Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard

Welcome — ask about adherence to the neutral point of view in context!

Before posting here, consult the neutral point of view policy page and the FAQ explainer. Also, make sure to discuss the disagreement at the article's talk page. Fringe theories often involve questions about neutral point of view. These should be discussed at the dedicated noticeboard. You must notify any editor who is the subject of a discussion. You may use {{subst:NPOVN-notice}} to do so. Additional notes: Consensus is assessed based on the weight of policy-based arguments, not on vote count or sheer size of argument. Consensus in previous discussions does not make policy, but you can generally rely on it. The list of articles where users flagged a point-of-view concern is here. This page is not a forum for discussions unrelated to the neutral point of view. We have a separate noticeboard for concerns about original research (material made up by a Wikipedia editor), and another dedicated noticeboard for questions about contextual reliability of a source. Start a new discussion

Articles related to trans rights in the UK

I have noticed a number of users editorialising articles to create pages for non notable gender critical academics (i.e. Joanna Phoenix) and remove balanced factual material regarding groups such as for women Scotland as well as lists of deceased trans people. These edits do not appear to be made in good faith or in line with Wikipedia rules on notability and neutral point of view and I would ask for a review by others outside the issue. Many thanks. 2A00:23C7:CB03:7F01:FC1D:EF13:73B4:DFB3 (talk) 20:33, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

Could you be bit more specific as to which articles you are concerned about? Blueboar (talk) 20:41, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

This page made me aware of the issue and edits made by this editor compounded my concerns given the nature of edits/talk contributions and pages edited. Given how contentious this area is in the UK I feel it would benefit from additional scrutiny. Thank you. 2A00:23C7:CB03:7F01:11FD:D918:AA49:E2D0 (talk) 00:24, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

I have been notified of this discussion by a ping, but the comments are so general that I don’t see anything I should reply to. Yes, I edit in gensex regularly. That means that my edits are always subject to scrutiny by other editors with various views on this topic. Sweet6970 (talk) 14:32, 29 May 2025 (UTC) 

I raised it here rather than constant back and forth given issues of notability and content. I assume good faith as always, but feel it would be wise to allow other editors to consider as I have concerns on point of view and this is currently a very fraught issue in the UK. I feel neither you or I are neutral enough to do this properly. 2A00:23C7:CB03:7F01:11FD:D918:AA49:E2D0 (talk) 21:43, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

Vilina Vlas

Can we get some opinions on this? The hotel is famous for being a prisoner rape camp set up for Bosniak Serb paramilitary forces. How should that be tackled in the article? Should the lead describe it as a former camp first or as a hotel first? Can editors look at the sourcing in the article and see if liberal use of "allegedly" and "apparently" is warranted? As far as I know, it is proven and confirmed it was a prisoner camp where systematic rape occurred. I don't think there are any WP:RS that deny it or cast doubt on those claims, therefore "allegedly" is unnecessary in my opinion.

Pinging @Srpska1992 and @Nitroerg542 as previously involved editors. TurboSuperA+_(connect) 06:14, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

This appears to be part of a general whitewashing campaign across several articles, with the minimisation of crimes committed during the breakup of Yugoslavia. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 10:18, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

In all fairness, its role during the Bosnian War is covered much more heavily in international news than its current role as a spa resort. It would probably be WP:DUE to state its former role first in the lead. I'll wait for a third opinion (or a fourth and so on), though. Srpska1992 (talk) 10:34, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

As the location is most notable due to documented historic abuses I would agree its former role should be noted first. 2A00:23C7:CB03:7F01:11FD:D918:AA49:E2D0 (talk) 00:36, 29 May 2025 (UTC)

WP:WIKIVOICE and article names

Is mentioning an article name considered stating a seriously contested assertion as a fact or violate NPOV policies?

We are specifically talking about navigational links links like See also, Infoboxes, Navbox etc..

If we write something like - During the Gaza genocide, an estimated three X people were killed. - then that could be a problem.

My perspective:

Mentioning the name of a Wikipedia article, by itself (in navigational links ), is not considered stating a seriously contested assertion as a fact. Simply referencing or naming an article does not imply any claim about the truth or contestability of its content.

Merely mentioning or linking to a Wikipedia article name serves as a form of citation rather than an endorsement of the article's contents. When editors reference other articles through wikilinks in Infoboxes, See also etc.. they are guiding readers to sources of additional information rather than asserting the accuracy or validity of the article name.

Related discussion : Talk:Gaza genocide#Part of Gaza Genocide Cinaroot (talk) 06:58, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

There was a clear rough consensus on Talk:Gaza genocide against calling it a genocide in wikivoice. The title of the article is irrelevant. Piped links exist for a reason - and even if they didn't, we are not obligated to just link to an article with no other words before/after it. Again, there was a clear (rough) consensus against calling it a genocide in Wikivoice - and that discussion was attended by dozens of editors. Until a wider consensus is formed that allows such, it is not appropriate to call it the "Gaza genocide" in wikivoice in any article. It can, of course, be linked if the link is piped to an appropriate phrase (such as "part of the accused genocide in Gaza").

But the title being that does not give people free reign to not pipe the link or not provide context in other articles. That was made clear in the move request, where it was made clear that the move was because the title was more concise and there is no other ambiguous event that would be confused with it. It was not an approval to call the event that in wikivoice across Wikipedia - whether linked or not. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 07:11, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

a) I think Berchanhimez is misconstruing the rfc. That RFC asked specifically "Should the article, including the opening sentence of the lead section, state the Gaza Genocide in wikivoice as fact" The consensus was against stating it as fact in gaza genocide article’s narrative, not against referring to the article title elsewhere.

b) My question extends beyond the specific context of the gaza genocide: in general, does WP:WIKIVOICE apply to article titles in navigational links?

I don't want to rehash everything I said in the other conversation. I'll pause here to allow other uninvolved editors to share their opinions. Cinaroot (talk) 07:33, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

If I understand your question correctly, wikivoice does not apply to article titles. We can have article titles like Mask of Agamemnon, Priam's Treasure, Theseus Ring and Mona Lisa (despite Speculations_about_Mona_Lisa#Subject). Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:31, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Yes, it does not apply to article names when they are used in infoboxes, see also, navboxes, and other non-narrative navigational elements. These organizational tools help readers locate related information. Cinaroot (talk) 17:48, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

My take on this particular issue is that Gaza genocide is the WP:COMMON NAME for events that are not in dispute. Whether those events legally constitute the crime of genocide is disputed. The dispute arises from whether there was genocidal intent and not whether the events occurred. Saying that a particular event is part of the larger set of (undisputed) events does not in any way imply that the legal threshold for genocide has been met.

More generally, do common name considerations extend beyond choosing an article title itself? Is mere mention of the common name in other articles (e.g. in infoboxes) or templates a violation of WP:NPOV? EvansHallBear (talk) 14:44, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

What else would you call it? Guy (help! - typo?) 13:30, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Ignore the blue link and look at the article text. If it reads "Gaza geonocide" in Wikivoice then it violates NPOV. No where on Wikipedia should this be called a geonocide in wiki voice. Clearly many consider it a geonocide and using Gaza genocide with some form of attribution is fine. Springee (talk) 14:19, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

The article's name complies fully with Wikipedia's policies. It was determined by the community, and multiple attempts to change it have not succeeded. So much precedent already exists. Mariposa War, 1971 Dhaka University massacre, Srebrenica massacre, Armenian genocide denial ( in body ), Sinjar massacre, Bibliography of the Rwandan genocide, List of films about the Rwandan genocide, International response to the Rwandan genocide, Gikondo massacre Cinaroot (talk) 17:57, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

This is the general idea. Nobody is opposing linking it entirely. But just because the title is "Gaza genocide" does not mean that the link can be used as an excuse to put that phrase in wikivoice without clarifying it is alleged/contested. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 00:17, 1 June 2025 (UTC)

I would imagine that there is nothing that can change it from contested to uncontested, so I assume it will always be contested even if Israelis killed every single Palestinian man, woman and child in the Gaza Strip and/or the state of Israel is found guilty of the crime of genocide. What seems unclear to me in cases like this involving wikivoice is when Wikipedia should stop caring about '...but so and so disputes this'. Sean.hoyland (talk) 10:36, 1 June 2025 (UTC)

In a place like a "See also" section or dab notice, articles should be referred to by their titles. We don't hide article titles like Victorian prudes supposedly (but probably didn't) hid table legs. That's completely different from inline text, where caution is needed in the use of contentious titles. A rule of thumb (which I just thought of, so sue me) is that if the visible sentence would violate npov if used without [[..]] then it also violates npov with [[..]]. Piping is your friend in those cases. Zero^talk 13:54, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Context matters, absolutely. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:56, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

I also strongly think that the "Gaza genocide" title should remain as it is. As stated and referenced within the article, a large majority of expert scholars in this area and several human rights organisations consider it a genocide; there is a clearly expressed and recorded intent from Israeli politicians; there is support from 47% of the population of Israel to actively kill absolutely all Palestinians and from 68% to completely remove all humanitarian aid to them, presumably including food and water; and mass starvation and indiscriminate killings are systematically used as weapons of extermination; complete annihilation of all structures within the entire territory and intent to annex and incorporate all of it into Israel is extremely prevalent; and as stated above, Wikipedia's standard policy is to use the term "genocide" for these types of situations for other encyclopaedia articles. David A (talk) 07:29, 1 June 2025 (UTC)

How about we implement what is currently on the Israeli bombing of the Gaza Strip (credit to @EvansHallBear)? Remove Gaza genocide from "part of" and put it in charges, with a wikilink. This will clearly communicate to the reader that genocide is a charge, as opposed to saying Event is part of the Gaza genocide, leading to the erroneous impression some will have that the Gaza genocide is a fact as opposed to a charge. See also - just Gaza genocide is fine. This communicates see the Gaza genocide article. In navboxes, as long as it is under charges even nothing as opposed to an event, just Gaza genocide is fine. Closetside (talk) 04:47, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

The Israeli bombing of the Gaza Strip is a significant event; charges in that context are understandable. However, how would one justify a genocide charge for a smaller event like the Flour Massacre?

When we say "X is part of Y," it means that X is related to Y, implying a hierarchical or structural relationship where X is a subset, section, or component of Y. I still don't understand why you believe this would make Y real. Cinaroot (talk) 07:04, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

I think that's the most appropriate course for articles on individual attacks. We should avoid classifying every civilian attack as part of the Gaza genocide and only list in charges if that's discussed in the article. However, for some of the broader articles on genocidal acts (e.g. Gaza Strip evacuations or Attacks on health facilities during the Gaza war), calling them part of the Gaza genocide should still be allowed. I'd argue that only calling these actions part of the Gaza war or a particular campaign within the war is a violation of NPOV as it implies these are just byproducts of the war and not intentional policy. EvansHallBear (talk) 15:29, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Yes, this works for me. If there are no objections, we can consider it resolved. Cinaroot (talk) 09:07, 6 June 2025 (UTC)

I would like to add a comment: if a particular attack is significant, like Sinjar massacre (5,000 killed), it can still be classified as part of the Gaza genocide. However, we do not need to classify incidents like the Kerem Shalom aid convoy looting as part of the Gaza genocide. Cinaroot (talk) 09:21, 6 June 2025 (UTC)

• The whole point of establishing a common name is to use it (in Infoboxes, navbars, see also, etc.), precisely because it's the common name (i.e., the name that the readers are familiar with and expect to see). Links in the article's body are usually adjusted per what is being said (in context). M.Bitton (talk) 15:35, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Can someone have a look at Media Madness?

I came across Media Madness and it has many issues. For example, about half of the prose and some 16 (out of 22) sources in the article aren't about the book or its author. Not to mention large sections missing inline citations and the article sounding more like an essay about Trump's relationship with the media rather than an article about a book. I don't know if that's a POV, OR, SYNTH, or BLP issue, but it is a CTOP area, so it's probably best that editors with experience in dealing with such matters take a look at it. TurboSuperA+_(connect) 18:41, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

This reads like a lot of WP:SELFCITE. Simonm223 (talk) 19:56, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Any indication of WP:COI in the edit history? Simonm223 (talk) 19:57, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Dispute over TCM lead section update (NPOV and RS compliance)

YellowFlag (talk) 09:55, 3 June 2025 (UTC)

I recently made a substantial update to the lead section of the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) article to better reflect the breadth of reliable academic sources per WP:NPOV and WP:RS.

The previous version framed TCM almost entirely through a Western biomedical critique, omitting significant recent peer-reviewed publications exploring physiological mechanisms (gut microbiota, neuroimmune pathways, systems biology, etc.) that are now being actively studied. My update carefully included multiple high-quality sources from:

- [The New England Journal of Medicine](https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJM199301283280406) - [The Lancet](https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(08)61354-9) - Pharmacology & Therapeutics (Yuan & Lin, 2000 — accessible via ScienceDirect) - [Frontiers in Pharmacology (2020)](https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphar.2020.00538/full) - [Frontiers in Pharmacology (2021)](https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphar.2021.746923/full)

I believe this is consistent with WP:NPOV’s requirement to represent all significant views in proportion to their prominence, while still acknowledging limitations and ongoing scientific debate.

My edit was fully reverted by User:MrOllie, who asserts WP:FALSEBALANCE applies and that these additions constitute advocacy for pseudoscience. However, the content I added is not promoting pseudoscientific claims of efficacy but summarizing emerging research directions published in highly respected, peer-reviewed journals.

For reference, the citations I included are fully accessible and verifiable: - Eisenberg DM, NEJM 1993 ([10.1056/NEJM199301283280406](https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJM199301283280406)) - Yuan & Lin, Pharmacology & Therapeutics 2000 - Tang et al., The Lancet 2008 ([10.1016/S0140-6736(08)61354-9](https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(08)61354-9)) - Zhang et al., Frontiers in Pharmacology 2020 ([10.3389/fphar.2020.00538](https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphar.2020.00538/full)) - Zhang et al., Frontiers in Pharmacology 2021 ([10.3389/fphar.2021.746923](https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphar.2021.746923/full))

I would appreciate third-party input on whether this constitutes WP:NPOV compliance or whether WP:FALSEBALANCE is being applied too rigidly in this case. Thank you.

WP:NOTNEWS. If these research directions pick up widespread acceptance, Wikipedia will report on it. In the meantime, it remains fringe content. 208.87.236.180 (talk) 12:30, 3 June 2025 (UTC)

Knowing nothing of the specific dispute, I note that Frontiers is a predatory publisher, and its journals should not be considered reliable for, well, pretty much anything. JoJo Anthrax (talk) 08:23, 6 June 2025 (UTC)

Move request and RfC

There is a move request and a related related RfC at the Besor Stream article that could do with more input. Thanks. M.Bitton (talk) 15:52, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Concept of "Critical Response" section on page for media content (TV/movies)

Over recent years, considerable content has been added to the Critical Response sections from very biased political viewpoints. I've opened Talk convo on one specific movie page, The Opposite of Sex, but it hardly ends there. See: The Opposite of Sex.

This has become particularly true from far-left viewpoints, as far-right viewpoints seem to be edited out of the site quickly. For reference, I align to neither.

Under Wikipedia's "Undue Weight" policy for content removal, I'm adding the topic here for broader discussion. See: Wikipedia:Editing policy. Neither these posters nor myself should be the arbiter of truth nor should one political viewpoint be considered valid "Critical Response" while the opposite is edited out. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 16:05, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

It looks like you removed relevant content cited to a piece in the New York Times and a book by an academic published by Columbia University Press. Removing that content definitely worsened the neutrality of the article, and the editors that reverted you were right to do so. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 16:14, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

It is an editorial in the NY Times, and not a fact-based topic. The author referenced has their own brand of toxic feminism complaints. Neither are unbiased and fact-based. The movie itself, which I love -- to be clear, could more seriously be hit on it's depiction of southerners as dumb hicks or religious followers as incompetent. My broader point: anyone can find a reason to be offended, but that doesn't make it a fact. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 17:17, 4 June 2025 (UTC

Almost every source used in Critical reception sections is an opinion, editorial, or review piece. The whole point of the section is to aggregate the opinions of reviewers. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 17:19, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

No, these are not if the movie. They are of the political opinions of those people -- using the movie to further their cause. That's different than fact-based commentary of simple facts about the movie. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 17:24, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

No, these are not if the movie. They are of the political opinions of those people -- using the movie to further their cause. That's different than fact-based commentary of simple facts about the movie. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 17:26, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

I'd recommend reading up on the broad literature of Literary criticism. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 17:28, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

The issue is one of focal point. An author with a political perspective using another work to justify their own viewpoint does not make the view fact or an unbiased opinion of the referenced work. List the opinion on their author's page, that the focus. But adding to the work's page (the movie listed, in this example) is clutter. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 17:54, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

And here's an example, which i'm posting here and on the movie talk page, of how I'm suggesting the comments should be handled -- i.e., not on the movie page -- and how Wikipedia operates currently:

Consider the group Parents Television and Media Council. They are a conservative political group which had relative success impact business decisions for TV networks, so relevant for good or bad. On their wikipedia page is a positive note for the TV show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. However, they are not listed in the Critical Reception section of the TV show.

When the focal point is the political perspective of a group or individual, it should be listed on the page of that group or individual -- just like this example -- but not on the referenced work... as that TV show or movie is just a tool for that political expression.

So, the quesiton is why a particular political view gets elevated as on page for The opposite of Sex. I'd suggest this violates the Undue Bias guideline for Wikipedia. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 18:39, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

This is approaching WP:PUSH territory. Considering your edits to the article, the talk page, and now the noticeboard - your feelings on the matter are obviously not in doubt. It may be worth taking a step back and allowing the discussion to breathe rather than feeling the need to personally retort to every response from every person. If you're correct, someone else will take up the baton. If your perspective requires repeated input from you and you alone, perhaps it's just not all that convincing. ···sardonism · t · c 18:46, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Check. First participation w WikiP. Learning as I go. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 19:03, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Check. First participation w WikiP. Learning as I go. 174.127.159.17 (talk) 19:04, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

As a literary critic I have to say that there is no such thing as an objective, non-opinion review. Criticism is a art form as much as it is information and the critic's views are central to the art. As such, the neutrality test here will always be WP:DUE. This will be contextual but I cannot think of a time when either New York Times or Columbia University Press publications would be undue for critical reception. I would encourage editors working with critical response to look beyond "media good / media bad" and instead look at things like allusion and metaphor in the review as these can help to build links between disparate artworks. Simonm223 (talk) 19:10, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Not disagreeing with you generally here, but I'd argue that just because the NYT publishes something in its opinion section doesn't mean that it's DUE. If it's from an actual NYT employee or contributor, sure - but those are mostly going to be published in the actual newspaper sections (even though they're mostly opinions). The opinion section is more likely to contain "guest" contributions - and they have an internal policy of giving that space to any public official who asks for it within reason. They don't let them just publish crap, but if a congressperson wants to publish an essay they wrote about something, they are generally afforded the opportunity to (as an extreme example). I would doubt that the views of a random congressperson are DUE for inclusion in a critical response section, unless there's something bigger (such as it being directly referenced in a bill that was proposed, or mentioned on the floor, or similar).

My point here is that I don't think we should be treating the NYT opinion section as always DUE just because of how big and well-respected it is. There's no telling whether the NYT published the opinion because they actually found it well-supported and well-written... or because they were giving someone space to publish an opinion and they happened to mention (insert topic here). -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 19:17, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Please note what I'm saying is explicitly about NYT media criticism and is not a position I would generalize beyond that. If the NYT pays a freelancer to write criticism then, yeah, WP:DUE would hinge on the author more than the outlet. But I would say most freelancers hired by the NYT have established names. Simonm223 (talk) 19:50, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

• The part being challenged isn't even an opinion piece or review, it's from an academic book on the subject. (Based on their comments the NYT bit was removed by accident - it's what the book says that they object to.) And that book is literally the best source in the section. I do feel we have to sometimes be cautious with reviews in order to summarize available reviews accurately, but OP's insistence that it is "far-left" is bizarre and obviously isn't how we weigh due weight in any case. It shows why WP:FALSEBALANCE is a problem - their objection is plainly that they disagree with what the academic in question says (hence their feeling that it is "far-left"), and are trying to insist that it is undue based on that. But due weight isn't determined by how we feel about what they're saying, it's determined by a source's quality, expertise, and impact; an academic book that has been cited 640 times and which was written by an academic expert on the relevant gender issues that it discusses is as good as a source as we can hope for. --Aquillion (talk) 20:41, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

  Well that's just silly then. Simonm223 (talk) 22:11, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

  Just to be clear the cited material in the article is patently obviously WP:DUE and should be retained. Simonm223 (talk) 22:36, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

Pinkvilla has an RfC

Pinkvilla has an RfC for possible consensus. A discussion is taking place. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. 2405:6E00:2236:9609:C400:A8FF:FE20:504E (talk) 18:34, 6 June 2025 (UTC)

POV pushing and source misrepresentation at Draco Pistol

We're having a problem at Draco Pistol. A couple of days ago, I removed this claim as being unsupported by the given reference. The article claimed that usage in violent crimes, and criminal seizures, caused an increase in US popularity in the Draco in 2023. The sources, however, say nothing of the sort. They make no statement about the Draco's popularity in the U.S. as a whole, nor attribute any reasoning, and only mention some incomplete local Detroit-area data. One of the sources was from 2022, and couldn't possibly support the claim.

User:SwissAmish reverted to reinsert it, without discussion; citing this source in the edit summary. The WXYZ source likewise did not support the claim they were reverting back in, for the same reasons I mentioned above (it's essentially a clone of the already unusable deadlinedetroit source, also from 2022). They then added in a bunch more unsupported claims generally attributed to "several police officials" writ large, all sourced to the same specific Detroit incident coverage. These all broadly have the exact same problem -- there are not "several police officials" in these quotes. There is *one* police, Chief James White. The only other named police official is a retired lieutenant -- i.e. not speaking officialy, and no indication that they're in a position to represent any broader opinion. They did not seem to understand that a U.S. Attorney is not a police official. SwissAmish's edits were taking several different, unrelated statements by different people, and conflating them via synthesis into a mashed up, inaccurate statement worded to appear as if they had more support than they actually did.

I reverted that, noting in the edit summary that the source doesn't match the claims. I then rewrote the text to accurately represent what the source said -- SwissAmish reverted it and cited the quote from the retired lieutenant above, which we've already established is both meaningfully different than what the claim says, and not representative of who the claim says. I carefully explained why this cannot be done on the talk page. You can read all the details there, but the TL;DR is I step-by-step walk them through examples of why this is synthesis, why the claims in the article do not match the quotes given, and they just simply don't get it.

Now today, it looks like they've yet *again* reinserted the problematic content -- now definitively knowing that it doesn't support the claims, so now it's intentional source misrepresentation we're talking about -- plus more. and then in a stunning display of undue weight retitled the "In the United States" section into a Criticism section and began dumping anti-Draco quotes -- again, two of which are from the Detroit/Ft. Wayne area, and bizarrely one of which is about usage in London (Ontario, Canada). The quotes themselves are nonsense generic anti-gun criticisms almost entirely not specific to the Draco.

What it seems to me is that this is an attempt to try and push a "Dracos are bad" POV by misrepresenting some overlapping local news coverage as being broader and more applicable than it is; and citing a tiny number of what appear to be pretty biased quotes from some pretty dubious sources as undue weight to mislead readers into thinking that a couple of people speaking about one incident in Detroit represent a consensus of law enforcement opinion across the United States. Can a third party help restore some sanity, please? ⇒SWATJester ^{Shoot Blues, Tell VileRat!} 17:39, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

As I have stated repeatedly, I have nothing whatsoever against this weapon. It is well documented in law enforcement and other circles. I am absolutely not trying to misrepresent anything. I have no ulterior motives here but covering this weapon and discussion around it. SwissAmish (talk) 17:50, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

Leaving this here:

I just now saw this discussion. The Draco appears to be disproportionately involved and/or named in crime and criminal subculture elements, to the extent that this has been recognized widely by the general public and media. You are correct that gun regulations, specifically the pistol classification in the US, is a propelling cause behind its widespread ubiquity in the world of crime, and what also brings the weapon its uniqueness as a high-capacity firearm.

I would also agree with your point that there is nothing inherently criminal about the gun; Rather, its high-potential for lethality coupled with an ease of restrictions surrounding it is something that has been heavily exploited by bad actors. On that note, I would concur that it does not have any place in the Criminal/Law communities you mentioned. It may also be noted that some credible and objective gun reviewers have discussed issues with the gun's alleged inaccuracy, short-range limitations, and suggested a lack practical application, or at least without modifications - References for this are available in the article and are all over the place online. Clearly, I have nothing personally against the gun, as that would be a flagrant violation of WP:NPOV SwissAmish (talk) 17:15, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the sources don't support the content about the popularity of the Draco. I also agree that a few local news stories in the United States (and Canada) can't be used to support broader claims. @SwissAmish, I suggest reverting yourself and returning to the Talk page to discuss the disputed content. Woodroar (talk) 18:38, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

Steaua București football records dispute

This is about WP:NPOV issues at Steaua București football records dispute, CSA Steaua București (football), and FCSB.

I want to be sure we are all on the same page, and especially that we avoid churnalism for making claims in the voice of Wikipedia. tgeorgescu (talk) 22:39, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

The gist: who is the winner of the civil law trial is a matter of heated debate in the Romanian press, and ultimately even winning the civil law trial could be deemed to be irrelevant. tgeorgescu (talk) 05:47, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Knowledgeable input requested from the relevant project. Cabayi (talk) 06:29, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

The paragraph I added is based on WP:RS which report on a final and irrevocable verdict from Romania's High Court of Cassation and Justice. The court’s ruling, per sources from the article: [15][16][17], legally attributes the historical records from 1947 to 1998 to CSA Steaua București and explicitly states that FC FCSB does not legally own the records from 2003 to 2017. These facts are reported by independent journalistic sources and not merely opinion, adhering to Wikipedia's neutrality standards.

Your addition to the article: “Odd enough, both sides to the trial claimed victory…” introduces editorial language that violates WP:TONE and WP:NPOV, which require a neutral, encyclopedic tone. Furthermore, citing only the lawyer of one the involved parties as a source of interpretation does not meet WP:RS, especially when the official court verdict has been publicly published and reported on by neutral media, and gives WP:UNDUE to a non-neutral source.

The statement about UEFA not being bound by civil law decisions might be appropriate in a separate section, if it's reliably sourced and written neutrally, but it should not be used to dilute or question the factual outcome of a court case already decided at the highest level. Wikipedia reports what happened, not how one party wished it had turned out.

It is accurate to state that, as of now, UEFA maintains the status quo regarding the club records. This is not because they dispute the court's ruling, but because they will be informed of such changes by the Romanian Football Federation. UEFA does not have the legal competence to intervene in disputes over club identity or honors, and there is currently no investigation or formal review underway by UEFA concerning this matter. Therefore, a more accurate and neutral phrasing would be:

“UEFA currently continues to recognize FC FCSB’s historical records, pending official notification from the Romanian Football Federation, which has yet to act following the court ruling.” Cezxmer (talk) 08:53, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Fair enough: Căvescu's press statements are biased and self-serving. But the same applies to Talpan's press statements. All of them are churnalism.

I do not profess to know who won the trial. Talpan says Talpan won the trial. Căvescu says Căvescu won the trial. They are both employed by parties to the trial, so their claims cannot be rendered as the unvarnished truth.

Rendering what Talpan claimed using WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV is, of course, welcome. Rendering his claims in the voice of Wikipedia is a WP:NPOV violation.

It's very difficult to say what a verdict really means, especially when it contains internal contradictions.

That is the issue: there are two interpretations of the final verdict, and it is not our job to decide which of those is true. the factual outcome of a court case already decided at the highest level is by no means clear.

AFAIK all WP:RS are churnalism, so the official court verdict has been publicly published and reported on by neutral media is not a truthful rendering of the press reports, since some WP:RS just took for granted what Talpan told them.

It might amaze you, but since postmodernism we know that one and the same text can have multiple meanings. The final verdict has multiple meanings, it means different things to different people.

So, yup, the text of the verdict is not in doubt. Its meaning is.

For the record, my edits to the article are at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Steaua_Bucure%C8%99ti_football_records_dispute&diff=1294517750&oldid=1294260033 tgeorgescu (talk) 09:36, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

No one has mentioned anything about Talpan. If you had carefully read the articles provided, you would see that they are reporting on final and definitive court rulings. These are not subjective interpretations, these are legal decisions issued by Romania’s High Court of Cassation and Justice. It is misleading to suggest that there are multiple valid perspectives on the matter when there is a clear and definitive court verdict.

• Orangesport article:
  • FC FCSB does not legally own the 2003 to 2017 records.
  • The court rejected FC FCSB’s request to be officially recognized as holding the honors from that period.
  • CSA Steaua holds the historical records from 1947 to 1998.
• Luju analysis that confirms that the High Court ruled FC FCSB has no legal connection to the historic club and that identity fraud claims were upheld.

Stop misrepresenting the legal situation by treating final verdicts as debatable opinion. Take care! Cezxmer (talk) 09:40, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

No one has mentioned anything about Talpan. Really?

The three sources you mentioned ([15][16][17]), they all got their information from Talpan. tgeorgescu (talk) 09:43, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

This is getting ridiculous and I'm breaking my promise. Learn to read. While they may include statements from Talpan or other parties, the core content is written by sports journalists and is based on the actual court verdicts. Selectively dismissing the entire article because of a quote is misleading and ignores the factual reporting that forms the basis of the coverage. Cezxmer (talk) 09:51, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

The actual court verdicts are multi-interpretable. tgeorgescu (talk) 09:53, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

The Orangesport article confirms that continuity is the decisive argument. And Luju is a dubious source, it should only be used with caution. tgeorgescu (talk) 09:49, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Well, one plausible interpretation of the verdict, according to the lawyer Adrian Căvescu, is that in the 21st century CSA has no legal standing for claiming the records.

Yup, I call it "plausible" because it is based upon the letter of the verdict which remained final. tgeorgescu (talk) 09:55, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Solutia pe scurt: Admite apelul. Admite cererile de intervenție accesorie. Schimbă în parte sentința apelată, în sensul că: Admite excepția lipsei calității procesual active a reclamantului CSA în privința cererii având ca obiect dreptul la palmares pentru perioada 1998-2003 și respinge această cerere în consecință.

Quoted by tgeorgescu (talk) 09:59, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

That is, according to the final verdict, the legal standing of CSA ended in 1998. It is a plausible interpretation. tgeorgescu (talk) 10:09, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Should we try to correct for reliable sources being systematically biased against Palestinians?

There's a requested move at Talk:Rafah aid distribution incidents#Requested move 2 June 2025 on whether to label the event as a "massacre". One of claims is that reliable sources as a whole are biased against Palestinians and refuse to label the killings of Palestinians as a massacre. Quotiing EvansHallBear: If we stick to the generally accepted word criterion from WP:NCENPOV, we will be replicating the bias in our sources in violation of WP:NPOV. I believe that this is irrelevant and possibly a case of WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS, but EvansHallBear, Rafe87, and Wisenerd appear to agree that WP:NPOV requires us to correct for that bias and should overrule the naming conventions policy in this case.

What do uninvolved editors believe is the correct interpretation of WP:NPOV? Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 23:43, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

Wasn't there some Arbcom guidance on the use of massacre in the context of Israel / Palestine? Simonm223 (talk) 23:44, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

@Simonm223: Not really. ArbCom banned people for taking different positions on content depending on the victims. But they didn't give much guidance on possibly disruptive arguments. I just created WP:TITLEWARRIOR, though, to elaborate on the types of unconstructive arguments I see at requested moves. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 01:57, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Since this essay seems rather targeted towards me (or a strawman of me) – I am not making the argument that all RS are biased against Palestinians. Only that specific RS are biased and that bias should be weighed appropriately per WP:ALLOWEDBIAS. On the other hand, sources that are biased towards Palestinians get branded as biased or unreliable. They should be treated consistently to best align with WP:NPOV. And I have already said I am not trying to "right great wrongs." I am under no illusion that anything we do here will have an impact on the ongoing conflict. I'm just trying to make Wikipedia as unbiased as possible. I initially opposed using the term massacre until it was pointed out that it's used rather liberally here when Israelis are killed. Hardly the behavior of a "warrior." EvansHallBear (talk) 02:45, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

@EvansHallBear: It's mainly because I'm tired of these arguments being made at requested moves for the past year, including at WP:ARBPIA5. This RM+the failure of a recent arbitration motions thread made me realize this is more of a WP:GENREWARRIOR-type problem than a single secretive cabal pulling the strings of all requested moves offwiki.

In terms of making Wikipedia less biased, I'd rather do so by trying to move articles when the victims are Israeli but reliable sources don't consistently describe the event as a massacre. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 03:56, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

@Chess:: Apologies if I took this more personally than was intended. These move requests do create a lot of heat for relatively little light and it would be good if some of the more common issues could be easily addressed. I also agree that the ideal would be to remove these WP:LABEL titles across the board except where there's been an established history of usage (like the examples in WP:NCENPOV). But trying to re-litigate a bunch of October 7 article titles sounds like a recipe for disaster. EvansHallBear (talk) 04:10, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:BIAS#Content reflects the bias in a source.

By virtue of our pillars, we are inherently biased when sources are. It is not appropriate for us to try and "correct" for problems in sources - even if it's for a purportedly "righteous" reason such as decreasing bias. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 23:48, 7 June 2025 (UTC)

I am not proposing any OR. I am proposing that in the I/P conflict, western MSM sources (in particular the NYT) should not be considered reliable solely when it comes to emotionally charged language such as "massacre". They have a demonstrable bias in this regard as I showed. There are plenty of sources that do humanize Palestinians and we should emphasize them on how we refer to these mass killings. Multiple primary sources are calling them massacres. EvansHallBear (talk) 00:15, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

It is original research to try and decide which reliable sources are "more reliable". WP:DUE and virtually every other relevant policy clearly states that we are not to try and decide which sources are better than others. We use the most common terms/phrases, and we report on the most common ideas/theories/etc, of all reliable sources. Trying to say that we should discount sources because of their bias is original research. If it's a reliable source, it gets included in the "tally" of consideration of the term. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 00:18, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

This isn't a question of more or less reliable. I am saying these sources are unreliable in that they refuse to humanize Palestinians. That they don't use humanizing terms should be given absolutely zero weight. It's not OR to determine which sources are reliable vs unreliable both in general and in specific contexts. EvansHallBear (talk) 00:31, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

"refus[ing] to humanize Palestinians" is not a criteria for reliability. You are of course free to have your personal opinion on a source, but we follow WP:RS which makes zero allowance for a source to be considered unreliable just because they don't use terms that you, or even a large portion, of editors agree with. So yes, it is OR, because in your own words "refus[ing] to humanize Palestinians" makes them unreliable for that. I'd even venture to say that you trying to push your own personal opinion this strongly is a clear violation of NPOV and if you continue you may very well find yourself being warned or sanctioned under CTOP procedures. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 02:48, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

I brought in outside sources showing bias in "reliable" sources around terminology used in this conflict. Not sure how that qualifies as OR. And as I noted above, I initially opposed the use of the term massacre despite it being my personal opinion based on Wikipedia rules. So I find the accusation that I'm POV pushing incredibly bad faith. EvansHallBear (talk) 03:13, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

I appreciate what you're trying to do but it isn't going to work. Wikipedia does not derive reliability from bias. I would suggest this is an argument to walk away from. Simonm223 (talk) 12:02, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

First of all, OR is allowed outside of articles. Not only is it allowed, it can be necessary (e.g., in assessing the reliability of a source). Second, it's entirely appropriate to assess whether one source is more reliable than another. That is, in fact, what WP:BESTSOURCES asks us to do. However, there's a difference between reliability and bias. Per WP:ALLOWEDBIAS, a belief that the NYT (or some other source) is biased is not reason to reject it. NPOV involves representing views from RSs proportionately, and the issue here may actually be determining what proportionality requires, recognizing that RSs are not limited to English-language sources. FactOrOpinion (talk) 03:24, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:Systemic bias points out that "As a result of systemic bias, Wikipedia underrepresents the perspectives of people in the Global South,[...] and Wikipedia tends to show a White Anglo-American perspective on issues due to the preponderance of English-speaking editors from Anglophone countries." Just as the Women in Red project tries to correct for male bias on Wikipedia, we could have a project to correct the pro-West or pro-US bias, especially on issues such as Israel's devastation of Gaza, where the US perspective is very different from the prevalent perspective in most other countries. NightHeron (talk) 03:56, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

That is a GOOD idea and one I would be happy to help with. Simonm223 (talk) 12:10, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

I'm in favor of that. Snokalok (talk) 12:34, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Also support this. The lack of an onwiki project that addresses the desire of editors to counter anti-Palestinian bias is why we're ending up with so many offwiki canvassing campaigns run by people who want to sabotage the project.

I'd recommend reading Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Interactions at GGTF, for another example of a task force that attempted to counteract systemic bias that other editors contended did not exist. I'm sure there are lessons to be learned from there. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 00:16, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

Also support, this seems like an obviously good idea. Loki (talk) 01:50, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

FWIW, WikiProject Countering systemic bias exists, though it says that it's only semi-active. FactOrOpinion (talk) 02:20, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

Probably because most editors see bias in Wikipedia as a feature, and not a bug. There is at least one instance that I know of where an editor interpreted WP:BIAS/WP:GLOBAL to mean that Wikipedia should have a Western bias, rather than it being something to avoid, and partly based an RfC close on it. So that particular project won't make sense until most en-wiki editors agree that systemic bias is something to remove rather than embrace. TurboSuperA+_(connect) 09:06, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

It might be a more fundamental problem. I think of the way Wikipedia treats NPOV as something like this picture where each article is like a magnetic domain.

Rotation of orientation and increase in size of magnetic domains in response to an externally applied field.

Wikipedia's version of 'neutral' is local, local to a page for example. The rules are applied locally, and the result only depends on the sources directly related to page. There's no reason 2 pages about similar kinds of events would have the same orientation because the pages sample different sources.

What many people seem to want is the picture on the right where there is a strong external system aligning everything, producing cross-article consistency, something like fairness or justice, where all massacre-like things are called massacres for example. But following the rules to maximize NPOV compliance for individual articles will always produce the picture on the left. There are occasional exceptions where we try to apply a global rule, like the boilerplate text for Israel settlements that has no dependency on local sources for a particular page. Sean.hoyland (talk) 14:06, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

There is, in fact, reason to think that if articles A and B are about similar events, the editors who choose to edit them have will similar biases and choose to use similar kinds of sources. There is reason to think that editor bias influences whether an article comes into existence in the first place. Unsurprisingly, en.wiki editors are more likely to use sources in English, and English sources likely have a bias relative to sources in all languages. There are lots of other examples. I'm not arguing that we should aim for the picture on the right; I'm simply noting that there's good reason to think that there's much more significant alignment than you're suggesting. FactOrOpinion (talk) 14:47, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

FactOrOpinion, your point about demographics and its relationship to source choice sounds right to me. And whether an article comes into existence in the first place being dependent (at least in many cases) to editor bias also sounds right. I suppose you can ask whether allowing individual editors to bring an article into existence in contentious topic areas is a good idea, or whether it might be better to add a bit of friction, centralize the process and require consensus. This is such an obvious idea that I assume someone has already suggested it and it was rejected. But for "there's good reason to think that there's much more significant alignment", I'm not sure about that. I'm not so optimistic. I think about word counts in sources and how they are a rough measure of the value of a human life, and how this varies wildly across the media landscape. If it were the case that there is a potential for more alignment, I would expect to see several examples of it having already happened in the topic area given the relatively high number of editors and revisions. Maybe there are examples and I don't know how to see them. Maybe source diversity in articles is a clue. Sean.hoyland (talk) 09:16, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

I don't understand what you mean by "I think about word counts in sources and how they are a rough measure of the value of a human life." FactOrOpinion (talk) 11:53, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

Apologies. I mean, for example, pick say 5 named individuals, with 5 different citizenships, German, Israeli, Palestinian, Thai, US, just normal people, all of whom died on or after Oct 7 in or near the Gaza Strip, and look at variations in the media coverage across the media landscape. It's hard for me to believe that these kinds of large variations in coverage can produce something smooth, like cross-article alignment, consistency etc. Sean.hoyland (talk) 01:34, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

But we're not talking about similar things that occur in the world (and I don't actually consider all deaths to be similar events) or even media coverage in any absolute sense. We're talking about WP articles. My premise was "if articles A and B are about similar events," and based on your brief description, none of those people would have a WP article. At most, they'd be mentioned in a sentence in an article about a broader topic, and there's a good chance that none would be mentioned individually, only as part of a discussion of how many people were killed from various countries, or of people killed in a particular event. They might have brief individual mentions if they were part of a select occupation like humanitarian aid workers or journalists that have gotten more attention. If they're only a sentence in an article about a bigger topic, the question would then be: what are the other related articles that we're comparing that first article to? (Or, if each is part of a sentence in different articles, how do those articles compare?)

And to be clear: I'm not saying that it produces something smooth, only that I think it's smoother than you suggested. FactOrOpinion (talk) 02:40, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

"none of those people would have a WP article"...yes, that's true, they are not notable to us, but I'm using their difference in citizenship as an example of one of the many things that work against cross-article consistency, things that cause variations in the volume, depth and nature of coverage across different sources covering conflict related events (as framed by Wikipedia editors). And our content is, in principle at least, meant to reflect that unevenness in terms of weight etc. My point really is that when we put a frame around an event, we are exposed to these fairly chaotic variations in coverage. And maybe the smaller the frames around events, the larger the potential for cross-article variations. Either way, I think we probably agree that Wikipedia can do better, even if it is not entirely clear how. Sean.hoyland (talk) 14:00, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I don't understand the problem with using English-language sources to determine English-language names.

Words have different meanings and connotations in different languages. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 14:21, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I guess a word can also have different meanings, connotations, associations etc. in the same language to different people, including the people who write our sources. So, I'm not sure what problem is really solved or avoided by just using English-language sources to determine English-language names. Maybe for titles it's just a practical thing. Sean.hoyland (talk) 14:39, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I think it depends on what en.wiki is trying to capture in NPOV: neutrality with respect to English sources (which emphasizes views in anglophone countries) vs. neutrality across languages, recognizing that these may not be the same. Even with respect to English sources, I bet that there are a disproportionate number of US sources relative to the fraction of English speakers globally who are American. FactOrOpinion (talk) 15:09, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

So, wikipedia equals electronic intifada? Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 00:48, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

"a project to correct the pro-West or pro-US bias, especially on issues such as Israel's devastation of Gaza"? Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 00:49, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Would there be a counter-project to support Western ideas and refute blood libels against Israel? Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 00:53, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Please be cautious - you don't want to be accusing Wikipedia editors of blood libel. Simonm223 (talk) 12:34, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

agree with berchanhimez. even if sourcing is biased against palestinians or against israelis, best we can do is use attribution if required. we dont WP:RGW Bluethricecreamman (talk) 02:03, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

The idea that RS are biased *against* Palestinians is absurd. The Israeli-Palestian conflict gets 100x coverage compared to wars in Sudan or Yemen where the number of casualties is much higher. Alaexis_¿question? 08:35, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Bias is not the same thing as lack of coverage; your comment has no relevance to this discussion. NightHeron (talk) 11:28, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Well, if the same event is ignored if it happens in Sudan but appears on front pages of all newspapers if it happens in Israel then it's reasonable to assume that there is a bias against Israel - possibly not always conscious but a bias for all intents and purposes. Alaexis_¿question? 19:22, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

That volume difference in coverage is likely a manifestation of the bias. O3000, Ret. (talk) 12:22, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

There's a literature on anti-Israel media bias [1][2][3][4] and Wikipedia's anti-Israel bias [5][6][7][8]. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 10:11, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Many of those are not reliable sources. For example PirateWires is a blog. However I think this discussion is straying very far from anything even remotely actionable. It's frankly irrelevant whether media is biased toward Israel or toward Palestine - while we should certainly be using high quality sources (preferably academic) for the conflict an implicit media bias is categorically not something Wikipedia is able to correct for in any circumstance. This is a long-running frustration in many domains. For instance an implicit Anglosphere bias against socialism is present throughout our article set on that topic. Simonm223 (talk) 11:59, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

The system for designating reliable sources is badly broken, as are several other Wikipedia processes. This is described well in the sources. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 12:14, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

The sources you've provided don't indicate much of anything at all except that right-wing outlets like Israel more than they like Wikipedia. This is hardly news. Simonm223 (talk) 12:33, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

If Wikipedia achieves NPOV, it will be disliked from both the left and right. That's what neutrality is all about. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 12:36, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

If that is your metric then Wikipedia is succeeding at neutrality. I think that's a rather weak description of achieving neutrality personally because it assumes a normal distribution of reliable sources across the political spectrum. Simonm223 (talk) 12:38, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

But instead, Wiki voice silences the right and sneers at pro-Israel sources while deeming left-wing sources (Vox, New Yorker, Al Jazeera, NY Daily News but not NY Post) reliable. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 12:38, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Al Jazeera is anti-Israel but is deemed reliable. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 12:41, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

The sources I listed above showed that Wikipedia's rules have been broken over and over in a systematic way to promote anti-Israel narratives; the enforcement has been minimal and has barely scratched the surface of addressing the issue. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 12:42, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

None of those sources are left-wing. They're mostly centrist. What they are is much less likely to fabricate or embellish stories than the NY Post and to have more transparent editorial standards than the PirateWires blog. Simonm223 (talk) 13:08, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I think this tangent has stopped being productive. Would you two consider doing something else? FortunateSons (talk) 13:19, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

"Massacre" titles are a plague in almost any context, whether in I/P or not. In addition to being opinionated they're also the vaguest possible descriptor for any incident where a lot of people die, it tells you nothing about how it happened or the circumstances unlike other titles - many massacres are also say figurative e.g. Saturday Night Massacre. Unless it is overwhelmingly the common name it should not be used. PARAKANYAA (talk) 08:41, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

What's unclear about what the word "massacre" means? According to webster-dictionary.org, the primary meaning is "The killing of a considerable number of human beings under circumstances of atrocity or cruelty, or contrary to the usages of civilized people." NightHeron (talk) 11:28, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

There are many different circumstances under which people can be killed, and the how and why is more relevant than the POV term for "bad killing" in most cases. PARAKANYAA (talk) 20:30, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Sometimes I think it might be better to not care what words mean when it comes to constructing NPOV compliant article titles. Treat titles as nothing more than a statistical result in the contentious cases. What would a machine that could read every single reliable source that discussed what we call the Be'eri massacre, a machine that doesn't care about words or people, call the article? It might give it the same name because the sources most likely to discuss the topic will be based in Israel. And they are also more likely to use the word massacre than other words. And describing it as a massacre isn't unreasonable or a misuse of language. So 'massacre' in that case might be the statistical result, the title that is objectively the most NPOV compliant (which does not mean it would necessarily look the most neutral either on its own or as part of a larger set of massacre-like events). When people care about these things, I wonder whether they are complying with the Universal Code of Conduct that prohibits "manipulating content to favour specific interpretations of facts or points of view". It's hard to not care about words. Other times I wonder whether a better approach might be to forget about complicated things like proper source sampling, compressing all that information down to a title etc., and just have a simple rule like - everything gets called an attack - (unless there is a very clear proper name for the event), so that editors don't have to spend time on these kinds of issues that in many cases will not have clear solutions. Sean.hoyland (talk) 13:00, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

This is going to be very difficult when things are recent, if not impossible, because long term notability significance does not look the same coverage wise. PARAKANYAA (talk) 20:31, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Also, for me, the answer to the question "Should we try to correct for reliable sources being systematically biased against Palestinians?" is no. For Wikipedia's system, my understanding is that neutral means faithfully representing the bias of all relevant sources. There is no external neutrality metric that can be used as a measuring stick and I'm not sure why anyone would think they could make one. An optimistic view is that policy compliance is emergent. Given enough time and revisions, articles will tend towards better policy compliance. I wonder if that is true in PIA. Maybe too soon to tell. It's only been a few decades. Sean.hoyland (talk) 13:17, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

I sense WP:AE discussions about people trying to "correct" sources in the future. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 20:31, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

I think the framing of this thread is off. What's actually being asked is "can we call something a word that sources don't use for it if the sources support the meaning of that word?" And the answer to that question is definitely "yes".

The facts we reference come from the sources but our words are our own. If the sources don't call an event a massacre, but it clearly fits some objective definition of massacre, we can call it a massacre. See for instance WP:MURDERS, where we have a whole flowchart about whether to call an event a "killing", a "murder" or a "death" (among other possibilities) based solely on the facts of the case.

IMO what we ought to do is create such a flowchart for mass deaths and then stick to it consistently (obvious WP:COMMONNAMES excepted of course, like with the murder/death/killing flowchart). That way it doesn't matter whether the sources use biased language. Loki (talk) 20:49, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Except in this case there are sources calling it a "massacre". [9] [10] [11] [12] TurboSuperA+_(connect) 20:55, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

Can we call something a word that sources don't use for it if the sources support the meaning of that word?

That's called WP:SYNTHESIS and is a form of original research. From the policy:

Do not combine material from multiple sources to state or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources.

If the source does not explicitly state the conclusion that the event is a massacre, you cannot combine your own definition of massacre with material from sources in order to conclude that an event is a "massacre". That's WP:OR. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 21:03, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

No it's not. The words we use are up to us, only the facts of the situation need to be sourced. We already do this with deaths: if sources call an event either a "murder" or a "death", if there has been no conviction we call that a "killing" even if no source uses that term. OR is inventing our own facts, not our own wordings.

In fact, we already have guidelines on this: look at WP:NOTSYNTH, for which several sections apply here, particularly WP:SYNTHNOTSUMMARY. Loki (talk) 23:36, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

You're not really considering WP:NCENPOV, which is the current flowchart.

1. If there is a particular common name for the event, it should be used even if it implies a controversial point of view.
2. If there is no common name for the event, and there is a generally accepted word used when identifying the event, the title should include the word even if it is a strong one such as "massacre" or "genocide" or "war crime". However, to keep article names short, avoid including more words than are necessary to identify the event. For example, the adjective "terrorist" is usually not needed.
3. If there is no common name for the event and no generally accepted descriptive word, use a descriptive name that does not carry POV implications. See above for how to create a descriptive name.

Common names come first, as you acknowledge. After that, we determine if there's a "generally accepted descriptive word". That is based on reliable scholarly sources. If that doesn't exist, we choose a neutral word, avoiding strong ones or weak ones to go for a descriptive one. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 00:06, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

That's almost the sort of flowchart I was hoping for.

What I was really hoping for is a more objective method for determining these things, exactly to avoid the issue of "what if all accessible sources are biased"? After all we know this does happen in other language wikis: e.g. if we could only use Japanese language sources on the Liancourt Rocks I guarantee you we'd be calling them Takeshima. Loki (talk) 00:15, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

Though it's not directly quoted in NCENPOV right now, I think the assumption is that it would be the most common name in English sources. Because that's what WP:COMMONNAME itself requires. Perhaps adding (in English language reliable sources) to point 1 of NCENPOV, or another way of directly including that information in NCENPOV would help. But as has been said, if all reliable sources are biased, we ourselves will be biased - that's how Wikipedia is designed. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 01:52, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

There is no requirement that it be based only on English sources. FactOrOpinion (talk) 02:16, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:COMMONNAME: Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's official name as an article title; it generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable, English-language sources) - emphasis added. I find it very hard to believe that NCENPOV is referencing a "common name" that is different than the common name in the actual article titles policy. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 02:32, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the correction. FactOrOpinion (talk) 02:55, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

We're also supposed to generally avoid anglocentric bias, though - I do wonder if WP:COMMONNAME could sometimes cause problems in that regard. if all reliable sources are biased, we ourselves will be biased normally includes all sources across all languages; COMMONNAME is the only place where we ignore non-English sources. I wonder if perhaps it should include a clause about avoiding common names that may represent anglocentric bias... it'd have to be handle cautiously, though, because other languages can also introduce biases (in this particular topic area, an argument that "all Arabic / Hebrew sources use X" obviously has to be approached with some caution. One thing I vaguely recall from the ArbCom case is that arguments of that nature were an issue.) --Aquillion (talk) 11:38, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

The problem with that particular approach would be that weight will be a serious problem. We had this issue to a significantly lesser degree for the Gaza Health Ministry-and-Hamas-discussion, where that policy doesn’t apply, and this devolved into the way it usually does. As one of the main contributors who wasn’t tbanned, I believe that - while, just to be clear, probably beneficial to my odds of writing a convincing policy-based argument in a discussion - such an approach to commonname would cause more problems than it would solve. FortunateSons (talk) 13:08, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

Two comments: 1) COMMONNAME applies to article titles… not to article text. 2) There is a distinction between descriptions and NAMES.

If there are lots of sources (English and non-English) that describe an event as being a “massacre” then we can describe the event as being a massacre (although if sources disagree, we might need to do so using in-text attribution).

BUT… we might NOT be able to entitle our article about the event as XXX massacre or Massacre of YYY. To do that we would need English language sources that NAME the event using the word “massscre” (“The XXX massacre” or “The massacre of YYY”).

In other words, we need to see how the contentious word “massacre” is used in context by our sources. Are they using it as a description or as part of a NAME? Blueboar (talk) 14:38, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

No, this is blatantly against WP:SYNTH and WP:NPOV. We cannot synthesize something as a massacre and describe it as such just because we think sources are describing it as a massacre when they don't explicitly call it that. We don't use contentious, charged, or extreme terms to describe something when the sources don't use those terms to describe it. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 01:00, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out. I haven't expressed myself very clearly here which has probably muddied the waters. But the issue in question is a VERY narrow case around bias in article titling (albeit a contentious one). This is being presented as a much more aggressive proposal to ignore facts from RS, substitute OR, etc, which isn't what was discussed.EvansHallBear (talk) 21:04, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

In general: The correct view is that editors are collectively expected to exercise proper judgement in determining a) which sources are factually reliable for a specific thing and b) the relative significance of all the views published in those sources. Editors should be encouraged to consider how their own demographic characteristics and biases may impact the sources the survey, in order to provide a more complete and accurate assessment of relative prominence, however, editors do not have discretion to deviate from the assessed significance when presenting content.

On this specific case: I have to decline to comment, as the disagreement does appear to cover the assessment of relative significance, the suggestion to deviate from said assessment appears to be a minor viewpoint that did not pick up much steam, and overall it appears to be a mess of a discussion I have no desire to get involved in. However, I do find merit in bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez's suggestion to split the proposals into different sections, or otherwise clearly delineate opinions on alternate proposals, in order to have some mercy for the poor bastard who will have to close this discussion. Perhaps it may also be appropriate to keep an assessment of the sources in another section. Alpha3031 (t • c) 15:11, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

An article to compare it to is Bucha massacre. WP:RS seem split over calling it "Bucha killings"/"killings in Bucha" and "Bucha massacre" [13] [14] [15] [16]. I see no issue adding "massacre" to the title of the Rafah aid article in question, per WP:EUPHEMISM, since "incident" is clearly a euphemism for killings. TurboSuperA+_(connect) 14:04, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

• There are several issues being rolled into one question here:

1. should we use the word “massacre” in our article title? THAT depends on overall source usage. Do enough sources NAME the event something like “XXX Massacre” or “Massacre at YYY” - so we can say this is a COMMONNAME. One or two sources doing so are not enough. It has to be lots of sources.
2. should we describe the event as being a “massacre” in article text? THAT takes fewer sources.
3. should we use in-text attribution or state that the event was/is a massacre in wikivoice. THAT depends on whether there are sources that explicitly say it wasn’t a massacre (rather than just preferring a different synonym).

All of these need to be considered… but all depend on sources. Blueboar (talk) 21:51, 8 June 2025 (UTC)

This seems very reasonable Simonm223 (talk) 19:31, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

One thing that has specifically come up in this topic area that might be worth considering in any guideline-essay that comes out of it: A lot of events are only covered in any depth by sources we'd reasonably consider biased. That is to say, if a lot of people in one group are killed somewhere, sources favorable to that group will give it wall-to-wall coverage as a massacre, while neutral sources will give it much less attention and sources on the "other side" will ignore it entirely. In other circumstances this would be less of an issue because partisan sources are a smaller bubble; but in nationalist conflicts you can end up with the media of an entire region, language, religion, etc. covering something as a massacre, with sources everywhere mostly ignoring it. And this results in people saying "look, look, the COMMONNAME is that it is a massacre!" I think that we might benefit from guidelines that COMMONNAMEs in regional or sectarian disputes that would otherwise violate WP:POVTITLE must exhibit usage that transcends the dividing lines behind the dispute, ie. you cannot rely primarily on sources with (either) Arabic or Israeli biases for an otherwise POV WP:COMMONNAME in the WP:ARBPIA topic area, and specifically not to call something a massacre. If the vast majority of sources that exist for something fall into one of those camps, you have to use a descriptive neutral title. --Aquillion (talk) 20:12, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I don’t entirely disagree with the premise, but considering that both sides consider the New York Times and BBC to be biased against them, I really don’t want to be the person trying to figure it which source has Arabic or Israeli biases, as that isn’t likely to lead to productive results. And if one chooses based on national origin, that opens up another can of worms FortunateSons (talk) 20:18, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree with both of you, but I think more with Aquillion than FS. Specifically I think that it would be hard to convince a consensus of editors at RSN that the NYT was biased, so we shouldn't let claims of that from a few editors worry us too much. Loki (talk) 01:41, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Considering I had at least one drawn out discussion about German or/or Jewish media in general (which hopefully isn't what Aquillion intended to include within the scope of "bias"), I lack your optimism here, but do hope you're right. FortunateSons (talk) 07:18, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Not specific to this situation but in general WP editors should try to write conservatively (from the middle ground), meaning that even if a majority of sources are using subjective language, we should be careful necessarily adopting that position as fact and instead use statements of attribution to at least keep wiki voice out of contested areas. In too many areas, Wp editors want to aggressively include wording and terms as fact that support or deny some moral position (eg see how fast our articles call out those on the far right), which can quickly lead to neutrality and tone problems. We are still bound by Due that majority viewpoints from RSes are given more weight, and the article is going to include more on these majority viewpoints, but we shouldnt simply equate the majority to being the objective truth in regards to current issues. Masem (t) 15:43, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

So, on your example, I'm a bit divided. Because, on one hand, you're right and I do agree that WP editors should attribute more often and should avoid over-summarizing in a way that often ends up running afoul of WP:LABEL. However accurately identifying far-right groups and figures is also important. There is an easily identified differential between the far-right and the far-left in that the far-left are pretty willing to adopt that label. It's somewhat baked into the idea of Vanguardism that there is a far-left, that it should be politically active, and that it should openly advocate for far-left stances. Likewise I don't think I've ever met an anarchist who calls themselves a moderate when they could instead call themselves a radical.

On the other hand, the far-right often feel a need to conceal their political position (either because of historical associations with Hitler, Pinochet, Franco and Mussolini - who are widely received by society as villains - or because, per Sartre, discursive dishonesty is a component of far-right political belief systems.) As such, if we are perfectly WP neutral on that issue we will be making a pedagogical error of accurately assessing the left-margin of politics while pretending there is no right-margin.

And that's not good.

I do think this is a soluble issue though and one with a solution within current WP policy and it's this: we should attribute more and summarize less. Let's move away from pithy infoboxes that try to wrap up a person or group's political ideology in two words or less and instead move toward clearer and more rounded discussion of best sources. An example might be to say, "Cas Mudde describes the 2023 victory of Geert Wilders in Dutch national elections as part of an emboldened far-right" (cited to Intereconomics 2024, 59(2)) rather than having an infobox that nakedly describes Geert Wilders as far-right. This would avoid wiki-voice, avoid over-summarizing and still allow for an accurate assessment from a WP:BESTSOURCE (Cas Mudde is an expert in the far-right and Intereconomics is a peer reviewed journal). Simonm223 (talk) 16:42, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

The problem with the rush to call people and groups as far right as fact/in wiki voice is because that's still based on a subjective term (where is the line drawn between the moderate and far right, just like what falls under "woke"), and the bulk of that is based on relatively current sources like news articles, which causes RECENTISM issues. In time, the broader academics consensus may agree the terms undoubtly apply so we can say that as fact, but that is not going to happen in the short term. So in the short term we should use more caution with using wiki voice, though still relying on DUE to include such labels with attribution outside wiki voice. Masem (t) 17:35, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I am in 100% agreement with you that Wikipedia grossly over-uses news articles for political topics. I understand why - expedience, ease of access and significantly less jargon. I'm someone who is well-accustomed to reading social science and humanities journals but even I can recognize that newspapers are much easier to read. So we have multiple accessibility issues. Newspapers are easier to access and easier to understand. However it's not actually a good thing. We should be using academic journals and books supplemented by news articles (if news articles are used at all) rather than news articles supplemented by academic journals and books as the basis for our political articles. Stricter standards for the use of news sources on politics articles would probably be one of the single greatest improvements we could make to Wikipedia. Followed by getting rid of infoboxes. Simonm223 (talk) 17:43, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

It isn't simply ease; it's also a matter of timing. News reports are published the same day or within a few days of an event, whereas peer-reviewed journal articles and books will not appear until months to years later. At that point, the content in an article is generally already sourced to RSs, and someone needs to be more motivated to say "that's what the news said at the time, but let's see how academics are now assessing it and replace these news sources, as they're not the best sources." I don't see how you can get rid of news articles unless there were consensus that political articles simply shouldn't be created close in time to an event, and I doubt that there's consensus for that. FactOrOpinion (talk) 18:09, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

That's the point I made about expedience. WP:TOOSOON is a thing. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a news portal. We can afford to wait. Simonm223 (talk) 18:11, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

But that essay is about situations where there aren't sufficient RSs for an article, not about situations where there are lots of RSs but better sources are written later. NOTNEWS says "Editors are also encouraged to develop stand-alone articles on significant current events." For example, I've worked on Deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, which a significant current event in the US for several legal and political reasons, and I think it would be ludicrous for us to ignore that subject until there are peer-reviewed legal and political articles about it. FactOrOpinion (talk) 18:31, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

And what I'm saying is that standard news cycle fare constitutes insufficient sources. Simonm223 (talk) 18:36, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

So if it were up to you, you would delete that article as TOOSOON? FactOrOpinion (talk) 18:48, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

This discussion has gone off the rails. I withdrew my support at Talk:Rafah aid distribution incidents#Requested move 2 June 2025 for using "massacre" in the article title. Any potential pro-Israel bias on Wikipedia should be addressed by fixing those articles to bring them into compliance with WP:NPOV. Ignoring the rules to make other articles more "pro-Palestinian" in an attempt to produce some sort of global neutrality was a terrible suggestion. EvansHallBear (talk) 16:42, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Just a reminder, editors are limited to 1,000 words in WP:ARBPIA discussions. Please follow this rule. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 18:51, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Sincere question (from someone who seldom comments in ARBPIA discussions): that says it applies to "formal discussions (RfCs, RMs, etc)." Is there a list anywhere of what is/isn't considered a formal discussion? The two examples both involve !votes and often get closed by someone uninvolved, but your comment suggests that it's not limited to that. FactOrOpinion (talk) 19:26, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Rule of thumb, anything that needs a closure FortunateSons (talk) 19:36, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

• That only applies to formal discussions (RfCs, RMs, etc). This isn't a formal discussion so that doesn't apply here. And besides, most of the discussions above have drifted away from ARBPIA-specific arguments to focus on underlying policy questions, which is probably a good thing - I think every experienced editor recognizes that "let's correct for the biases of sources in this specific topic area!" is obviously a nonstarter. But we probably need some sort of guidelines, even if it's just some essays, to deal with the constant WP:POVTITLE title-wrangling; and general discussion aimed at figuring out what that would look like isn't covered by the word limit. If this discussion leads to an RFC to change some policy, that is where the word limit would apply, but I'm skeptical it's heading there right now, and I certainly can't picture anyone calling for a formal close of this discussion itself. --Aquillion (talk) 20:03, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

As an aside, here is a search for all articles with "massacre" in their name in the Israel-Gaza War category. Obviously each individual case has its own circumstances but it might be worth going over that list and looking for outliers, as well as double-checking to make sure that anything that hasn't been moved to a more neutral title yet actually meets WP:COMMONNAME. --Aquillion (talk) 15:47, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

To save some time, here are the attacks that still have massacre in the title (as opposed to redirects):

"Massacres" of Israelis (7)

• Nova music festival massacre
• Kfar Aza massacre
• Be'eri massacre
• Netiv HaAsara massacre
• Alumim massacre
• Psyduck music festival massacre
• Kissufim massacre (Move request ongoing)

"Massacres" of Palestinians (5)

• Flour Massacre
• Nuseirat rescue and massacre
• Rafah paramedic massacre
• Al-Najjar family massacre (Move request ongoing)
• Fahmi al-Jarjawi School Massacre (Move request ongoing)

EvansHallBear (talk) 16:25, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Neutrality and undue weight concerns on Komil Allamjonov

Hello, I would like to raise concerns regarding the current state of the article on Komil Allamjonov.

1. The article appears to violate Wikipedia's core principle of neutrality (WP:NPOV). It predominantly portrays Mr. Allamjonov in a positive light, highlighting achievements without any critical perspectives.

2. There is no "Criticism" or "Controversies" section, despite the fact that multiple independent sources (e.g. OpenDemocracy, Ulster University) have published detailed reports alleging potential conflicts of interest, favorable treatment of affiliated businesses, and political entanglements.

3. The majority of references come from government-controlled or favorable media. The article lacks balance from reputable, independent or international media sources.

4. The tone often reads promotional, with sentences that seem more like PR than encyclopedic writing. For example, “He promoted freedom of the press” and “created innovative platforms” are not presented with adequate sourcing or neutral framing.

Request: Please consider a thorough NPOV cleanup. Addition of a well-sourced "Controversies" section would help restore balance and meet encyclopedic standards. I am happy to assist or provide reliable sources from independent investigations and reports. Light Low (talk) 08:54, 9 June 2025 (UTC)

Help wanted over at Talk:Michael Jackson#High profile controversies lack prominence in this article

This has been brought up in detail several times on this noticeboard

At first I thought that Wikipedia policy recommends against prominence of controversies after I was pointed to WP:CRITS. But this is NOT what is actually the case, interpretting it like that is nitpicking, and high profile editors and administrator are aware of this behaviour.

New editors and IP use it a lot, specifically the WP:CSECTION, to remove criticisms or controversial items from articles. Most of the times this is a COI/NPV issue and the criticism they tend to wrongly remove is justified by WP:DUE. Turning it into a guideline or policy, as in its current version, could just empower them more. We need to fix this for sure.

— Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)/Archive 64#WP:CRITICISM's status as an essay

Also pages about organizations and corporations and philosophy, religion, or politics may actually contain criticisms or controversies sections. Is Michael Jackson a corporation under the definition of WP:BLPGROUP?

'"when the group is very small, it may be impossible to draw a distinction between the group and the individuals that make up the group

Note that criticism and controversy sections are not prohibited by policy, and the tag should only be used if there is a real concern that the criticism section and its contents are causing trouble with the article's neutrality.

— Template:Criticism section

Wallby (talk) 13:49, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

References

Zohran_Mamdani and pushing of material alleging anti-Hindu discrimination

a few accounts, including one newer account, @Banksy50201, have been trying to include info about Zohran Mamdani.

• Something about him protesting the controversial Ram Mandir temple
• Some twitter video about someone cursing against hindus in the background of one of his videos where he was protesting
• Something about Narendra Modi being exonerated of his role in the 2002 Gujarat riots

Bluethricecreamman (talk) 14:10, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

This is a shockingly biased description of what I at least have been asking for inclusion. My only attempted edits have been to add verifiable cited coverage of Mr. Mamdani’s participation in a very prominent 2020 protest in Times Square New York City against “anti-Hindu fascism.” Please see the talk page to see my history and my concerns. I have never tried to even mention Narendra Modi or any political party. The authentic video that is so MISLEADINGLY being dismissed as “someone cursing in the background while Zohran is just protesting” byUser:Bluethricecreamman

Is a video of Mamdani being told to give sound bites to introduce himself and then to also say something about “them”, ie, the protestors standing behind him who are chanting that “all Hindus are haramis (bastards/illegitimate/sinful).” Mamdani says yes, introduces himself in some detail as a candidate for NY state assembly district No. 36 (an election he won) and then says that he’s there to protest the reconstruction of a temple in India on the site of a demolished mosque. Mamdani gestures behind him (to the same protestors screeching that “the people known as Hindus are bastards”) and says he’s here with these other protestors and also others on other side of the Square.

Anyone who understands Urdu or Hindi can see that the description given of the video here is completely misleading. In any event, this same user concedes that “inclusion of his stance and the reaction to it is warranted” but then has been blocking even neutral descriptions of exactly that as somehow “bashing” Mr. Mamdani. I absolutely agree the entry must not editorialize or take any stance on whether Mamdani should have been there or not - but this fact is absolutely relevant and is absolutely “due” for inclusion.

If you look at the talk history, this user who is censoring any mention of it also keeps changing the goal posts of why it cannot be mentioned. Mr. mamdani is an elected government official of my state of New York and is now running to represent 8 million New Yorkers like myself as our mayor. Elections start in a few days. Why can a neutral fact-based description of his stance on this issue not be included? His stance on other “contentious” issues like the Israel-Palestine conflict or taxes are included. Why is just this being censored so heavily? Banksy50201 (talk) 15:01, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

You cannot use that tweet per WP:BLPSPS. FactOrOpinion (talk) 20:21, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

To reiterate: I am only interested in including a fact-based reference to Mamdani’s public STANCE on “anti-Hindu fascism and his participation in the 2020 Times Square protest of which there is more than enough coverage and evidence. Claiming that “dueness” prevents even a brief description of his stance on an issue because Mamdani is not central to the underlying issue is an obvious STRAWMAN by User:Bluethricecreamman.

No one is saying that Mamdani should be referenced in Wikipedia entries on the construction of a “controversial Ram Temple” or anti-Hindu fascism more generally at all. This is about an inclusion of an elected politician's open public stance on a political issue on his OWN Wikipedia page - the same page on which his stance on many other “contentious” issues and reactions to those stances have also been described. I’ve no idea why User:Bluethricecreamman is pushing so hard to censor this issue. Banksy50201 (talk) 15:18, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

As far as I can tell from this edit, we're talking about exactly one source, this Times of India article, for WP:WEIGHT. It also pretty clearly characterizes Mamdani as a critic of the BJP regarding their treatment of Muslims in India. I don't think saying that much would be a problem in the article. We're not going to cite tweets, though. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 15:36, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

That makes sense to me. (There have been a couple of different articles covering his stance and reactions to it in that same source on the issue, just FYI.) Is there a rule against citing tweets (grateful for the rule reference to educate myself)? Banksy50201 (talk) 15:49, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

See WP:RSPTWITTER and the links in that entry. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 05:10, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Regarding the same article: Criticism of the candidate should be included for balance. But criticisms have been swiftly and repeatedly removed[17][18][19]. An article entitled "Zohran Mamdani acknowledges ‘pain and confusion’ over his decision not to co-sponsor Holocaust resolution this year" is being represented with the sentence "Mamdani voted in favor of the 2025 Holocaust remembrance resolution". Material from the New York Times and CNN was removed. Given the level of concern in the Jewish community about this candidate, I cannot see how anyone could view the current wording of the Israel-Palestine section as balanced. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 21:42, 10 June 2025 (UTC)

Request: Please consider a thorough NPOV cleanup. Addition of a well-sourced "Controversies" section would help restore balance and meet encyclopedic standards. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 09:33, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

A WP:CONTROVERSYSECTION would be a magnet for non-notable criticisms and should not be added. – Muboshgu (talk) 20:25, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I am suggesting adding the above references from CNN, NBC and the New York Times. Major news. Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 23:12, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

It's seldom consistent with WP:NPOV to create a separate section for controversies. You're not being told to omit the content (as long as it's supported by RSs, appropriately summarized, and WP:DUE), only that it's inappropriate to create a separate "controversies" section where you gather all of the critical content. FactOrOpinion (talk) 23:49, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks @FactOrOpinion. If I add back the material described above, and someone reverts it, can I tag you? Allthemilescombined1 (talk) 00:03, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

If you reinsert text that says Concerns have been raised or have stirred controversy, I will revert it. That is WP:WEASEL language. The third revert you shared is WP:SYNTH so I would revert that too. – Muboshgu (talk) 00:21, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I don't actually want to spend the time needed to look into whether any specific revert is/isn't justified. That is, in and of itself, that one can include critical content does not imply that a specific edit which adds critical content is an appropriate edit. I looked at your first example above, where you added "Concerns have been raised among centrists about his criticisms of Israel, socialist leanings, and relative lack of experience," sourced to this NBC article, and that article doesn't support the text you added. What the NBC article said about centrists was "His criticisms of Israel, socialist label, and relative lack of experience could hurt him, though, with centrists," which doesn't imply that centrists have actually voiced these concerns. It also doesn't belong in the lead, as it's not summarizing the body. Could another editor have chosen to improve the text and move it into the body instead of reverting it? I think that's a stretch, as it's hard to argue that this sort of conjecture is DUE, it doesn't naturally fit into any existing section, and it's not great content for starting a new section. FactOrOpinion (talk) 01:14, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

References

Promotion of anti-trans fringe theories on J. K. Rowling

(Moved from WP:FTN per request)

The article lead currently states, in Wikivoice, "...Her remarks have been described as transphobic, resulting in condemnation from various sectors and fueling debates on freedom of speech. Rowling denies being transphobic, stating that her views stem from her experience of domestic abuse and sexual assault. Her expression of these views has impacted her public image and relationship with readers and colleagues, altering the way they engage with her works."

The bit about "her views stem from her experience of domestic abuse and sexual assault" is insidious. It basically implies that transgender people either did the domestic abuse and sexual assault Rowling experienced (which is not true), or that transgender people are highly prone to such actions (also untrue), and the substance of Rowling's fringe views is only gone into late article.

A featured article (How has this not been demoted?) should not have actual attacks on transgender people in the lead. A featured article should have basic respect for facts, and a featured article should not be a WP:COATRACK to promote fringe theories that promote hate.

It's a problem, and that article's relation to Rowling's views on transgender people has been problematic for years, edits generally attempting diminishing non-fringe views in favour of giving Rowling's attacks on trans people more space.

Some major WP:OWN issues as well. In my opinion, it's almost impossible to get an edit through, unless it's mildly anti-trans, in which case it will be highly defended and reverted back to. For example, if you check the archive, you'll see regular calls to revert everything back to the "consensus" version that passed FAR (in 2022 - this is not how FAR is meant to work.), often right after a several-month debate over a small change. Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.9% of all FPs.} 20:14, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Why not just remove the part about where her views stem from? While Rowling denies being transphobic, her expression of these views has impacted her public image and relationship with readers and colleagues, altering the way they engage with her works. or Rowling denies being transphobic, but her expression of these views has impacted her public image and relationship with readers and colleagues, altering the way they engage with her works. I think that's enough for the lede. TurboSuperA+_(connect) 20:36, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Because the article has major WP:OWN issues. Attempts to revise it are getting reverted, or being asked to wait several months for a revision of a later section. Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.9% of all FPs.} 01:15, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

This content has been replaced; work is underway on talk to update the Transgender section of the article, and improvements to the lead should follow. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 11:41, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

I would second this assessment. Simonm223 (talk) 11:02, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

However this pattern is probably more indicative of the problem:

After stating that the article was painfully non-neutral regarding Rowling's position on trans issues I was asked rather pointedly to provide some new sources indicating this and I provided the following: [20]

You will note these are peer reviewed sources.

There was a small bit of back and forth regarding one source and then I asked the following [21]

There was some more discussion in which a couple of editors argued that "described as transphobic" was sufficient which Loki and I disputed as suggesting a dispute that didn't exist.

The response was for one of the principal article owners to threaten AE claiming that I had not sufficiently evaluated sources. [22] They then suggested my peer reviewed sources constituted cherry picking [23] And that the standard for making any changes to the POV of the article was a comprehensive survey of all literature on Rowling. [24] and another editor including the request that a person who wanted to change the article should parse all scholarly sources since 2020 discussing Rowling and gender. [25]

There is an impossibly high bar for making changes that reflect Rowling's transphobia. None of the defenders of the article have expressed any interest in doing the heavy lifting though. This is passed entirely back to whoever wants to make any changes. I will admit that I pretty much abandoned any concerted effort to move the needle after that. You will notice my participation at article talk drops off a cliff after that point. After all, why bother? Unless I want to become an effective SPA (which I do not) I would never have time to meet the very high standard being imposed by the people protecting this article. Simonm223 (talk) 11:51, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I third the WP: OWN issues and this description of the situation. Loki (talk) 15:05, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Loki and Simon, amid all the discussion, can you point to any relevant RFCs that have been conducted? Or even a time when the article was tagged and justified as POV? The "impossibly high bar" is defined at WP:FAOWN. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:31, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Then help out a little on the source review. Dismissing my sources as "cherry picking" was hurtful. Your declination to provide new sources yourself in that discussion was an exacerbating factor. I understand you have other things going on in your life at the moment but taking a few minutes to hit up Wikipedia Library and see if there were new sources I missed during my review would have gone a long way toward a sense of good faith. Simonm223 (talk) 17:19, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I am sorry you were hurt, and that my post came across to you as it did, but I did not dismiss your sources as cherry picking; I explained that we needed to comprehensively survey all sources, as each time I have done that, I've found that (still) most scholarly sources on Rowling go well beyond what we examine on talk, and I was explaining the work we needed still to do. And I'm sorry about the exacerbating factor, but I have explained several times on talk that I am now a 24/7 caregiver, with a chaotic and grief-filled existence, and cannot do the roll-up-my-sleeves work I was once able to do. I did ping Victoriaearle, who has excellent source access, hoping she would pop in and do that, and then I spent ten days in the hospital with my husband. And two of the three main FA writers of this article (olivaw-daneel, AleatoryPonderings, and Vanamonde93) -- who had most of the sources -- have gone missing. I'm sorry my life isn't better at the moment, and I'm equally sorry you were offended by my post-- I am often hurried when typing, and never intended to say "you" were cherry picking, rather to point out how to move forward with a process that had been lacking since the 2022 FAR. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:39, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I sincerely appreciate this apology. Simonm223 (talk) 18:47, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I sincerely appreciate you acknowledging it; life is too short and I don't want to hurt people over Wikipedia content, but I know I am too often hurried because of my circumstances, and my talk page posts may lack clarity when I'm rushed. Be well, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:50, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

@SandyGeorgia, I've recently tagged the article as POV, prior to seeing this discussion. Please see Talk:J. K. Rowling#WP:NPOV. TarnishedPath^talk 11:04, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

Also echoing the opinion that there are WP:OWN issues and a few editors absolutely bogging down any attempt at discussion and change. The talk page feels pointless and endless and it's utterly discouraging to try and contribute at all. LittleLazyLass (Talk | Contributions) 03:51, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Like I said on the talk page, I don't think that your (most recent) concern makes sense. This is not an attack on transgender people (or at least, we are not in any way repeating an attack on transgender people in Wikivoice), and I say that as someone who has consistently wanted to cover Rowling's increasing transphobia more prominently.

This is a close paraphrase of her denial from the essay she posted in 2020. It does rely on her belief that trans women are threats to cis women to make sense. But if you don't believe that, it just doesn't make sense. We're not repeating anything false; the reader is welcome to the conclusion that her denial is bad.

Also, I don't really think that we need to include her denial in the lead and have said that several times, but if we're going to, I don't think that repeating the logic for her denial is in any way undue. I do think that the current paragraph is much better NPOV-wise than it had been previously, because the previous paragraph had been hedgy about the accusations of transphobia to the point where it wasn't even clear if she actually believed anything controversial. Loki (talk) 01:36, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree with you that Rowling's "safe-space" claims are communicated dispassionately and are attributed to her. But I agree with Adam Cuerden that any movement of the article to more clearly articulate how her transphobia has been received is imposed with impossibly high bars. Incredible preconditions are set to even begin to discuss revisions to that language. I would prefer not to bring this to AE or ANI because it would become a whole bloody time sink that I don't think would lead to anyone being satisfied, thus me putting my diffs here and NPOV/N instead of either of those places, but change needs to come to the Rowling article. It's entirely non-neutral and is increasingly out of step with the real-world reception of this BLP. Simonm223 (talk) 12:00, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I do agree with that. The current lead is an improvement on the previous lead but it's still an NPOV violation. Loki (talk) 16:18, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

• If there are conduct issues, I think it's important to take them to WP:AE, even if building a case would be a pain. I'm skeptical that AE could actually untangle something this complex (especially when a lot of the back-and-forth accusations relate to stuff like WP:OWN, misuse of sources, WP:CPUSH / WP:TEND and the like, all of which is hard to prove even in the best of circumstances), but my perception is that AE is creeping towards a broader trans-related gensex2 ArbCom case; having a record of attempting to solve this there could be useful if it's going to get rolled into it. And AE's response could help determine if it should go there or get rolled into such a case if it occurs, ie. whether they go "yeah that's a problem" vs "there's something there but we can't untangle it" vs. "lolno". Plus a few AE cases where people highlight what they think are conduct issues by people involved might get people to back down a bit - you never know. Sometimes an informal warning from AE is enough. But at the very least having people tiptoeing around accusations of conduct issues or AE without actually taking things there isn't good and isn't sustainable. --Aquillion (talk) 16:28, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

  I have absolutely no interest in starting an AE filing over this. As you mentioned above the AE process is particularly poorly suited to handle multi-party disputes involving WP:OWN and WP:CPUSH. And besides, I don't want to see any of the parties involved here sanctioned. Many of them have contributed valuable work to the Rowling page outside of this one issue, particularly Vanamonde93, who has put a considerable effort into a range of significant women within science fiction and fantasy and whose work on Ursula K. LeGuin demonstrates a clear interest in making good articles on a topic I think we both care quite a lot about. I just would like to see the page protectors relax their hold on the article sufficiently that it can be brought to something resembling neutrality. I hope a discussion here, away from the local consensus of the JK Rowling page will help to elucidate the extent of the problem that their well-intentioned protection of a page about a significant SFF author has created. Simonm223 (talk) Simonm223 (talk) 17:06, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree with you about the incredible preconditions. As I said on the article talk itself, the article reads like a puff piece and is entirely dissonant from JK Rowling's actual public image. Snokalok (talk) 12:40, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

I took a look at the article for the fist time and immediately saw similar tidbits like this all over it - the type of quick small fixes I typically enjoy contributing as I go - but then I checked out the talk page and edit history and just sighed instead. Thatbox (talk) 10:29, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Seems attributed to her, so I do not see an issue. Slatersteven (talk) 11:05, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

If people would like to contribute to the Featured article review, it'd be helpful. Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.9% of all FPs.} 12:13, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Since a lot of the dispute there is over the process, I suggest just withdrawing it for now and going through the formal steps (formal notification etc.) There's obviously serious issues that need to be addressed, especially since coverage has shifted so drastically since it became a featured article and the article really hasn't reflected it (and efforts to do so, coupled with disagreement over how to do so, have led to obvious instability.) I think that your previous attempt could reasonably be seen as notification but there's no reason not to cross every t and dot every i; a few weeks won't change much unless people suddenly reach an agreement on how to fix the various problems to the point where a FAR is no longer necessary, in which case, well, good for them. At the very least, whether you withdraw it or not, it should be added to Wikipedia:Featured article review/notices given immediately - I suspect that the false perception that the article is still FAR quality is a big part of why disputes there are so intractable, so getting the ball rolling properly on this (and keeping it going until we reach a conclusion) is necessary. --Aquillion (talk) 16:55, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Yes. Because I totally have the energy to do this again in a month. Frankly, I don't think this article can possibly be considered amongst Wikipedia's best work; I think it'd struggle to pass GA as it is now. And people on that page are criticising me for responding to attacks made against me over having opened an FAR.

This is, as far as I can tell, why the article is so problematic. Anyone raising issues with it is attacked mercilessly, with no attempts to actually engage with the problems. Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.9% of all FPs.} 20:19, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Just a courtesy ping to SandyGeorgia, whose edits/edit summaries appear to have been referenced above. — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 16:11, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks. I encourage Simonm223 to re-read the diffs presented, as the misrepresentation of my position should be apparent with a more careful read. Else, Simonm223 is welcome to discuss the misunderstanding on my talk page. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:25, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Also, re Rhododendites ping, it appears that Vanamonde93 is also referenced in the cited diffs ("parse all scholarly sources"), so pinging as well. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:43, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

The article is no longer eligible for Wikipedia:Featured article criteria as there is ongoing controversy and edit wars. The article shows this lack of consensus in its lack of clarity , and pun intended, general Weasley-ness.

On the paragraph

• "various sectors", "fueling debates", "engage with works" are cliches, opinions, or overreach
• "her views stem from her experience of domestic abuse and sexual assault" is incorrect based on a quick search and her website
• there is too much detail

The Political_views_of_J._K._Rowling is slightly better.

My suggestion is "...Since 2020, Rowling has been vocal on transgender, sex and gender, and freedom of speech issues. This has created significant media attention, personal attacks, and a legal case."

(]] Wakelamp d[@-@]b (talk) 04:02, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

I don't mean to be hyperbolic here, but could you imagine writing "David Duke has been vocal on race, culture, and freedom of speech issues. This has created significant media attention, personal attacks, and legal cases." It's just so whitewashed and disingenuous 2601:486:100:9780:F862:61AA:C5A4:6CBE (talk) 07:05, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

Also diverting nearly all criticism to the political views page has been part of what has caused the core page to become so non-neutral. Simonm223 (talk) 12:20, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

In the Philanthropy section, we get "Rowling stated she had founded and would fund Beira's Place, a women-only rape help centre that provides free support services to survivors of sexual violence.[364] The centre does not serve trans women.[372] Rowling has donated to the group For Women Scotland, which brought legal challenges leading to the UK Supreme Court case For Women Scotland Ltd v The Scottish Ministers.[373][374]" - there's not more context given, and it's very much phrased in a way that hides the extreme transphobia of both - the press release for Beira's Place was an attack on other trans-inclusive rape help centres, and what For Women Scotland v. The Scottish Ministers was about isn't stated. Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.9% of all FPs.} 05:27, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

Work is underway on article talk, with lengthy discussion about how to position the For Women Scotland issue;

sources would be useful and for the avoidance of edit warring while consensus is forming, that text hasn't been altered. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 11:36, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

A challenge I've seen is that all references to Beira's Place come from WP:ABOUTSELF sources. Particularly the director of the facility who regularly states gender-essentialist claims in her writings such as: It does not take a genius to work out the threat if men, convicted of sexual crimes, decide to identify as women, whether for their own sexual gratification, and access to what should be women-only spaces and the women within them. Several criminal cases exemplifying this problem have now attracted public attention. Yet the NHS response, even where rape was alleged, has been to initially deny that it was possible, given that the assailant self-identified as woman.[ 7] This kind of denialism – of not believing women by design – is not new, but it is a new iteration. Everyone, regardless of their sex – and regardless of their gender identity – deserves safe care. That also means respecting women's boundaries. The only coverage in less-than best sources comes from places like the Daily Mail and the Telegraph - publications that are of dubious reliability regarding trans issues. Minor anti-trans groups in the notoriously transphobic UK, unfortunately, often escape wide scrutiny. As Wikipedia Library is something of a bust I'll try hope not hate and the SPLC next. Simonm223 (talk) 11:44, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

A note the citation goes to a piece of legislation and not to anything that actually supports her wild claim. Simonm223 (talk) 11:45, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

Yeah. There's nothing about Beira's Place that wasn't either written by Beira's Place staff or by transphobic publications. I can identify quite a lot of deeply transphobic language about other people coming from Beira's Place supporters but, unfortunately, no third party sources describing Beira's Place that would be considered reliable by Wikipedia. Simonm223 (talk) 11:51, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

Pink News? It feels like it's pass WP:PARITY, and we could always quote some of the director's statements. Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.9% of all FPs.} 14:12, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks. We would probably need to include some parity if we use Pink News but, at least, they're more reliable than the Daily Mail. Simonm223 (talk) 14:14, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

I'd say Pink News is the Parity to rehases of a press release (the current sources). Adam Cuerden ^(talk)_{Has about 8.9% of all FPs.} 21:14, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:NORUSH; something may eventually be written. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:28, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:ABOUTSELF usage is not for situations in which exceptional claims or claims about third-parties are being made. in short if an WP:ABOUTSELF claim is being contradicted by reliable, secondary sources it is making exceptional claim/s and should not be used at all. TarnishedPath^talk 06:30, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

• Comment. I strongly object to the removal of the text "her views stem from her experience of domestic abuse and sexual assault". Removing it erases Rowling's POV from the article, and without it, would fundamentally misrepresent her POV on transgender issues. While I can sympathize with those who are disturbed by Rowling's POV, in this case the section of the article is directly about Rowling and her POV. One can't write on that topic without accurately representing Rowling's POV and communicating that POV in a neutral way. This whole thread appears to be an attempt to WP:CENSOR Rowling's POV from the article. Wikipedia is WP:NOTCENSORED. As for WP:FRINGE, it's not FRINGE in this context, as the main topic of this subsection is Rowling and her POV. That said, I agree with Adam that the stonewalling of adding peer reviewed sources is a problem. That does have a negative impact on the POV of the article. Those sources should be allowed.4meter4 (talk) 22:10, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

  Rowling's POV that her experience, of domestic abuse and sexual assault, having anything to do with transgender persons doesn't belong in the article. It's an exceptional claim about third parties and it's WP:UNDUE. TarnishedPath^talk 06:34, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Talk:J. K. Rowling#WP:NPOV

I've started a discussion at Talk:J. K. Rowling#WP:NPOV when I tagged the article as having POV issues, due to referring to teh subject as "gender-critical" or a "gender-critical feminist". However it looks like others here have spotted other NPOV violations. Editors discussion is invited. TarnishedPath^talk 11:02, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

Category:Democratic backsliding in the United States

Uhtregorn removed Category:Democratic backsliding in the United States from a large number of articles (examples: [26], [27], [28], [29], [30]). Based on an exchange on their talk page, my sense now is that they have an NPOV concern. I'd appreciate broader input about how to determine when the use of this category is sufficiently neutral for articles with recent-ish content (i.e., articles focused on some event/issue in the 21st century, as contrasted with an article like Jim Crow). FactOrOpinion (talk) 12:53, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Yeah this seems like a neutrality concern. The issue of democratic backsliding in the United States across the 21st century has a significant corpus of academic work associated with it. Deleting it whole cloth with "oh it's just opinion" seems problematic in this context. I do understand many Americans don't like to consider that their democracy has been impacted by the events of the 21st century but... I mean...

They have. And while this is a broader issue than the Trump administration, it is certainly applicable to the Trump administration. Simonm223 (talk) 13:01, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

My position on this is already clear from the earlier discussion referenced above, but for the record, I also support FactOrOpinion's view here, and I find the removals of this category from the articles highly problematic. Lova Falk (talk) 13:14, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

That category can be ripe for OR/POV pushing, but can be made objective: Anything that is included, with proper sourcing and appropriate neutrality per WEIGHT, on the mainspace Democratic backsliding in the United States article that has a separate detailed article about it should reasonably be included in this category, as well as any page itself that includes the same appropriate information with relating the topic to democratic backsliding. That said, of the five examples given, I think the last two are iffy, as there's nothing about book banning or transgender disenfranchising on the backsliding page, even though that my personal opinion is that they are aspects of backsliding; so unless that's specifically discussed in the context of those articles, that's probably an appropriate removal, at least until there's the clear link between those topics and backsliding made on the appropriate page(s). Masem (t) 14:20, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Of course anything in this category should be supported by reliable sources used in appropriate articles. Such sources are abundant so this should be a soluble situation. Simonm223 (talk) 15:15, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

As I understand Uhtregorn's concern (and my understanding might be wrong; hopefully they'll join the discussion here and speak for themself), the issue is at least partly that they think (many? all?) relevant RSs need to be used with attribution due to perceived bias, but it's not possible to attribute a category.

I'll note separately that although some of the articles have RSs that explicitly address democratic backsliding, others don't. For example, I first noticed this set of deletions when the category was deleted from Detention of Mahmoud Khalil. I don't know that I'd ever looked at the categories for that article before. The article doesn't explicitly discuss Khalil's detention / attempted deportation as an instance of democratic backsliding (and I'll now check whether there are RSs discussing this). However, erosion of free speech rights is a standard element of democratic backsliding, and so are things like warrantless arrests and detention without any allegation of a crime having been committed. So I see it as a relevant category for that article. But the question is: what kind(s) of sources need to be present in the article for that assessment to be more than just my personal opinion? For example, does there need to be an RS explicitly using the term "democratic backsliding" or "democratic erosion" in relation to Khalil's arrest/detention? FactOrOpinion (talk) 16:52, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

So would it be an idea to have a discussion on the talk page of Category:Democratic backsliding to clarify what criteria an article should meet in order to be included in this category? Once we reach consensus about the criteria, it will be easier to assess whether particular articles belong in the category or not. Lova Falk (talk) 17:59, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Do we think we could come up with criteria better than a simple (and objective) relevancy test similar to what Masem and FactOrOpinion suggest? As another example, Uhtregorn removed the category from the article January 6 United States Capitol attack and it has not been restored yet. But, a simple search for the word "democracy" in the article shows multiple quotes and references from people saying things like, "This is an attack on democracy". Similarly, the content of the article Arkansas Act 372 (which Uhtregorn removed the category from as well) does not directly discuss or mention larger government issues or democratic principles, so it seems fair to be removed from there. CaptainAngus (talk) 23:12, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Category:Democratic backsliding as a whole feels inappropriate. We should not be taking it upon ourselves to classify things as examples of democratic backsliding. Maybe we should have the general category that includes Democratic backsliding and concepts related to it, but it should not include specific events or instances that we deem democratic backsliding. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 🛸 23:24, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

That's at least where I'm saying that if the article actually ties in how it is directly related to democratic backsliding, that should be reason to include it in the category. If you can't directly connect it, then its OR or POV to include it no matter how much you think it might be. And ideally, we are talking more than one RS source that affirms how it is directly connected but an academic discussion of the application. Masem (t) 00:04, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

I second this. "Democratic backsliding" isn't a single event, but a trend of multiple events. It doesn't make sense as a category page. We can link relevant pages from the pages we already have that are devoted to democratic backsliding, but these relevant pages cannot be appropriately called examples of "democratic backsliding" in isolation. That's just not how democratic backsliding works. 24.11.203.127 (talk) 00:04, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

To clarify, I'm not saying the category should be done away with entirely. It functions well for pages that specifically cover a broad overview of democratic backsliding in different places at different times. However, discreet events like coups or specific legislation seems to me like it's better off being linked to in the pages on democratic backsliding, rather than in a category for democratic backsliding. Most of these events only make sense as forms of democratic backsliding when put in a broader context, which is done on the respective pages for democratic backsliding by region and era. 24.11.203.127 (talk) 00:18, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

I would push back a little just based on the value of the category. Speaking solely as a 'user' or 'reader' of Wikipedia, one who is fairly ignorant of history, clicking on the category took to me such items as 2002 New Hampshire Senate election phone jamming scandal and Operation Eagle Eye, which occurred in the 60s. I would still argue that a lot of these pages are clearly related, which begs for a category to group them. Maybe it just needs a less 'suggestive' name? CaptainAngus (talk) 01:24, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

I am concerned that the assertion that these pages are "clearly related" begins to dip into OR. It's not that I personally disagree with you, but I think Wikipedia should be held to a more rigorous standard than my opinion. 24.11.203.127 (talk) 03:44, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Actually, "Democratic backsliding" isn't a single event, but a trend of multiple events - this is exactly why I think it is so important to have this category. When wanting to read more about this subject, I look at the category and see which other articles are there. And some may surprise me. That is precisely the purpose of a category. Lova Falk (talk) 12:23, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Concur the category should only really be used on pages like Democratic backsliding in the United States. Traumnovelle (talk) 01:28, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree with the OR/POV concern. Certainly some events will universally be agreed as backsliding while others are going to be subjective. For this reason it would be best to only link pages where RSs have made the connections for us. If the article text doesn't talk about X being an example of backsliding then it is OR for an editor to, in effect, state that it is based on adding the category. Springee (talk) 12:39, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Does this approach limit/narrow the use of the category? Would a slightly less 'loaded' name for the category address this? ie, how often would a source use the exact word "backsliding"? What if the category name was broadened, something like "Democratic impacts" or "Democratic process" or "Political impacts upon democratic law"? I recognize none of these are great suggestions, just spitballing here. CaptainAngus (talk) 12:47, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

No there should not be an exact-word requirement. Sources that talk about democracy being in decline, degraded, compromised or threatened by the (undemocratic) actions of parties in power all constitute sources that are pointing to democratic backsliding. What we should avoid are unsourced claims.Simonm223 (talk) 13:35, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Lets also keep in mind that when we are categorizing something, that should be a defining feature of that event, not just because it can be tied to it. Thus, something like the J6 insurrection would clearly be defined, but some of the other examples given so far, particularly those called as steps towards democratic backsliding, should not be included unless we have multiple sources that consider the event as defined as part of democratic backsliding. Eg: this should all be predicated on having multiple reliable sources (and ideally, not news coverage or immediate opinion of such news) to be able to do that. Masem (t) 14:09, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, I'd agree with that. My point is mostly that this isn't a word-match game but rather about those things for which reliable sourcing indicates an appropriate correlation. And it's not just a Trump thing either. The examples I alluded to originally are Bush / Obama era ones. Simonm223 (talk) 15:59, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

I think my point is that the sourcing for this category should be based on multiple sources, with far less weight for those written in the short term of the event. I can see an editor finding an op-ed in a reliable source about an event that claims it is an indicator of backsliding, but that really doesn't mean the event is well-recognized as being related to the backsliding, that's just one person's opinion. With a category that can be prone to subjective assessments, having a stronger requirement for sources for inclusion helps to remove that concern. Masem (t) 16:20, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

I think this is the best way to go about it. It addresses my concerns about event NPOV without compromising the entire category. 24.11.203.127 (talk) 22:29, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Re: "We should not be taking it upon ourselves to classify things as examples of democratic backsliding," what if RSs characterize something as illustrating / contributing to democratic backsliding?

For example, in the most recent Bright Line Watch survey, "Experts overwhelmingly rate the following federal actions as threats to democracy: Trump’s failure to return Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador after he was deported due to an administrative error, the executive order targeting the Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue, and the administration’s actions to withdraw funding from leading universities and to limit their academic freedom. In each case, more than three-quarters of respondents rate the threat as serious or extraordinary."

Democratic backsliding is a topic of academic study, not just a matter of editors' personal opinions. FactOrOpinion (talk) 14:48, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

• But reliable non-opinion sources frequently cover things as examples democratic backsliding. We have all sorts of categories on things that random editors might personally find controversial (from fascism to genocide to massacres to crimes); the answer is always that we use them in contexts where high-quality WP:RSes do. When RSes cover something as an example of democratic backsliding, we have to reflect that with a category - we can't omit something used in high-quality sources just because editors might find it objectionable. "That's just, like, your opinion maaan" isn't a valid response to the high-quality academic sourcing examining democratic backsliding. --Aquillion (talk) 14:56, 14 June 2025 (UTC)

Should the term "massacre" be supported by a majority of reliable sources to be applied to an event?

WP:NCENPOV states that when deciding article titles, the term "massacre" should be used if it's either in the WP:COMMONNAME or a generally accepted word for an event. Should this extend beyond article titles? For example:

• Should categories such as Category:Massacres meet the WP:NCENPOV standard to be used on an article?
• Should lists such as List of massacres in the United States have the WP:NCENPOV standard for an event to be included in them?

If not, what should the standard be? The reason why I want this to be Wiki-wide is to avoid accusations of double standards and bias that are present with value judgements such as term "massacre". There are many lists and categories populated with articles not generally considered to be "massacres", and when cleaning them up, I want to use the same standard for all of them. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 07:23, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

Any content that is un-sourced can be challenged. So yes, to add something as a massacre a RS must say it was. But wp:v already covers that. Slatersteven (talk) 11:15, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

The problem with all the massacre categories, about which I have complained at length, is that they are mixing two things almost entirely discussed seperately by RS, under a banner with a POV term. This is state perpetrated "mass killings" and lone actor "mass murders", both of which are defining categories and lack the pov terms to the same degree. They are both often called massacres, but inconsistently, and massacre itself is really just a POV way to say "murder of many people that is bad". Categories are supposed to have a clear and non subjective definition, e.g. we cannot have a category about "Bad books" or "Evil people" even if all the sources agree that a book is bad or that a person is evil, so is very poor for categorization of these kinds of crimes. IMO we should split the 1 or 2-person crimes to the mass murder categories (which is the common name for this kind of thing in criminology sources; yes yes it's all so stupid) and split the state actor killings to "mass killings" which is the common name for that type in criminology sources. I doubt I could ever get consensus for it, but I think that is the best solution. The list is probably fine provided you can find a source that calls it that. PARAKANYAA (talk) 01:44, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

Kern et al.

Could you please review edits by 2A00:23C8:C904:1301:0:0:0:0/64 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · block user · block log)? From my layman point of view, it seems that they may be promoting a paper by Carina Kern, et al. Also, do you too think that Kern does not pass WP:NACADEMIC? Many thanks for your advice. Janhrach (talk) 15:29, 15 June 2025 (UTC)

"Asian/Pakistani/Muslim" grooming gangs in the United Kingdom yet again

• Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), which Grooming gang moral panic in the United Kingdom was merged into last year, could use more eyes. A new Government report (the Casey report) has come out alleging that there is evidence of “over-representation” of Asian and Pakistani heritage men among suspects in local data – collected in Greater Manchester, West and South Yorkshire [31]. This topic needs to be handled with the utmost care to balance what different sources have said about the subject.

Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:30, 16 June 2025 (UTC)

Disagreement at Talk:Deemak

Hi all. There has been an active disagreement at the linked talk page about the stability of the article, which is about a recent Pakistani film. Any helpful comments are most welcome, thank you! M. Billoo 20:11, 17 June 2025 (UTC)

Religious views being promoted at Malik ibn Nuwayra

There is a pattern across many Islamic pages bold or biased claims being made with citations to some western scholar that is not actually saying what the citation says. I assume this is a way of adding credibility to content. This was the case at Malik ibn Nuwayra when I started editing it, with numerous citations that were unsupported by the source. I edited out claims that were unsupported and I added sources to some claims, but my edits seem to be provoking some religious people. Malik, the historical figure, was killed by another historical figure, Khalid, whom some Muslims revere. There is apparently a religious controversy between groups of Muslims whether Khalid was justified in killing Malik or not, and users believing he was justified are flooding the article with numerous defences of Khalid by religious scholars.

One of the falsely cited sentences I removed involved Khalid and how he was viewed after the killing. The source did not support the claim being made. My edit was immediately reverted. I undid the reversion, and explained WP:NOR at the user's talk page. The user found another source instead, titled: "The Scorching Thunderbolts Against the People of Rejection, Deviation, and Heresy".

I did not remove this addition, but I added an introductory sentence to the paragraph saying that the source is a polemic, since the work is attacking "the People of Rejection, Deviation, and Heresy." This edit was also immediately reverted. The user was highly offended that I suggested his religious scholar is a polemicist:

And how dare you call Ibn Hajar and Ibn Taymiyyah “polemicists” in the article? They are well-known and respected scholars.[32]

So far in the talk page, I've been accused of being a hypocrite, biased, and a sectarian, though I haven't shared my opinion or religious view at any point.

There is also a sentence in the article saying that a religious scholar has prohibited the criticism of Khalid for killing Malik. I edited this out, saying this religious ruling is irrelevant to the Wikipedia article on Malik. This edit was also immediately reverted. The article concludes by referring to another religious scholar from the 13th century, who apparently says we should not "unjustly condemn" those who were involved. But the book this user cites to was not written by that author. It seems like another made up citation.

As the article currently stands, there are only 10 sources. 5 of them are religious sources, all from the group that seeks to defend Khalid. The other 5 are academic sources, and there are are no sources from the other side of the controversy. The religious sources include "Scorching Thunderbolts" and "Genius of Khalid". 3 out of the 4 paragraphs in the article body include opinions of these religious scholars on why Khalid was justified or innocent, or why he should not be condemned. This is not even a page about Khalid.

My edits are being immediately reverted and I'm not interested in an edit war, so I'm posting here. Trulypromised (talk) 03:25, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

you have not fully addressed concerns on the talk page, and a quick purview of the edits suggests that the version you created was definitely sectarian. ("contemporary sunni polemicists" is definitely not neutral wording). Inclusion of religious opinions about a figure in the formation of the religious practice is arguably WP:DUE. Sources can definitely be non-neutral, as long as they are WP:ATTRIBUTED.

the made up citation claim is troubling. are citations being made up, is there claims the source is being misinterpreted, or something else entirely? Can a few clear examples be given?

Your edits are being reverted due to WP:ONUS, and as part of the WP:BRD cycle. Bluethricecreamman (talk) 04:38, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree about WP:ATTRIBUTED, and I think it is fair to describe "Scorching Thunderbolts against Heretics" as a polemic. You'll note that I tried to attribute their views by describing them as Sunnis, whereas in a previous version Sunni religious scholars were listed as "prominent historians". I've also been saying the other side needs to be given due weight. 50% of the article's sources from one side of the controversy and 0% to the other side is undue weight.

Examples of original research/religious views with false/incorrect citations (first 2 now edited out):

1. "Second, Abu Bakr acted in a manner similar to Muhammad's response when Khalid may have attacked the Banu Jadhima and executed their men." [33]}}

Note also the expressions of doubt regarding a separate controversial incident ("may have attacked"). This sentence cites to Patricia Crone. While the page numbers are correct, here is what Crone actually says:

"The Prophet charged him with the destruction of the idol of al-ʿUzzā at Nak̲h̲la and later sent him to the B. D̲j̲ad̲h̲īma, whom he wrongfully attacked. In 9/630 the Prophet sent him from Tabūk to Dūmat al-D̲j̲andal [q.v.] where he captured the ruler al-Ukaydir and sent him to Medina. In 10/631 he was sent to invite the B. al-Ḥārith of Yemen to Islam. On the outbreak of the ridda or “apostasy” after the Prophet’s death in 11/632, Abū Bakr sent him against the rebels, on which occasion he committed another two misdeeds, first by killing Muslims (through a misunderstanding) and next by marrying the widow of one of the victims. Abū Bakr, however, forgave him and he commanded the Muslims against Musaylima in ¶ the Yamāma." (emphasis added)

Crone does not express doubt over the Banu Jadhima killings. Crone does not say Abu Bakr was following the Prophet Muhammad's example. I concluded that this was the original editor's opinion with an attribution to a western scholar for credibility, and I edited it out, and I specified this in the edit summary.

2. "Abu Bakr chose to pardon him stating that Khalid did nothing wrong and that the crimes of Malik had been proven."[34]

This sentence also cites to Crone. I have already reproduced the relevant section from Crone, she simply says "Abu Bakr, however, forgave him". She makes no further mention of the killing. Crone clearly does not say that Abu Bakr stated "Khalid did nothing wrong and that the crimes of Malik had been proven." To the contrary, she called it a misdeed. So this was not only original research but a made up citation and a false attribution to Crone. I rewrote the sentence with information from other sources used in the article.

3. "Al-Dhahabi, addressing the broader issue, emphasized the prior virtues and sincere worship of those involved, suggesting such qualities could atone for mistakes, while cautioning against both exaggerating in their praise and unjustly condemning them."[35]

This is from the current version, and it is a religious recommendation that we should avoid unjustly condemning those involved in the incident. Not sure the what relevance is to a wikipedia article on the incident. In any case, the sentence cites to "History of the Prophets and Kings" by al Dhahabi, but there appears to be no such book by that author. There is a "History of the Prophets and Kings" by a different author (al Tabari), but I could not locate this content within that author's work. Trulypromised (talk) 09:22, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing out his mistakes. Regarding the claim of a "made-up citation," this is the edit he was referring to which I initially reverted: [[36]][[37]]. I already explained this on the article’s talk page. The source by Glubb includes a quote from Umar, which I summarized as: “Umar acknowledged Khalid and agreed that Abu Bakr had shown better judgment in supporting him.” That’s why I reverted the edit. Later, Trulypromised raised this on my talk page: [[38]]. He argued that Glubb didn’t directly mention the Malik incident. I replied here: [[39]], explaining that while Glubb quoted Umar, he didn’t include the full background which, according to some Islamic scholars, is linked to Malik’s execution. I couldn’t find an English source that gives this full context, as most are in Arabic like Islamweb or Aljazeera.net, so I used Glubb’s source because it at least mentioned Umar’s statement. Trulypromised reverted my edit again: [[40]]. I now recognize that it was a mistake to use Glubb for this point since he didn't mentioned Umar’s quote connection to Malik’s execution. That’s why I didn’t restore the edit again.

Instead, I looked for a better source and found one: the work of Ibn Hajar, "Scorching Thunderbolts". His commentary is "very important" because it gives more detail than many reports, which often stop at Malik’s execution (first paragraph of article's "Death" section). Ibn Hajar mentions a narration where Malik’s own brother later admitted the truth to Umar, confirming that Malik had commit apostasy. He added that since Umar, as caliph, never punished or criticized Khalid afterward, this adds support to the view that Khalid's action is justified. Ibn Hajar’s explanation also matches the context in Umar' quote (which Glubb quoted) that Umar acknowledge Khalid later and praised Abu Bakr’s decision to support him. It’s also worth noting that this work of Ibn Hajar, which Trulypromised criticized, is known for refuting weak or fabricated reports and defending respected Islamic figures like Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and Khalid, using "reliable evidences".

Regarding the content sourced from Crone, it was originally taken from the Khalid's page. I can't verify it because i don't currently have Brill's account. However, I can provide sources from modern scholars like Ali al-Sallabi and Taha Karaan. Both clearly stated similary with this, “Abu Bakr acted in a manner similar to the Prophet Muhammad’s response when Khalid may have attacked the Banu Jadhima and executed their men.” I chose not to add those content and sources because I was aware it would shift the article more toward Khalid’s defense, which I expected Trulypromised object to. So when he removed that content, I didn’t revert it.

As for the citation to "History of the Prophets and Kings", I made an error of the title. The correct title is actually "Biographies of Eminent Nobles", a work by Al-Dhahabi. I originally intended to use At-Tabari’s view from History of the Prophets and Kings but instead chose Al-Dhahabi’s view because it presents a more neutral perspective. Selenne (talk) 11:26, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

You might remember that I never removed the Scorching Thunderbolts, I just wish to make it clear in the article that this is a polemic from one side of the controversy. Even its wikipedia article calls it a strong polemic, as a form of praise. Since there is controversy over the event, I think this should be clear in the article, and we should move all the religious defenses of Khalid to one paragraph, and have a roughly equal paragraph describing the opposite religious views, and we already have sources from western scholars. What do you think? Trulypromised (talk) 12:07, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

One more point, I don't think religious prohibitions or guidance about not criticizing Khalid are relevant in any way to this article, and I don't think you can justify them as relevant. Trulypromised (talk) 12:10, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

I’d like to clarify that Ibn Hajar’s view on Malik incident isn’t as polemic as it might seem. He simply adds another POV, supporting reports that say Malik committed apostasy like the one from Sayf ibn Umar. He also mentions a report where Malik’s brother later admitted the truth to Umar’s brother. This could explain why Umar didn’t bring the issue up again when he became caliph, even though he had the power to act. So it’s not fair to call Ibn Hajar’s view polemical. Even if his book has strong opinions, in this case, he’s just providing more evidence to support Khalid’s actions.

As for the “Death” section of the article, I think it’s already well-organized. The first paragraph gives background on Malik’s death. The second talks about the main reason for his execution which is apostasy as scholars claim. The part from Ali al-Sallabi doesn’t defend Khalid. It just gives another view on Malik’s apostasy, similar to Madelung. The third paragraph shows scholars who defend Khalid. Some from a religious angle, like Ibn Taymiyyah, and others with evidence, like Ibn Hajar and Watt. The last paragraph offers a neutral view, which is a fair way to end the section given the different historical opinions. Selenne (talk) 13:03, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Alright, then the opposing views will also be interspersed throughout the section, although I think this won't be as clean as separating them. Also, an evidence backed opinion is still an opinion, and its in the interest of transparency and WP:ATTRIBUTION to make it clear that the ibn Hajar source is not a neutral history, but an argument directed against other viewpoints.

For the last paragraph, the issue is not really neutrality but relevance. The first source is fine, but the Dhahabi source is religious guidance cautioning against condemning unjustly. I don't see how this is relevant to Malik's death since the wikipedia article is not going to condemn anyone, and the religious guidance is certainly not relevant for all readers. Trulypromised (talk) 13:56, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree that it’s important to show which parts are opinions and to follow WP:ATTRIBUTION. In the article, Ibn Hajar’s view is clearly shown as one of many opinions. He gives reasons based on earlier reports, and it helps explain why Khalid’s actions were defended by some scholars. Since Umar didn’t take action against Khalid later on about this matter, his view adds helpful context. That’s why I think it’s it’s fair to include his opinion in the section.

About the Al-Dhahabi quote, I understand it sounds more religious. But it shows how early scholars approached these events with care. His message was mostly for scholars, but it can also remind readers not to judge quickly when sources are unclear. That makes it relevant to include. Overall, I think the “Death” section already gives a balanced view with background, reasons for the execution, and different opinions. Selenne (talk) 14:49, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

It's not the article's job to tell readers not to judge quickly, especially when this is religious guidance. Trulypromised (talk) 14:52, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Regarding balance, there is exactly zero sources discussing viewpoints from the other side of the controversy, and 5 from the pro Khalid side. The 5 academic sources are neutral. I'll add some of the viewpoints from adherents of the other religious group. Trulypromised (talk) 14:54, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

pinging @Yujoong to participate as well. Bluethricecreamman (talk) 04:38, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

A question does the source or does the source not say X, I do not care what other sources say (read wp:synthesis)? Slatersteven (talk) 11:25, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Can you clarify what you're referring to? Trulypromised (talk) 11:44, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

This thread, What do the sources being used to support this content actually say about it? Slatersteven (talk) 11:46, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Artificial consciousness and external links

Over at Artificial consciousness, a user who wrote a piece of software tried to insert an external link to a site called 'everything2', which hosts user generated content. On that site a user wrote a post discussing that same piece of software. The consensus at Talk:Artificial_consciousness#External links removed was to omit the link. Now, about a month later, that same user is applying a {{POV}} template to the top of the article. On the talk page the user is insisting that omitting the link is a NPOV issue.

This one seems obvious to me, but I guess we need more opinions. MrOllie (talk) 13:40, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Your instinct is right. Point them to WP:NOTPROMO. Simonm223 (talk) 13:43, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Yes it looks right, but the information given is wrong. The link was not to my software, but to the artificial consciousness article in Everything2, where also other things are written, and everyone can write there more. This is wrong, Everything2 is not user generated content, look what it is, it is a moderated wiki, the content there must be accepted by admins, furthermore can be voted out by users. It is moderated like Wikipedia, though the rules are somewhat different, and all the wiki works in different principles. And i think it's important that people can see explanations written outside Wikipedia, this is not Wikipedia content, everyone knows, but it may clarify things for some people who choose to read it. Furthermore, more external links were removed, with no real proof that they all somehow violated Wikipedia rules. Wikipedia is a collective effort, but it is not a perfect one opinion, or someone's view how it should be, and NPOV applies, removing that content violated NPOV. Tkorrovi (talk) 14:00, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

We really don't need an external link to a low quality WP:UGC website even if it isn't promoting your software. Simonm223 (talk) 14:09, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:NPOV is about representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic. The external links are not part of the representation and the exclusion of some external links is no justification for applying a POV tag. While we're here, for the avoidance of doubt, any representation in the article of views found on Everything2 would be a prima facie breach of WP:NPOV's significant views that have been published by reliable sources. NebY (talk) 14:20, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Yes they are part of the representation. Tkorrovi (talk) 14:27, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

• Everything2 appears to be an extremely poor quality site. We do not link to seemingly random message boards. This has nothing to do with NPOV; it's just removing a crappy link. GMG^talk 14:06, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

  Everything2 is a famous website, the successor of slashdotcom. It's easy to hit everything, especially if one doesn't know. This was brought here for you to help to force me to agree, because i don't agree that i violated any Wikipedia rules, and that some other content in the external links violated it. Thus you keeping pushing the same arguments without a real proof, is a useless effort, as this is intended against me, for forcing me to agree, and i don't agree. It is not intended to protect any Wikipedia changes, as they force it anyway and there is nothing i can do. So it is not that reason, the sole reason of it is a force against me, to force me to agree. Which is important for these 2 people, as i started that article and edited it amost for 20 years, it is difficult to discredit me, so help is needed. Tkorrovi (talk) 14:25, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

I've read through that talk page discussion and it really seems like more of a WP:IDHT/WP:OWN issue. I guess I can drop a note that I do not believe this to be within the scope of this policy or noticeboard on the talk page as well, but I don't really see that as likely to resolve a WP:1AM. Alpha3031 (t • c) 14:45, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

I'm in the same boat. I'd support removing the tag, excluding the link, and reviewing this editor's conduct for evidence of deeper issues. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 14:47, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

The narrow point of whether a POV tag's appropriate seems in scope for this page (and the consensus clear), but yes, so much more can't be dealt with here. NebY (talk) 14:54, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

NPOV disputes are not decided by consensus, you were wrong in writing that in your explanation of removing your tag. But i will not restore it, i don't start an edit war. Tkorrovi (talk) 15:09, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Ok slam me more, it is not ownership, i no way owned the article, just put a lot of effort into it. It's not a problem of me claiming ownership of the article, it is just the problem that it is difficult to discredit me, as too many people who dealt with the article, respect me. So all has to be tried. The matter is now not about the article, because hardly ever will the deletions be restored, the matter is only in trying to force me to agree, and discredit me. Why don't you continue, your help was asked.--Tkorrovi (talk) 15:01, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

You don't have to agree. Just stop edit warring over an NPOV tag that you've now added four times. GMG^talk 15:36, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Not in sequence and not when removed by the same person. But i clearly said that i don't want to start an edit war, and i also said that i will not revert again. Is that not enough, how many times is it necessary to bug me? About agreeing it is not so easy, they beat you with a lot of talk, and accusations, some of these false, as you can see on the talk page, to force you to agree. And you constantly have to say that you don't agree, because if you omit it once, then it is assumed that you gave a silent agreement Tkorrovi (talk) 15:54, 18 June 2025 (UTC)