world. Its 973,000-square-foot meat-processing plant in Tar Heel, North Carolina, was processing 32,000 pigs a day as of 2000. When WH Group bought Smithfield in 2013, its acquisition of Smithfield's 146,000 acres of land made WH Group one of the largest overseas owners of American farmland.
"Murke's Collected Silences" (1955) is a short story by the German writer Heinrich Böll. The Murke of the title, an editor for the Cultural Department at Broadcasting House, starts collecting bits of discarded tape containing silence, where the speaker has paused, which he splices together and takes home to listen to in the evening. Soon he advances to recording his girlfriend sitting silently in front of a microphone.
Stanley Green (1915–1993), the Protein Man, was a sandwich man who walked up and down Oxford Street for 25 years. His placard, warning of the effect of protein on the libido, recommended "protein wisdom": "Less Lust, By Less Protein: Meat Fish Bird; Egg Cheese; Peas Beans; Nuts. And Sitting". One writer described Green as patrolling the streets, "campaigning for the suppression of desire".
Ian Melville Stephens (1903–1984) was the editor of the Indian newspaper The Statesman (then British-owned) in Kolkata, West Bengal, from 1942 to 1951. He became known for his decision to publish graphic photographs, in August 1943, of the Bengal famine of 1943, which claimed between 1.5 and 3 million lives. Their publication helped to persuade the British government to supply adequate relief to the victims, thereby probably saving hundreds of thousands of lives.
Harriet K. Wistrich is an English solicitor and radical feminist who specializes in human-rights cases, particularly those involving women who have been sexually assaulted or who have killed their violent partners. Wistrich is co-founder of Justice for Women, a feminist law-reform group, and co-editor, with her partner Julie Bindel, of The Map of My Life: The Story of Emma Humphreys (2003).
Emma Clare Humphreys (1967–1998) was a Welsh woman who was convicted, in 1985 at the age of 17, of the murder of her violent boyfriend and pimp. Humphreys spent a decade in prison before winning an appeal against the conviction on the grounds of long-term provocation. The appeal was significant because it supported the argument that courts should take issues such as "battered woman syndrome" into account when considering a defence of provocation.
Julie Bindel is an English writer, radical feminist, and co-founder of the law-reform group Justice for Women, which helps women who have been prosecuted for killing violent male partners. Bindel's work focuses on male violence against women and children, particularly prostitution and pornography.
It Ain't Me, Babe (1970) was the first comic book produced entirely by women, co-produced by Trina Robbins and Barbara "Willy" Mendes. Only one 36-page issue was ever produced. The first print run in July 1970 sold 20,000 copies; the second and third, 10,000 each. The cover featured Olive Oyl, Little Lulu, Wonder Woman, Sheena, Queen of the Jungle, Mary Marvel, and Elsie the Cow, fists raised, and the words "women's liberation".
John Valentine Dittemore was a director of The First Church of Christ, Scientist, the Christian Science church, in Boston from 1909 until 1919. Before that he was head of the church's Committee on Publication in New York, and a trustee for ten years of the estate of Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science. Dittemore is best known as the co-author of Mary Baker Eddy, the Truth and the Tradition (1932).
Jane Haining (1897–1944) was a Scottish missionary in a school for Jewish and Christian girls in Budapest, Hungary, who was recognized in 1997 by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations for having risked her life to help Jews during the Holocaust. Arrested by the Gestapo in April 1944, Haining was deported to Auschwitz, where she died three months later, probably as a result of the camp's catastrophic living conditions.
This article was written by several editors, including its creator Elisa.rolle.
Dora Ohlfsen (1869–1948) was an Australian sculptor and art medallist. Working mostly in Italy, she became known for having created the first Anzac medal and the war memorial in Formia, Italy. Her portrait medallions were commissioned by a range of public figures; Mussolini allowed her to sketch him in 1922. In 1948 Ohlfsen and her lifelong partner, Hélène de Kuegelgen, were found dead in their apartment in Rome as a result of a gas leak, deemed to have been an accident. Friends packed up the contents of Ohlfsen's studio, which have never been traced.
Mark Sullivan (1874–1952) was an American journalist and syndicated political columnist. Author of the six-volume, 3,740-page Our Times: The United States, 1900–1925 (1926–1935), he was described as a "giant of American journalism" and the "Jeremiah of the United States Press".
Asma Abdel Rahim El Dareer is a Sudanese feminist physician known for her research in the 1980s into female genital mutilation. One of the first Arab women to speak out publicly against the practice, El Dareer led a research project into FGM at the University of Khartoum from 1977, during which she conducted the first large-scale survey of women who had experienced it. The author of Woman, Why Do You Weep? (1982), El Dareer became interested in FGM because she was herself infibulated at the age of 11.
Woman, Why Do You Weep? Circumcision and Its Consequences (1982) is a book by Asma El Dareer about female genital mutilation in Sudan. The book includes information from El Dareer's 1977–1981 survey of over 3,000 women in Sudanese states with a high prevalence of the most severe form of FGM. Conducted for the medical faculty of the University of Khartoum, it was the first large-scale survey of women who had undergone the procedures.
The Vienna Café was a coffee house and restaurant in London, at 24–28 New Oxford Street, that became a meeting place for writers, artists, and intellectuals in the early 20th century. Regular visitors included Ezra Pound, H. G. Wells, and W. B. Yeats. The café closed shortly after the outbreak of World War I in 1914.
Sonia Burgess was a leading British immigration lawyer who initiated several important cases, including M v. Home Office (1993) and Chahal v. United Kingdom (1996). She was killed in London in 2010 when she was pushed in front of an eastbound Piccadilly Line tube train at King's Cross St Pancras during the evening rush hour.
An exchange on 24 May 1983 between Diana Gould and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was voted one of Britain's most memorable television spots. Gould, a schoolteacher appearing as a member of the public, confronted Thatcher on the BBC current-affairs programme Nationwide over the sinking of the General Belgrano during the 1982 Falklands War. The exchange became iconic because of Gould's persistence in asking why Thatcher had given the order to sink the ship. Thatcher was irritated that the question had been allowed. Denis Thatcher told the producer that the BBC was run by "a nest of long-haired Trots and wooftahs".
15 year veteran, known by many, respected by all. Wields a steady collaborative persona. Highlights COI issues and calmly combats paid-editing on Wikipedia's top articles. A rare bright star among the sleeping throngs. Improves WP at a high level.
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar. Thank you for your continued work. It was nice to come across your name - it was probably the first time I clicked through The Signpost for the first time since 2014. Hope all is well! Missvain (talk) 23:29, 1 December 2020 (UTC)
The Writer's Barnstar. For the excellent work on Ezra Pound and subpages. You're doing a great job! Victoria (tk) 01:06, 5 October 2020 (UTC)
The Tireless Contributor Barnstar. I know it's frustrating to work on The Holocaust, but it's vitally important. You're doing excellent work. I've been trying to stay out of your way, but will be happy to weigh in on copyediting/etc when the polish stage starts. Let me know if you need anything from the sources - I've finally got the scanner up and running! Ealdgyth - Talk 20:47, 16 December 2019 (UTC)
The Editor's Barnstar. Thank you for your work on Jan Grabowski (historian). It's a much much better article, after your rewrite. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:24, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar. For "following the money" and highlighting the COI issues, and explaining what gullable fools we have been to allow this advertising, promotion and paid-for-editing on Wikipedia's top articles. Colin° 20:42, 1 April 2018 (UTC)
The Anti-Flame Barnstar. Your ability to stay calm and collected when some other users are being obtuse, inflammatory, or otherwise just exhausting has been noticed, and is very much celebrated. Keep it up, you! -- Cheers, Alfie. (Say Hi!) 13:06, 23 January 2018 (UTC) (Couldn't really find an appropriate barnstar, but this is close enough)
The Barnstar of Diplomacy. I appreciate your contributions regarding my topic ban as well as your thoughts on Arbitration Enforcement. I am hoping that some changes may now result that will make the process a better one.--MONGO 13:02, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Collaboration Power. Thank you for your tireless contributions to Chris Sherwin, and for helping it evolve into an interesting and informative biography. Your collaborative efforts are greatly appreciated. 19:32, 28 October 2017 (UTC)
The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar. For defending Wikipedia spirit and diligent doxing of articles' fates. Zezen (talk) 20:47, 5 March 2017 (UTC)
The Original Barnstar. I pulled up the FGM article in class today, which was an eye opener for many students. Thank you for bringing that up to FA status. Dr Aaij (talk) 16:44, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
The Special Barnstar. I'm sure you've heard it before, but the Chelsea Manning article is amazing! I hope it's one more symbol to her that people care. The article must have taken so much work! I just wanted to say thanks. Chelsea is a person I love and respect for her courage and honesty. DaphneLantier 23:21, 1 January 2017 (UTC)
The Barnstar of Diplomacy. For calling me out with this edit, but doing so diplomatically and with WP:AGF in mind. Also, for generally being an awesome contributor to our community, and I hope the long conversations about creating more receptive places within our community pan out. Sadads (talk) 13:31, 4 April 2016 (UTC)
The Mediator Barnstar. I saw you didn't already have this one. Given your moderate and well-reasoned comments at my and Sagerad's AE threads early this year, I cannot tell why not. Darkfrog24 (talk) 23:38, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
We couldn't have done it without you. Well, maybe. But the encyclopedia would not be as good. Celebrate. Smallbones(smalltalk) 13:44, 1 November 2015 (UTC)
The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar. I've long read that you are one of our most respected editors and more and more I understand why you have gained that reputation. Thank you so much for your your integrity and dedication to building an encyclopedia that we can all be proud of. Gandydancer (talk) 00:13, 18 May 2015 (UTC)
Gratitude Coffee. Sarah, once again you are a rare bright star among the sleeping throngs. Your recent comments give me a little faith that common sense and truth have some chance here. Danke, petrarchan47tc 21:21, 26 March 2015 (UTC)
The Writers' Barnstar. Thank you for your contributions to improve Female genital mutilation to Featured Article quality as evidenced by its current status as Today's Featured Article on the Main Page of Wikipedia. Thanks for this high quality contribution related to multiple important topics and intersecting with multiple WikiProjects ... The Wikipedia community appreciates your important efforts at quality improvement on this site at such a high level. Thank you. — Cirt (talk) 03:14, 6 February 2015 (UTC)
The they said it couldn't be done award. Doing the impossible is natural for some people, but elevating female genital mutilation to the main page is way beyond mortal reach.
Congratulations, and thanks for enriching Wikipedia and its readers. Johnuniq (talk) 00:00, 6 February 2015 (UTC)
The Feminism Barnstar. For your contributions to the Women in 2014 article. Well done, Slim. GRuban (talk) 18:38, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
The Feminists Engage Wikipedia Award! If Adrianne Wadewitz were here, she'd give you this award for all you have done! Djembayz (talk) 23:29, 10 November 2014 (UTC)
The 25 DYK Creation and Expansion Medal. I admire the variety of subjects you have donated which cover many worthy and under reported subjects. You are doing your bit for trying to reduce our systemic bias - thanks. Can I thank you on behalf of the DYK project and the wiki for 25 of the articles. Hopefully we will see many more. Well done. Victuallers (talk) 23:48, 31 October 2014 (UTC)
The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar. Thanks for your recent edits clarifying close paraphrasing vis-à-vis plagiarism. I think the policy is now much clearer and accurate. Rationalobserver (talk) 17:07, 9 October 2014 (UTC)
The Editor's Barnstar. Thanks for your good work all over the place--and just now on Female genital mutilation. As an old-fashioned liberal I believe such articles have an importance reaching far beyond the merely encyclopedic. Drmies (talk) 20:21, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
The Writers' Barnstar. Truly appreciating your uncompromising neutrality on a very challenging subject. SAS81 (talk) 16:03, 21 May 2014 (UTC)
The Cure Award. In 2013 you were one of the top 300 medical editors across any language of Wikipedia. Thank you so much for helping bring free, complete, accurate, up-to-date medical information to the public. We really appreciate you and the vital work you do! ... --Ocaasi, Doc James and the team at Wiki Project Med Foundation
The Special Barnstar. We may not have crossed paths before, but I've always seen you doing wonderful work everywhere! A major contributor of Good and Featured articles which I always admire and respect. Thank you for your hard work over the years! Maybe I could learn a thing or two from you someday :) Best Wishes. -TheGeneralUser(talk) 21:04, 15 February 2014 (UTC)
The Original Barnstar. Because, one year on, I keep looking back to your work on Christian Science as an example of how it should be done. Alexbrn 11:24, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
The Original Barnstar. Just saying well done and great work on the Female genital mutilation article-- Cailil 12:15, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
The Million Award. For your contributions to bring Female genital mutilation (estimated annual readership: 1,544,000) to Good Article status, I hereby present you the Million Award. Congratulations on this rare accomplishment, and thanks for all you do for Wikipedia's readers! -- Khazar2 (talk) 14:09, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
The Million Award. For your contributions to bring Chelsea Manning to Good Article status, I hereby present you the Million Award. Congratulations on this rare accomplishment, and thanks for all you do for Wikipedia's readers. -- Khazar2 (talk) 23:15, 28 August 2013 (UTC)
The Content Creativity Barnstar. For creating Black Twitter—an article we had needed to have for a while—and doing it well. — Daniel Case (talk) 06:14, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
Mind the Gap Award ...is awarded to User:Slim Virgin who has diligently worked to close the gender gap on Wikipedia and related projects through content contributions, outreach, community changes and related actions. For saying the right thing, at the right time, in the right place, to the right people. ```Buster Seven Talk 18:41, 22 June 2013 (UTC)
The Teamwork Barnstar. For efforts at promoting teamwork on the BP article where teamwork and trust were broken down. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:34, 11 June 2013 (UTC)
The Good Article Barnstar. For your contributions to bring Christian Science up to Good Article status. Thanks, and keep up the good work! -- Khazar2 (talk) 13:46, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
BLP Barnstar. I, Kaldari, hereby award SlimVirgin the BLP Barnstar for keeping an eye on Anita Sarkeesian and making sure that it meets both the letter and spirit of the BLP policy. Kaldari (talk) 19:22, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
Barnstar of Diligence. With compliments! Mootros (talk) 02:35, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
The Original Barnstar. For sterling work improving the Christian Science article! Alexbrn (talk) 13:59, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar. Many thanks for your tireless efforts in keeping article clear of WP:COI and other nonsense. Hu12 (talk) 04:08, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
For writing well. For no good reason at all I was leafing through White House Farm murders. That is some fine writing you did there: thanks for making us look better. Drmies (talk) 04:47, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar. Thank you for all the good you do! MONGO 02:13, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
The Snazzy Shoes of Empathy Award. Dear Slim, There probably isn’t a barnstar you haven’t been awarded already. But your outstanding, well-reasoned arguments for treating biographical ‘subjects’ with fairness and respect deserve credit. So here’s a pair of snazzy shoes. In recognition of your ability to empathize with the people we write about. Mad love! Draco 03:14, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
The Current Events Barnstar. For your work on the Bradley Manning article. INeverCry 22:57, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
The Purple Barnstar. Thank you very much for your kind support at the RfC/U. You recently came under tremendous pressure for standing up for the integrity of this project. You ended up writing a well-balanced version of an article you had no interest in to begin with, and received a lot of undeserved flak for it. Your efforts are much appreciated. Draco 16:23, 13 July 2011 (UTC)
All Around Amazing Barnstar. Awarded to SlimVirgin, for this wonderful rewrite – and everything else. JN466 17:05, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
All Around Amazing Barnstar, to SV with long overdue appreciation, admiration, gratitude and respect for all that you do here...Modernist (talk) 22:50, 16 June 2011 (UTC)
The Featured Article Medal. SlimVirgin, given the number of featured articles that you have authored, this appears to be overdue. Keep up the good work! MrMedal (talk) 15:20, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
The Oddball Barnstar. Finding a Barnstar which SV has not already received or deserves is difficult, but here is one for her work on Bradley Manning. I've been a part of the group of editors who has done something with that particular oddball subject and I am proud to be able to offer SlimVirgin a Barnstar which seems appropriate for her (andher). With hopes that the New Year brings SV many more (Barnstars, not oddballs), and with thanks, here you are. S. Rich (talk) 01:34, 6 January 2011 (UTC); updated, 04:31, 25 August 2013 (UTC)
The Good Heart Barnstar. Thanks ever so much for responding to my blunder in such a patient and courteous manner. Your friendly, non-confrontational note genuinely eased my anxiety. It's nice to know that cynical accusations haven't completely replaced constructive criticism at Wikipedia. —David Levy 05:30, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
The BLP Barnstar. SlimVirgin, I hereby award this barnstar in recognition of your vigilance, effort and professionalism improving the Gillian McKeith article. You've done an excellent job! All the best, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 01:37, 11 December 2010 (UTC)
The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar. For protecting the Riverview, New Brunswick article from presistant vandalism, I award you this barnstar Zonafan39 (talk) 01:36, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
The Admin's Barnstar. For regular work at RPP, meaning I don't come in to a huge backlog like I used to! GedUK 07:14, 8 July 2010 (UTC)
The Barnstar of Liberty. In recognition of your courage, wisdom and diligence in defending the fragile, flickering flame of freedom from blowhards and bullies. Freedom Fan, 25 May 2010
The Admin's Barnstar. Your hard work and even hand on the Catholic Church RfC were instrumental in its success. It was a pleasure working with you. Sunray (talk) 03:33, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
The Tireless Contributor Barnstar. I, George, hereby award SlimVirgin The Tireless Contributor Barnstar for her exemplary work getting the Muhammad al-Durrah article promoted to featured article status. You single-handedly improved this article from a poorly balanced, atrociously written pile of words into one of the best works on Wikipedia, under a constant barrage of criticism, bias, and multiple edit wars. My hat's off to you for your tireless efforts, and your ability to keep a cool head under fire. Wikipedia is a better place because you're here. ← George 03:07, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
The Writer's Barnstar. For your outstanding contribution to David Icke. Sir Richardson (talk) 06:01, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
The Rescue Barnstar. This barnstar is awarded to SlimVigin for working to make stubs threatened for deletion better articles. Not only does this make Wikipedia a better site, it helps retain new editors. For all of those new editors who you have helped, and they just didn't know how to say thank you properly, thank you. Ikip (talk) 03:56, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
The Biography Barnstar. Tmol42 expresses his grateful appreciation to SlimVirgin for taking him under her wing, for improving The Rosehip Queen and championing the cause of her notability. Tmol42 (talk) 01:47, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
Defender of the Wiki. For starting the RfC on the advisory council. Good call. Durova 23:22, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
The Biography Barnstar. You already have the home-made barnstar which is probably more apt, but this seems just as good! Many thanks for your astonishing efforts with the Ian Stevenson page. Cheers, Blippy (talk) 04:58, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
The WikiProject Palestine Featured Article Medal. Awarded for bringing this WikiProject Palestine article to Featured Article status: For your amazing efforts in turning Abu Nidal into a comprehensive and highly readable account of a difficult and controversial subject.This WikiAward was given to SlimVirgin by Ian Pitchford (talk) on 21:09, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
Home-Made Barnstar. No comment needed - just see her work on the articles around the '48 events in Israel/Palestine. Ceedjee (talk) 17:03, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
User:SlimVirgin has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian, and therefore, I've officially declared January 25 as SlimVirgin's day! For being such a beautiful person and great Wikipedian, enjoy being the Star of the day, dear SlimVirgin! Peace, Rlevse ~ A record of your Day will always be kept here.
The Excellent Userpage Award. SV, your user page is amazing! Johnfos (talk) 20:42, 24 January 2009 (UTC)
Defender of the Wiki. I, Alex Bakharev (talk), award you with this barnstar for your great efforts to make Wikipedia a cleaner place for everybody Alex Bakharev (talk) 00:27, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Hard to imagine that this website hasn't been greatly enhanced due to your contributions.--MONGO 06:46, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
I think I saw someone mention Diogenes with his lamp looking for an honest person for you awhile back. It seems appropriate now. You are strong, I know you will get through this. Many people stand by you and you can count me as one. - Ѕandahl ♥
Wikipedia has been diminished. Jayjg 02:11, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia Monarch Award. For fearlessly and selflessly, and often singlehandedly, fighting corruption, injustice and abuse wherever you see it. For giving WP a solid foundation by helping formulate its content and BLP policies. For making WP a better place for everyone, and helping realize the dream of having the knowledge of mankind available to all, despite the obstacles. Crum375 (talk) 20:34, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
Awarded for fighting the good fight StickyParkin 00:39, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
The Antiflame barnstar. Since there is no anti-corruption barnstar with an image of Diogenes of Sinope with his lamp - and I lack the technical skill to make such a desperately needed barnstar - this seems like the closest one to suit your recent situation. User:Slrubenstein (Talk) 14:41, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
The Red Barnstar. Well deserved. Face it: you rock, SV! This is for standing tall in the face of adversity, for all you do for this project that goes unrecognized, and for just being a cool chick. DavidShankbone 02:05, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
Brown Dog Award. To SV, for your hard work in bringing me back to life and onto the Main Page. Perhaps we've made someone uncomfortable. TBD 01:05, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
The Ultraviolet Ray of Sunshine Award. Thanks for being a highly energetic source of inspiration to many users. Your constant efforts deserve appropriate appreciation and encouragement. Thanks for being there and doing a job no one else can do. ¶ dorftrottel ¶ talk ¶ 23:34, December 5, 2007
NOR Award. Thanks for your wisdom and advice, hope you can relax, stick in or whatever suits you best, you have my somewhat uncomprehending support against these slings and arrows of outrageous nonsense. .. dave souza, talk 19:13, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
Original Barnstar. For courage and fortitude in the face of a vicious corporate smear campaign. Mantanmoreland 23:02, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
Thumbs up to Sarah. A fabulous person and a terrific editor who perseveres despite remarkable adversity. Please accept this humble token of appreciation from one of your many admirers on Wikipedia. Sandahl 21:09, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
For suffering the jockstrap slings and suction-cup arrows of outrageous abuse. Crockspot 21:05, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
For repeatedly helping to end the bias on the holocaust page and looking after the truth. Freetown 02:11, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
The Epic Barnstar. To SlimVirgin, for quite extraordinary research and editing work in support of NPOV at Zionism, leading to substantial improvements in that article. BYT 13:37, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
SlimVirgin has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian, and therefore, I've officially declared today as SlimVirgin's day! For being such a beautiful person and great Wikipedian, enjoy being the Star of the day, dear SlimVirgin! Love, Phaedriel - 10:57, 15 June 2007 (UTC) A record of your Day will always be kept here. My dearest Slim, today is your well deserved Day, and this modest dedication is joined by my everlasting gratitude to you. Enjoy it, friend - and don't forget to check your mail! :)
The Special Barnstar. I wanted to thank you for the amount of work you have done in the mainspace. You have done an impressive amount of work, both in quality and quantity. Again, thank you. :) Acalamari 01:50, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
The Holocaust Memorial Star. To SlimVirgin, for your tireless and selfless dedication and effort in greatly improving the Holocaust and related entries, I thank you for all of us, and hereby award you the Holocaust Memorial Star. Those who cannot remember the past...Crum375 18:28, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
The Society Barnstar. Awarded for your nuanced and balanced dissemination of information regarding animal rights activism in human society. Specifically inspired by a superb re-write of the Animal Liberation Front article. Rockpocket 17:59, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
I present this strawberry ice cream to SlimVirgin for her fantastic work in bringing articles into line with the BLP policy, and for her willingness to help new users. ElinorD 21:26, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
Barnstar of Diligence. For your dedication and perseverance in accomplishing what no one thought possible: making our core content policies succinct, easy to understand and consistent with each other. ≈ jossi ≈(talk) 00:07, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
This fist of respect goes to SV for caring in 2006 about the writing. Happy New Year! --qp10qp.
Defender of the Wiki. For continuing to defend the project against self-promoters and charlatans, and incurring great wiki-stress in the process, I award you this barnstar. Briangotts(Talk)(Contrib) 03:43, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
A posse ad esse, a verbis ad verbera: for your ability to cut throughit. --Doc 17:35, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
Original Barnstar. Congratulations on your Great Idea to combine several similar policies into one policy. This is a long over-due step. I hope it succeeds and then maybe you can move onto others! I appreciate your hard work and boldness in proposing this. Johntex\ 00:20, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
Goldenwiki Award. Congratulations upon Rudolf Vrba becoming a featured article, you have worked on it for months with amazing diligence, intelligence and above all superlative research and wide backround reading. In honor of all your efforts and in recognition of your contributions to worldwide scholarship that this article will now reflect it is my honor to present you with this Goldenwiki award. Mazel Tov ! IZAK 08:18, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
Defender of the Wiki. Awarded to SlimVirgin for her defense of Justice on Wikipedia. IZAK 06:34, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Awarded to SlimVirgin for her Wisdom in this regard. IZAK 06:34, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Awarded to SlimVirgin for her ValorIZAK 06:34, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Barnstar of Diligence. For demonstrating calmness, resolve, and dedication to editorial excellence in the face of controversy and abuse, I, Xoloz, award SlimVirgin this well-deserved Barnstar of Diligence. Xoloz 20:07, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
Original Barnstar. For your laudable concern for good editing and sourcing and your tireless efforts toward the same I award you the Original Barnstar--Drboisclair 19:21, 25 May 2006 (UTC)
Tireless Contributor Barnstar. On the occasion of her 30,000th edit, a Tireless Contributor Barnstar for SlimVirgin, who has still managed to keep her sense of humor in the face of the unceasing onslaught... Jayjg 17:39, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
Original Barnstar. For your patience, kindness and decency, your help with difficult pages, and above all your much valued friendship, I'd like to give you this barnstar. Grace Note 06:26, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Original Barnstar. A barnstar for the ideal Wikipedian. Thanks for all your good work. You don't know how appreciated you are. [[Sam Korn]] 12:40, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
Resilient Barnstar. Thank you for defending my name in the recent spat of User:Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters's 3RR block. I appreciate the time and effort that you spent discussing items with that user, and the calm demeanor that you (virtually...) expressed. So, here's the Resilient Barnstar for you! Thanks a lot, User:Bratsche
Tightrope Award. You are hereby presented with your own unique Tightrope Award, which represents the amazing Charles Blondin carrying Jimbo Wales safely across the Niagara Falls. Think of it as an early prototype of editors like you carrying Wikipedia on their shoulders! Bishonen 21:42, 27 August 2005 (UTC)
The Sandwich of Diligence. Awarded for Unswerving Strength and Tenacity. This is a special award created for fighting vandalism on my user pages. Wear it with pride, brave Wiki-warrior! Hamster Sandwich 01:20, 26 August 2005(UTC)
For dealing kindly but firmly with Gabriel/Gavin, I think you deserve this (repeated) award. N (t/c) 21:15, 22 August 2005 (UTC)
Barnstar of Diligence. A Barnstar of Diligence to you as ... your work is diligent and invaluable to Wikipedia. D. J. Bracey(talk) 01:37, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
What a champ! I hereby award you this wifflebat award for your amazing patience and hard work and perseverance in helping to get people, including ardent opponents, to recognize FeloniousMonk's merits as an admin candidate. Tomer 06:28, August 11, 2005 (UTC)
Wow, I keep running into your great edits all over the place. You are quite simply among the finest Defenders of the Wiki we have ever had ... I hereby award you the Cool as a Cucumber Award, for remaining cool when the situation gets hot ... func(talk) 3 July 2005 17:04 (UTC)
Glowing Barnstar. For working around the clock to block vandals, I hereby award you the "Glowing Barnstar". Keep up the good work. Anonymous editor June 29, 2005 18:26 (UTC)
Defender of the Wiki. For your hard work in keeping LaRouche movement propaganda out of Wikipedia, I hereby award you the ancient Defender of the Wiki barnstar. Willmcw, 17 Feb 2005
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The Writer's Barnstar. For the excellent work on Ezra Pound and subpages. You're doing a great job! Victoria (tk) 01:06, 5 October 2020 (UTC)
The Editor's Barnstar. Thank you for your work on Jan Grabowski (historian). It's a much much better article, after your rewrite. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:24, 8 September 2018 (UTC)
The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar. For "following the money" and highlighting the COI issues, and explaining what gullable fools we have been to allow this advertising, promotion and paid-for-editing on Wikipedia's top articles. Colin° 20:42, 1 April 2018 (UTC)
The Anti-Flame Barnstar. Your ability to stay calm and collected when some other users are being obtuse, inflammatory, or otherwise just exhausting has been noticed, and is very much celebrated. Keep it up, you! -- Cheers, Alfie. (Say Hi!) 13:06, 23 January 2018 (UTC) (Couldn't really find an appropriate barnstar, but this is close enough)
The Barnstar of Diplomacy. I appreciate your contributions regarding my topic ban as well as your thoughts on Arbitration Enforcement. I am hoping that some changes may now result that will make the process a better one.--MONGO 13:02, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Collaboration Power. Thank you for your tireless contributions to Chris Sherwin, and for helping it evolve into an interesting and informative biography.
The Barnstar of Diligence. For your work on Jill Valentine and Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Jill Valentine/archive1. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:48, 19 July 2017 (UTC)
The Cure Award. In 2016 you were one of the top ~200 medical editors across any language of Wikipedia. Thank you from Wiki Project Med Foundation for helping bring free, complete, accurate, up-to-date health information to the public. ... -- Doc James along with the rest of the team at Wiki Project Med Foundation 18:08, 3 May 2017 (UTC)
The Special Barnstar. I'm sure you've heard it before, but the Chelsea Manning article is amazing! I hope it's one more symbol to her that people care. The article must have taken so much work! I just wanted to say thanks. Chelsea is a person I love and respect for her courage and honesty. Daphne Lantier 23:21, 1 January 2017 (UTC)
The Mediator Barnstar. I saw you didn't already have this one. Given your moderate and well-reasoned comments at my and Sagerad's AE threads early this year, I cannot tell why not. Darkfrog24 (talk) 23:38, 24 February 2016 (UTC)
We couldn't have done it without you. Well, maybe. But the encyclopedia would not be as good. Celebrate. Smallbones(smalltalk) 13:44, 1 November 2015 (UTC)
Gratitude Coffee. Sarah, once again you are a rare bright star among the sleeping throngs. Your recent comments give me a little faith that common sense and truth have some chance here. Danke, petrarchan47tc 21:21, 26 March 2015 (UTC)
The Writers' Barnstar. Thank you for your contributions to improve Female genital mutilation to Featured Article quality as evidenced by its current status as Today's Featured Article on the Main Page of Wikipedia. Thanks for this high quality contribution related to multiple important topics and intersecting with multiple WikiProjects ... The Wikipedia community appreciates your important efforts at quality improvement on this site at such a high level. Thank you. — Cirt (talk) 03:14, 6 February 2015 (UTC)
The they said it couldn't be done award. Doing the impossible is natural for some people, but elevating
The Feminism Barnstar. For your contributions to the Women in 2014 article. Well done, Slim. GRuban (talk) 18:38, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
Mind the Gap Award. Thanks for your soft but strong, steady hand on the tiller at the Gender Gap Task Force. Never give up the ship! ;-) Lightbreather (talk) 23:49, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
The 25 DYK Creation and Expansion Medal. I admire the variety of subjects you have donated which cover many worthy and under reported subjects. You are doing your bit for trying to reduce our systemic bias - thanks. Can I thank you on behalf of the DYK project and the wiki for 25 of the articles. Hopefully we will see many more. Well done. Victuallers (talk) 23:48, 31 October 2014 (UTC)
The Original Barnstar. Because, one year on, I keep looking back to your work on Christian Science as an example of how it should be done. Alexbrn 11:24, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
The Teamwork Barnstar. What wonderful improvements to Mary Babnik Brown. Thanks. Doug Coldwell (talk) 11:17, 5 January 2014 (UTC)
The Million Award. For your contributions to bring Female genital mutilation (estimated annual readership: 1,544,000) to Good Article status, I hereby present you the Million Award. Congratulations on this rare accomplishment, and thanks for all you do for Wikipedia's readers! -- Khazar2 (talk) 14:09, 20 September 2013 (UTC)
The Content Creativity Barnstar. For creating Black Twitter—an article we had needed to have for a while—and doing it well. — Daniel Case (talk) 06:14, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
The Admin's Barnstar. I thereby award you with this Admin's Barnstar for closing five discussion formerly listed at the Requests for closure subpage of the Administrators' noticeboard. Keep up the good work. Best regards, Armbrust 21:14, 17 July 2013 (UTC)
The Good Article Barnstar. For your contributions to bring Christian Science up to Good Article status. Thanks, and keep up the good work! -- Khazar2 (talk) 13:46, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
BLP Barnstar. I, Kaldari, hereby award SlimVirgin the BLP Barnstar for keeping an eye on Anita Sarkeesian and making sure that it meets both the letter and spirit of the BLP policy. Kaldari (talk) 19:22, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
The Content Creativity Barnstar. For Glasgow effect Daniel Case (talk) 15:56, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
For writing well. For no good reason at all I was leafing through White House Farm murders. That is some fine writing you did there: thanks for making us look better. Drmies (talk) 04:47, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar. Thank you for all the good you do! MONGO 02:13, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
The Snazzy Shoes of Empathy Award. Dear Slim, There probably isn’t a barnstar you haven’t been awarded already. But your outstanding, well-reasoned arguments for treating biographical ‘subjects’ with fairness and respect deserve credit. So here’s a pair of snazzy shoes. In recognition of your ability to empathize with the people we write about. Mad love! Draco 03:14, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
The Current Events Barnstar. For your work on the Bradley Manning article. INeverCry 22:57, 17 May 2012 (UTC)
The Purple Barnstar. Thank you very much for your kind support at the RfC/U. You recently came under tremendous pressure for standing up for the integrity of this project. You ended up writing a well-balanced version of an article you had no interest in to begin with, and received a lot of undeserved flak for it. Your efforts are much appreciated. Draco 16:23, 13 July 2011 (UTC)
The Oddball Barnstar. Finding a Barnstar which SV has not already received or deserves is difficult, but here is one for her work on Bradley Manning. I've been a part of the group of editors who has done something with that particular oddball subject and I am proud to be able to offer SlimVirgin a Barnstar which seems appropriate for her (and her). With hopes that the New Year brings SV many more (Barnstars, not oddballs), and with thanks, here you are. S. Rich (talk) 01:34, 6 January 2011 (UTC); updated, 04:31, 25 August 2013 (UTC)
The Good Heart Barnstar. Thanks ever so much for responding to my blunder in such a patient and courteous manner. Your friendly, non-confrontational note genuinely eased my anxiety. It's nice to know that cynical accusations haven't completely replaced constructive criticism at Wikipedia. —David Levy 05:30, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
The Anti-Vandalism Barnstar. For protecting the Riverview, New Brunswick article from presistant vandalism, I award you this barnstar Zonafan39 (talk) 01:36, 9 July 2010 (UTC)
The Barnstar of Liberty. In recognition of your courage, wisdom and diligence in defending the fragile, flickering flame of freedom from blowhards and bullies. Freedom Fan, 25 May 2010
The Tireless Contributor Barnstar. I, George, hereby award SlimVirgin The Tireless Contributor Barnstar for her exemplary work getting the Muhammad al-Durrah article promoted to featured article status. You single-handedly improved this article from a poorly balanced, atrociously written pile of words into one of the best works on Wikipedia, under a constant barrage of criticism, bias, and multiple edit wars. My hat's off to you for your tireless efforts, and your ability to keep a cool head under fire. Wikipedia is a better place because you're here. ← George 03:07, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
For creative design reorganization of Frelinghuysen Arboretum--Tomwsulcer (talk) 03:48, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
The Rescue Barnstar. This barnstar is awarded to SlimVigin for working to make stubs threatened for deletion better articles. Not only does this make Wikipedia a better site, it helps retain new editors. For all of those new editors who you have helped, and they just didn't know how to say thank you properly, thank you. Ikip (talk) 03:56, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
The Biography Barnstar. Tmol42 expresses his grateful appreciation to SlimVirgin for taking him under her wing, for improving The Rosehip Queen and championing the cause of her notability. Tmol42 (talk) 01:47, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
The Biography Barnstar. You already have the home-made barnstar which is probably more apt, but this seems just as good! Many thanks for your astonishing efforts with the Ian Stevenson page. Cheers, Blippy (talk) 04:58, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
The WikiProject Palestine Featured Article Medal. Awarded for bringing this WikiProject Palestine article to Featured Article status: For your amazing efforts in turning Abu Nidal into a comprehensive and highly readable account of a difficult and controversial subject. This WikiAward was given to SlimVirgin by Ian Pitchford (talk) on 21:09, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
User:SlimVirgin has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian, and therefore, I've officially declared January 25 as SlimVirgin's day! For being such a beautiful person and great Wikipedian, enjoy being the Star of the day, dear SlimVirgin! Peace, Rlevse
On September 7, 2008, User:SlimVirgin was inducted into
Hard to imagine that this website hasn't been greatly enhanced due to your contributions.--MONGO 06:46, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia Monarch Award. For fearlessly and selflessly, and often singlehandedly, fighting corruption, injustice and abuse wherever you see it. For giving WP a solid foundation by helping formulate its content and BLP policies. For making WP a better place for everyone, and helping realize the dream of having the knowledge of mankind available to all, despite the obstacles. Crum375 (talk) 20:34, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
The Antiflame barnstar. Since there is no anti-corruption barnstar with an image of Diogenes of Sinope with his lamp - and I lack the technical skill to make such a desperately needed barnstar - this seems like the closest one to suit your recent situation. User:Slrubenstein (Talk) 14:41, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
The Red Barnstar. Well deserved. Face it: you rock, SV! This is for standing tall in the face of adversity, for all you do for this project that goes unrecognized, and for just being a cool chick. David Shankbone 02:05, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
The Fauna Barnstar. For your work on animal rights and the Brown dog affair David Shankbone 21:20, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
The Ultraviolet Ray of Sunshine Award. Thanks for being a highly energetic source of inspiration to many users. Your constant efforts deserve appropriate appreciation and encouragement. Thanks for being there and doing a job no one else can do. ¶ dorftrottel ¶ talk ¶ 23:34, December 5, 2007
NOR Award. Thanks for your wisdom and advice, hope you can relax, stick in or whatever suits you best, you have my somewhat uncomprehending support against these slings and arrows of outrageous nonsense. .. dave souza, talk 19:13, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
Thumbs up to Sarah. A fabulous person and a terrific editor who perseveres despite remarkable adversity. Please accept this humble token of appreciation from one of your many admirers on Wikipedia. Sandahl 21:09, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
For suffering the jockstrap slings and suction-cup arrows of outrageous abuse. Crockspot 21:05, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
For repeatedly helping to end the bias on the holocaust page and looking after the truth. Freetown 02:11, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
The Society Barnstar. Awarded for your nuanced and balanced dissemination of information regarding animal rights activism in human society. Specifically inspired by a superb re-write of the Animal Liberation Front article. Rockpocket 17:59, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
This fist of respect goes to SV for caring in 2006 about the writing. Happy New Year! --qp10qp.
A posse ad esse, a verbis ad verbera: for your ability to cut through it. --Doc 17:35, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
Goldenwiki Award. Congratulations upon Rudolf Vrba becoming a featured article, you have worked on it for months with amazing diligence, intelligence and above all superlative research and wide backround reading. In honor of all your efforts and in recognition of your contributions to worldwide scholarship that this article will now reflect it is my honor to present you with this Goldenwiki award. Mazel Tov ! IZAK 08:18, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
SlimVirgin whom I had always endeavored to emulate, is the ideal Wikipedian beyond any iota of doubt. --Bhadani 16:10, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
Tightrope Award. You are hereby presented with your own unique Tightrope Award, which represents the amazing Charles Blondin carrying Jimbo Wales safely across the Niagara Falls. Think of it as an early prototype of editors like you carrying Wikipedia on their shoulders! Bishonen 21:42, 27 August 2005 (UTC)
The Sandwich of Diligence. Awarded for Unswerving Strength and Tenacity. This is a special award created for fighting vandalism on my user pages. Wear it with pride, brave Wiki-warrior! Hamster Sandwich 01:20, 26 August 2005(UTC)
01:37, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
What a champ! I hereby award you this wifflebat award for your amazing patience and hard work and perseverance in helping to get people, including ardent opponents, to recognize FeloniousMonk's merits as an admin candidate. Tomer 06:28, August 11, 2005 (UTC)
Glowing Barnstar. For working around the clock to block vandals, I hereby award you the "Glowing Barnstar". Keep up the good work. Anonymous editor June 29, 2005 18:26 (UTC)
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