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See also: Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Abortion advocacy movement coverage
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Contents

1 Preamble
2 Proposals on titles
3 Discussion
4 Comments by the community (Vote)

Evidence
Completed
23 February–22 March
  • Collect systematic evidence of the frequency with which the proposed titles are used in various English-speaking countries
  • Cite Wikipedia policies
Community consultation
Completed
23 March–23 April
  • Consultation from the community (voting and discussing)
Closing
In progress
24 April–1 May
  • Administrators will review comments
  • Issuance of binding solution on 1 May

Preamble

The Arbitration Committee has requested a binding, structured community discussion on the article titles "Support for the legalization of abortion" and "Opposition to the legalization of abortion". From commencement, editors should collect systematic evidence of the frequency with which the proposed titles are used in various English-speaking countries, as well as any other material which is relevant to the appropriateness of any proposed title, and present that evidence in an organised, structured and easy to navigate manner. After a period of one month from the commencement of the RFC (on March 23 at 00:00 UTC), comments from the community and a vote will take place. This will be closed by three neutral administrators (HJ Mitchell, Black Kite and EyeSerene), who shall report to ArbCom. The vote's result shall be binding for a period of three years.

At this structured discussion, participants should maintain civility and decorum, and the discussion should remain focused on the topic. The various proposed variants of titles are presented below, each with its own section. In each section, editors are welcome to provide reasoned arguments and appropriate references that support that section's title.

If you have any questions about the process, feel free to leave a message on the talk page of Steven Zhang (talk · contribs), Whenaxis (talk · contribs) or at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification.

Regards, Steven Zhang (talk · contribs) and Whenaxis (talk · contribs)

General points of policy relevant to all options

  • Per WP:TITLE, to choose the title of an article is, essentially, also to choose its topic and scope. So, in evaluating these options, it is important to look at them not as merely choosing a label to be applied to a pre-set scope of political advocacy, but as defining the scope that these specific two articles will address moving forward.

Arguments and policies regarding Pro-choice movement / Pro-life movement

For arguments specifically relevant to the titles Pro-choice and Pro-life, which were removed from this list as not sufficiently viable, see Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Abortion article titles#Archival of arguments regarding Pro-choice / Pro-life.

Sources

  • Google Books shows 19,100 results for "pro-choice movement", 40,500 results for "pro-life movement".
  • Google Scholar shows 2,170 results for "pro-choice movement", 3,470 results for "pro-life movement".
  • Google News Archive shows 3,600 results for "pro-choice movement", 13,400 results for "pro-life movement".
  • Google Web Search shows 530,000 results for "pro-choice movement", 2,070,000 results for "pro-life movement".
  • Encyclopaedia Britannica uses pro-life movement and pro-choice movement as "redirects".
  • The Washington Post stylebook says "The terms right-to-life and pro-life are used by advocates in the abortion controversy to buttress their arguments. They should generally be used as part of an organization's title and in quotations, but not as descriptive adjectives in the text. Use abortion-rights advocates for those who support freedom of choice in the matter, antiabortion for those who oppose it." (page 185, under "right-to-life")
  • NPR, by self-report, uses "pro-choice" and "pro-life" on-air, while acknowledging these as "non-neutral language favored by the opposing special interest groups". On its web site it prefers anti-abortion and abortion rights, following the AP stylebook. [1]

Policy based arguments

For

  • Firmly grounded in sources. Does not require Wikipedia to fabricate names.
  • WP:POVTITLE supports the use of POV titles where the common name of the topic is POV. (The weight of this necessarily depends on analysis of WP:COMMONNAME, which is addressed separately.)
    • Arguably best meets the criteria of WP:POVTITLE as it is the only option in which both groups' names are used to describe themselves. Additionally, it is the only option in which one group is not given a negative title.
  • Constitute scope-definition-improving modifications to what are believed to be the original names of the articles.
    • WP:TITLE compliant: defines, with adequate clarity while adhering closely to sources, the scope of the articles as being about the United States movements that use these names (which are either the only movements to use these names or, at minimum, clearly WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for the titles).
    • This clarification of scope allows these titles to overcome many of the arguments against using Pro-choice and Pro-life as titles, since those arguments arise from vagueness as to what the articles' topics are.
    • Closest terms to original titles of articles, which WP:PRESERVE supports.
    • Sets a scope that, unlike the current titles, embraces coverage of these movements' activities beyond advocacy regarding legal access to abortion, and unlike titles that include the term "abortion", beyond abortion itself.
  • Arguably best meets the criteria of WP:COMMONNAME.
  • Parallel naming insofar as each movement is identified by the name it prefers for itself.
  • Does not limit global perspective; with these articles scoped to the United States movements that use those names, different articles would naturally address global perspective on related issues.
  • As the articles would now have clear scopes that exclude material not related to these movements, such material would become a natural candidate for refactoring to more general articles, most obviously Abortion debate. This supports the goal of having a broad, global overview of political advocacy regarding abortion, as opposed to these specific US movements, handled by a single article with a neutral title.
  • It can be argued that these movements were the actual original topics of these articles as written, before the vagueness of their titles compromised that, which would mean that WP:PRESERVE best supports restoring and maintaining that scope.
  • Concise.

Against

  • The titles are based on the self-chosen names of the corresponding US political movements, each of which is designed to put their own side in a good light and (by implication) their opposition in a bad light. Though arguably fair, it may be seen as questionable neutrality.
    • This is much more significant if WP:COMMONNAME is not held to strongly support these titles, which in turn makes WP:POVTITLE inapplicable.
  • There are extensive and well-known problems with the logical and philosophical underpinnings of the labels these movements use for themselves. These may validly be seen as problematic in various ways, though this is arguably irrelevant to Wikipedia's purposes because our standards for usage are sourcing-based, not evaluative of said logical and philosophical underpinnings.

Arguments and policies regarding titles including the terms "abortion-rights" and "anti-abortion"

Sources

  • Google Books shows 35,000 results for "abortion-rights movement", 84,900 results for "anti-abortion movement"
  • Google Scholar shows 535 results for "abortion-rights movement", 1,900 results for "anti-abortion movement"
  • Google News Archive shows 20,900 results for "abortion-rights movement", 68,200 results for "anti-abortion movement".
  • Google Web Search shows 3,310,000 results for "abortion-rights movement", 1,490,000 results for "anti-abortion movement".
  • The AP Stylebook says "Use anti-abortion instead of pro-life and abortion rights instead of pro-abortion or pro-choice." (page 5, under "Abortion")
  • The New York Times stylebook says "For the sake of neutrality, avoid pro-life and pro-choice except in quotations from others. Impartial terms include abortion rights advocate and anti-abortion campaigner (or, in either case, campaign, group or rally). Anti-abortion is an undisputed modifier, but pro-abortion raises objections when applied to people who say they do not advocate having abortions." (page 5, under "Abortion")
  • The Philadelphia Inquirer is described by NPR as using "abortion rights advocates" and "anti-abortion". [2]
  • CNN is described by NPR as using "abortion rights supporters", "anti-abortion activists", "pro-abortion rights", and "anti-abortion rights". [3]
  • NBC is described by NPR as using "pro-abortion rights", "anti-abortion", and "anti-abortion advocates". [4]
  • CBS is described by NPR as using "pro-abortion rights" and "anti-abortion rights". [5]
  • The Chicago Tribune stylebook is quoted as counterindicating "pro-life" without mentioning "pro-choice", though reporters and editors were also reportedly issued a memo saying that neither "pro-life" nor "pro-choice" should be used; however, computer analysis showed that the terms "surfaced sporadically" in the publication despite this. [6]

Arguments common to all variations

For

  • Firmly grounded in sources. Does not require Wikipedia to fabricate names.
  • Parallel naming insofar as each "side" is identified by a somewhat-neutral, common term used for it rather than its own preferred name.
  • Arguably sets a more useful scope (per WP:TITLE) than the current titles, as anti-abortion movement activities such as sidewalk counseling and crisis pregnancy centers are in-scope with these titles and are not with the current ones (or any other invented titles that construct the opposition case in terms of legality).
  • WP:POVTITLE supports the use of POV titles where the common name of the topic is POV. (The weight of this necessarily depends on analysis of WP:COMMONNAME, which is addressed separately.)
  • "Abortion-rights" and "anti-abortion" qualifiers are frequently regarded, and explicitly described, as neutral or impartial terms by reliable sources in their style guides.

Against

  • Arguably not neutral due to giving preferential treatment to abortion-rights by constructing anti-abortion using a negative ("anti-X") formulation, and by describing the abortion-rights movement using a term which they use themselves, while describing the anti-abortion movement with a term they do not often use and may object to.
  • By identifying the United States pro-life movement as an "anti-abortion movement" (whether specifically or as part of a class), sets a scope that makes coverage of that movement's involvement in other areas such as capital punishment, stem-cell research and euthanasia problematic.

Arguments regarding Abortion-rights movement / Anti-abortion movement

For

  • Due to factors like press usage, may meet WP:COMMONNAME reasonably well, or arguably even better than the self-identification-based names (but see Against section).
  • Reasonably concise.

Against

  • Implies the existence of a single, worldwide "movement" on each side of the debate, which is dubious.
  • Fails to set an unambiguous scope for the articles per WP:TITLE: it isn't clear whether the articles are scoped as about the US pro-life and pro-choice movements, since it doesn't identify them by the names they use for themselves and they aren't clearly WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for the terms, or about abortion-rights and anti-abortion political advocacy on a global scale, which brings in the invalid implication of a global movement and arguably violates WP:PRESERVE.
  • WP:COMMONNAME support is undermined by lack of clarity in scope: sources using "abortion-rights movement" and "anti-abortion movement" may be talking about entirely distinct movements in different countries, especially since these terms predominate when talking about such movements outside the United States.
  • These terms, if used to signify the United States pro-choice and pro-life movements, outright deny those movements the right to self-identify, which is supported by WP:Naming conventions (identity) (a proposal that has no official status) and is considered important by many Wikipedians.

Arguments regarding United States abortion-rights movement / United States anti-abortion movement

For

  • Arguably defines a clear scope per WP:TITLE.
    • Sets a scope that, unlike the current titles, embraces coverage of these movements' activities beyond advocacy regarding legal access to abortion.
    • Possibly does an even better job of clearly defining scope than Pro-choice movement / Pro-life movement, though given WP:PRIMARYTOPIC there is not a lot of ambiguity to resolve there.
  • Does not limit global perspective; with these articles scoped to the United States movements, different articles would naturally address global perspective on related issues.
  • As the articles would now have clear scopes that exclude material not related to these movements, such material would become a natural candidate for refactoring to more general articles, most obviously Abortion debate. This supports the goal of having a broad, global overview of political advocacy regarding abortion, as opposed to these specific US movements, handled by a single article with a neutral title.
  • Arguably restores the articles to their original scope, which is supported by WP:PRESERVE.
  • Arguably meets WP:COMMONNAME well. Though the full phrases do not often occur in sources, we may validly read strong WP:COMMONNAME support by considering the "United States" prefixes to be "natural disambiguation" per WP:PRECISION and so considering primarily the "abortion-rights movement" and "anti-abortion movement" stems. However, also see the Against section.

Against

  • Scope may be ambiguous in that the "pro-life movement" and the "right-to-life movement" are both arguably identified by the term "United States anti-abortion movement", but are distinct topics.
  • Not all sourcing statistics regarding "abortion-rights movement" and "anti-abortion movement" can be read as supporting WP:COMMONNAME status for these titles, as the movements being referred to are often not the United States movements. It is not clear how often the United States movements are those being referenced.
  • Not very concise.
  • Outright denies those movements the right to self-identify, which is supported by WP:Naming conventions (identity) (a proposal that has no official status) and is considered important by many Wikipedians.

Arguments regarding Abortion-rights movements / Anti-abortion movements

For

  • Defines a completely clear scope per WP:TITLE -- in this case, one of global coverage of abortion advocacy movements.
    • Sets a scope that, unlike the current titles, embraces coverage of these movements' activities beyond advocacy regarding legal access to abortion.
  • Arguably beneficial in terms of WP:GLOBAL perspective because of covering related worldwide movements in each article.
  • Arguably meets WP:COMMONNAME extremely well. As it is setting a scope that encompasses multiple related movements, the important consideration appears not to be the raw frequency of the plural phrases in sources, but how often the unpluralized terms "abortion-rights movement" and "anti-abortion movement" are used to refer to any such movement. Thanks to worldwide press preference, that criterion is met to a very high degree.
  • Reasonably concise.

Against

  • Arguably sets an inappropriately broad scope that would call for a WP:SPLIT, since numerous regional abortion advocacy movements are likely to be discrete, notable topics capable of supporting independent articles (and the United States movements unquestionably are).
    • Because of the broad scope involved, it seems as likely that material would be suitable for refactoring from Abortion debate into these articles as the other way around, which may be undesirable.
  • Arguably out of keeping with WP:PRESERVE because of rescoping articles originally about the US movements to global coverage.
  • A strong case can be made that global perspective is better addressed by a single article, like Abortion debate, than by one article handling each side of the advocacy spectrum.

Arguments and policies regarding constructed "support for" and "opposition to" titles

Arguments common to all variations

For

Against

  • Fails to meet WP:COMMONNAME.
  • Specifically contraindicated by WP:TITLECHANGES as compromise titles made up to quell contention.
  • Using a constructed title makes Wikipedia responsible for the framing that takes place, making any attempt at neutral point of view a matter of endless wrangling over incredibly subtle nuance in a situation like this that is, in the broader cultural context, largely an endless war of spin doctoring. We take a lot of work and risk of failure on ourselves when we abandon our fundamental approach of being guided by our sources.
  • Scopes these articles (out of keeping with WP:PRESERVE) as about general perspective on political advocacy regarding abortion, which is arguably better addressed by a single article with a neutral title -- which already happens to exist, in Abortion debate.
  • The attempt to devise titles which encompass otherwise-identified partisan sides to this issue with neutral language is arguably original research.
  • Leaves us without articles scoped to the United States pro-choice and pro-life movements, which are discrete notable topics clearly suitable for encyclopedic coverage in and of themselves, and probably in a state where we are bindingly forbidden to have articles so scoped. This leads to a situation where, for example, if we wished to cover the pro-life movement's involvement in advocacy regarding capital punishment, stem-cell research and euthanasia, we would have great difficulty finding someplace to do so where it would be germane to the article.
    • If, on the other hand, we were not forbidden to create articles on the pro-choice and pro-life movements, which we would then likely want to do, WP:PRESERVE strongly indicates that renaming and rescoping our current articles and then making new articles on the movements is the wrong way to go about the whole business, if the current articles were even arguably once about those movements; instead, that scope should be retained and general-perspective articles should be created if necessary (which they probably aren't because Abortion debate can handle it).

Arguments common to variations that construct opposition in terms of legality

For

  • Consistent with the spirit of the previous consensus at the mediation cabal
  • Many Wikipedians apparently consider legality the fundamental issue here.

Against

  • Constructing the opposition case in terms of opposition to abortion being legal is questionable from the standpoints of descriptiveness (i.e. setting an appropriate scope per WP:TITLE) and neutrality.
    • Though logically, to oppose something being legal is to oppose it taking place, rhetorically, in this context, constructing opposition in terms of legality raises the specter of women being forced to resort to dangerous illegal abortions. A suggestion that it is only legal abortions that are objected to, not illegal ones, could be seen as serving a partisan POV.
    • The suggestion that opposition to abortion takes only the form of working against legal access, rendering out-of-scope compassionate measures that act to reduce the need for abortions to be performed rather than solely meting out punishment when they are performed, serves a partisan POV.
    • People who advocate politically against abortion would typically see this as an aspect of their being opposed to abortion, full stop.
    • Anti-abortion activities which do not center around denial of legal access, such as sidewalk counseling and crisis pregnancy centers, are out-of-scope for articles titled this way.

Arguments regarding Support for the legalization of abortion / Opposition to the legalization of abortion

For

  • Supported by previous consensus at the mediation cabal
  • Strictly parallel naming.

Against

  • Least concise option.
  • Mildly counterindicated by WP:COMMONALITY due to legalization/legalisation spelling difference.
  • Overly precise – exclude content on support and opposition for criminalization of abortion (in locales where abortion is legal).
  • Stigmatize abortion by implying that the baseline state of affairs is for it to be illegal, which violates WP:NPOV.
  • Non-descriptive: nonsensical as considered in any jurisdiction where abortion is not illegal, especially ones where it has never been illegal.
  • Defines a scope that, due to the use of the term "legalization", does not match up with the actual content of any version of the articles in question which has ever existed, and which is not useful moving forward (if the content of the articles was actually rewritten to match the scope set by their titles, the results would be extremely poor).
  • Constructs opposition in terms of legality (see above)

For

  • Reasonably concise
  • Strictly parallel naming

Against

  • "Support for legal abortion" may be considered POV if misread as "support for abortion as long as it's legal"
  • Constructs opposition in terms of legality (see above)

Arguments regarding Support for abortion legality / Opposition to abortion

For

  • Reasonably concise
  • Parallel naming to within a reasonable degree of fidelity

Against

  • Defines a scope where there is overlap between the two topics in the form of people who support legal access to abortion but oppose abortion itself.
  • Neutrality and descriptiveness questionable in that framing the "oppose" case's position as one of opposition to abortion itself may be read as framing the "support" case's position as one of support for abortion itself.

Arguments regarding Opposition to abortion ban / Support for abortion ban

For

  • Descriptive
  • Reasonably concise
  • Strictly parallel naming

Against

  • Constructs opposition in terms of legality (see above)

Arguments regarding Support for abortion legality / Opposition to abortion legality

For

  • Descriptive
  • Reasonably concise
  • Strictly parallel naming

Against

  • The construct ("<noun> legality") is uncommon.
  • Syntactically offputting - "Support for the legality of abortion / Opposition to the legality of abortion" sounds more natural.
  • Constructs opposition in terms of legality (see above)

Arguments regarding Support for legality of abortion / Opposition to legality of abortion

For

  • Descriptive
  • Strictly parallel naming
  • In comparison to "Support for abortion legality / Opposition to abortion legality"

Against

  • Marginally less concise than "Support for abortion legality / Opposition to abortion legality"
  • Constructs opposition in terms of legality (see above)

For

  • Descriptive
  • Strictly parallel naming
  • In comparison to "Support for legality of abortion / Opposition to legality of abortion":
    • Probably easier to understand.
    • Probably a more natural phrasing.
  • Easier to comply with "If possible, the page title should be the subject of the first sentence." in WP:LEADSENTENCE than many other options.

Against

  • Marginally less concise than "Support for abortion legality / Opposition to abortion legality"
  • A bit awkward and in a more colloquial, unscholarly tone than Wikipedia typically adopts
  • Constructs opposition in terms of legality (see above)

Arguments regarding Support for the toleration of abortion / Opposition to the toleration of abortion

For

  • Toleration can be interpreted in terms of law, ethics and specific actions, which is arguably the desired scope of the articles.
  • Therefore, arguably describes the desired topic of our articles more accurately than anything above (describing the topic is key to titles, especially constructed ones, as per WP:TITLE)
  • Arguably neutral like the other constructed titles, but without any issues over whether legality is the right framing.

Against

  • Unusual choice of words.
  • Not concise.
  • Arguably not neutral because "toleration" implies that abortion is something that people would still rather avoid. Although arguably this is the point: virtually no one is in favour of abortion per se. Some people argue that there is a right to an abortion, but virtually all of those people would prefer a situation where unwanted pregnancies didn't happen or were much rarer.

Arguments regarding Support for availability of abortion / Opposition to availability of abortion

For

  • Title concentrates on the practical thing that differentiates the two sides, but leaves scope to discuss all the related points: legal, political, ethical etc.
  • Arguably neutral like the other constructed titles, but without any issues over whether legality is the right framing.

Against

  • Unusual choice of words (but arguably not as unusual as “toleration of abortion”) .
  • Not concise.

Arguments and policies regarding merging and refactoring into Abortion debate and Abortion debate in RegionName

The two articles under discussion become redirects to Abortion debate. Much of their content is moved to Abortion debate. Articles such as Abortion debate in the United States can be created as appropriate under WP:Summary style.

For

  • Sets a scope that does not require us to decide where the lines around diverse and fuzzily defined "movements" are.
  • Arguably beneficial in terms of WP:GLOBAL perspective by having a core article (Abortion debate) with a worldwide orientation.
  • Addresses concerns over framing and labeling by giving a space where the uses of the different terms can be described without greatly promoting specific terms.
  • Easier to meet requirements of WP:NPOV (especially WP:CRITS) as both sides of each debate will be contained within each article.
  • Since we're talking about making an already-existing article with no major alternative titles the primary article, then forking by region off of that, WP:COMMONNAME analysis has no great bearing here (though see Against section for the impact on our ability to cover relevant topics that do have common names).
  • There may be nothing to prevent there still being pro-life movement and pro-choice movement articles as subarticles below Abortion debate in the United States. The difference would be that these would be articles about the movements (e.g. when formed, major personnel, major events, achievements), rather than about the issues, which would be described in the overarching parent articles. This depends on how the binding effect of this RFC upon relevant article titles is interpreted (clarification of this issue has been requested).

Against

  • Possibly out of keeping with the intent of the RFC by specifying a merge and refactor rather than titles for the two specific articles in question.
  • Leaves us without articles scoped to the United States pro-choice and pro-life movements, which are discrete notable topics clearly suitable for encyclopedic coverage in and of themselves, and possibly in a state where we are bindingly forbidden to have articles so scoped (clarification of this issue has been requested). Similarly for any other regional movements that may be notable in and of themselves.
  • This would be a fairly radical refactoring and so is recommended against by WP:PRESERVE.
  • Even merging our material on both sides of the United States advocacy spectrum into Abortion debate in the United States is a poor, contraindicated merge by the criteria of WP:MERGE.
  • Preserving article history would require extremely difficult and complex history merging, to the point that it would likely just not be done, resulting in loss of article history.

Discussion on possible alternative titles/questions regarding process

This section is for discussing the proposed titles only (such as additions and suggestions). This is not for detailing one's preferred option for a title, that discussion will commence on March 23

  • Query. Will the result of this discussion apply only to article titles, or will it also apply in-text to other articles, eg. "X is pro-life" vs. "X is anti-abortion"? –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:37, 22 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • (Sorry, posted this first in wrong section)— Preceding unsigned comment added by Jerzy (talk • contribs) 06:19, 23 February 2012‎
  •    I'm embarrassed to weigh in with fundamental issues at this apparently late date, but then, i suppose no one is obligated to respond.
    1.    "Legalization" is an act or process; as the "pro-choice" article indicates in a graphic, abortion is fully legal in essentially the whole northern hemisphere, and legal at least to protect the mother's [physical] health in most of the rest of the world, so the controversy is actually about legality versus illegality of abortion, and far more about (hypothetical) acts or processes of prohibition than of legalization.
    2.    The articles purport to respectively be about two opposing world-wide phenomena of advocacy: a two-sided struggle. The graphic offers support more for the idea that there are at least six positions, corresponding to unqualified legality, unqualified prohibition, and four intermediate ones of advocacy for the status quo where it matches one's own position, but some degree of legalization in some other jurisdictions and/or prohibition in others.
    3.    In fact, even this 6-position view is too reductionist: IMO there are a lot of people who are sincere in believing that it's none of their business to have an opinion about what is right for other societies, and have only an opinion of whether their own should needs change.
    4.    In practice, what you think about abortion in other societies is as significant as your opinion of the number of angels who can dance on the head of a pin, unless you are going overseas with your sniper rifle, or sending similarly deadly quantities of money overseas.
    In short, the attempt to write two articles about two supposed world-wide movements on reproductive rights is ridiculous. Oh, excuse me, fundamentally misguided. IMO the articles should have their "Amero-centric" tags removed, and be merged into American controversies about abortion and contraception law, which should be tagged {{Lacks nuance}}, pending addition of at least 4 more sections.
    --Jerzy•t 05:57, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    •    (What i said above is far more important than this, so i am subordinating it as a comment on my own main point.) Part of the political controversy in the US is about what actions actually constitute "abortion". (A very small number of people are probably interested in a corresponding scientific and philosophical issue, about whether that question has any meaning -- since there is no such thing as an "instant of conception".) Arguments one way or the other can be important talking points in efforts to win votes, but i have serious questions about any use of "abortion" in defining the scope of a WP article that doesn't devote a section to how ill-defined the word is.
      --Jerzy•t 05:57, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

From a copy-editing standpoint, how about a slight alteration on the last set of names, to "Support for abortion legality" and "Opposition to abortion legality"? For one thing, as Jerzy pointed out the current proposal doesn't take into account that "legalization" means "making something legal", not "supporting its continuing being legal". For another, the current proposal is lengthier. Allens (talk | contribs) 20:11, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, or Support for the legality of abortion / Opposition to the legality of abortion (compare the original 'Support for the legality of abortion / Opposition to abortion'). It would answer the non-neutral argumant against 'Opposition to abortion' and make them both evenly concise. I really can't think of any objections to both your format and the one I suggested. With yours being more concise. Therefore, I think it would be sensible to include one or both into the structured discussion. JHSnl (talk) 09:08, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Oh. Another formatting matter. Shouldn't "Other descriptions" be its own section, not under the last set of names? Allens (talk | contribs) 20:14, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Variants of legal/legality/legalisation has been discussed before. The proposal could always be adjusted to encompass the lot, or alternatives could be offered. Each could work, really. Steven Zhang DR goes to Wikimania! 20:25, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

What is going on ... where are my comments and the others that are now gone? I'd like someone to post an explanation of what happened to the discussion and why my comments were deleted.--Djathinkimacowboy 21:24, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Steven removed the comments by the community section below because there was a misunderstanding. Discussion on the titles and input from the community will take place after the 30 day period (starting on 23 March). The discussion that you were involved in has been archived here: Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Abortion article titles#Closed discussion. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. Steven and I are working diligently to address your concerns. If you have any other concerns, please let me know. Thanks, Whenaxis talk · contribs | DR goes to Wikimania! 21:33, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • The proposals to date would all continue the present false dichotomy. We should be discussing a spectrum of positions. Not all who support a putative right of access to legal abortion on demand also support public funding for such. Not all who support a putative fetal right to life also want the death penalty for practioners who provide abortions to rape victims. There are many incremental positions in between the extremes that are not well addressed by the polarized terms above. Does pro-life convey whether a person is in opposition to antibacterials, to weed killers, to contraceptives, or just to abortions? Does pro-choice convey whether a person is in favour of a right to sex-selective abortion, to reduction of multiple pregnancies, or simply to avoid an inconveniently-timed pregnancy? It is absurd to contend that WP must adopt a binary nomenclature. LeadSongDog come howl! 22:57, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • About 6 pm today (UK time) a BBC TV 1 television news item said that the debate about rights and wrongs of abortion is likely to never be settled. The same seems to be happening here: compare two people, Mr.X and Mr.Y, each reporting a sensitive matter such as a death; X obeys WP:NPOV and reports neutrally, and Y reports emotively. X complains that Y should have reported neutrally. Y complains that X's neutral style is "as if the death does not matter to anyone", and inserts emotive matter if he can, or else complains to the editor. The same likely applies to titles of articles reporting emotive subjects. There are two points of view here, and such conflict is likely to be hard to resolve. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 23:09, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
In the real world, perhaps, but on Wikipedia such conflict is settled easily: WP:NPOV is a fundamental tenet of Wikipedia policy. Emotive content is simply not appropriate here, period. This issue isn't "one title is NPOV and one is not," but rather, "which title conforms most to NPOV?" Yunshui 雲‍水 23:49, 23 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The thing that's currently controversial in the UK is sex-selective abortion. Not general abortion rights. The same is generally true in the Asian sources I looked at. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 08:29, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Procedural query. The two sides seem to be always being taken together when titles are proposed, but there's no rule requiring that they be taken in the same format. I don't think WP:NPOV requires for balance that if one article is titled (e.g.) 'Support for legal abortion' the opponents of that position must have their article titled 'Opposition to legal abortion'. Can the debate be structured so that people can indicate support for different phrasing for the two sides? Sam Blacketer (talk) 09:31, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    This is basically an extremely bad idea. If it fell out of the actual formulation, that's unfortunate, but an absolutely vital consideration that was addressed by the current titles and which needs to continue being addressed by whatever is adopted is that the articles have parallel names. Before the current titles, one article had wound up at the propaganda name its own proponents prefer for it, while the other had a more neutral title. Mix-and-match is a spectacularly bad road to go down. —chaos5023 (talk) 13:09, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
YES, chaos! I came here specifically to say the exact same thing. It is absolutely MANDATORY that both names have identical, parallel syntax or the whole effort is for naught. If they're different, then not only will one side or the other complain about the names being biased, but in my opinion, one or both of the names will almost certainly BE biased. With parallel construction, nobody can reasonably complain, modulo the specific words used (e.g."pro-life" vs. "pro-murder").
I'd also like to say that I hope there's enough attention to this arbitration to keep it clean (with respect to integrity). Every other professor that I personally know where I teach (a legit, real university) has forbidden students to cite wikipedia, not because it's written by amateurs, since it's sourced. No, they have complete disgust and frequently contempt for this project because conflicts like the present one are again and again resolved by socially-malfunctioning, authority-abusing geeks angry at the world, sitting in their parent's basement in their underpants who support each other without regard to the content of the discussion so that they themselves will be unquestionably backed-up when they need to gang up on someone. Several academic studies have supported that contention, though they presented that same conclusion in a faaaaaar more polite way.
My point is that if the shocking, disgusting things I saw at arbcom last year happen again here, I strongly encourage people to object LOUDLY instead of being bullied and beat-up by the other political faction until they quit in disgust. HelviticaBold 14:24, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Agree that bullying here is too often tolerated and I'll go further, IMO I have on occasions been punished myself for being the victim. What chance has a newbie? But I still believe that there's more chance of a good result for those who do try to stick to the behavioural guidelines. Some interesting observations above, but are there better places to discuss them? Feel free to reply on my talk page if you feel that this is getting off-topic. Andrewa (talk) 15:46, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
More important (and I'm still a long way from understanding the process), the opinion above that it is absolutely MANDATORY that both names have identical, parallel syntax is premature here I think... what we're looking for here is predominantly white hat. But since it's been expressed I'll flag that I don't think it's that simple at all, and trying to be a bit white hat, WP:AT doesn't seem to support this but WP:IAR might. And it might be a moot point if we decide not to restrict the topic to exactly two articles, see below. Andrewa (talk) 00:24, 1 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
It's beyond premature, it's not supported by observation of reality. "Abortion rights movement/position" and "anti-abortion movement/position" are used, in- and outside of American English, very, very broadly, and are often chosen specifically to avoid association with or implication of highly-politicized activism activities, and focus on the broader politico-philosophical positions. Using these less loaded terms would also reduce the WP:OR tendency to assign anachronisitic labels like "pro-life" (dates to the 1970s) to earlier anti-abortionists. Proponents of anti-abortion viewpoints often like to use euphemisms that avoid "anti-", the same way that anti-war protestors like to call themselves peace activists or anti-alcohol organizations were called temperance leagues, but I don't think we need to care. The terms are accurate, and instantly sourceable as being used both inside and and outside the movement for generations. I'm not sure I prefer them to a pair of the more constructed alternatives (which can be even more neutral and are not naming problems because redirects exist and work for a reason). But they should not be painted as being "mandatorily" excluded as reasonable options. SMcCandish (talk) 04:52, 6 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Is it too late to suggest another? It may be rather late to suggest this but the "pro-life" alternatives are mostly in the form of "Opposition ...". One might have considered "Support for Banning Abortion". I see ban used in practice. It also allows degrees or partial bans. It also is symmetric with many of the "Support for legalizing ..." Jason from nyc (talk) 16:04, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thinking this through, the argument is about whether and in what circumstances abortion should be legal. The most common position taken by one side seems to be that abortion should be/remain legal with exceptions limited to widely agreed-upon cases (e.g. late term). The most common position taken by the other side seems to be that abortion should be made illegal either in all cases, or with limited exceptions (rape, incest, when the life of the pregnant woman is at risk, etc.). Since, as Jerzy pointed out above, "abortion is fully legal in essentially the whole northern hemisphere, and legal at least to protect the mother's [physical] health in most of the rest of the world", one side is generally arguing to retain the status quo, while the other is arguing for legal restrictions. That makes me think of a pairing like "Support for abortion legality" and "Support for abortion prohibition" or something along those lines. Maybe "Abortion legality movement" and "Abortion prohibition movement". cmadler (talk) 16:30, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    •    This discussion is too informal for the term friendly amendment to apply, but Cmadler's ideas do an excellent job of meeting my "what makes it two-sided?" objection: in practice, in any particular jurisdiction, only the status quo and one politically conceivable direction of change are on the table. (Note, however, that that sharpens rather than softens my argument against the IMO artificial approach of treating the positions in a world-wide article, rather than in a two- -- or one- -- article per country fashion.)
      --Jerzy•t 06:33, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I am in complete agreement that these titles need to be standardized but I am at a loss for why pro-choice, pro-life are unacceptable in the first place. While the terms themselves may convey a POV that does not necessarily mean that they are unusable due to NPOV restrictions.

  • If these terms are the predominant terms used by individuals in society who are active and vocal about this issue then they are the most accurate terms. I think we start to move towards counting angels on pins when we abandon the language of the debate for other contrived terms which only exist because each side thinks the other's name is too POV.
  • It seems to me that although there is a great variety within the two camps - as mentioned by Jerzy - such variety does not mean that the two camps cannot be defined by the labels used in the debate itself! For example, when one talks about 'Democrats' or 'Republicans' one does not assume - especially these days - that every single member of either party holds the exact same opinions as their fellow members. Nevertheless, the two categories continue to exist and successfully describe the majority of politicians and American voters. Just as not all in the pro-life camp favor the complete prohibition of abortion not all in the pro-choice camp favor complete and immediate access to abortion.
  • Even if individuals don't agree with every view of the general pro-life/pro-choice dichotomy almost no one attempts to adopt a categorization outside of those terms. I don't know of any examples from public figures or advocacy groups in which someone has tried to say they don't fall into either category. On the other hand it is not infrequent to hear people say "I am pro-choice but would not have an abortion," or "I am pro-life but believe it is a decision that should not be made by the government."
  • If the pro-choice/pro-life option is deemed unacceptable despite the fact that those are the terms used by the majority of individuals participating in the debate why is the AP stylebook alternative not viable? Although Abortion-rights movement / Anti-abortion movement are somewhat clunky they at least represent the consensus view of the largest news agencies in the English speaking world.

Ultimately, it seems odd that wikipedia would reject both labels most commonly used in the debate (pro-life/pro-choice) and a professional/scholarly consensus alternative (Abortion-rights movement / Anti-abortion movement) and instead create new terms to describe an existing public debate.Grin20 (talk) 21:52, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Query. What were the original names of the articles and how long did those names last? I think this should be a factor in the discussion, and added to the "for" for the relevant names.LedRush (talk) 18:40, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I haven't been following this debate, so maybe this has already been addressed, but why do we have two articles? Last time I checked, POV forks were against policy. Shouldn't we just have one article about the debate that covers both sides? Then there is no real issue over the name, since it's neutral anyway ("Abortion debate" would work fine). --Tango (talk) 01:45, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • I believe that this is constitutes a legitimate POVFORK. Whenaxis talk · contribs | DR goes to Wikimania! 01:49, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • The examples given there aren't really comparable to this. While they are mutually exclusive points of view, they aren't simply opposite points of view. It wouldn't make sense to have one article that discussed both capitalism and communism because they are two completely separate economic systems (and far from the only two). You could very easily have one article on the abortion debate and, even without the naming issues, that article would be better - the arguments on both sides aren't isolated from each other, a lot of them are simply counters to the arguments of the other side. It's very confusing to have the argument in one article and the counter-argument on another, and it's unnecessarily duplicative to have them both in both articles. --Tango (talk) 02:09, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • That is certainly a viable option. I will discuss with Steve and AGK about this. Whenaxis talk · contribs | DR goes to Wikimania! 02:12, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
        • After reading the feedback given by other it's clear to me that this is the best option. Other authors have presented many other sub-classes of the debate, each of which could easily be and article in it's own right. I think the example given above about economic systems is correct. There are many economic systems and there is a parent article economic system that describes and links to them. Likewise a parent article like what Tango suggest can frame the debate and provide links to the many flavors of it. This would also server to frame the discussion within and internationl setting providing links to various countries and regions issues and policies.War (talk) 05:38, 1 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to suggest that we have more than just these two articles. Opposition to the legalization of abortion and Support for the legalization of abortion are both good topics and clearly scoped. They both should have articles. But Right to Life Movement and Pro-life movement are both also notable and well-defined topics, with plenty of material for articles and seemingly much interest in writing about them. They should not simply redirect to Opposition to the legalization of abortion as one does currently, and I'm surprised that Right to Life Movement doesn't seem to ever have existed, I get 1.4 million ghits [7] (your results may differ) and quite a few Wikipedia articles mention it by this name as well. There will be similar organisations and movements linked to the other side too I expect. Andrewa (talk) 02:11, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Andrewa, this is supportable evidence for the above sections. If you would be so kind to place this evidence under the appropriate header. All the best, Whenaxis talk · contribs | DR goes to Wikimania! 02:13, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I confess I'm very confused about the process. Does this satisfy your request? It doesn't deal with the main point I was trying to make, but I'm not sure how to. Andrewa (talk) 02:37, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yep. That'll do. :) Don't worry a lot of editors have never experienced a "binding content discussion" such as this one. Regards, Whenaxis talk · contribs | DR goes to Wikimania! 02:43, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
OK. But how about the point that having main articles by this name doesn't necessarily mean we can't have articles on the related topics too? For example, the point has often been made that pro-life includes anti-euthanasia views as well as anti-abortion, yet it currently [8] redirects to Opposition to the legalization of abortion. To me this seems wrong, it is a distinct but related topic not well covered by the article, and so the current redirect violates the principle of least astonishment. Andrewa (talk) 03:06, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm... and I guess that also means that pro-choice is also related to euthanasia. Whenaxis talk · contribs | DR goes to Wikimania! 14:45, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
A good green hat, let me now be black hat: Not necessarily. White hat: In Australia, organisations such as Right to Life http://www.righttolife.com.au/ who dislike being described as anti-abortion and consistently use pro-life or pro-choice or similar instead are equally concerned about euthanasia as abortion, but I know of no such connection with regard to those with opposite views. The various Voluntary Euthanasia Societies (http://www.saves.asn.au/ for example) have no policy on abortion, but their opponents have strong ones. Andrewa (talk) 19:47, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Beware. This be a very large can of worms that now seems to be opened and may cause many an emotional entry. Study long thine entries well before posting. Canoe1967 (talk) 19:27, 26 February 2012
  • "Support for abortion legality / Support for abortion prohibition" makes sense to me but perhaps I would prefer "Support for legality of abortion / Support for prohibition of abortion" not sure why adding the word "of" makes it easier for me to understand, but it does. Maybe "abortion legality" sounds a bit like a kind of legality, rather than a position on abortion. I don't know. I notice we have Legality of cannabis, Legality of the Iraq War, Prohibition of drugs etc. Should we add "Support for legality of abortion / Support for prohibition of abortion" to the list? Yaris678 (talk) 22:33, 26 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: The Guardians styleguide gives pro-choice and pro-life as the preferred to abortion and anti-abortion[9]. They should be added to a source in the first section rather than being used as a source in the second section which is a blog on their site. 94.2.68.193 (talk) 08:37, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
No, it says "pro-life should not be used to mean anti-abortion" – Danmichaelo (talk) 21:13, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - Reading these articles, I think they have bigger problems than the naming convention, starting with what their purpose is. Having the two articles split is inherently POV, whereas a balanced discussion on a single page would be far preferable for dealing with bias. At the moment, the content on these pages is very US focused, and probably more properly belongs at Abortion in the United States (as does the other country content, seemingly there as an afterthought). If there were to be two articles, it would be better to have the ISSUES debated on a single page, and then a page about 'pro-life' and 'pro-choice' movements, restricted to only the activities of the actual movements, not about the underlying issues. OwainDavies (about)(talk) edited at 10:52, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I strongly agree with this. The option should at least be presented. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 19:29, 28 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
This isn't a real option. Since you're effectively talking about a WP:MERGE of two huge articles, often merging them into a THIRD huge article (Abortion debate), any even slightly justifiable way of constructing it talks about merging these articles -- and then factoring material about the US pro-life and pro-choice movements into two other articles! So at the end of the day, it has accomplished the same visible result as resolving the RFC in favor of Pro-life movement / Pro-choice movement would have, except it's damaged the hell out of the article history involved. It does nothing but achieve the same ends as a much simpler option with bonus shooting ourselves in the foot technically. Basically, if you want global overview to be in a single, neutrally-titled article, support Pro-life movement / Pro-choice movement, since with those titles finally defining a coherent scope for these articles, material that isn't about those movements would naturally factor to Abortion debate. —chaos5023 (talk) 00:52, 3 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Query - Is it too late to suggest alternative titles? It seems to me that the most neutral and descriptive titles would be "Support for the legal availability of abortion" and "Opposition to the legal availability of abortion", as that fully captures what the topic is about AND avoids "legalization" which implies a change from the status quo.Lawdroid (talk) 15:04, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    It isn't too late to add options, no. Please carefully consider the existing options as to whether any already provide the benefits your proposal would have, though, and whether major points against existing options would also weigh against yours. For example, I would say that the extreme wordiness of your proposed titles makes them a somewhat unlikely alternative to the largely semantically equivalent Support for legal abortion / Opposition to legal abortion, and that arguments against that option also tend to apply to yours. —chaos5023 (talk) 15:25, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Chaos on all points.LedRush (talk) 15:39, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I shall simply point out that, at least in my neck of the woods, the debate is really about whether insurance should pay for abortion or not. Bwrs (talk) 04:44, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

*One article - not two - I'm with Owain on this. I think splitting the topic into two articles is wrong. A common objection to the proposed naming pairs is that they are not parallel. That's because the attempt to analyze this issue into two positions obscures its many levels and nuances. This topic cannot be properly presented as two sides of a dispute. Editors who cannot work collaboratively on such an article should not be working on it. Pleas add an option to have a single article covering the issue. Jojalozzo 20:22, 27 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As an alternative to Pro-life movement and Pro-choice movement, how about simply Pro-life and Pro-choice? This would have the same strengths of the former, chiefly avoiding the dog's breakfast that is the "support/opposition" titles, and would further avoid the pitfall of implying the existence of some unified "movement". --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 19:29, 28 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Another addition I would like to make is that focusing on the legalization of abortion (or however you want to word it) is much too narrow. Plenty of people are "consistent pro-life", meaning that they oppose abortion, euthanasia, war, capital punishment, etc. Also, plenty of people are opposed to funding of abortion and government support of abortion and would describe themselves as "pro-life" though they do not advocate prohibition. There should be room for a "pro-life" page that encompasses all these things and does not focus so narrowly on the legalization of abortion. Can these points be better represented in the "for/against" items above? --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 19:29, 28 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

My issue with this discussion is that it's not totally clear what is being discussed: it looks like it might be very hard to separate out naming and content. If the article is on that group of people who oppose it being legal to have an abortion, then a case can probably be made for one of the word salad constructions. But if it is about the "pro-life movement", broadly construed, and the article on the pro-life movement is all about abortion and not the other issues which the pro-life advocates claim to also support, by their own arguments it is lending undue weight to only one aspect of the pro-life movement. A similar but less strong argument could perhaps be made regarding the term pro-choice.

I hate to go all wikilawyer, but a "structured discussion on the names of the [...] articles" (as ArbCom has specified) can be interpreted in two ways: perhaps it is a discussion of the best names for the articles concerning the topics strictly defined, or perhaps it is a discussion of the best names for the articles as they currently exist. Either way, the right-on warriors for truth, justice and freedom will find a way of challenging it on this basis. Only unlike me, they'll challenge it after it has concluded rather than just as it is kicking off. —Tom Morris (talk) 09:49, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This issue will very likely be cited as a model case of the limitations and shortcomings of encyclopaedias in general, and of Wikipedia in particular, when it comes to issues that have complex geographical and historical dimensions. The majority of editors of these articles will likely come from the USA (I myself am writing in Scotland), but the material itself is envisaged as covering a variety of contemporary contexts, and including a good stretch of history in those different contexts going back to the varied forms of legislation passed in different countries. Arbitration can solve (in an ad hoc fashion) the choice of titles, but it does not address the deeper question of how a suitable title can be found that properly covers every country in which there is debate about legislation, together with their different histories. There is no single debate, for which a single title can be found: there are many debates, oriented to different legislative contexts, with varied histories. In practice, the proposed articles are bound to be dominated by the US context, its legal framework, and its history. This is not because of the content, but because of who the editors are likely to be. It would be far preferable to have articles that are geographically, historically, and legally specific. e.g. 'Abortion debates in the USA'. I can imagine a single page that summarises the contents of these specific pages; but I cannot imagine the split between two pages proposed here having an outcome that pays due attention to the different legal contexts in which these debates are conducted. Thelongview (talk) 12:07, 1 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I completely agree with you, although this discussion might be more something that should be discussed áfter this 'evidence gathering' face. (Abortion debate is there, so that summary page already exists.) You do, however, are in my opinion right to point out that this debate is now framed out as a discussion on the title, while it might be better to start out with what the content of the page should be. Maybe the involved user (Whenaxis, Steven Zhang) can figure out a way to structure the debate which will commence later in this fashion: 'what content' first, 'what title' second? JHSnl (talk) 12:18, 1 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the content needs sorting out first. I would propose that the pages should be (without prejeudice to the naming):

  • One page containing the main arguments for and against abortion (legal, ethical, religious etc.). This should be on a single page in order that the two can interact fully (i.e. side x says this, but side y reject this on the basis of...). This is probably based on abortion debate.
  • One page for each major country under discussion, such as Abortion in the United States which should primarily cover issues of legality, along with any specific issues faced in that country (major campaigns etc.)

Now, some of these may have large sections that deserve a daughter article. The two most obvious in the context of this debate might be the Pro-life movement in the United States and the Pro-choice movement in the United States. If these articles did exist, they should only be about the movement, not about the issues. For instance, it could talk about the major groups, action they take and any variance in position, but should not talk about the acutal issues (that would be in the main article).

Other daughter articles could include single topic issues like Islamic views on abortion (haven't even looked to see if this is an article, it's just an example of the sort of thing that could be).

I think this type of structure is the only way to make sure that the issues stay clearly defined and separate from the complications and inherent POV of national and interest group bias. Any further thoughts? OwainDavies (about)(talk) edited at 17:43, 2 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • This suggestion has some merit... although I'm not sure if it addresses the issue that this RfC is supposed to be about. The title "Pro-choice movement in the United States" may make more sense than "Pro-choice movement" but there will still be contention over whether it should be called that. Yaris678 (talk) 17:16, 4 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not certain of what the structure is supposed to be on this page. So I'm not adding to the many lists above (but someone helpful and clueful is welcome to try to add my suggestion : )

But anyway, it would seem to me that rather than talk about "american bias", why not have United States in the title of each "movement" (United States Pro-life movement; United States Pro-choice movement) for the existing articles (a simple page move); and have another page for International abortion debate movements, with the US movement pages existing there with a concise summary and template:main linking to the pro life and pro choice pages? Leave Abortion debate for the general information, and if necessary, split off by country as needed (something like: Abortion debate in the United States). - jc37 19:22, 2 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It is said above, and re-iterated, that "abortion is fully legal in essentially the whole northern hemisphere". I'm not quite sure how relevant this is, but if it is relevant, is it true? In UK, for example, abortion remains illegal unless two doctors in good faith decide that the case falls within one of the designated exceptions. This is not often checked - and may be widely disregarded (witness the recent furore about sex-selective abortions in UK). 'Widely available', Yes: 'fully legal', No. A second point - a usage by a particular institution (in their style guide, for example) is not necessarily evidence of NPOV. The UK Guardian may use 'anti-abortion', but it is certainly not NPOV as between the two sides of the debate - should it be balanced by Fox News referring to 'pro-life' (if I'm wrong in suggesting that Fox News would do this, I shall be happy to apologise)? There are topics (and this is one) where truly NPOV terms are hard to come by. Which is NPOV - 'enhanced interrogation' or 'torture'? [no option has been added in the drafting of this paragraph]Twr57 (talk) 21:40, 3 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Firstly Fox News appears to use anti-abortion - see the above source list.
Secondly while the Guardian isn't politically neutral in general abortion isn't a controversial topic in the UK, so they aren't pushing a POV here.
Thirdly I don't think you need to go to the "technicality" of the UK. For example abortion is still largely illegal in the Philippines, Pakistan, Iran and Egypt, to name only the largest such countries in the northern hemisphere. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 21:54, 3 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your first and third points. As to your second point, I disagree. I'm not sure if 'in general' qualifies the political neutrality of the 'Guardian' or abortion not being a controversial topic in UK, but (assuming the latter) I think you're wrong. Witness recent press reports about sex-selective abortions, and demonstrations and counter-demonstations outside abortion clinics. At the very least, it is controversial to say that it isn't a controversial topic. The best you can say is that it isn't as hot an issue as in USA. And the fact (if it were a fact) that it isn't a controversial topic wouldn't mean that the Guardian wasn't pushing its side of the argument in its style guide.Twr57 (talk) 16:01, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Abortion is and always has been a controversial topic in the UK. The difference with the US is that the debate is conducted in a more civilized way. Mhkay (talk) 22:46, 16 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There are half a dozen trivial variations on "legality" and "legalization", which seem likely to steal votes away from one another. It's like an election where the choices are:

  1. Support Republican — 40%
  2. Very, very strongly support Democrat — 25%
  3. Very strongly support Democrat — 20%
  4. Strongly support Democrat — 10%
  5. Somewhat support Democrat — 5%

and the Republican is declared the winner! For the integrity of the process, I would strongly urge that the combined vote total of the various legality/legalization titles be taken into account. -- P.T. Aufrette (talk) 01:42, 4 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

PLEASE READ BEFORE ADDING OPTIONS — I, on the basis of no sort of authority or anything like that, am asking you, dear reader, to help keep this RFC sane by only adding new options to the above list if you, at the very moment you're adding it, believe that the option you are adding is the best one and is the single way this RFC should be resolved. I ask this because I believe that adding options for the sake of covering bases doesn't add anything useful to the process and helps make the whole thing an indigestible wall of text that prevents people from engaging usefully with it. I hope you'll agree. —chaos5023 (talk) 23:58, 2 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • While a certain amount of trimming might be useful, I don't actually know what "the best one" is at this stage. I think it helps to get ideas out in the open. Let other people see what they think of them. Yaris678 (talk) 17:16, 4 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Extensive trimming is called for, yes. As far as kicking things around and seeing what people think of them, I would suggest that that can happen on the talk page, and options can be added to the actual analysis if they turn out to have something serious going for them. Nothing about the way this RFC was set up makes it appropriate for it to be a far-reaching inquiry into obscure and unlikely potential naming schemata for these articles. —chaos5023 (talk) 20:55, 4 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • Where does it say we are allowed to add options? The instructions only mention making comments. I would assume that this means that if I want another option added I should suggest it in a comment. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:58, 7 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Suggestion for one page title. 'Abortion issues by country/region/religion'. This idea may work if a one page article is decided on. The page could have links/contents as to what the issues are in each area, solve the USA focus, and have all issues branch from one place. I don't know if there is a 'milder' term for 'abortion' that would be more acceptable in the title. Could we add 'One Page Article' to the suggestions above?.Canoe1967 (talk) 21:30, 5 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Question:.
Why are
"It may be problematic that these names are sometimes used outside the United States to refer to topics other than abortion..."
and
"It may be problematic that the term 'pro-life' can be more wide-ranging..."
Listed as arguments against "Pro-choice / Pro-life" but not as arguments against "Pro-choice movement / Pro-life movement"? The fact that whoever drew up the list could not think of a single argument against "Pro-choice movement / Pro-life movement" suggest a (I would assume unconscious) bias in favor of that particular choice. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:35, 7 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
They are listed as specific to Pro-choice / Pro-life because they're only relevant in the (severely misguided) case where these articles are used as catch-alls for global political advocacy regarding abortion, which only happens as a consequence of poor scoping; the "movement" variations define the articles' scope as about the US movements that use those names, so we know in that case that there's no reason to be including global politics in the articles in the first place. The list is a highly collaborative exercise and was not drawn up by any one person, but beyond that you're overlooking that the arguments that apply to all options including the terms pro-choice and pro-life apply to the "movement" variations. —chaos5023 (talk) 04:18, 8 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Title suggestion I propose asymmetric titles both starting with Abortion for clarity:

  • Abortion opposition
  • Abortion rights support

However, that still leaves us avoiding the most common, even if biased or euphemistic, labels of "pro-life" and "pro-choice". Obotlig (talk) 23:55, 12 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Please see the brainstorming section on the talk page. —chaos5023 (talk) 01:34, 13 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Invalid Argument? Re: Abortion-rights movement / Anti-abortion movement, the following argument appears to be invalid: "Gives preferential treatment to abortion-rights by suggesting that they are for the protection of a right, while anti-abortion is against that right". This suggestion only occurs when you put the two next to each other. "Anti-abortion movement" used by itself (which it will be as an article title) suggests nothing either way about rights. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:57, 16 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Even if they are separate pages, people will still often read both of them, and it is still arguably unfair for one title to have a positive orientation while the other has a negative orientation. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 03:51, 17 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree, but that's not what the text I quoted above says. I would have no issue if the text listed one title to have a positive orientation while the other has a negative orientation as an argument. I do have an issue with the present wording claiming that both titles refer to a right. That is factually incorrect. --Guy Macon (talk) 08:26, 17 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • If the text you quoted were changed to "while the opponents of abortion are against that right," would that remove your objection? That sentence doesn't necessarily have to refer to "Anti-abortion movement" as a title, does it? I think it can just mention "opponents" and work just as well. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 20:40, 17 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • That would address my objection. I really have no problem with the spirit of what is being argued here. Mine is a purely technical objection; Saying that the title "anti-abortion" is against anything other than abortion is simply not true. Saying that the opponents of abortion are against that right is fine, and from what I have heard of their arguments (which isn't much) is an accurate portrayal of their position. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:56, 17 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
To me the use of the term movement implies articles about, primarily, people and/or organisations, rather than one about concepts and arguments. To me the name these articles should be given depends what the focus of the articles is to be. LukeSurl t c 22:34, 18 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting point. If the articles are about the concepts or arguments, then maybe “pro-life” and “pro-choice” would be best, but if the articles are about the movements, then maybe “pro-life movement” and “pro-choice movement” (or “right-to-life movement” and “abortion-rights movement”) would work. Bwrs (talk) 14:16, 24 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Abortion is an important issue. Wikipedia:Edit warring is so so so unimportant; The Arbcom are important people is this debate but they are simply not important. Change perspective - abandon Wikipedia:Edit warring; accept WP:Fluidity and if the world does end I will apologise. Tom Pippens (talk) 20:43, 19 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by the community on proposals

After one month from the commencement of the RFC (March 23), members of the community are invited to comment on the various proposals here, giving reasons as to why they support their preferred argument. This discussion is not a vote, and as per all discussions, comments will be weighed based on strength of argument.

General comments

  • My suggestion, Pro-family planning or anti-family planning. The right to an abortion (and contraception) is about family planning. Either you support a women's right to decide if and when she will be a mother or you do not. It's about family planning. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.178.172.45 (talk • contribs) 18:26, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • There are many issues on this topic (why there is this RfC!) but one clear aspect is that the discussion in the USA is far more active than that in other countries (eg European states) where abortion is legal (in the sense of available through open public channels but may have a hurdle). "Opposition to the legalization of abortion" and "Support for the legalization of abortion" directly imply that it is no currently legal. I'd contest that the title(s) need to be differentiated by country name, at the very least. --AlisonW (talk) 01:35, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Food for thought, perhaps there are abortion stances, even in the US, that delineate themselves from the common names (I don't know offhand but it seems likely). Certainly if the global movements don't use them, we can't use these terms to describe the overall debate. However... I would see it as a massive gaping hole to have no big headers that says pro-life movement and pro-choice movement. Whether those are article titles or section titles, wouldn't matter much. Who cares? We merge and split stuff all the time, often based merely on how much content we have.
If there's enough material that falls outside the common terms, have it in separate articles (with our original titles). If not, make the common names sections within the originally-titled articles. Keep those common-named articles or sections strictly scoped to people, and the events surrounding them, who associate themselves with those movements.
PS. Yeah the common names suck, but that's not for us to judge. Yeah they're POV, but so is every article title on a movement or company or a half-dozen other subject types. LL Cool J seems to think he's cool, and we seem to have no problem advertising that POV stance. Equazcion (talk) 21:56, 26 Mar 2012 (UTC)
  • To decide what the "best" name would be, I imagined explaining all of this to someone who's unfamiliar with terms like "pro-choice" and "pro-life"; perhaps a non-native speaker of English who's only just come across them.
A brief analysis, in dialogue
Questioner: What's this all about?
Explainer: It's about the pro-choice and pro-life movements.
Questioner: What are they? Choice of what? Whose life?
Explainer: It's about whether or not pregnant women should be able to get abortions. (Although "pro-life" sometimes covers euthanasia and the death penalty too...)
Questioner: Oh, right. So those are the two different sides. But let me guess, it's not that simple?
Explainer: Right. There's a lot of nuance about who can get an abortion under what circumstances. And the terms "pro-choice" and "pro-life" aren't universal or accepted by everyone.
Questioner: Well I guess it's only natural. Each side dislikes the other using a positive name, right?
Explainer: It's not just that. Even people on the same side don't uniformly accept those labels.
Questioner: But whatever they call themselves, the whole thing is about...
Both: ...the abortion debate.
Me: Can we just call it that, then?

-- Perey (talk) 10:07, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • The problem is not article names, but scope. The RFC asks, "What are the best names for what we've got now?" But the community should ask, "What neglected aspects are not covered, what aspects are overcovered, what additional niches can be scoped to article names?" We solved a lot of contention in re Sabbath-related names by ensuring every article had a clear scope and summary style was used as strictly as possible; there are now a lot of Sabbath-related articles but no naming arguments. So it would be much smoother here to ensure more than two articles (some would be quite short) and stick closely to a scope for each one. I.e.:
    • Several articles should coexist and the groups covered under each article name would be, with some exceptions, those that self-identify under that name. Nuances and disambiguation should be specified throughout such as via WP:SUMMARY. Here's an example, easily adjusted by the community without the kind of contentiousness we have observed in past fora:
      • First, abortion debate contains two large sections (including more than one name each) and several smaller sections. Pro-life, right-to-life, and anti-abortion each exist; "pro-life" contains a SUBsection about "anti-abortion" because the latter is a subset of the former, and "pro-life" contains other sections such as about euthanasia; "right-to-life" describes movements that prefer that term, explains why they do, and is harmonized with the other two depending on what RTL movements consider their relationship with "pro-life" or "anti-abortion". Pro-choice, abortion-rights, and pro-abortion each exist; in this case "pro-abortion" is a subset of "pro-choice" because some pro-choicers don't regard themselves as always in favor of abortion; "abortion-rights" explains groups that favor that term over the others. Leftovers, like Ron Paul's unique position, [ADD 19:19, 14 April 2012 (UTC): and the pejorative but encyclopedia-worthy titles "anti-life" and "anti-choice",] would generally be in the subsections of "abortion debate".
    • Each article contains style notes in a subsection indicating who self-describes, who uses the term to describe others, relevant styleguide and dictionary notes such as we've amassed on this page, and enough clarification to ensure that scopes stick well for 3 years.
    • A solution that allows multiple scopes to exist will eventually yield harmonious editing. A solution that requires this broad topic set to be discussed in only one or two articles (not counting geoscoping, which would be unhelpful) will IMHO keep the battleground open. JJB 18:51, 14 April 2012 (UTC)
  • I am not in favor of the term pro-life when referring to the abortion debate, I find it to be misleading as it only refers to the destruction of a zygote and not the life of the mother. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.103.10.93 (talk • contribs) 21:07 23 April 2012 (UTC)
Support for User:Chaos5023/Why your entire way of thinking about the Abortion Article Titles RFC is wrong
  1. BlueMoonlet (t/c) 22:43, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Support Specifically due to his argument about the difference between the United States' Pro-life and Pro-choice movement and the abortion debate. Ryan Vesey Review me! 22:49, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Support and commend to the closers' review as a local consensus. See my comments there. JJB 14:49, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Voting

The comment phase being now open, here is a numbered chart of the options under consideration at the time of opening, so that we can refer to them by number for brevity:

Note: edited to include option 13, added after opening of comment period. —chaos5023 (talk) 16:57, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Note: also edited to include option 14. —chaos5023 (talk) 23:40, 25 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
1. Pro-choice movement / Pro-life movement
2. Abortion-rights movement / Anti-abortion movement
3. United States abortion-rights movement / United States anti-abortion movement
4. Abortion-rights movements / Anti-abortion movements
5. Support for the legalization of abortion / Opposition to the legalization of abortion
6. Support for legal abortion / Opposition to legal abortion
7. Support for abortion legality / Opposition to abortion
8. Opposition to abortion ban / Support for abortion ban
9. Support for abortion legality / Opposition to abortion legality
10. Support for legality of abortion / Opposition to legality of abortion
11. Support for abortion being legal / Opposition to abortion being legal
12. Refactor to Abortion debate and Abortion debate in RegionName
13. Support for the toleration of abortion / Opposition to the toleration of abortion
14. Support for availability of abortion / Opposition to availability of abortion

—chaos5023 (talk) 02:17, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • My preference order, were we presently conducting instant-runoff voting (edit: or Borda count voting) (which it's not completely clear we aren't), would be: 1, 4, 3, 2, 14, 7, 6, 11, 10, 9, 13, 8, 12, 5. (edit: option 13 added later.) (edit: and option 14.) (edit: reordered 4 and 3 after realizing that 3 probably sets an ambiguous scope) My reasoning is that 1 has the best combination of WP:COMMONNAME support with other factors; 4 probably has the best WP:COMMONNAME support of all, but it sets really too broad of a scope, I feel that these articles should be scoped to the US movements because of WP:PRESERVE, and its other issues feel like the sort of thing that will become larger problems down the line. 3 is almost as good as 1 decent, but I really don't like ignoring the right to self-identify in any context, (edit:) and United States anti-abortion movement is probably ambiguous. 2 is a pretty bad idea because the scope it sets is just plain ambiguous, but it's still a better idea than any invented title. Out of the invented titles, I like (edit: 14 and) 7 best because I feel the issues with constructing opposition in terms of legality are much worse than those with doing otherwise. Among other invented titles other than 5, I'm mostly going by feel and don't care that much. I think 12 is a really bad idea for the reasons stated in its section, and the only thing I like worse than 12 is 5, keeping the current titles, which set a completely useless scope and are basically the poster children for why WP:TITLECHANGES is important. In support/oppose terms, I support 1, 3, and 4, oppose everything else, with a strong oppose for 12 and 5. —chaos5023 (talk) 02:26, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    I know this has been worked on for a while, but shouldn't sections be created for each of the options so that users can support and oppose? How on earth will closers deal with responses such as "1, 3, 4, 2, 7, 6, 11, 10, 9, 8, 12, 5"? FormerIP (talk) 02:28, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Tallying instant-runoff voting results is actually pretty straightforward. Check out the article. I'm not seeing why reading consensus from supports and opposes on 12 separate sub-proposals would be easier. —chaos5023 (talk) 02:39, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    AV's a shit system for such tallying of options because lower preferences only come into play once higher ones are knocked out, thus making it hard for middle ground compromises to make it to the end. Borda or Condorcet are more conducive to finding consensual positions, although Condorcet has the major problem that it's very hard to explain the results sheet to the uninitiated. Timrollpickering (talk) 13:23, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    I'd be entirely happy with Borda. Luckily, my preference list makes a perfectly fine sheet for it as well. —chaos5023 (talk) 14:29, 23 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 is the only option: pro-life and pro-choice. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 10:01, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm confused on whether regular users are allowed to comment yet, but I strongly support (1), weakly support (12; based on the biases I have seen here, rolling it all on to one article would lead it to being the pro-choice article with a footnote; thus my tepidity in support), and oppose everything else (except for 3, which I am neutral on) (I misread 3: I am striking my neutrality and moving to strongly oppose) based on WP:UCN as well as subtle implications of other titles that either do not fit or are improperly scoped (there is some overlap between the "right to life" movement and "pro-life" movement, but they are not identical). I was told on one article here that was, surprisingly, related to this (Non-Catholics for Choice) that "self-identification is held in high regard by the community" as well, but do not remember the policy (if there was one), and it is clear, that in the US, the locus of these debates, the mainstream of each group self-identifies as "pro-choice" or "pro-life" (while generally characterizing the other as "anti-choice" or "anti-life"/"culture of death"). St John Chrysostom Δόξατω Θεώ 11:22, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • There was never any "regular users" vs anybody else regarding this section of the RFC; the only issue was that this phase wasn't supposed to open until March 23. Your input is entirely appropriate. :) The right to self-identify doesn't show up in any live policy or guidelines that I've found, but it did make it as close as a proposal, WP:Naming conventions (identity). —chaos5023 (talk) 15:58, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support option (1) Light-jet pilot (talk) 13:26, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 per COMMONNAME. 2 would be acceptable. I don't support any of the other options, because they seem to be trying to replace commonly-used terms for no good reason. I don't think 1 is US-centric. It's possibly true that the terms serve as flags to rally under in the US, but that's because it's an issue that Americans get particularly worked up over. But they are standard, normalised terms throughout the English-speaking world, I think. FormerIP (talk) 13:31, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Probably only 1 per WP:COMMONNAME (although 2 could also be acceptable). Current titles are original research. My very best wishes (talk) 14:14, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support either option 1 or option 12 — I have NPOV concerns about the use of "abortion rights" vs. "anti-abortion". If we're going to go that route, it should be "pro-abortion" vs. "anti-abortion", but I know most would be opposed to such wording. We should either use the common name given by supporters of each side (i.e. pro-life, pro-choice) or refactor to include both viewpoints in a single article, e.g. Abortion debate in RegionName. Options like 7, 9 and 10 are insufficient as many "pro-choicers" do not support abortion legality in all cases. — FoxCE (talk • contribs) 16:23, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm going for 1. It's easier for people to understand as they've certainly come across these terms before. AndieM (Am I behaving?) 16:33, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • My vote is for 2, with 1 being my second choice. MyNameWasTaken (talk) 16:34, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 is my clear first choice. If there is a consensus to reject those terms, I would view 2, 5, 6, and 10 as viable titles. Eluchil404 (talk) 16:50, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 14, 13, 11, 12, 10, 8, 9, 4, 3, 2, 7, 6, 5, 1. Although they sound a bit odd, 14 and 13 and the two most neutral options that best define the scope that I think everyone wants. Neutrality and a scope that everyone wants is surely the aim here. 11 is the clearest option of all those that concentrate on legality. 12 is arguably the most neutral option but it is going to be a lot of extra work. I don't mind helping out in that work if it comes down to it. After that I have ranked them by ease of understanding and neutrality. Yaris678 (talk) 17:12, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • If the choice is between 1 and 2, I'd !vote for 2 because it's the more international WP:COMMONNAME choice. Outside the US, I have never heard pro-life/pro-choice being used commonly. In fact, in my native language Wikipedia (de-wiki) "pro-choice" are explicitly defined as the US-movement and not the movement itself (cf de:Pro-Choice). Regards SoWhy 17:17, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support option 2 or 12 and Oppose option 1. I strongly believe that a general title is the best. Using terms such as the ones in option 1 only increases the bias towards any of the two movements. AlexCovarrubias ( Talk? ) 18:19, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1, 4, 2, 3, 5, 9, 7, 6, 10, 14, 11, 8, 13, 12. Effectively I support option 1, accept options 4 and 2, weakly oppose options 3, strongly oppose options 5-14 (I tried to arrange "mirrored" options, but I'm not sure I could make the 2 same results within 10 tries) with option 12 being particularly the worst one, as it condemns the topic to the infinite edit warring, disputes and other counter-productive behaviour. — Dmitrij D. Czarkoff (talk) 18:53, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support option 1 Pro-choice/Pro-life is the way to go per all of the above. Option 10 would be a distant second choice. Juno (talk) 19:34, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Borda. Consider the following as an approval vote or strike. Support 2, 3, 4, 14. Tolerate 1 (a pathetic euphemism, but a common one). Oppose rest, particularly all phrased in terms of legality, since it is an inaccurate depiction of the belligerents. (At least in the US, where current debate is mostly between subsidizing it and making it inconvenient.) Kilopi (talk) 22:39, 26 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Please register opposition to the use of Borda count in the relevant proposal rather than here. —chaos5023 (talk) 17:43, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Likewise Oppose Borda, which I consider silly and inaccurate, and compels editors to grade preferences on options about which they don't give a tinker's damn. Support options 3 and 2, no objection to option 5, Oppose option 1. Ravenswing 01:19, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Please register opposition to the use of Borda count in the relevant proposal rather than here. —chaos5023 (talk) 17:43, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 5. Longwinded but accurate and neutral. Never 1, which are America-centric and designed to be offensive to the opposing sides. Good luck at settling this though, I don't expect any consensus will ever be arrived at. Barsoomian (talk) 02:17, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 3 (U.S. x Movement). I like the idea of having articles that are strongly scoped to cover the U.S. movements, and a more general article that covers the broader debate globally. As noted, the U.S. movements on both sides are notable in their own right, and there is more than enough to say about them to merit their own articles. I'm very impressed with this RFC, overall. A great job has been done, of distilling issues that are difficult both politically and technically, to produce a very comprehensible set of choices, with good arguments for and against each. I wish all community discussions on WP were this well organized.--Srleffler (talk) 02:21, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • support 1 to me the most neutral way to name a political position is to use the name that they, themselves would use for their own movement. This avoids constructing people that do not see themselves as opposing a legal right as civil rights opponents. In reality the issue of abortion is so thorny because it is not arguing over whether or not a right should exist. Pro-life advocates do not universally advocate AGAINST choice: they argue that in this case the right to life overrides this particular right of choice. Likewise for Pro-choice advocates, they are not anti-life they simply dissagree on the definition of life. Any title except the self-assigned titles represents Wikipedia taking a position. #2 is also acceptable however I think that for the sake of fair treatment towards the positions espoused we should use the names that they themselves assign to their own positions. HominidMachinae (talk) 06:19, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • None of the above. 12+4+1 or similar as proposed by 20040302 below. There should be articles on the pro-life and pro-choice movements (with titles to match), but they should not be about opposition to and support for (legalized) abortion generally, only about those who identify themselves with those terms (pro-X). For the rest, we should present both sides together in one or more "abortion debate" articles. So I guess it's a combination of options 1 and 12. Most importantly, Wikipedia should never fall into the cheap propagandists' trap of using "pro-life" and "pro-choice" as synonyms for certain positions on abortion (that's not neutral, as it implies that we agree with the groups' positions that they really are the parties of life and choice respectively).--Victor Yus (talk) 07:26, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Since, per WP:TITLE and as repeatedly and thoroughly brought up in the actual arguments above, to choose Pro-choice movement / Pro-life movement as the articles' titles is to set the articles' scopes to those topics, your concern that articles so titled would be covering positions rather than movements is unfounded. If we choose option 1, we are choosing those scopes for these articles. I entirely agree with you that we shouldn't use pro-choice and pro-life as synonyms for these positions in running text, but the use of language in article bodies elsewhere on Wikipedia has always been beyond the mandate of this RFC, and has been specifically clarified as such. —chaos5023 (talk) 13:14, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Replied on the talk page. I hope you're right, but I fear it might turn out you're not.--Victor Yus (talk) 14:09, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    That eventuality would be something to greatly fear, certainly, but my being wrong in this would require consensus to overturn WP:TITLE. It ain't gonna happen. —chaos5023 (talk) 15:06, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • And of course oppose Borda or any other manner of automated vote counting, since it eliminates thought and reason from the considerations (and allows the organizers to suppress options they don't like by refusing to allow them onto the list).--Victor Yus (talk) 07:31, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Please register opposition to the use of Borda count in the relevant proposal rather than here. —chaos5023 (talk) 17:43, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12+4+1 (ie refactored to include 12, 4, 1). On the provisio that the relevant articles do not include ethics, legality, POV, but list (with sub-articles representing) organisations and groups (and their history) that have a position on abortion, and their history. Anything about the actual issues of abortion should be included under ethics of abortion, abortion law, and related articles. (20040302 (talk) 11:30, 27 March 2012 (UTC))[reply]
    This is really smart, and while I don't think we can get directly there with this RFC, I think it's where we should optimally end up. I strongly support this option if closing admins feel it makes a workable close. —chaos5023 (talk) 15:20, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    (addendum) re. 4, it may be better to use a combined term for that such as Abortion pressure groups or Abortion advocacy groups. Note the salient and topical links to the articles at Advocacy_groups#Adversarial_groupings. I know it's past the point of adding new options, but I'm still thinking about it. Sorry to add confusion. (20040302 (talk) 11:07, 30 March 2012 (UTC))[reply]
    (addendum) For an alternative title to 4, my prefence is now Abortion-related advocacy groups. 20040302 (talk) 10:03, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 5, 10, 2, 12. Oppose 1. I think neutral/non-biased/fully-factual article names are best - the common name will still be a redirect and will be mentioned in the lead paragraph. eug (talk) 12:01, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support 1 for its neutrality, with 5 and 10 getting no objections. I strongly oppose the rest. ~FeedintmParley 14:20, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 is best choice. 7, 8, 9 will work. Several are too wordy and unwieldy, however neutral they may be claimed to be.Pete unseth (talk) 15:36, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • My preference is 1, which has the support of WP:COMMONNAME. The only real argument against it is neutrality, which is negated by WP:POVTITLE. 2 would be OK, but I don't think "abortion rights movement" is a particularly good counterpart to "anti-abortion movement". The rest are all contrived, slightly inaccurate, or both. Hut 8.5 16:06, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1, 3-14 (equal), 2. 2 has inherent bias (one side gets "rights" and the other is forced to be an "anti-"? That's an endorsement, folks.) and all the others are clumsy constructions that defy COMMONNAME. With the first choice, each side gets portrayed in positive wording of its own choosing, and the wording is arguably the most common and readily understood. I would drop the word "movement", though. It's a stance, and not necessarily an organized one. --JaGatalk 16:16, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Pro-choice and Pro-life aren't workable as titles; see Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Abortion article titles#Archival of arguments regarding Pro-choice / Pro-life. Mainly, in order for a title to be workable, it has to identify something, and those adjectives don't. That insanely vague scope is actually the entire reason we are here at the end of a long chain of intractable contention. At minimum, those terms need to be attached to a noun before they even identify a topic, and none other than "movement" have yet gained any traction. —chaos5023 (talk) 16:21, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    I disagree, but I don't think it's important enough to start a row. 1 is still my top choice, with or without the "movement" tacked onto the end. --JaGatalk 16:33, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Incidentally, option 2 fails to unambiguously identify a topic too, and that's IMO the biggest problem with it. By resolving in favor of that option, we would be handing the editors on these articles titles that fail to actually tell them what the articles are supposed to be about. I feel like I should have campaigned to remove them from the RFC entirely, honestly, but it's too late now. —chaos5023 (talk) 16:35, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, very strongly oppose 2,3,4 as unfair to the pro-life side (which frequently complains about this title in media publications). If we choose 2, 3, or 4, it will be an example of mob-rule-by-vote over neutral point of view, and a black eye on Wikipedia itself (the fact that it's frequently done by most of the mainstream media is a black eye on the media). Magog the Ogre (talk) 17:02, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    I don't think that's really fair or AGF to say. Wikipedia has a consistent general policy of following our sources, and WP:COMMONNAME is one of the biggest deals in this process. Our sources happen to often be doing something arguably weird and sketchy in this case, but it would still be consistent with a principled adherence to Wikipedia policy to follow them as they do so, rather than automatically meaning mob rule won out. —chaos5023 (talk) 17:25, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 6 and 12 and oppose 1 and 3. I consider myself to be both anti abortion and pro choice and I don't think they will capture the grey areas. It's also a very US centric titling. KingStrato (talk) 17:16, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm sorry to add more crosstalk, but I really feel like votes like this arise from confusion as to what this RFC is for. This RFC is not deciding How Wikipedia Will Cover Abortion Issues Globally. This RFC is deciding the titles of two specific articles that have their own history and context. If option 3 were chosen, that would mean that the United States movements identified would be the topics of the articles, and there is nothing wrong with political movements in a given country being a topic. Global perspective on related issues, in that case, should be handled by other articles. The only problem is if you come in thinking that these articles are our catch-alls for abortion advocacy, and that they continue being catch-alls no matter what their titles are, which is really the source of 99% of the problems in this whole context. And is also plain wrong. —chaos5023 (talk) 18:12, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, and I could live with 4 and 2. The other ones sounds completely contrived, especially when the word legal is involved, which to me indicates that it is in fact illegal. As an example, any time I would read something like, "Legalization of marijuana" or "Legalization of gay marriage" or "Legalization of prostitution," the default stance is that the action in question is illegal. This is not true, at least for the United States. And I know everyone keeps saying this, but I'll repeat it: we need to follow WP:COMMONNAME, even if by default the names are POV. We are here to report information to readers, not refactor or re-dress it in order to create the illusion of neautrality with issues that are inherently POV. Angryapathy (talk) 17:38, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12 + 1 - Though add United States to 1, since it's been determined that these terms may have different meanings internationally. (While too late now, this should have been listed as an option here, as it was on the talk page brainstorming.) Oppose all the rest. - jc37 18:35, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    While not supporting 4, I'll join in supporting 20040302's plan noted above. - jc37 18:41, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support 1. Yes, it's not perfectly neutral, but neither is anything else, and at least it is not invented by Wikipedia (thus injecting WP into the debate more than ought to be) and is best compliant with WP:COMMONNAME. This issue is so incredibly nuanced that any attempt by the title to describe it (i.e., the "support"/"oppose" options) is going to miss some significant wrinkle, so we might as well use labels that are familiar and then describe all the wrinkles in the article text. Worst of all, though, is "abortion-rights"/"anti-abortion", which is a longstanding and well-known way of presenting the issue in a skewed way by institutions that are not in fact neutral.
I also want to say that this conversation should be about more than just the article title. My best solution would be to have the "Pro-life movement" and "Pro-choice movement" articles focus only on the history of the U.S. movements, with a very brief summary of the issues in debate and a {{seealso}} hat to "Abortion debate in the United States". Conversely, "Abortion debate in the United States" should focus only on the debate, with very brief summaries of the movements and {{seealso}} hats directing to "Pro-life movement" and "Pro-choice movement". This is very similar to 12, but I wouldn't say "refactor" because discussion of the movements should remain as proposed in 1.
So my sequence is thus: 1 (more or less combined with 12), then 5 through 14 excluding 12 in no order (all equally awful), then 2 through 4 in no order (all equally super-awful). --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 19:33, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
P.S. I have no objection to adding "in the United States" to an article title, though I don't think it's necessary. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 19:55, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Very strong oppose to any title containing the word "rights" on only one side. We're talking about people in support of distinct, different rights, but rights nonetheless in both cases. One side is in favor of the right to have an abortion, regardless of the desires of the baby--the other is in favor of the right to be born, regardless of the desires of the mother. Unfortunately, these "rights" and not compatible, but both are about alleged "rights". Support #1... lesser support for 10, but a preference to 10 over 5 for reasons already discussed ("legalization" sounds like a process yet to be undertaken or completed, while "legality" carries no such meaning). Actually, all the rest are generally Wiki-made-up titles and at least you can't say that about #1. Matt Yeager ♫ (Talk?) 20:14, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I add my voice to most strongly oppose any title which frames one side in terms of "rights" and the other in terms of "opposition" ("anti-") for the reasons given, to which, at this time, I have nothing to add. Either WP:UCN (I'm not opposed to adding "US" to [1]), or framing both in terms of "rights" (as pro-life people advocate for the right to life for the unborn ["right to life" is a separate movement of which this is a subset], the pro-choice advocating for, as far as I can tell, preference utilitarianism [thus giving all rights to the mother and abrogating any that the infant/foetus may possess] as regards the expressed preferences of mother/child). Both advocate for "rights", but different rights or prioritization of such (having Peter Singer at one extreme and the Catholic Church at the other), whereas "rights" is, in English, an inherently very positive term or appellation, whereas "anti-" is neutral or slightly pejorative. St John Chrysostom Δόξατω Θεώ 03:05, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I also very strong oppose using the term 'rights' for only one side of the issue. This term implicitly lends support by assigning moral credence. "Pro-Life" and "Pro-Choice" adequately describe the moral debate, are the common names for each side of the issue, and when used together offer a NPOV for the topic. Lwsimon (talk) 14:10, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, Oppose 2, 3, 4, Meh to the rest of the options, except for 13 and 14 which are quite a mouthful. SpencerT♦C 21:15, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1, 3-14 (equal), 2. —per COMMONNAME, POVTITLE, PRESERVE. (Aside: The best answer isn't even listed: Pro-life movement / Abortion-rights movement. Each got the most Google hits. This hang-up with symmetry and parallelism is undercutting COMMONNAME.) --Kenatipo speak! 22:18, 27 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 5. 1 has neutrality issues and the terms are only common terms in the US. 2 and 4 have neutrality issues. 6–14 are awkwardly worded. Epbr123 (talk) 09:50, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1, 2, 4, 5, 6 all seem reasonable, so I would support any of those (with equal weight). None of the others seem horribly unreasonable, but the wording of most of them sounds awkward and stilted. The really key thing here is that any of these are plausible phrases somebody might type into a search box, so whichever pair ends up being used, the others should all exist as redirects. -- RoySmith (talk) 12:13, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 if it means that those articles will be US-specific and the 'general' abortion debate will be transfered to Abortion debate. Otherwise 12+1+4 or 12. Other options in order of preference: 9, 10, 11, 6, 5, 3, 2. Admins may use Borda as a way to gauge the opinion, but their closing should be based on analysis of discussion, not on counting. JHSnl (talk) 13:33, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Borda, with alternate proposal As we all know, usual procedure per WP:VOTE would be that counting up all the responses in a Borda-like way, or in any other way that treats them as strict votes, will not by itself determine the outcome of this discussion. On the other hand, people want to have a conclusion to this issue and want to avoid a "no consensus" outcome, so I understand the inclination to bend the usual !vote rules. Still, I am concerned about simply adding up the votes in Borda style. For one thing, there is only one "pro-choice"/"pro-life" option, and nine "support"/"oppose" options, so a person who ranks the former first will still give a very high rank to the latter (or at least some versions of it), while a person who ranks the latter first will give a very low rank to the former. Issues like this have a serious potential to give rise to unfairness if the vote is close. Instead, I suggest that the closers weigh the rankings (and I think, in general, that the rankings were an inspired idea) carefully but without strictly counting votes. Or, if strictly counting votes seems necessary, do it several different ways (such as including a four-option tally among "pro-choice/life", "anti-rights", "support/oppose", and "debate") and announce a consensus result only if several counting methods give you the same answer. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 16:07, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    That all seems pretty reasonable to me. I'd suggest, though, that discussion of the Borda count proposal should be moved to that proposal rather than here. —chaos5023 (talk) 16:09, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I've cross-posted there. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 17:25, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yes I do as this wikipedia covers more than some excited states, that title should be Superior court. And please don't assume I haven't read the RFC.--Canoe1967 (talk) 18:38, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
... wow. —chaos5023 (talk) 18:45, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support 12 to avoid inherent POV in present arguments separately. Strongly oppose 5,6,7,8,9,10&11 as the argument goes far beyond 'legality'. Of the others, weak support for 1 & 2 PROVIDED that the content changes are made to be about the movements only (and not about the arguments) which should be at abortion debate. OwainDavies (about)(talk) edited at 07:36, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 3, 12, 4, 13, 14, 2, 10, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, 7, 1. I'd certainly prefer Instant-runoff voting as it's the kind of system that gets you the least hated result. What's all this strongly stuff? Does it make your vote count more? In that case, I strongly support my first preference and strongly oppose my last. If I'm rich, do I get extra votes? Josh Parris 11:14, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Josh, by usual procedures, this kind of discussion on Wikipedia is not a vote. How well a person supports their position with sensible arguments, as well as how strongly they feel about certain options, are taken into account when the discussion is finally evaluated. In this case, because the question has been so fraught for so long, the final evaluation is likely to count people more than it usually would. But still I think what you see is partly because WP veterans are used to talking that way. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 12:25, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 (and 12) is the only sensible choice. "Use common name" if I have to point at something, but more generally: we shouldn't be trying to participate in the actual debate(s) that are occurring out there in the world.
    — V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 16:08, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12 as the most general and most important topic, with 1 on the groups that self-identify as pro-life and pro-choice movements, which are notable in themselves, with whichever (take your pick, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) for an overview of the different movements. Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 17:32, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12 - overview article of the debate and worldwide issues, with regional and national (NPOV balanced) articles on the specifics within the regions, cultures and legal systems. If these become too big (or if they would be too big were they to be created by merging), they are WP:SPLIT in the normal way. I would imagine that this would be the case for Abortion debate in the US, and wouldn't be at all surprised if editors there chose to have Pro-choice movement and Pro-life movement articles. The difference would be that these would in no way cover the worldwide debate, the moral and human issues etc. They wouldn't even cover the US debate, but would simply describe the US movements per their titles, with all the other matter in the parent and other regional articles. --Nigelj (talk) 19:46, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Maybe this thought wasn't amplified enough in the sections above, but the thing is, the two articles we are deciding about should never have been made to cover worldwide debate. These are the articles that were originally titled Pro-choice and Pro-life. Their original topics as written were the movements in question, but because they had uselessly vague adjectives as titles, everybody edited them to cross-purposes and people routinely decided they were general coverage articles, to the point that they wound up with their current insane titles and people literally cannot stop thinking of them as such, to the point where they look at an article title of "United States abortion-rights movement" and think "that's a bad title, why would we provide worldwide overview coverage under that title?". THE ENTIRE POINT IS WE WOULDN'T, WE WOULD COVER WHAT THE TITLE ACTUALLY SAYS. The thing is, though, since these were originally Pro-choice and Pro-life, it's completely insane to go through massive merging, refactoring and splitting gyrations in order to get back where we started but with titles that give us a clear scope. WP:PRESERVE alone says hell no, don't do that, just put the articles back where they were and clarify what they're about. —chaos5023 (talk) 19:57, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm not sure that anyone can reliably speak for exactly what the community of Wikipedia editors will say and do after this RfC is over. Let's vote and get a result first before we start saying what other people will say 'hell no' to. If it's decided that there's work to be done refactoring content, it'll be better to just get on and do it. --Nigelj (talk) 20:10, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Okay, let me rephrase, then. Whether or not we would provide coverage of the actual scope set by the article's title, per the entirety of WP:TITLE, we emphatically and desperately should do so, because instead providing coverage of some other random scope that arrives out of nowhere would be bugfuck screaming insane. —chaos5023 (talk) 18:35, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I strongly support 5 and 13. I strongly oppose 8 and 11. I will tolerate all other options. I believe that 8 uses poor syntax and 11 is confusing. I believe that no one is in favor of aborting every child conceived and it is hopefully not someone's first choice which is why I like the word toleration of abortion. Thepoodlechef (talk) 21:24, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2, 3, 5, 11, 1, then oppose all the rest. Thanks to everyone for their hard work on this issue. Saltwolf (talk) 00:16, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 6. 5. 7. then 8 to 14 in no particular order as I think they are cumbersome or odd in one way or another. 2. 3. 4. & 1. trail my list. I think they are more USA specific than the others. Wanderer57 (talk) 02:30, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 4 - best: most neutral & recognizes multiple movements/issues/camps; 3 - runner-up: good to denote location POV; 2, 6, 9, 10, 11, 12 - acceptable; 7 - "less good": asymmetrical; 8, 14 - too specific to range of sub-issues and views; 5 - inaccurate: implies not currently legal; 13 - inaccurate: "tolerance" <> "legality"; 1 - most objectionable: both common usage advocacy terms are spectacularly deceptive and non-descriptive. "Pro-choice" entirely ignores the competitive rights aspect of this issue - which is more the legal theory basis in current law and philosophical underpinnings than the often cited privacy rights aspect. What choice does the fetus have? "Pro-life" implies opposition to abortion legality is virtually synonymous with pacifism. "Pro-life" also implies there is an "anti-life" option, which is absurd except perhaps for some nihilists. "Pro-life" also implies, at a deeper level, those for abortion rights actually like abortion. Summary for Borda method: 4, 3, 2, 6, 9, 10, 11, 12, 7; 8, 14, 5, 13, 1 - descending support, with those after the semi-colon in opposition. I cannot avoid noting the entire list of choices & the 60+% of the discussion I read listed the support for abortion rights before opposition to them, indicating bias by itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by WayneLBurnham (talk • contribs) 21:10, 31 March 2012 (UTC) WayneLBurnham (talk) 12:53, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1. It's what they call themselves. Any other titles seem to favor one position or the other unequally. Student7 (talk) 18:24, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • In an approximate order, 14, 13, 10, 9, 7, 8, 11, 2, 4, 1; 3, 12, 6, 5. I oppose anything after the ";" as inaccurate or impractical. 14 is the most true (those who oppose abortion oppose it legal or not, in general), with 13 a close runner-up. 10/9/7/8/11 are ordered that way because of which already have articles linked, mainly. 2, 4, and 1 are correct but potentially biased. Allens (talk | contribs) 19:08, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1- Most widespread. —Bzweebl— talk 19:52, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support (5), oppose (1). Number five's accurate and duly describes both movements objectively. I strongly oppose titles (i.e. option (1)) specifically designed to antagonize the opposing viewpoint. Tyrol5 [Talk] 20:26, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support (1) for its neutrality. (5) would probably be my second choice. I prefer not to characterize one side as "pro-" something, and the other side as "anti-" something. ~SunDragon34 (talk) 01:12, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose 1 - Choice 1 is the only one which requires prior knowledge to understand (e.g., "pro-life" could mean anti-death penalty or in favor of abortion to save the life of the mother); the others are all self-explanatory. For that reason, I find #1 unacceptable. My full list of choices is 10, 9, 11, 5, 14, 7, 8, 2, 4, 3, 12, 13, 6, 1. Matchups 01:44, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 12 as the only option that can truly meet WP:NPOV and WP:GLOBAL, and it defines the core issue succinctly: a phenomenon of the human behavioral condition is under worldwide debate. Despite the attendant problems with WP:PRESERVE and WP:MERGE, refactoring to Abortion debate and Abortion debate in RegionName is the best possible solution because it accurately describes the crux of the matter and while allowing for forked sub-articles relevant to specific regions. The position-identifying terms "choice", "anti", "movement" and the positional and country specific term "legality" are all avoided in framing the scope of the issue as well, but allowed for in outlining the positions taken by various camps within the main article and in forked-article bodies. The overarching issue is multi-factorial: primarily legality and access, but with side issues of religious freedom, etc., so it seems incumbent upon an encyclopedic entry to first name the core issue before jumping off into factors of that core issue. For example, Law is a broad subject forked a hundred ways to Sunday, but all the sub-articles have that primary article as their jumping off point. A user of the encyclopedia should be able to find all relevant articles by viewing that one main article, and this can only be accomplished hierarchically with one main article. Sctechlaw (talk) 02:53, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1 as common names and self-chosen names. Khazar2 (talk) 05:26, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 12 definitelly, as it is the one which allows all views on the matter to be expressed in same article, either being a generalistic Abortion debate, or particular for each case, Abortion debate in RegionName. FkpCascais (talk) 06:47, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, 5, 2. Oppose 12. The problem with 12 is it ignores that each position has its own unique history and its much easier to talk about each as individual entities, which they are. The debate itself could be handled more in another article. Shadowjams (talk) 19:09, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1; none of the others are particularly appealing. It is true that many news outlets use terms such as "abortion-rights opponents", but these are usually recognized as deliberate euphemisms. In actual conversation, Americans use "pro-life" and "pro-choice", and Wikipedia should follow actual usage, not euphemistic usage. Finally, I suspect that the Google Books statistics are misleading, because they tracked the frequency of "pro-life movement" and "pro-choice movement", when they should have tracked "pro-life" and "pro-choice" instead. — Lawrence King (talk) 03:22, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • My choices are: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 14, 13, 8, 1, 12. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wiki4Thal (talk • contribs) 3:59, 3 April 2012
  • Strongly Support 1 is truly the only option even worth discussing: although I personally oppose using "pro-choice" as a euphemism for "pro-abortion" (because, duh, having the baby is as much of a choice as is aborting it, if you support the concept of making a choice about the baby's life or death), pro-life and pro-choice are the way to go here. Scarletsmith (talk) 04:04, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly Support 12. While every proposal has its drawbacks (even 12), #12 is the ONLY proposal that eliminates any argument by either side that one side is getting "preferential treatment" with the name selected. With #12 there wil be no more debates about the merits or drawbacks of "anti-", "pro-", "con", etc. And ONLY #12 will harness the power of POV to keep the subject neutral. If that sounds crazy, consider that two separate articles become the pet projects of partisans, but a single article will have its POV pushers neutralized by one another, thus keeping the whole topic on an even keel of NPOV. (Of course, credit for this idea goes to James Madison, Federalist No. 10.) My distant choice for second place would be #2, which I believe to be semantically neutral; its biggest drawback is that some people involved with this issue conflate the prefix anti- with a negative POV (which I think is stupid, would someone object to being called "anti-slavery"?).HuskyHuskie (talk) 07:38, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1 as being the "least bad". Where, in fact, are far more than two positions - there is "support for all abortions" (small group), "support for minor limits on abortions" (fairly large group), "noticeable limits on abortions" (also a large group), "near ban on abortions" (smaller group), and "total ban on all abortions" (small but vociferous group), and a "government has no business in anything regarding abortions at all" (libertarian position which also says no one should be forced to assist in an abortion by government rules). Collect (talk) 13:29, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • In order 1, 4, 2, 6, 5, 9, 10, 7, 11, 8, 14, 13. No support for 3 or 12. Sam Blacketer (talk) 13:58, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 2/4 (strong), support 1 (weak), oppose all others. It is not Wikipedia's place to make up titles from whole cloth, this and other sorry business notwithstanding. By deciding that we know what things should be called better than the people most involved with them, we are trying to stick our noses into and influence the topics of our own articles, thus changing us from neutral encyclopedia into self-appointed activist. It's a slippery slope from the sidelining of WP:POVTITLE, to euphemism, down to outright whitewashing. Option 2 or 4 has the advantages of COMMONNAME, NPOV, and not glossing over the varied ideological stances on both sides of this single issue (e.g. some "pro-lifers" also support the death penalty, some "pro-choicers" don't actually want the choice for themselves, etc.), AND it is not U.S.-centric (if we want, main articles can be worldwide in scope with country headings and "main article" hatnotes); Option 1 has the advantages of COMMONNAME and that that is largely what these two camps have traditionally named themselves (at least in the U.S.). All other options constitute a noxious brew of WP:SYNTH, WP:OR, and neutraler-than-thou sanctimony ...except 12, which just punts this exact same argument over to individual country abortion debate pages, solving nothing. So we've simply reduced the number of potential combatants, not actually settled the question. ☯.ZenSwashbuckler.☠ 17:01, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    You seem to be thinkier than many option 2 supporters, so let me ask you: what topic do you consider each title in option 2 to identify? —chaos5023 (talk) 17:19, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Hmm. If the following really really lengthy response doesn't answer your question, please let me know and I'll try again.
    I'd identify Abortion-rights movement as those people who work to make, and keep, abortion legal and available in various jurisdictions, with peripheral inclusion of those who aren't really activists but who may vote that way. I'd identify Anti-abortion movement as those people who work to make and keep abortion (or, piecemeal, particular kinds of abortion) illegal and unobtainable in various jurisdictions, with peripheral inclusion of those who aren't really activists but who may vote that way. I don't like the word "movement" very much, but the articles are about the ideologies and their adherents and their actions in the real world, rather than simply dry, abstract philosophical perspectives (which are pertinent, but no more tell the whole story than Henotheism tells the whole story of YHWH, Baal, and the peoples of the ancient Near East).
    The former would include people who consider themselves "pro-choice" and don't want to make abortion illegal or unobtainable, but make working actively to reduce the number of abortions performed a major policy initiative; "abortion-rights" also doesn't imply the other side has principles against personal freedom. I understand some people identify as both pro-choice and anti-abortion; but the scope of the articles isn't limited to philosophy, it's also about how people vote. I think if you vote in favor of abortion rights, even if you are personally against abortion, you deserve that nuance captured, but would not be lumped in with people working to ban abortion. This group is either its own article (that's what we need here, a third article to name), or it's pro-choice/pro-abortion-rights/in favor of legalization/etc. The common ground between this group and the "anti-abortion" or "pro-life" side goes only as far as reducing the numbers - banning it outright is a line this group won't cross, and thus I'd argue that puts them on the other side, with that complexity noted.
    My voting breakdown has COMMONNAME as the single most important factor in naming these, as I think neither side's possible objections to its own title are other than frivolous (pro-choicers want abortion rights, however nuanced; pro-lifers want abortion bans, however balanced; this is unambiguous and not a smear or oversimplification); as I see it most objections boil down to, "Well, those people don't actually support (personal freedom/the sanctity of life) - here's what they should be called instead." (In which case we should dispense with the discussion and just call it fascists vs. babykillers.
    I see all arguments pertaining to Northamerocentricity of the title not as weakening the argument in favor of #2 but rather tipping the scales between #2 and #4, then putting country-specific information in appropriate separate articles. ☯.ZenSwashbuckler.☠ 19:42, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Okay, that answers my question; thanks. It doesn't make any sense to me to identify all those people in the world as belonging to a single "movement", but if it makes sense to you that's fine. —chaos5023 (talk) 20:02, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Well, I don't think any honest treatment is completely free of misgivings about the word "movement," nor did I push intentionally for world-wide scope (the strongest thing I meant to say is that that's an option). I figured deciding on national vs. world scope is a matter for the articles themselves (which I intend to mostly stay away from) - currently Support for the legalization of abortion does seem to be written from a global perspective, with subsections headed by Main Article hatnotes. But that doesn't mean it needs to stay that way; I thought this brouhaha was mainly about naming the ideologies and people for indexing convenience and truthfulness of reporting, not dictating that everyone who thinks a particular thing is ipso facto a member of one or the other crusade. If you replaced the word "movement" with something like "politics" or "advocacy," I'm sure options 2 and 4 would have much more support. The main thing I came here to write was that it's a bad idea to doublespeak pro-life and pro-choice into unsourced wishy-washy babble like Opposition to the toleration of abortion and thus try to unencyclopedically and paternalistically influence the debate rather than just reporting it. If, on the other hand, we are actually here to decide how many splinter groups off of these need their own articles, and furthermore what they should be named, that needs to be made clear at the outset. I think that's beyond the scope of this RFC. If I'm wrong about that, please let me know as soon as practicable. Thanks! ☯.ZenSwashbuckler.☠ 20:42, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    This is kind of precisely the stone I've been rolling uphill for the last two months: people have gotten so fixated, in this context, on the idea that we're trying to come up with names for ideologies that they've completely forgotten what article titles on Wikipedia are for, which is identifying topics. That's what the "General points of policy" section at the top is about, but people just read that, say "oh, sure, of course", and go right back to answering the wrong question. Which is going to keep us in this ridiculous mess forever, as far as I can tell. —chaos5023 (talk) 21:22, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    I'd suggest that the participants in this subthread consider my suggestion of substituting the word "activism" for the word "movement". It clearly sets scope, but avoids the issue of assuming two unitary "movements" (or, worse, slicing up two lumpy mushes into some countable number of "movements"). Homunq (talk) 15:15, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    That's a pretty decent idea, and I wish it had come up a month and a half ago so we could've considered it properly in this RFC. —chaos5023 (talk) 15:42, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 5, 12. Orenwolf (talk) 21:49, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 5/12, strong oppose 1/13. I prefer WP:NPOV rather than WP:COMMONNAME--В и к и T 10:11, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support for option 1. It is the only option which meets WP:Commonname and presents both sides of the debate in a WP:NPOV manner (meaning, not couching one side as either opposing rights/positions in a negative way). The only other choice which meets WP:NPOV is 12, though I have some doubts of the viability of that option. Many of the other options are linguisting messes, and I wouldn't support any of them. If I am forced to rank options from 1-14, I will edit this post accordingly.LedRush (talk) 14:02, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 Petecarney (talk) 14:57, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support #12 - do not support others. Full disclosure, i am unlikely to edit the affected article/articles. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 15:31, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support for 1 or 6. Having dealt with the medical consequences of backroom abortions I am deeply divided over this issue. But calling it legal abortion is appropriate since back room abortions kill and injure many women around the globe particularly in the third world. Calling it abortion is also appropriate because that is what it is. I'm fine with either one and mildly so with some others.Jobberone (talk) 21:38, 4 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 5 10 9 14 8 7 2 4 11 13 6 3 12 Zibart (talk) 12:34, 5 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong for 1, mild for 3. Predicated on the assumption that the articles are focused on the movements rather than the wider debate. Jeffrw (talk) 01:01, 6 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12, 3, 2, 1, 6, 5, 4, 9, 10, 8, 11, 13, 14, 7 if Borda is used. Otherwise, Support 12, 3, 2, 1 and Oppose all others. Kaldari (talk) 02:14, 6 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12, 1, 7, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 3, 2, 4. Handling political footballs like this is incredibly difficult, and if Borda is not used, I would oppose all options except 12, 1, and 7 (in that order of preference). -Jhortman (talk) 03:15, 6 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1 and 12. 1 as terms which succinctly sum up the reasoning behind each side of the political argument's positions, and which are thus ideal for describing those political movements. However, I do agree that there are problems of scope which might be better addressed with a unified "abortion debate" article. I oppose 2 as inherently non-neutral. 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 11, 13, and 14 are all clunky and unsatisfactory. 5, 6 and 10 would be acceptable. -- LWG talk 03:50, 6 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12, 3, 2, weak 4. Changed upon reflection. Support 2, support 4 (weak), oppose all others, per ZenSwashbucklers arguments: Option 2 or 4 has the advantages of COMMONNAME, NPOV, and not glossing over the varied ideological stances on both sides of this single issue (e.g. some "pro-lifers" also support the death penalty, some "pro-choicers" don't actually want the choice for themselves, etc.) - KillerChihuahua?!? 15:02, 6 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 2,3 and 5. Oppose 1.--Shakehandsman (talk) 00:10, 8 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, Oppose all others. Clegs (engage in rational discourse) 08:25, 8 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1 ~ No need to re-invent the wheel here, but I would recommend dropping the movement part, as this issue hasn't "moved" in decades. — GabeMc (talk) 22:28, 8 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 6, 1..5, 7..14 — Line 6 tends to ask the right question, leading to consideration of the constitution of the choice and the nature of the act, e.g., how many bodies make up the living wounded versus how many constitute the choice, with respect to the ever-changing nature of the act. Crockett.jesse (talk) 01:44, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think 12 is the best, then 3, 2, and weakly 1. Guettarda (talk) 02:37, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 5, 6, 7, in that order; since those titles describe the text of the articles. Christopher Rath (talk) 16:33, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 5, 2, 4, 6, 7, oppose 3 and (oppose most strongly of all on NPOV grounds) 1. Jakew (talk) 17:46, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1, 6, 11, 7, 9, 10, 8, 4, 3, 2, 12, 5, 13, 14 This wedge issue is very responsive to how the question is framed. That's why both sides put so much effort into making their names positive ones. Are we doing this because we think we can do better? Or is everyone just trying to stick the other side a bad name? We all have our own bias. Can't we let each side have the name it picked for it self? Gaelhalee (talk) 20:42, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1 and 6 Wa3frp (talk) 21:48, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I don't really like votes. So I'll just say this: I think "pro-choice" versus "pro-life" are both misleading and inaccurate. I also think "pro-" versus "anti-" has a way of unbalancing the sides implicitly (although we wouldn't care in most situations other than this one). I also think "rights" and "toleration" have a way of imbalancing the discussion and being somewhat inaccurate. I think the options that discuss "legality" and support/opposition are closest to describing the actual debate in accurate, NPOV terms. Seeing as abortion is legal in a lot of areas, "legal" is probably more accurate than "legalization". I suppose support/opposing a "ban" might work too, but seems less direct, and so I prefer it somewhat less. Shooterwalker (talk) 22:36, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    To tilt at the windmill one more time, it works out very poorly to start with a presumed scope of "each of these articles is covering one side of the issue of abortion" and go from there. Unless we're going to act as if this RFC has enough juice to throw out WP:TITLE, titles identify topics. Reason from there and you get some very different, but much more sensible, manageable and encyclopedia-friendly, results. —chaos5023 (talk) 22:44, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Option 1 only - these are the only titles that clearly define what each side see as their key argument - makes it clear and easy to understand. iamtheedge (talk) 06:48, 10/04/12
  • Option 6 makes the most sense to me. Per Strunk and White's dictum: "omit needless words". "Support for" and "Opposition to" are equivalent and NPOV. It'd be nice if the preposition was the same, but that's not how English works. "Legal abortion" is what these articles are about. Legalization is what they're about in some countries, but that's not on the table in others. So we don't need a verb. Just the adjective "legal" and the noun "abortion". David in DC (talk) 19:39, 10 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1; oppose the rest. Chonak (talk) 03:57, 11 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • My preferences, in order: 12, 13, 14, 2, 4, and 3. I'd oppose 5-11, legality is a main issue but not the only one, and strongly oppose 1, euphemisms. Richard Keatinge (talk) 10:56, 11 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strogly support 1, 7-14 are strongly opposed, all others are neutral. 1 is the most common term amoung the group and the most likely search term. I believe it is the most applicable, and a great common name. Added by Jon Weldon II: (talk) 14:38, 11 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support for 5, Strong oppose for 1. Although I loath to vote in this, and think reopening this can of worms was a bad idea, it seems as though we are given little choice. The renaming was correct, and using the old names is a violation of NPOV. We should strive to have the least bias as possible and take what certain journalist organizations have chosen to refer to these groups as. Some(NPR, AP, etc) have given direct instructions to their employees to not refer to either side as "pro-choice" or "pro-life", because it cast obvious dispersions of the other views from opposing sides. A US centric naming, without heeding this issue, would be detrimental to the project. I won't list my preferences i order for the other title listings, but have no objections to 2,4,,6,7, 9 or 10. I oppose 3. Dave Dial (talk) 15:08, 11 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Withdrawing my support for 2 and 4, and am now opposing those alternatives. Also,in relation to 5, why not name the articles "support/opposition for/to legalized abortion" Dave Dial (talk) 22:06, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • My vote goes to 6. It is the clearest and simplest of the 'legal' variations 5 to 11, also 8 has a double negative (opposition to ban), and 5 fails because abortion is legal already in some places. Of the 'non-legal' choices: 13 and 14 use weasel words. 2, 3 and 4 are unclear in the use of 'abortion-rights' to characterize one side of the argument - is it the mother's right to choose or the child's right to life which is meant to be encapsulated in the term? But I have a question about what these pages are to become. At the moment they cover the world but are US centric. If they are to cover the world then 1 and 3 fail because they are US centric. If they are to be US only then 1 is good. Summary if pages to be world-wide: first 6, then equal second 7-9-10-11, then equally not good 12-13-14, then equally serious problems 1-2-3-4-5-8. If pages to be US only then first equal 1 and 6, other rankings stay as they are Aarghdvaark (talk) 08:05, 12 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I vote for 12 because this IS a debate. The other names are actually the descriptions of the positions taken by each group in the debate. All other options that use Support/Oppose are bad because they always give a negative connotation to one of the sides. My second vote goes to 1 since it is the only one that has a pro-something in both sides, so it doesn't give a negative connotation to any side of the discussion. Mozzello (talk)
  • Vote: 3, 12, 6, 11, 4, 14, 10, 9, 2, 1, 8, 7, 5, 13.
1. Accuracy 2. Simplicity 3. Grace of expression. New here, but: the issue is precisely the legal precedents that are established, relating to the rights of living, breathing adult humans who may "own" and/or possess the right to direct the "use" of and/or "dispose" of fertilized eggs, at any stage in their development, that can grow into living, breathing adult humans. And yes, behind the moral arguments are primarily issues of money and power (who pays, and who decides). Legality embodies supposedly enforceable standards which can be redefined along a continuum that ends with prohibition, and this article is about the debate affecting the legalities in the U.S.A. Beadmatrix (talk) 11:21, 13 April 2012 (UTC)Beadmatrix[reply]
  • I vote for 12 for the reasons of Mozzello above. However, as a backup I support 2. Why? because "1" is wrongly too broad: pro-life includes various non-abortion topics such as capital punishment - I pointed this out in evidence, but someone deleted it: the Roman Catholic Church's website on pro-life shows that opposition to capital punishment, euthanasia, etc. is part and parcel of "pro-life". All the formulations such as "opposition to [legal] yadda yadda/or ban... " (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11) also are wrong, because groups and debates that make exceptions for (e.g.) life of the mother, rape, incest, etc. fall out because they are not opposed to legal abortion, but only certain abortions (like if we had a group opposed to driving drunk only on vodka, we wouldn't call that an anti-drunk driving group but an anti-vodka group). "13" is wrong because most of the anti-abortion groups actually don't oppose toleration but want to outlaw the practice (with some exceptions, perhaps), "14" is wrong because it be more directed toward the provision of abortion services (public funding, say) than the legality/policy debate over abortion itself. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 16:34, 13 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12, 1, 4. I support 12, with the proviso that articles with other titles considered shall not be forbidden. For instance, a "pro-life movement" article could and should still exist. It would describe the history and use of the term "Pro-life", but it wouldn't contain arguments used by the pro-life movement when it can link to "Abortion debate" for the same. It could also (as others have noted) link to euthanasia and death-penalty topics. Perey (talk) 09:40, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I Support 2 and 1. 12 might work too. I am opposed to using descriptive titles for something which has common names in reliable sources.TheFreeloader (talk) 12:13, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12 I just looked at the articles and Opposition to the legalization of abortion would be nicely rewritten as Abortion debate, with regional articles added in. Shii (tock) 15:51, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1+2+12 as per my #General comments: multiple articles should exist, not two. Any other combination of 1+2 with 3, 4, and/or 12 ranks next. Failing that, 1+12, 2+12, 1, 12, 2, each of which can have an optional +3 and/or +4 added. Oppose Borda because of uneven choices, but if used, I note that all of 5-11 and 13-14, in combo with any of 1-4 and 12, are equally poor, and worse so if used without any of 1-4 and 12. JJB 19:00, 14 April 2012 (UTC) Add tangent: We need a brief article on the original meaning of "antilife" (MW, 1929): "antagonistic or antithetical to life or to normal human values". This would include a briefer section on the pejorative cooption of the term to mean something like pro-choice. JJB 14:55, 23 April 2012 (UTC)
  • 1  The snippet from the second result on a Google search for "pro-life" is from prolife.com and states, "Christian group that argues against abortion and premarital sex."  Yet there is no mention of "premarital sex" in the current "Opposition to the legalization of abortion" article, and four non-Christian religions are mentioned.  The answer for a long time has been to have a separate article for "Pro-life", whether or not there is a "Pro-choice" article, and then whatever content organization is needed for Abortion debate (12), which currently defaults to three articles.  However, the framing of the current discussion does not allow coverage of "Pro-life" as a separate article, and does not allow coverage of "Pro-life" in articles titled with the word "abortion".  By the process of eliminating all titles that include the word "abortion", the only option remaining is choice "1".  Unscintillating (talk) 00:20, 15 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, 12. 1 is nice because it is the common name, is used by the movements themselves, and is reasonably neutral. 12 is a nice compromise because it sidesteps the naming issue and ensures that this contention won't recur in the future. Oppose 2 because it is not neutral; it construes one side in terms of support and one side in terms of opposition. --Cerebellum (talk) 11:04, 15 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 For reasons given. Thanks, Charles Edwin Shipp (talk) 11:21, 15 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12 as my first choice. If that fails, then I would say 2. Ale_Jrbtalk 11:42, 15 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, then 12. I support 1 because of WP:COMMONNAME and WP:POVTITLE. I oppose 2 because it is not NPOV: associating any viewpoint with "rights" and the opposing viewpoint with "anti" portrays the second viewpoint negatively.--RJGray (talk) 20:15, 15 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 5, 6, 9, 10, 8, 12 in order of preference for arguments previously posted. —Entropy (T/C) 00:19, 16 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Anything but 1. This is Wikipedia, not Americanpoliticsipedia.—S Marshall T/C 08:33, 16 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • (later) This is a serious point. "Pro-life" and "pro-choice" are phrases that (1) are only in widespread use on the American continent; and (2) do not contain the word "abortion" and so would not be associated with abortion by most people in the world. This is compounded by a new thing I've learned during this RFC, which is that many American Wikipedians appear to believe that most English speakers are in the US. I can only attribute this to ignorance. In fact the vast majority of English speakers are in Asia. I'd hazard a guess that India has more of them than China but I'm willing to be corrected about that...—S Marshall T/C 07:50, 19 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 2 as the best combination of neutrality and accuracy. Second choice would be all the ones with 'legal' in the title; third choice is option 1, which is just too blatantly POV for my liking, even if it does reflect common American usage. Oppose 12 as unworkable and a bad idea; whatever we decide to call them, the two movements are notable enough to deserve coverage in independent articles. Robofish (talk) 01:27, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • This argument does not make sense to me. Gun control has two separate movements within it, but we don't have pro-gun control and anti-gun control articles. Actually this seems to suggest that we should split every political article of sufficient notability into pro and con articles. Shii (tock) 06:54, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2, 1, 6. No opinion on the remaining options. Not going in for all that Borda nonsense. Kafziel Complaint Department: Please take a number 03:42, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, think 6 is a very good option. Oppose 2 on grounds that both groups self identify as 1, do not as 2. Vincent Moon (talk) 11:59, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • None of the above - Refactor None of the proposed sets of titles adequately represent the content of their respective entry, nor do they conform to WP:SUMMARY. Abortion debate should contain a summary of each position under the political and ethical sections, and both existing entries should be merged into Abortion debate in the United States. For an example of this, see similar series Gun Control and Gun control in the United States. Lwsimon (talk) 14:55, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 3 > 2 > 4 > 1 > everything else. I'd also support "activism" over "movement" or "movements", since it avoids the problem with the plurals; though I realize it's probably too late for that option to get serious consideration. Furthermore, I support AGGRESSIVE refactoring of actual arguments into Abortion debate; these articles should ONLY cover historical actions and personalities, NOT arguments (except in a minimal, summary-style section, preferably a common one that's included in both articles). Finally, a comment on voting rules, which is my expertise: Borda count can have problems with strategic voting, but as far as I can see from the votes so far that's not a problem here. Still, the phrase "remaining Borda count points may be distributed equally between the remaining options" is utter nonsense; it's not clear what it means, and insofar as it does mean anything, it's a TERRIBLE idea. I urge that this NOT be adopted, as strongly as I can. I would favor using Borda count on only each person's top 5 options, with anything unranked or ranked after 6th place getting 0 points. (This is not actually the best possible voting method, but given that voting has already started and people were told it's Borda, it's the best option consistent with that.) Homunq (talk) 18:16, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, oppose 2, 3, and 5 because 1 is the plain language convention. The other options are either tinged with polemicism or awkward phrasing Soonersfan168 (talk) 20:36, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1. These terms are what the vast majority of people looking up the topics will use. Powers T 21:11, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Since you ask, I'd say 1, or possibly 12. --Andreas Philopater (talk) 21:36, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 1, then 2, then "Support for legality of abortion." Chutznik (talk) 23:51, 17 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 2 and 12, oppose 1. What I hope comes out of this RFC is a set of most importantly non-convoluted and non-vague names. Option 1 is using a term which not everybody agrees to and is not as widely used in media and contemporary debate. It is also ridiculously vague and does not contain the word "abortion" which represents the true scope of these two articles. The options with "support" and "opposition" are far too long and convoluted, and violate WP:COMMONNAME. 2 uses non-vague terms which uniquely identify the topics- 12 creates a similar effect. If Borda count or instant-runoff voting is used, then 2, 12, 4, 3, 6, 9, 7, 10, 11, 8, 5, 14, 13, 1. A412 (Talk • C) 04:13, 18 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I can't be bothered to read about your wierd voting systems, but given that this is a vote, all of my "points" should go to 1, and after that, 1, then 1, and then 1. Hipocrite (talk) 14:01, 18 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support for (1). Mild support for (12) and (14). Why? Abortion discussions have largely moved on from whether abortion should be allowed or not to what limits should be put on abortion. All the other titles indicate the most relevant point is the legality of abortion of any sort. This is not a scenario that is at all likely anymore. The public discussion is now usually framed as the groups in favour of extending abortion in favour of the right to choose against the groups (pro-choice) in favour of maintaining viable life or the pro-lifers. (12) is probably too vague and would need lots of re-directs. (14) is probably too scientific or precise and would need lots of re-directs too. --Nath9091 (talk) 14:17, 18 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 2 - It's the only choice that doesn't exclude conditions or put opposition in negative light. e.g. no one wants an abortion. No one supports illegal abortions. No one is Pro-death or anti-choice. Unless the title could put "Not' in front of it and the other group would be neutrally described that way, it's a bad title. --DHeyward (talk) 17:47, 18 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 6 then 5 only. "Pro-life/choice" probably need explaining to most speakers of English, who are not from North America (as S Marshall|C rightly points out half a screen up). The "legality" ones are ugly & probably ungrammatical. Lots of Northamerocentricity here, and we should have a single worldwide article, if only for that reason. Johnbod (talk) 03:14, 19 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2,7,1,12 - 1 and 2 are the most certain to pass the common name recognition, although 1 uses non-neutral language. 7 isn't the most common name, but it's reasonably neutral and representative of the positions of both groups. 12 is an interesting way of sidestepping the issue, but only temporarily. I'm a bit concerned that, given the potential length of article for each side, it would eventually run into the same problem when the main article needs to be split for readability. Sailsbystars (talk) 13:25, 19 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • strongly support 12, with 1 (and possibly others) used as redirects. agree that "pro-life" is too broad (encompassing discussions re euthanasia etc.) and "pro-choice" is too vague. second choice: 2. strongly oppose 13. Mrs smartygirl (talk) 17:36, 19 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support 1: WP:COMMONNAME knocks out most of the other options as too esoteric, and this is the only option that presents parallel phrasing of the two sides of the debate. Strongly oppose 2 as unbalanced, especially since those who view themselves as pro-life/anti-abortion don't view abortion as a "right" in the first place. Using "abortion rights/anti-abortion" is doubly biased against the latter viewpoint, since it isn't necessarily anti-abortion in all cases. —Torchiest talkedits 22:20, 19 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1, 7, 10 Mark Arsten (talk) 01:40, 20 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support for 1 Per WP:COMMONNAME and it is the only option that doesn't paint one group in a negative light. This is followed by option 5 then 6. I am completely opposed to any option that uses the term "anti" because of the deeply negative connotation of the word and the fact that using the term "anti-abortion" can be blatantly false. Remaining votes should go in the order 7,10,9,8,11,14,12,13 Ryan Vesey Review me! 15:51, 20 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support for 1 per WP:COMMONNAME, weak support for 14 and oppose all others. Routelegs 19:32, 20 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2: Clear, unambiguous, concise, unbiased, unpolitical, neutral, trasnational, timeless -- all the things all of the other options aren't in one way or another. The so-called "common names" in vogue from the recent past in the U.S. will redirect to the titles chosen, as will all of the other options purveyed here, so please don't fret about that, folks. Strongly Oppose 1. Softlavender (talk) 23:12, 20 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • In order: 12, 4, 3, 2, 14, 13, but most seem relatively neutral to me. EmyP (talk) 03:00, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Prefer 6, 10 Strongly Oppose 1, 2, 3, 4, 13 Too many of the proposals have ideological slants, intended or not, embedded in the words. --Pechmerle (talk) 03:11, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12, 6, 9, 10 I think both sides of an argument should be in the same article, per WP:POVFORK. If we mus have separate articles, then we should have something neutral and precise, which 6, 9 and 10 are. All the others are either POV, vague or inaccurate. --Tango (talk) 09:25, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 5, 10, 9, 4, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13, 14, 1 Option 1 (pro choice/life) is POV slanting by the proponents. It's 5 (legalization) that is the actual issue, despite claims to the contrary. Johnuniq (talk) 09:46, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2, 4, 12, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 6, 10, 11, 14, 13, 1. As much as I'd love to spew my rants on both sides' use of loaded language, I think they've all been pretty well covered already. I'd prefer the articles titles set a more dispassionate approach than what we would expect of the culture warriors. — Bdb484 (talk) 20:28, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 12,1,2. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Waltezell (talk • contribs) 23:32, 22 April 22 2012 (UTC)
  • Support 1. The orgs are allowed to self-identify, even if others may not see them in the same light. IronDuke 02:53, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 10, 1, 2, 9, 7, 6, 4, 5, 14, 8, 3, 13, 11, 12 SleepingDragon7 (talk) 02:54, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 2 - Just because the word "anti" is used doesn't necessarily associate a negative connection with the latter, it's just a matter of fact. I don't see why there would be a problem with proclaiming you are anti-something you don't like. I'm anti-lots of things. VegaDark (talk) 04:51, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]


  • 3, 2, 6, 14, 10, 9, 4, 11, 1, 7, 13, 8, 5, 12
Look, please don't make it difficult for your volunteer vote-counters, you bozos! Just give your ordering sequence of exactly 14 numbers, and STFU with the contingencies, conditionals, interpretations, and objections to the process! This is where the wave function collapses. This is where symmetry breaks.
Vote or vote not. There IS no "WELLL, I'd like 12, unless 3 is better maybe, but I strongly oppose borda because..."
Thus spoke HelviticaBold 06:48, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2. It may be ugly, but it is reasonably commonname-y & strips a great deal of the bias in option one. Yes, Choice/Life is popular in the media, but they are polarizing terms that aren't of encylopedic quality anyhow. 6 my second pick; we should strive to be accurate & commonname is not an excuse to propagate rhetoric. mordicai. (talk) 17:31, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    Option 2 fails to unambiguously identify a topic for either article. —chaos5023 (talk) 17:36, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1 because, simply put, I've never seen these topics referred to as any of the other options, so calling them anything else would be euphemistic and silly. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 17:38, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • 2, 1, 5, 12, 3, 14, 10. Sceptre (talk) 18:10, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 14. Strongly oppose 5,6,7,9,10,11,13, all but the last because this is not a legality issue. 13 because "tolerate" implies it's existence is unpleasant, and therefore not NPOV. -- Despayre  tête-à-tête 18:36, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support 2, 7, 1 in that order.  / Per Edman
  • 2, 3, 1, 4, 7, 6, 8, 5, 10, 9, 11, 13, 14, 12 Keep it simple, this is a complex issue that ties into dozens of other debates, there is no perfect umbrella. Uberhill 19:09, 23 April 2012 (UTC)
  • 1, 2, 10 Bowing to familiarity, though 2 would be almost as usable as 1 Raitchison (talk) 19:21, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support 3, 4, 2 because of clarity, use by other media outlets, and COMMONNAME. Like 3 because it limits scope to U.S. movements. Like 4 because it addresses the reality that there are multiple movements within each camp. (Would strongly support a plural 3). Then support 12 because it allows for better NPOV, followed by 14 which addresses that the debate is really about access at this point as much as legality. The rest follow: 6, 9, 10, 8, 7, 13 5 as original, unclear, or cumbersome. Strongly oppose 1 on grounds of NPOV, as well as the reality that Pro-life movement is not limited to abortion, while pro-choice movement largely is. Option 1 would imply a false balance between the two positions. Aharriso (talk) 20:06, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Very strong support for 12 and after that, I think 6 and 7. The debate certainly isn't limited to legality or availability; nor is it an issue of "legalization" (it's already legal in many places, as I understand it) or completely a debate about "rights" (since there's a lot of debate about what rights these would be). I would second what other people have said about pro- and anti- pages, too; not sure why we would need both. OliverTraldi (talk) 23:11, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strongly support option 1. Both names are commonly used, and are also widely used by both groups to refer to themselves; as an added bonus it is by far the most neutral option. Strongly oppose options 2, 3 and 4, and also oppose options 5 to 14. Options 2 to 14 all suggest one or both movements are only about abortion, or only about its legal status; this is inaccurate (the pro-life movement also opposes embryonic stem-cell research and euthanasia; the pro-choice movement wants abortion to be easily available, etc.). Most also favour one side (the "support" or "rights" one) at the expense of the other side (the "anti" or "opposition" one). In addition, option 3 implies abortion is only an issue in the United States; this is also inaccurate. Options 2 to 4 are especially problematic as they imply there is a right to abortion, and also that there is no such thing as a right to life before birth — from a moral point of view, there is nothing even remotely resembling a consensus supporting this view, and from a legal point of view this implied claim is partially or completely inaccurate in several jurisdictions. — ABCXYZ (talk) 23:56, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • support option 1 as first choice. Followed in order 5,6,2,14,13,7,8,10,9,2,3,4,12. Using what both groups call themselves is a fairly neutral solution, and many of the issues in question aren't just about abortion but contraception and many other issues. JoshuaZ (talk) 01:02, 24 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Official voting/feedback phase ended

Please note: the official voting/feedback phase of this RFC ended at the end of April 23rd. —chaos5023 (talk) 00:20, 24 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]


Admins, please note tallies

I have done the raw tallies at Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comment/Abortion_article_titles#Tally. Any questions, I can be contacted by email. You can check my work by looking at the spreadsheet linked there. Homunq (talk) 20:43, 24 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Admin discussion

  • A few thoughts.
  • This obviously isn't a counting exercise, but there are only three options with any serious amount of support, which are 1,2 and 12 (and its variants). Proponents of 1 are often virulently opposed to 2 and vice-versa. These numbers are about equal.
  • There is a lot of discussion of problems surrounding 1; mostly that it fails POVTITLE and is US-centric. The latter is unsurprising as the articles were originally about the American movements, and thus used the COMMONNAME in that country. It is also pointed out 1 fails to identify the topic - that's not to say the US pro-choice/pro-life movements aren't not an encyclopedic topic in their own right, of course. One could argue that 2 also has this problem, though. Ironically, many of the supporters of 1 dismiss 2 as not being NPOV. Together with the above, this feeds a train of thought that the 2 vs 1 debate is not being treated as a semantic or article-naming one, but as a political issue.
  • 12 is a compromise option, and has a reasonable amount of support. The points made in favour of the 12+1 / 12+4+1 etc. options are interesting and it's a shame that it wasn't given as a separate option at the start (or that what 12 would entail wasn't made clearer). It is certainly attractive as a method of attempting to fit the sub-variants of the topic into a easily navigable format; though as mentioned above it could (and would) be argued that it may be equally as valid to cover the US "pro-life"/"pro-choice" arguments in a separate article or articles as well, or else there could be serious article bloat. Black Kite (talk) 02:05, 28 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • This is just a placeholder for now. At first glance I broadly agree with Black Kite's observations, but once I've read the discussion more thoroughly I'll attempt to make a more thoughtful contribution (hopefully within the next couple of days). EyeSerenetalk 07:42, 30 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Update: I'm currently putting together a crude summary of the voting, which I'll make available once it's finished. As always when judging consensus, strength of argument will be a key factor but I think it may be a useful exercise nonetheless. In addition to BK's comments re 12+1 etc above, I also found the mention of "activism" as a title option interesting. EyeSerenetalk 09:24, 2 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Voting record transcluded below. The table is based on a mixture of traditional wiki!voting and ranked votes depending on how the respondent commented. I haven't scored anything; if that's felt necessary then there would be ways to merge the two voting styles but, it would be bound to involve some arbitrary score assignment. Personally I'd rather let the votes stand in the form they were offered. I'll post another table showing how I broke down the votes, but that's for later because right now I'm going bug-eyed staring at spreadsheets :) EyeSerenetalk 18:53, 2 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Abortion article titles RfC voting breakdown
Option Strong support Support Neutral Oppose Strong oppose Ranking (where preference was expressed/can be unambiguously inferred)
1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th 10th 11th 12th 13th 14th
1 15 31 1 15 8 26 10 4 3 2 1 2 1 1 7
2 3 13 2 15 4 17 12 9 6 1 1 3 2 2 2 2 2
3 1 4 1 18 4 5 12 2 3 2 3 1 2 1 1 3 2
4 2 1 2 13 3 1 8 7 4 4 3 2 3 1 2 1
5 2 8 1 15 3 5 12 7 3 2 1 3 2 2 3 1
6 1 7 1 16 3 6 10 7 4 2 5 2 2 2 1
7 3 1 13 4 7 6 2 4 5 4 3 1 2 2 1 1
8 16 4 3 2 1 1 3 6 3 3 5 2 3
9 1 1 15 4 6 5 5 2 4 5 2 5 1
10 3 2 14 4 2 6 6 4 6 2 5 3 4 1 1
11 14 5 3 3 3 1 1 3 3 4 3 3 1 2
12 4 16 1 15 2 15 9 3 6 1 2 1 1 2 3 1 6
13 1 1 15 6 6 2 2 3 1 6 6 4 1
14 3 1 13 2 2 3 1 3 7 3 1 1 3 1 1 3 3 1
1+4+12 1 4
1+12 3
The voting phase attracted comments expressing some form of preference from 160 distinct respondents. Of these, nine comments were unable to be fully parsed into the above tabular format.

I've added some scoring in the collapsed table fwiw. Ranked only just looks at the Ranking section, assigning 1st=14 points, 2nd=13, 3rd=12 etc (similar to Borda). Traditional only is an attempt to score the rest of the table by assigning Strong support=15 points, Support=14 (same as ranked 1st), Oppose=-14, Strong oppose=-15. Combined is the two together. Although I don't believe in rigidly scoring Wikipedia discussions in this way, I found the tabulation etc a useful exercise because if nothing else it compelled me to carefully read each comment :) EyeSerenetalk 11:32, 3 May 2012 (UTC) edited 11:56, 3 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Now I've had a chance to think it through for a while, I'm going to try to base my contribution towards this closure on what I feel to be three key points:

1 Site policy, mainly the requirements of WP:TITLE.
2 Discussion/voting/weight of argument. Obviously the closure should reflect community opinion as far as that opinion doesn't conflict with site policy.
3 Polarisation. To me the ideal solution should also limit the scope for future polarisation in the subject area, providing a clear structure within which editors of opposing viewpoints are able to work.

1 Policy, mainly WP:TITLE. There appears to be some confusion over whether the RfC applies to the two articles as originally written (which were about the US pro/anti abortion movements) or as they now stand (widened to include the global debate). The point is repeatedly made that in the former case only option 1 might be policy-compliant (per WP:COMMONNAME, self-identification etc), whereas in the latter case option 1 is not compatible with a world-wide viewpoint (per WP:NPOV, US-centricism etc). Depending on the version of the article preferred, WP:TITLE can be honestly invoked to support either case and thus I feel neither case is compelling. It seems to me that because the purpose of the RfC is to decide the article titles it will by definition also set their scope. Therefore we should be more concerned with trying to find titles or a title structure that would unambiguously define future article scope, rather than trying to match the existing or former content to a title. Whatever the outcome I believe some editing, refactoring, merging and/or splitting will be inevitable to bring title and scope into alignment.

2 Discussion etc. What I've taken from the discussion and voting is the level of division over the terms "Pro-life" and "Pro-choice" (option 1), which tend to be firmly favoured by those who prefer them and equally firmly objected to by those who don't. There is warm support for "Abortion rights" and "Anti-abortion" (option 2), but although generally less vehement there is also some notable opposition by those who dislike the semantics. A complete refactoring of the subject (option 12) also attracts significant support and seems to be an acceptable alternative for many who've preferred one of the more contentious options. Of these top three, option 2 attracts the broadest range of support and the least firm opposition. I concur with Black Kite that the combination options (1+4+12 etc) are interesting and may have suffered from being introduced late in the day. However, due to the support for some of their constituent options I believe they may still be worthy of consideration if they offer a way forward.

3 Polarisation. As has been pointed out elsewhere, it's perhaps difficult for a non-US editor to fully appreciate the depth of feeling on either side of the abortion debate (which appears to be far more robust in the US than the rest of the world). However, Wikipedia has dealt with many equally divisive subjects and I see no reason why we can't try to provide a framework that allows editors from either side to work together - if not happily, then at least productively. I suspect that one reason the titles and scope of the articles have changed over time is that there was no clear structure that enabled editors to understand where their contributions did, or didn't, fit.

Given the above, I'm leaning towards recommending something along the lines of a refactor of the topic (option 12) with an over-arching global-viewpoint parent article and clear summary-style sub-topics one of which could be option 1 or 2 and deal with the US debate only (possibly as a single article or possibly not). I should stress though that these are only my initial thoughts and are of course subject to the input of my fellow closers :) EyeSerenetalk 12:13, 4 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]


This is just note to say that I have now read through the wall of text (that was fun!) and I'll be posting some initial thoughts here later today, and probably refining them over the coming days. I apologise for the delay. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:20, 11 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies, folks, I'm currently travelling on WMUK business. I'll have my thoughts here by the end of the week at latest. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 09:45, 15 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Also awaiting HJ's thoughts :) EyeSerenetalk 07:52, 21 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
My sincere apologies again, to all the participants who have patiently awaited a close, and to my fellow closers, for the time it has taken me to get to this. My (extremely tardy) comments are now below. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 06:18, 31 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • I apologise profusely for keeping you all waiting. Having read through the discussion and the voting, it's clear that there are very strong feelings and extremely diverse views on this topic. Abortion is a web of moral, political an religious issues, so it's inevitable that people are going to disagree, and sometimes heatedly. However, this RfC is not about abortion per se. Nor is it about the legal, political, religious, and moral issues surrounding abortion. It is about how we title the articles that provide encyclopaedic coverage of these debates, and, by extension, the form in which we, as editors of an encyclopaedia, write about the debates.

    It is worth noting, briefly, that much of this strength of feeling originates in the United States, and that the debates surrounding abortion seem to be much more prevalent in the United States. It is of note particularly because at least some participants express the view that some of the proposed titles are only widely used in the United States. There are other strong arguments against option one, despite it being the most popular option in the vote. For example, many point out that the term "pro-life" (both within and without the United States) is not used exclusively in the context of abortion and may refer, among other things, to an opposition to capital punishment; others suggest that the terms "pro-choice" and "pro-life" are relatively recent labels, and do not reflect the history of the debate; still others point out that the terms, although commonly used, were chosen by the respective 'camps' to disparage the other. I concentrate so heavily on option 1 because the most supported options seem to boil down to "option 1" or "something other than option 1". Arguments in favour of option 1 (or in opposition to something other than option 1) that I thought were particularly well-made include the view that "wrinkles" (to borrow BlueMoonlet's term) can be described in the article, that it avoids the term "rights", and that it is the most common label used by the members of these movements.

    It is my opinion that structuring this RfC as a vote was a bad idea, and bringing in a system that is obscure at best on Wikipedia for an RfC such as this was a terrible idea. If there is one thing a controversial RfC doesn't need, it's a disagreement over how to count votes. Not least because the entire purpose of a Request for Comment is to facilitate discussion, not voting. I get the impression from the talk page and from many comments above that a significant portion of the participants were unaware that the Borda method was the suggested method of voting or didn't fully understand what that meant. However, using that count for the time being, the six highest-rated options and the only ones to gain over 1,000 points (NB, I am relying on the numbers at Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comment/Abortion_article_titles#Tally because I confess to not fully understanding the counting method and to being far better with words than I ever was with numbers) are options 1, 2, 12, 6, 5, and 10. Interestingly, the last three are far more similar to each other than any of the first three. Also interesting is EyeSerene's first table, which shows that option one is both the most supported and the most opposed. By all but one of the different tallies for different methods, option one comes out on top (though marginally, and marginally behind option two in the dissenting tally).

    I'm going to make a suggestion that will meet with displeasure from many of the participants, perhaps my fellow closers, and possibly make ArbCom wish they had appointed a yes man, and I apologise for making this suggestion after keeping everybody waiting for so long. It is is my opinion that no clear consensus, sufficient that all parties can accept its legitimacy even if they disagree with it, has emerged from this RfC (bolding that bit for those more interested in my conclusion than my working). It is also my opinion that only such a strong consensus can lay this argument to rest. So my suggestion is that we hold another, narrower RfC, with the aim of determining whether we should have one article for the entire debate (along the lines of option 12) or separate articles for the opposing views, and if we are to have separate articles, whether they should be titled in accordance with option 1, option 2, or some variation of options 5, 6, and 10. If this suggestion is taken up, I would implore participants not to treat it as a vote, but to set aside their own views and engage in intelligent debate about which format and which title is the most appropriate. I would also suggest that the same three admins, having now become more familiar with this debate and the nuanced arguments surrounding it than certainly I ever wanted to be, should be the ones to close this second phase of the RfC. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 06:18, 31 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • I'll add some more, including my response to HJ, over the weekend. Black Kite (talk) 11:18, 1 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thanks for that thoughtful analysis HJ. There's no displeasure from me because in essence I support your conclusion. It's certainly not incompatible with the tentative and rather vague way I framed my closing thoughts, in as much as even after reading, re-reading and picking apart the debate I was still unable to come to any firm decision that I felt was a true reflection of respondents' comments, and the solution I was leaning towards requires further input to decide the details in any case. I also share your concerns about the wisdom of trying to impose a solution that can be legitimately argued to be unsupported by a clear consensus, which at present applies to all the options. Some additional thoughts:

    If I've correctly understood your comment, you are not recommending a new RfC but simply an extension to clarify consensus around the leading options and associated variants. While I feel this is probably the right way to go, I have some concerns about requesting a second round when participants have already expended a great deal of effort on the subject. However, if editors are willing to invest additional time I'm happy to make myself available for as long as necessary. On a related point, I think if some editors are reluctant to participate further we should take account of applicable comments made during the phase already concluded. I'm keen to avoid any impression of requiring editors to keep repeating themselves in discussion after discussion.

    If we do this I agree that voting should be discouraged. I understand why it was suggested previously and appreciate that many respondents set out their reasoning as well as casting their votes, but personally I found the reasoning to be the more informative part of the process. I have no objection to traditional support/oppose-type !voting as long as it's accompanied by explanatory comments.

    As well as closing the second round, are you suggesting that we three frame the questions? Between us we seem to have a good idea of where we'd like clarification from the community, so that might be a sensible way forward.

    Finally, it would be nice to conclude this within a reasonable time period... :)

    I do have some further thoughts but I'll wait for BK's response before posting anything more that may be irrelevant or unnecessary. Best, EyeSerenetalk 12:44, 1 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

    • Replying to just that one point specifically for the time being, my proposal is essentially a second phase of this RfC–this on has determined the 'finalists', so to speak, of the many options offered, and I think we need a second discussion to establish a firm consensus on which of those is preferable, which didn't really happen in this RfC for a variety of reasons. And if people are sick of discussing it, there's no reason why we can't leave the articles where they are for the time being, then revisit the RfC in a few weeks to give everyone a break. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 00:43, 2 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's fairly clear that we aren't going to determine a consensus from the results of this RfC, and there needs to be further input from the community on the way forward. It would certainly be a waste of many editors' time (and an invitation that the current problems persist) if we merely suggest the status quo be retained. Not only does there need to be a community decision, it needs to be as transparent as possible in order that those whose first choices are not selected can still engage with the editing area. (Hence, partly, my leaning towards a version of option 12). The question is what we do next. If we are going to have a second (or extended) RfC I would suggest the following;
    • the options are clearly delineated into no more than four sections, which I think would be 1, 2, 12 (edit: or 12+4+1 etc.) and some conflation of 5 & 6.
    • editors are clearly asked whether they support a refactoring of the articles (such as 12) and what the scope of the "sub-articles" should be (i.e. US-centric, world-centric)
    • Obscure vote-counting systems are not used
    • Given some of the talkpage comments, the community is asked whether they have any strong views on retaining the same three admins to close the debate. Black Kite (talk) 19:48, 3 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • So... where next? We seem to agree that this RfC hasn't come up with anything we can point to as a consensus, though it has indicated where the community has strong views. We also seem to agree that a second round should concentrate on the leading options perhaps including combinations, and that a discussion is preferable to a vote. However, can I tentatively suggest that the logical next step might be to clarify the issue BK summarises in his second bullet point above ("editors are clearly asked whether they support a refactoring of the articles (such as 12) and what the scope of the "sub-articles" should be (i.e. US-centric, world-centric)")? In fact, I'd support widening the question to encompass the entire topic. It seems to me that until we get a clear answer to the question of how abortion as a subject on WP should be structured, discussion about individual article titles and scopes is unlikely to prove productive. I realise this is effectively introducing a third round (!) and trying editors' patience further, but given the objections on the talk page and in other places that the RfC was asking the wrong question(s), I feel obtaining a community consensus for the framework of the debate so we can hopefully then ask the right questions might be a worthwhile exercise.

    Re BK's last point, unless I've missed something I've only read one comment that expresses a wish for new closers. I appreciate the frustration behind that comment, but would hope editors can understand and forgive us when real-world priorities intrude. Unless more editors express their dissatisfaction I don't really see a need to take it further, but if we do then I'm happy to abide by the outcome :) EyeSerenetalk 08:18, 7 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

    • I agree. Without a decision on structure any discussion on titles is going to be at best disputed and at worst pointless. So, as you say, where next? I presume an RFC type discussion on structure with a fixed number of options would be indicated? Black Kite (talk) 20:15, 10 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
      • That makes sense to me. Because things are moving slowly here perhaps this is something we could ask for editor assistance with? I would propose options to include:
  1. A single article about the abortion debate that presents all viewpoints (advantage: one clear home for all abortion controversy stuff; disadvantage: likely to be long so non-compliance with WP:SS)
  2. A single over-arching summary article with daughter articles that break the debate down in some way such as by country, by viewpoint etc (advantage: complies with WP:SS; disadvantage: breaking the debate down by viewpoint may lead to the articles engaging in the debate rather than being about the debate)
  3. A matched pair of articles presenting the For & Against viewpoints
  4. ...
Obviously there are other potential options and permutations that others will be able to suggest. My personal feeling is that options that are clearly not policy-compliant should probably be disallowed, though I'm not sure how much our appointed role as interpreters of consensus allows us to 'interfere' (for want of a better word!) with the shaping of that consensus. EyeSerenetalk 08:08, 14 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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