Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style

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Transgender pronoun / identity

This edit resulted in this text being added to the manual of style:

Where known, use terminology that subjects use for themselves (self identification). This can mean calling an individual the term they use, or calling a group the term most widely used by that group. This includes referring to transgender individuals according to the name and pronoun they use to identify themselves.

I have seen that a few times in passing and it never seemed troublesome until now when I just read an article that is highly confusing. That article is: Brandon Teena. Here are some weird things that result from this policy:

• This is a person born and mostly raised as a girl, yet nowhere in the article is this fact made clear.
• As a young girl, "he" was sexually assaulted by a male relative. (We presume it is a male relative, there is no indication of how that person self identifies!)
• "He" was raped in "his" vagina. He had female external genitalia.
• "He" almost certainly had two X chromosomes.
• Legally this person was identified as a female/woman and when sentenced to jail "he" went to the woman's prison.

After reading this article and the talk page, it occurred to me that a slavish adherence to this aspect of the manual of style has not led to a clear article. Among other things, it seems that the "temporality" of the gender transition would have helped. A discussion of how "She" was born a girl and then later "He" self identified as a man, would have clarified the article greatly.

Next, I considered the fact that some people self identify as Napoleon or as Aliens from another planet. Do we write the article seriously when people self identify in patently ridiculous ways? Yet this policy says we do.

Finally, I noticed that this part of the guideline was added by one editor without any discussion at all. I do not know that below the radar edits are the same as consensus, but even if they are, consensus can change and I recommend that it does so.

I am not interested in making edits that would "disrespect" transgendered people. But I think some degree of clarity is also appropriate and the policy needs to recognize that this is an encyclopedia first and foremost.

I would change the policy as follows:

Where known, use terminology that subjects use for themselves (self identification). This can mean calling an individual the term they use, or calling a group the term most widely used by that group. This includes referring to transgender individuals according to the name and pronoun they use to identify themselves.

This self-identification style should not be used to the exclusion of clarity in the article. For transgendered individuals, it is often helpful to clarify declared birth gender and use appropriate pronouns for that gender up to the biographical point where a gender-association change can be identified.

I would invite re-wording to fit what I am trying to say better.

--Blue Tie 07:05, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Self-identification is the only relevant standard for topics regarding transgendered individuals, as it bloody well should be. Anything else is opinion - the equivalent of an online 'pants check'.

Moreover, I would consider using one pronoun before 'a gender-association change can be identified' and another 'afterwards' (and requiring authors to define and straddle that point) to be much more confusing than consistently referring to an individual by their chosen identification. Phrases like 'his vagina', etc., while perhaps confusing for some, are neither factually incorrect nor inherently confusing in the context of a biography of a person with gender identity disorder. It may be outside your experience, but it's not wrong, nor unclear.

To me, this is a classic situation where using proper editorial skills to avoid confusion is far preferable to policy wonking, to say nothing of your repeated comparisons of transgendered people's self-identification to mentally ill individuals considering themselves 'Napoleon' or 'aliens'. Such arguments are not only based on a blatantly and utterly false analogy, they are also highly offensive in and of themselves. Based on your use of such false analogies and offensive statements, I submit that you may not understand issues of gender identity well enough to offer an informed policy recommendation regarding self-identification. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 14:46, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

You seem to be taking offense needlessly. Your personal attack regarding my understanding is not appreciated. I was looking at a specific article where I considered the issue to be handled wrongly. I note that you argued vociferously there as you are dong here. Are you too close to this subject matter to comment objectively and politely? --Blue Tie 04:54, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I didn't make a personal attack, I pointed out your false analogy between delusion and gender identity disorder and the general concern it raises for me regarding your general knowledge about the issues involved in gender identity disorder. In any case, I'm honestly sorry if you felt attacked. Cheers! -- User:RyanFreisling @ 05:30, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

This quote: "I submit that you may not understand issues of gender identity well enough to offer an informed policy recommendation regarding self-identification." was what I considered the personal attack. You used ad hominum argument to suggest that my points were invalid. However, you apologized and I accept it completely.

But your new comment says I made a false analogy between delusion and gender identity disorder. I did not do that. I do not think you read what I wrote or understood it correctly. In essence, our policy makes no distinction between the deluded or insane and those with transgender issues of all kinds -- not just "gender identity disorder" (and some are extremely challenging, I have had exposure to them and I am very sympathetic toward them). That our policy makes no such distinction -- or even allows for editorial insight on this is a problem. And I think that a slavish adherence to this guideline has created a less than ideal article in the case of Brandon. --Blue Tie 05:42, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I read what you wrote. I simply don't see how either a comparison nor a distinction between transgendered individuals and 'deluded' individuals needs to be made, since they are entirely different situations. Since you raised the issue on 'Brandon Teena' and not here, and in the interests of accuracy, I strongly suggest you'd be better off raising the issue of 'deluded' self-identification (thinking oneself to be an alien or Napoleon) independently of pressing for alternating pronoun usage on transgender bios (to say nothing of transsexual murder victim bios). -- User:RyanFreisling @ 05:57, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok, let me see if I can make it clearer. The policy says: "Where known, use terminology that subjects use for themselves (self-identification). This can mean using the term an individual uses for himself or herself, or using the term a group most widely uses for itself." So, a person declares themselves to be half man half fish (transphibian). Do we really write an article that says " Joe Blow is a transphibian from the aquatic planet gozog" just because he says so? I'm not trying to destroy the whole style intent here, but it became clear to me that this guideline is too sweeping and has been used too sweepingly, particularly in the Brandon article I cited. --Blue Tie 06:06, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

'An appropriate transition point' to refer to an individual's gender is plainly inappropriate. Their sex, not their gender, is what changes. Their sex is a different matter than their gender, and it is their gender identity, not their sex, which determines the use of pronouns. I'm not even going to answer your 'transphibian' comment except to say that it doesn't bear on pronoun usage for transgendered individuals in the slightest, and it really doesn't interest me as an exercise of policy 'in absurdum'. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:11, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

You claim it is plainly inappropriate, but I disagree. I also disagree that their sex changes. Their sex is defined by their chromosomes. What changes is their claimed or identified gender. As far as not answering the "Transphibian" comment as being too absurd, apparently you did not click the link. Although Prince Mongo declares with absolute sobriety and makes this claim in legal documents, in courts of law and in every venue possible, that he is an ambassador from another planet, wikipedia does not identify him as "Ambassador from Mongo", but instead says that "he claims to be an Ambassador from Mongo". Do you really think wikipedia would be a better encyclopedia if instead, it followed this guideline and just accepted his claim as though it were fact?

I knew a man who as he grew older became weird. He came to believe he was Joan of Arc and had a new mission. He had lived for 67 years as a man. (He was the Y chromosome contributor to several children). Should his final 3 years of dementia be used to determine his life long gender identity if he had been written about in wikipedia? Yet by your extreme view of this guideline... yes it should be -- no recognition of before and after should be used in the pronouns. Something is wrong with that view. And it creates articles that are more confusing than they need to be and less factually accurate than desirable. --Blue Tie 06:23, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

You're welcome to disagree with the practical and legal realities of sex reassignment (not gender, sex reassignment), and you're welcome to your repeated associations of the issue with extreme and absurd cases of 'weird', deluded people, and you're welcome to in essence conflate delusion with gender identity, but I'm simply not going to play with utter absurdities of that sort. Enjoy. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:28, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Basically, I have to agree with Ryan's comments above. Self-ID is where it's at. Anything else is going to be highly offensive to the subject and could easily come under WP:BLP rules. Note that a transsexual woman of note (no names!) has threatened legal action against a person for using what she considered "wrong pronouns" and for harassment on usenet. WP:COMMON applies here, folks. Furthermore, equating people diagnosed with gender identity disorder (and, yes, disorder it is) with people suffering from transient delusions is more than a little unfair here; apple, oranges and all that. Note that most reputable media organisations (like the BBC, for example [1] (doc)) have editorial policies which either mandate or strongly suggest referring to the person by their self-identity. Can you imagine referring to someone like Miriam as "he" because of their alleged original genitalia? Do we really want to go there? - Alison^☺ 22:53, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

I do not think you exactly read my suggestion. I am not saying that we should NOT refer to the person by their chosen gender. However, it is a matter of record that most people are born with an identified gender. It is a matter of record and wikipedia cannot be sued for reporting such a fact. My suggestion was that in at least some cases, there would be an appropriate transition point. It just makes things clearer for the article, plus it is more factual. Interestingly enough, on this issue, wikipedia guidelines on style contradict wikipedia policy on things like WP:RS, WP:OR on this matter. For example, in some cases it is a matter of public legal record that an individual, choosing to be identified as one gender is legally considered to be a different gender. Incidentally, I do not know why you consider that I was making a comparison between gender identity disorder and people suffering from transient delusions. I did not do that.--Blue Tie 05:03, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree that switching pronouns mid-article is even more confusing, but I also agree with Blue Tie that the article as it stands is potentially puzzling to readers who are not used to issues of transgender identity. May I suggest a compromise: the introduction should try to describe the central situation of Brandon Teena in gender neutral language, before then moving on to using the male pronoun. Here is an example (and bear in mind that I'm not remotely knowledgeable about gender identity disorder, so I may offend those who are, but I'm just trying to provide something to work with here):

Brandon Teena (December 12, 1972 - December 31, 1993) was a transgendered person, born with female sexual characteristics but self-identifying as male. Born Teena Renae Brandon in Lincoln, Nebraska but known simply as Brandon, he was raped and eventually murdered in one of the most infamous American hate crimes of the 1990s...

OK, this is a little clumsy, but it explains to the casual reader that Brandon was regarded as physically female by conventional society, but self-identified as male, before moving on to use the male pronoun, yet also does so without using female pronouns. How does that work? Feel free to shoot me down. Cop 633 00:15, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the solution is an editorial one, not a policy one. Let's discuss your suggestion on the Talk:Brandon Teena article's talk page. I'll put my comment here and there, to avoid seeming evasive of your suggestion. In my opinion, as it stands, it's got promise - except that a transgendered man is a 'transgendered person, born with female sexual characteristics but self-identifying as male'. Just linking 'transgendered man' to 'female-to-male transsexual' or the equivalent and skipping the redundant redefinition in the article space should solve the issue well. Also, the issue of how society regarded Brandon is not quite as you suggest, since there is testimony that various individuals at various times believed he was a man and did not know of his transgenderism. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 00:21, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

• (ec - sorry, Ryan) We're kinda moving away from WT:MOS territory here and back onto Brandon Teena, but I can see your point. There's a good example of this at work in the Wendy Carlos article, which begins by ignoring her gender entirely and relying on surnames. It seems to work. Thoughts? - Alison ☺ 00:24, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it "works" all that well. Its kinda vague. Not so good for an encyclopedia. Wendy Carlos' article should mention it in a bit more detail. She has been pretty vocal and open about it, though not in a way that I would call "attention seeking". BTW, I have been a big fan of hers since she was openly a he. --Blue Tie 05:27, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

'Openly a he'. Sheesh. Another little example of what is at once a factually incorrect and a simply offensive use of pronouns to refer to a transsexual. You may not accept, understand or care at all, but if you said something like that about her to her directly, I can all-but-guarantee that comment would be perceived as hurtful and seriously disrespectful. Thankfully WP:STYLE's self identification in its present, unmodified form is likewise at once more appropriate and informative. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 05:41, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I honestly don't see the harm in keeping a very brief explanation of what a 'transgendered man' is. Many readers will assume that a 'transgendered man' is a physically male person who self identifies as a woman, and may not even think to click on the link. You have to remember that many readers who do not know much about gender identity disorders will not know the 'rules' about pronouns and may assume that transgendered people are normally referred to by their physical gender. A little potted explanation like this explains the situation quickly, so that the non-experts will know where they stand. (The same problem is there in the Wendy Carlos article BTW, which says she had a sex change but doesn't say from what to what. It would harm nobody to state it clearly). Cop 633 00:59, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Cop 633's idea a couple of posts up. That looks like a good solution. But I also think that the wikipedia manual of style should be adjusted because I have seen it used (By Ryan Freisling in particular) to support confusing edits. Furthermore, how does this interact with WP:VER when you can verify that legally this person was born as a different gender than the one that they later identified with. I note that policies tend to trump guidelines and this is a guideline. --Blue Tie 05:24, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

'Confusing' is easier to correct than 'patently incorrect' or 'erroneous'. Referring to Brandon Teena as 'she' and as 'he' can hardly be argued to be 'less confusing'. The issue should be addressed without creating an arbitrary and invasive 'litmus test' or 'pants check' in order to simply and properly refer to transgendered individuals. 'Confusion' has many sources, and the source of this confusion isn't WP:STYLE. And 'gender' and 'sex' are different. Many transsexuals believe that they were born a different 'gender' than their 'sex', and their unchangeable 'gender identity' is what is at odds with their changeable physical sex. For them, their gender identity doesn't change - and gender self-identification determines pronoun usage - so how could such an arbitrary and fundamentally invasive policy demanding WP:VER of a change in their gender (not their sex) ever possibly be correct or encyclopedic? Self ID for transgendered individuals as a guide to pronoun usage is the reasonable answer. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:01, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I fundamentally disagree with you on what changes, but I do not see how it matters either way. What matters is that this style guideline is messed up. It should recognize before and after some point in time where there was a change. That would make articles clearer. I know you disagree. No point in replying just to say you disagree. But if you have a new point that would be good to see. But if you are not going to recognize the points I am making and just keep repeating your opinion that my ideas are no good, its not going to advance any discussion.--Blue Tie 06:27, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not ignoring your points, I've simply said that:

• your desire to frame policy using absurd scenarios like your 'transphibian' and 'Joan of Arc' guys is extreme, and unsupportable. When either of them are notable, then they may rise to the level of a useful case for crafting guidelines and policies. Obviously absurd and misapplied scenarios can be (falsely) argued to upend even the most basic and generally useful of guidelines and policies, to say nothing of policies regarding issues of controversy like gender identity and sex reassignment for BLP / BIO subjects.
• I've also stated that as per the facts of Gender identity disorder and sex reassignment, it is the individual's anatomical sex, and not their gender, that changes for the transgendered person and that self gender-identification (being inherently verifiable by first hand account) is therefore the only reasonble, verifiable standard for name and pronoun usage regarding transgendered individuals on WP. Note an appropriate test of the guideline could regard a notable transgendered person who verifies that their gender identity does change over time, in which case given their notability there should be guidelines in that person's history for such usage. Much more useful example than fish-people.

Creating an arbitrary and unverifiable 'threshold' below which the appropriate pronoun is somehow not appropriate for a transgendered person seems to be WP:OR, to say nothing of entirely inappropriate to the subject matter, unencyclopedic and erroneous. Moreover, as times go by we will undoubtedly finding ourselves struggling more and more with the limitations of pronoun and gender-related language rules to accurately describe what is in natural fact best described as a wide range of human gender identities and sexes, so I don't doubt that you are struggling with this issue right now. In the case of Brandon Teena, I'm not struggling with usage as the guidelines are very clear in his (tragic) case. Last, I'm honestly sorry you feel the discussion isn't advancing, I don't agree. Cheers, and goodnight (it's bed time). -- User:RyanFreisling @ 07:02, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

The heart of the problem, as I see it, is that it's impossible to follow WP:NPOV in this situation. The nature of transgendered people is an ongoing debate with strong feelings on both sides. But where Wikipedia would normally take the middle road, in this case there's none to take. You've gotta use "he" or "she" (or a third pronoun, and those always stick out like a sore thumb, taking the reader out of the article).

So one side will win out where usage is concerned, and there's no point in being unrealistic about which side that'll be. First, the rule is already in place. Second, while we're gonna disagree on what the exceptions are, self-identification is a pretty sensible overall guideline. And third, Wikipedia is consensus-driven, and it lives on the internet, which (in a very broad average sense) tilts liberal. So the rule is not gonna be outright overturned -- and that's fair whether you agree with it or not, because it's how the game is played here.

That said, there's certainly room for improvement. User:Cop 633 beat me to the solution I was planning to suggest: make sure it's clear at the start of the article what the person's gender/nature/whatever is, especially in cases like Brandon Teena where that's deeply relevant to the subject matter. The article User:Alison brought up, Wendy Carlos, is a spectacular example of how not to do it. It's downright coy, deferring the subject for several paragraphs and being indirect even then. The editor clearly didn't consider Carlos' sex change important, which is fine -- and thought you shouldn't consider it important either, which isn't fine. Wikipedia is about providing facts, not making points.

So I think this principle of clarity, just giving the reader the information up front, is about as good a compromise as we'll reach. And policy-wise, that's all I have to say.

But I also want to address something about the debate itself. I've been following the Brandon Teena talk page for a while now, ever since some semirandom browsing led me to that article. It's on my watchlist because, quite apart from my own biases, I just think this is an interesting question. And I think everybody involved needs to keep in mind that reasonable people can and do disagree about this. Those like User:Blue Tie who disagree with the rule (and those like me who at least find it dubious) are not automatically bad people. I don't know if that's how you feel, User:RyanFreisling, but I do hear it in your tone -- and I'm guessing part of that comes from all the trouble User:Gwen Gale has given you guys on the Brandon Teena page. Gale's obnoxious conduct and edit warring made me wince just reading it. But that's about her as a WP editor, not her case.

Blue Tie's analogies are offensive, but that's not why he's making them. He's trying to make the point that self-identification obviously stops somewhere, something the rule as stated doesn't acknowledge. If you think that dividing line is easy to nail down, consider Leslie Feinberg, who self-identifies as a third gender and prefers pronouns like "hir." You'll notice the article studiously avoids using pronouns -- precisely because it's not obvious whether the ones Feinberg prefers would be appropriate. If it were put to a vote, I think most Wikipedians would agree with using "he" in Brandon Teena's article; I seriously doubt that most would agree with "hir" in Feinberg's.

Okay, I've spent far too long writing this. Bedtime for me too. Cheers, all. ~ CZeke 10:40, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your thoughtful response and I overwhelmingly agree with your post. First of all, I must say that if my tone implies that I think editors who have concerns with the style guidelines for transgendered individuals are bad people, I will conscientously work to change that, because it's not my intention. I'm a passionate editor and debater, and the internet medium can allow for or imbue the discussion with an unintentioned brusqueness. I'll work hard to combat any impression in my WP work that I judge others personally.

While we can disagree with one another around the useful guideline for WP, etc., it's important to note that an appropriately NPOV determination should not fall along liberal/conservative lines. There is an existing body of knowledge on the issue in the form of the existing medical standards and legal definitions of gender identity disorder and sex reassignment, and collectivelly they lend a lot of added weight to the use of self-identification around gender identity.

Last, I certainly don't advocate the use of what I would consider incorrect pronoun constructions like 'hir', 'zis', etc. They may become prevalent someday, but I don't think they can be considered an improvement. We should absolutely follow the rules of style grammatically while we use the guideline of self-identification to refer to transgendered individuals, which as I mentioned can potentially be fluid - but will always be first-person verifiable. The rule need not apply to the deranged, the 'part-fish', etc., because if we do so and employ an 'artificial threshold' beyond self-identification for verifiably transgendered individuals, we would be engagng in a particularly contentious and unverifiable form of original 'social' research. Again, my sincere thanks. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 14:43, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I appreciate your open minded review of the situation. I did not realize that I was being offensive. I do not quite understand it and would also appreciate a discussion on my talk page about it. I suspect that it was not what I said that was offensive but what people thought I was intending, meaning, implying or something else. But not what I actually said. And I said what I meant. So if something I actually said was offensive, I am unaware of it, but I would like to be shown it for my own edification and future improvement. Please leave a message on my talk page explaining how I offended.

The example of "hir" above is also interesting. I thank you for providing it. Because this seems to be a topic that is controversial and because my motives may be in question, I want to explain my thought process for beginning this discussion.

In wandering around, I found the Teena Brandon article. I have never had a problem with the "self ID" gender thing in other similar articles. However, this article was a bit confusing and in particular, one sentence about the sexual molestation or assault as a child really stuck out in my mind. As I read the article for the third time, I strongly felt that one sentence should read "she was". Once I mentally put "she was" in that sentence, I realized that it created a really odd problem with the article that would not go away until there was an explanation of the pronoun transition. When I mentally added that explanation (Gender Identity Change) at the appropriate point, I had a sort of Eureka! moment. The article suddenly seemed to read better and make more sense.

So I looked at the talk page on the matter and saw that the basis for the current situation was this guideline. This is where the fix should be if the guideline is being used as a crutch that makes the articles less informative and more confusing. And it seemed to me that the way to fix it would be to recognize a transition point in the life of the person. There is more to this that I will discuss later, but that was how I first approached this guideline.

But once I read the guideline, I suddenly also realized how weak it was: self identification does not always deserve respect. Just because someone self identifies, it does not mean that we always present that assumption on their part as a fact. Prince Mongo self identifies as an alien ambassador. But wikipedia only says that this is what he claims, it does not respect that self identification as though it were a fact. And that is appropriate. But according to this guideline we should call him "Prince Mongo, Ambassador from the Planet Mongo" rather than say that he claims to be an ambassador from another planet. Immediately one can see that this guideline has a failure mode.

Extending that logic to gender identification we could say: "just because someone self identifies as a particular gender does not make it an automatic fact". The fellow I was talking about who felt that he was Joan of Arc is an example. He had lived his life for years as a man (with a different identity and life occupation) and only in some sort of age syndrome did he change. Of course, I am not sure he exactly gave gender an explicit thought, but another person, a homosexual black man, in his last 6 months of AIDS did. He explicitly began to claim he was a woman, down to speaking in a high voice, wearing women's clothing and self mutilation (to a degree -- he really didn't like pain enough to do the full job). But the nursing staff chalked his behavior up to AIDS related dementia, not to a rational choice. Should that self-identification of gender identification get respect? The guideline says "yes". And the example given above, per this guideline, Leslie Feinberg should be labeled "hir" because that is the self identification. This guideline gives us just black and white choices on an area full of greys.

So, how do you fix that problem? Is there a way to have a somewhat universal rule that provides for the greys? Another Eureka! moment. WP:NPOV is the answer. The article does not have to make a judgment call on such things. It does not have to have either a pro or negative pov (whichever side is pro or negative... I cannot tell). It can just rely upon WP:NPOV standards such as verifiability and reliability, using pronouns appropriately according to the context. For example, take Walter - to Wendy Carlos. Historical events prior to the gender identification change should be "He". This can be verified, for example, by reading contemporary interviews with Carlos (and also liner notes) where Walter is described as a "he" "his" and "him". Later, however, after the gender-reassignment, Wendy is a "she" and "her". Also, when speaking generally and not in reference to any particular time frame, use the chosen pronouns. This solution entirely respects the individual's choices while at the same time remaining neutral and fact based... just as wikipedia should be.

I am not sure this entirely clears up the problem in all areas, but it makes many of them easier and improves wikipedia. For example, it can be verified that Prince Mongo was born to human parents. It cannot be verified that he came from another planet with ambassadorial credentials. So, wikipedia just reports the facts and stays neutral. It can be verified that Feinberg was born female and that later, she changed her gender identity. Wikipedia just reports the facts and stays neutral. If the article were to address historical events prior to a gender identity change, it would be appropriate to use "her" and "she". After a gender identity change (third gender) "hir" and "ze".

So too, with Teena Brandon. Use "she" was sexually assaulted as a child and then use "he" and "him" for historical events after an explained gender re-identification.

A tag explaining the use of pronouns in such article should also be developed and included.

That was my thinking. I was thinking of clarity and factual neutrality in articles to make them better. I am not on some gender bashing hunt. I think this manual of style can be improved by looking to NPOV. --Blue Tie 10:28, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

AEB

I appreciate that you want to use factual neutrality and clarity. Here are the facts, and how basing our style guide on anything but self-ID (including to discuss childhood events) is both far more unclear and more POV.

Fact One: Continually using examples of deluded individuals and 'fish-men' as absurd arguments ro revise WP naming guidelines for transgender individuals is offensive. It is offensive in that 1) gender identity disorder is not a delusion and one therefore has no bearing on the other from a policy perspective and 2) since the situations are not equivalent it's logically offensive to editors seeking to avoid facilitating blatantly erroneous arguments made 'in absurdum'.

Fact Two: As you yourself stated, your self-mutilating Joan of Arc's caregivers (again, that's a lovely example) felt the cause of that person's behavior was 'AIDS-dementia' and so I think you'd have to agree that would be a determination that that person is not a transgendered individual under the standards of care in the U.S. - so like fish-boy and prince whatever, I don't see how that can be a valid case for establishing policy regarding transgendered individuals.

Fact Three The term you just employed, 'Gender Identity Change' is apparently your own invention - it has no medical basis. While indeed gender is fluid, and examples exist of people whose gender, and not their sex, is said to have changed, the overwhelmingly more frequent situation is of a person suffering from 'gender identity disorder' who changes their sex (using 'sex reassignment') to conform to their 'gender identity'. A great number of them report having these identifications in childhood. Therefore, intentionally referring to a transgendered person when describing them in childhood by the pronoun matching their 'sex' rather than their gender is arbitrarily and unacceptably POV and unsupported on the facts. Words are meaningful and you can't create new ones on which to base policy when you refuse to accept the underlying facts.

Practical, Useful and Non-Offensive Example Your suggestion would have us writing sentences like the following (I'm using some difficult cases to stimulate our thinking to solve them editorially):

"Brandon Teena (born --/--/--) was a transsexual man. He identified as male since she was a child. When she was young, she felt herself to be male.He was raped and murdered after it was discovered that she had been born female.

Of course it should read:

"Brandon Teena (born --/--/--) was a transsexual man. He identified as male since he was a child. When he was young, he felt himself to be male. He was raped and murdered after it was discovered that he had been born female.

Your suggested revised policy (the arbitrary threshold) would be a major disruption. It would be unverifiable, would cause 'confusion', and would be offensive to transgendered and non-transgendered people alike. Absurd extreme examples like yours aren't nearly enough for WP to impose a policy that would be so counter-productive and destructive, and to the best of my knowledge, WP policy doesn't allow non-standard grammatical constructions like 'zis' so I echo your concern that we not base policy around violations of policy.

Last (and again), given that you came to this issue from your response to the use of a pronoun on one sentence, don't you think using editorial skills to deal with those instances is better than making broad and offensive swipes at the policy? I surely do. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 14:15, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I am disappointed. I had hoped that in describing my thoughts in detail a substantive discussion would ensue. Instead you have given more details on your revulsion to the examples I raised. (Your revulsion to the examples is not an indication of my bad faith you know). But you have not really dealt with the issues I raised. In particular:

"Fact" One is not a fact. It is an editorial opinion. However, I did not intend to be offensive and taking my words as offensive is a failure to assume good faith. As far as your other statements, the style guideline does not take into account any considerations of the validity of the claim. It simply says that if a person so identifies, that is how they are to be referred to. This extends past transgender issues, but it includes them. Your objections on this matter suggest you are not grasping the point, but I do not know how to make it clearer. Indeed, someone else already explained it in great clarity but you do not seem to be recognizing the issues.

"Fact" Two is another editorial statement by you. The discussion would go better if you were not being so quick to take offense and trying to read some imagined meaning between the lines and simply deal with the issue: The style guideline does not handle this matter.

"Fact" Three. It may be apparent to you that I have invented it. But it is not in fact true. The only fact here is that you think it is a fact.

Three "facts". None of them factual. But all expressed in a disdainful way. Unfortunate.

Now as for editing examples, it is entirely inappropriate to assume that I or other editors are idiots or that we seek to violate NPOV, V or RS as you have proposed I would suggest. Instead of setting up strawmen, why not ask me how I would edit? Here is one example of how I might edit the opening per my suggested guidelines.

"Brandon Teena (born --/--/--) was a transsexual born as a female, who from the age of 14 identified as a male. He was raped and murdered at the age of 21. His life has been the subject of two movies.

(I used the fact tag where I was not sure of the age just now).

You claim that my approach would be unverifiable. On the contrary, it would be entirely verifiable. It can be verified that a person was born under some particular gender identity and then, at some age, determined a different identity. Gender reassignment is even more clearly established. This is not arbitrary. The same would go for other identity changes, such as a person identifying as Joan of Arc or as Native American or as an alien from outer space. These examples that you call "absurd" are found on the pages of wikipedia and the style policy ought to apply generally and uniformly.

I hope that, if you reply again, it would be more constructive and that you would assume good faith. --Blue Tie 13:52, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Once again, you are factually misstating what gender identity disorder and sex reassignment are, by stating 'a person was born under some particular gender identity and then, at some age, determined a different identity.'. As I said already, that does not describe the majority of transgendered individuals, and we should have clear self-verifiable info on which to base article content and pronoun usage for those whom it does apply.

I'm disappointed as well, but only in that you seem to continue to ignore what I've posted, attribute it to some personal revulsion, and restate unfounded views of the subject matter – which is supposed to be transgendered self-identification as a guide to pronoun usage, but you have used extreme examples of deluded individuals who are not transgendered to make your case. I want to make sure the policy for transgendered individuals is factually-based, without POV bias.

It's not personal, I've made my points clearly and grounded entirely in fact and I don't think it's necessary to repeat them. And I don't object to your intro at all, but you might want to expand your sample to explore some of the age or 'threshold'-related pronoun usage you've proposed. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 14:20, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I have a few questions, that are tangental, so i would take them to your talk page. However, this one may be to the point and help get somewhere: Are we in disagreement that the style guideline does not only apply to transgendered people? --Blue Tie 14:34, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I do agree. I've been assiduously containing my argument to the issue of pronoun usage for transgendered people on WP. I support the current version in that it specifically describes policy for transgendered individuals. That's the issue for me. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 15:10, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I do not understand your answer. I will try again. If you agree then it means that the manual of style does not ONLY discuss transgendered individuals, but includes ALL incidences of self identification. If you disagree it means that the manual of style ONLY discusses transgendered individuals in this identity matter. Your answer seemed to go both ways. So do you agree or disagree? --Blue Tie 00:24, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

My answer is very simple. I am concerned with self-identification as a guide for transgendered individuals, not any wider policy discussions. The manual of style discusses transgendered individuals and I support that specific sentence containing that specific guideline ('This includes referring to transgender individuals according to the names and pronouns they use to identify themselves.' I am not interested in a wider policy discussion involving deluded individuals, etc. - just in properly dealing with pronouns for transgendered individuals on WP articles like that of murdered transsexual Brandon Teena, on whose page this discussion emerged. That's my context and my interest. One sentence that indicates the proper usage for transgendered individuals. Nothing more. I do hope that's a clear enough answer. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 00:27, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

OK. I think we do not have much to discuss, because we are talking about two different things. I am referring to the whole section on self identification (and verifiability in regard to that) and you are talking about a subset without the context of the whole policy. I see no way to discuss the smaller issue out of the context of the larger issue; they are related by intent of the style manual. However, now it makes sense to me that you would not have understood or appreciated my examples if you were unilaterally limiting the discussion to a the subset while I was addressing the more global issue. As an aside, though, I suppose there is a question about whether people suffering from gender identity disorders and intersexed persons should be treated under different rules of respect than other people with identity troubles. If so, perhaps the two issues should be separated. Then we could have rules that only pertain to GID/intersexed persons and other rules that pertain to people with other identity issues. I'm not sure that would be proper though. --Blue Tie 01:07, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

I just wanted to briefly add that the Jan Morris article seems like a better model than Wendy Carlos: it manages to be clear about Morris's situation, while still using the female pronoun throughout, and it does so by simply stating the facts at the beginning of the relevant paragraph; it does not have the confusing 'read between the lines' attitude of the Carlos article.Cop 633 16:00, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

My 2c is that Wikipedia's policy here is the fairest approach. I don't support giving an inch to those who want to describe someone who considered themselves male with a female pronoun, any more than I would support describing a black man as a "nigger". Grace Note 00:45, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

And if that black man self-identifies as white? Would you ban all references to him ever being black or called black by others? --GunnarRene 16:21, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

As an alternate solution, what about creating a template for transgender individuals to display at the top of the page explaining their birth gender and their preferred gender identification, then stating the Wikipedia standard that they will be referred to by their preferred gender? This eliminates confusion and still refers to people by the pronoun that they themselves prefer. Queerudite 18:28, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Should we add a disambiguation link to WP:SG!?

Please participate in the following discussion. --J.L.W.S. The Special One 13:10, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Image sizing, again.

The section on image sizing was recently changed, on what appear to be spurious grounds to allow image sizing "On a lead image that captures the essence of the article". I can see no good reason for this; and image sizing is, as the rest of that section says, a very bad idea. I propose to remove that wording. Andy Mabbett 21:15, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

That was apparently the agreed wording which was voted upon. A more curious question is why it was originally left out. G-Man * 21:33, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

From the discussion cited, there was, clearly, no such agreement. Andy Mabbett 21:55, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Look above, the version with the clause in it was the option which recieved the most votes. G-Man * 20:05, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Read the discussion: Wikipedia is not a democracy. Andy Mabbett 23:10, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Past-by Typo?

Hi, I was reading the article and came across "When a player moves past “Go”, that player collects $200." As an example of "Good" style. Isn't it "passed" rather than "past"? I think the last is only used "in the past sense" (sorry poor joke). Victuallers 10:54, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

No — surely in passing go he "passed 'Go'" but "moved past 'Go'". I'm sure somebody will chip in with the proper names for these parts of speech. – Kieran T ^(talk) 10:59, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

• I think I leant something... I have always used passed. I didn't relaise past was an adverd, but dictionary.com says it is. Thanks for your time Victuallers 13:44, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I have to contradict myself ... I typed "A car went past" into Word. Its grammar checker says that it is not a sentence as there is no verb. Is there an English expert out there? (I'm not as its my 1st language!). Obviosly if you change it to "passed" then its OK. Is this a UK/US thing? What does an american version of Word say? Victuallers 19:38, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

That sentence does have a verb: went. The adverb past tells how the car went. If you change it to passed, then it's a sentence with two verbs and it makes no sense. Recast the sentence in present tense and use passing to see it more clearly. I don't know what Word says, but it doesn't matter; Word is not the arbiter of English grammar and usage. The Monopoly example in the stylebook is correct, too. In that case, past is a preposition telling where the player is moving in relation to Go. The word past can be in many parts of speech. --Rob Kennedy 20:09, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Soccer/Football

If there is a dispute over what to call this sport in an article the article's subject is not region specific (like a video game that gets released worldwide), how should it be handled? Should it follow the spelling guidelines regarding different varieties of English (use what the article originally said, i.e. use "honor" instead of "honour" if that is what the articles creator used in it)? TJ Spyke 07:48, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

I think within an article, it should follow the first contributor rule. However, in naming categories and deciding on titles for articles, for example, there may be some value in uniformity across a number of related articles/categories. If a uniform decision had to be made, the greater popularity of soccer in Britain might be considered. However, the ambiguity of "football" is an argument in favour of "soccer". Within articles, I don't think this makes a shred of difference, so there should be no preference. Joeldl 12:34, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Proposal for changes to the "National varieties of English" section

I agree with the basic principles underlying this system, but would like to propose some changes. The first two should be straightforward and uncontroversial. Joeldl 12:45, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I think the principle has a major flaw: Many contributors don’t obey to one variety of English (even if they said they did), if such could be defined clearly in the first place — limiting it to “national varieties” is even harder. Template:User Mixed English has over 250 users transcluding it on their user pages and not all of them are non-native speakers of the language. Many articles can’t be geographicaly bound to one regiolect. I don’t think it’s a problem to use petrol and gasoline alongside each other inside one article, because they are synonyms, in everyone’s passive vocabulary at least. I would very much welcome a set of rules selecting one preferred form for each of the major systematic cases (-re/-er, -ise/-ize, -yse/-yze, -ou-/-o-, -ell-/-el-, æ|œ/ae|oe/e, …).

Let’s be brave, let’s make the MoS more prescriptive. — Christoph Päper 19:17, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if it was just a poor example, but I know from reading Talk:Gasoline that petrol and gasoline are not "in everyone's passive vocabulary" with many editors (perhaps falsly) claiming to have never heard of one or the other, or not known they were synonyms, before coming to the article. — The Storm Surfer 00:56, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Possibly correctly. There is a novel by Arthur Ransome, which depends in part on the characters not knowing the synonymy. It's a juvenile, but the older characters are of the same age as many of our readers, and some of our editors. Other examples would probably be worse. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:12, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

"Provoking conflict"

• Move the comment "If an article is predominantly written in one type of English, aim to conform to that type rather than provoke conflict by changing to another. (Sometimes, this can happen quite innocently, so please do not be too quick to make accusations!)" to Rule 4 rather than Rule 1. First note that the rules are given "in rough order of precedence". Rules 1 and 2 are precisely designed to specify cases where changes are justified, and this language suggests that even justified changes might provoke conflict. This is counterproductive because people should be encouraged to accept changes based on these rules rather than reject them. This language was originally lower down in the list. Joeldl 12:45, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • • Support - I agree with the rough-order-of-precedence argument: this belongs after those rules identifying when changes are justified. Rule 4 is the best place for this: it compliments the point already there. I do smile, though, when I read "this language suggests that even justified changes might provoke conflict" ... all the justification in the world is no guarantee against conflict. Jimp 16:49, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
      • You're right. I guess what I'm saying is that Wikipedia shouldn't be presenting conflict caused by improvements to the encyclopedia as something to be avoided. Joeldl 09:37, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

"Rarely the case"

• Remove the comment "which will rarely be the case" from under Rule 4. Rules 1 through 3 give good reasons to change spelling/usage in cases which cannot be described as "rare", and this language seems to create a presumption against those arguing that the requisite conditions for changes under Rules 1 through 3 apply. This change was made over the objections of one editor (in his edit summary) on 24 December 2006, and I can locate no talk page discussion of the change. Joeldl 12:45, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • • Support - No, these cases are not really rare and even if they were what use would it be of noting this here? Jimp 16:49, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Oppose — These cases are rare because, first, this section is talking about wholesale changing of the entire article (not changing one errant spelling which would fall under Articles should use the same spelling system and grammatical conventions throughout.) so the only reason lefit is If there is a strong tie to a specific region/dialect, use that dialect. and:

1. Most articles do not have such a tie.
2. Articles that do tend to start out in that dialect, either through conscientious editors or because such articles are usually started by people who speak the dialect in question. – The Storm Surfer 01:04, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, "rare" is an exaggeration, even if it is only warranted in a minority of cases. It seems to me that it is quite likely that in articles of international interest, a "haphazard mix" may well have developed through lack of attention. In that case one needs to change perhaps half the spellings, in some cases more if you need to resort to the "first major contributor" rule. A second issue is that it's only rare if you assume that other people are abiding by the rules in the first place. Finally, it is not rare that disagreement may arise about whether an article is country-related, particularly when a subject has some aspects of worldwide interest and others of interest to only one or a few English-speaking countries. In such cases the article may well have been started by people not from those countries. For example, it is entirely conceivable that an American interested in France might start an article on some aspect of EU law. Then other editors are justified in changing it to UK/Irish usage. People who are not knowledgeable about the rules may be comforted in the idea that the guidelines support them, because it is supposedly "rarely the case" that changes are needed. Joeldl 02:05, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Comment - Justification for a wholesale changing of an entire article does arise and, whilst not all that common, it seems to arise (in my experience) more often than really fits with its description as "rare". That aside, though, what I question is the use of noting this "rarity" at all. These words don't really seem to add anything. You either have such a case or you don't - whether these cases be rare or not has no effect on what should be done in them. Therefore I support this suggestion of Joeldl's. Jimp 02:21, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

"Haphazard mix"

• Relax the "one dialect only" rule to concern specific points of usage/spelling only. The "one dialect" rule seems like a needless fixation to me. Of course, nobody wants to see both honor and honour in the same article. I would also agree that you don't want color and honour. But what difference does it make if you have honor and centre (which is actually a possible combination in some countries, but that's beside the point)? This rule also means that we have to go back and look for evidence of what the original author's dialect was. This is not always possible because you may see centre, but you still don't know whether the person is Canadian, British or other, so you can't conclude whether to write tyre or tire. And you may well, for example, have direct knowledge that the original author was Canadian, but you still can't conclude whether they would have written honour (predominant in Canada) or honor (common alternative). Some would suggest the original author in some sort plant a flag on the article with, for example, a "UK spelling" tag, but this seems quite undignified to me. Let them plant a flag with whatever words they happen to use. Also, I don't see any reason why the use of elevator instead of lift in one part of the article means that one has to write gasoline instead of petrol elsewhere. Again, the fact that two words may be distributed without a definite pattern across multiple English-speaking countries makes this rule difficult to apply.

  So my proposal is to apply the single-dialect rule only to specific points of usage in which the coexistence of different practices would produce an impression of disunity of the article. I believe this means essentially:

• Don't use different words to mean the same thing (e.g., petrol and gasoline). This might extend to whole sets of words in specialized areas of vocabulary, rather than just individual ones, but judgments would need to be made on an individual basis.
• Don't use the same word to mean different things in a way that would be confusing. (Try to avoid using college in both the American sense of "university" and the Canadian sense of "level intermediate between secondary school and university" when referring to educational institutions in China, for example. In this case, though, the "Use words common to all" rule would probably kick in anyway.)
• Use consistent punctuation, capitalization practices, etc., throughout the article, but if two English-speaking countries disagree on unrelated points (e.g., use of quotation marks on one hand and use of periods in such abbreviations as Dr. on the other), no effort needs to be made to align usage with the preferences of a particular country.
• Don't use different spellings of the same word.
• Don't mix spellings in a single family of words. This means a definite choice needs to be made in the -ise/-ize, -our/or, -re/-er groups and similar families.

These guidelines may seem unwieldy, and they are indeed difficult to state. But they are easy to apply, because, basically, what they say is not to worry about the "one dialect" rule except where it really matters. Joeldl 12:45, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• • • Comment - I spell it colourisation could live with colourization or colorization but colorisation seems decidedly odd to me. One of my own edits followed the logic color therefore nanometers (as opposed to nanometres which is my prefered spelling). I hadn't been aware that honor and centre was actually a possible combination in some countries (which is not beside the point whilst the one-dialect rule remains in place). But this, to me, would seem to be covered by the impression-of-disunity bit ... to me that is. Is not impression of disunity, then, perhaps a little vague? Unwieldy, difficult to state, open to interpretation ... is this the right direction? On the other hand, I do agree with the concern about trying to figure out the dialect of the first non-stub major contributor but is this even necessary? If you can't determine whether the dialect is Canadian or British and you want to write tyre/tire, it's your call, you narrow it down. However, if the article has sentences like "The mediæval traveller would often practise maths at organised reflexion centres so as to avoid diarrhœa." you shouldn't feel free to throw a color into the mix. Jimp 16:49, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
      • I think color would be strange in it mainly because it is so obvious the sentence was chosen specifically to illustrate British spelling. Personally, I wouldn't particularly mind seeing "the color of his reflexion", but even that is unlikely to appear because it would be unusual to insert a word in someone else's sentence and for that word to happen to be of variable spelling. I think some of us may just have a subconscious desire to be able to attribute a hypothetical nationality to "the" author of an article. But of course, there is no single author, and perhaps the lengths we should go to to guarantee the appearance of a single author should be limited. In practice it places an extra burden on us to have the rules be nationality-based because we have to consider all the possibilities in various countries when the nationality of the original author is unknown, when there even is a single author. Theoretically, I would prefer to leave "disunity" open to interpretation so that extreme cases can be dealt with individually.

        Canadians are used to seeing mix-and-match spellings. For them, anything goes except the more peculiar British spellings like tyre and kerb. Apart from maths, your example would be entirely possible in Canada. Organised is possible, but unusual. Some newspapers in Canada use color. My sense is that all of the words in the sentence except maths and organised could coexist with color, because all the spellings except organised are frequent in Canada (although practise and reflexion are in the minority), as is color. Organised, though possible, would strike people as particularly British-leaning, and people know color is the American spelling, so organised and color can coexist in the same country but probably not in the same newspaper. I don't think it's really worth sorting out what combinations are possible unless people have a genuine aesthetic problem with these combinations, and I'm saying I don't. Those who do in the U.K. or elsewhere are just as likely to be shocked at some combinations that are possible in Canada as they are at truly impossible ones. I guess the importance of this kind of consistency is a matter of personal taste for people, but I doubt Canadians would be shocked by anything you threw at them. Joeldl 18:19, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

      • By the way, colorise is the main entry in the New Zealand Oxford. It sort of makes sense because -ise/-ize makes you think of French/Latin/Greek words and a very English u doesn't really belong there. Sort of like humorous. Joeldl 10:36, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

It is interesting that you should mention the word tyre, because the original British spelling has flipped between the two versions:

"1485, "iron rim of a carriage wheel," probably from tire "equipment, dress, covering" (c.1300), an aphetic form of attire. The notion is of the tire as the dressing of the wheel. The original spelling was tyre, which had shifted to tire in 17c.-18c., but since early 19c. tyre has been revived in Great Britain and become standard there."

The I spelling is still considered valid in the UK, albeit very rarely used. Likewise, -ize versus -ise; modern uses of the Z apparently derive from the original British spellings of those words, and this too is apparently considered by some etymlogists to be a valid alternative spelling in British English, despite falling out of use a long time ago. Adrian M. H. 17:35, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

"I think color would be strange in it mainly because it is so obvious the sentence was chosen specifically to illustrate British spelling." yeah, it was a bit of an over-kill but you get what I mean. "The color of his reflexion", whilst a little unusual is still able to claim closeness to its Latin roots compare this to "the colour of his center". You write, Joeldl, "I don't think it's really worth sorting out what combinations are possible unless people have a genuine aesthetic problem with these combinations, and I'm saying I don't." You may not have such a problem, others may claim to, how do we sort out whether the be genuine problems or not? It's all very subjective: haphazard mixes are okay unless they produce an impression of disunity you write. Some might argue that any such mix produces such an impression. Jimp 03:13, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose - needlessly complex. — Omegatron 02:09, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

• The basic rule I am proposing is to is to say that inconsistency need only be avoided if such inconsistency is confusing or distracting, and the examples I gave are just examples, similar to the examples of country-related topics given lower down. It may be more difficult to state, but it is easier to apply for two reasons. First, it means there are fewer cases where action needs to be taken. Second, the current system is difficult to apply because you need to try to piece together the hypothetical original author's dialect (which may not exist because there are multiple authors), and then make judgments about what that person would have preferred. Since at this point we may not know their dialect, this involves consideration of all possibilities in all countries. I am saying we should just look and see that the original author wrote -ize, and reflection hence we should write -ize and connection, but this says nothing about -or/-our, and we are free to choose. Currently, we need to think about the fact that -ize and reflection most likely mean that the author is Canadian or American, and choose among possible spellings for the U.S. and Canada. But it is possible that the author was among the minority of Britons who write "reflection" and "organize". Or, maybe we know the "original" author was Canadian. What do we do then? Does an American editor let Canadian usage claim the entire article, even though the first author didn't use any non-U.S. spellings? As you can see, the apparent "simplicity" of the current system stems only from what it leaves unsaid and the details it leaves unresolved on how to apply it. Joeldl 08:47, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

• More important than counting how many cases there be in which action need be taken, question how clear it be whether such action need be taken or not. What seems confusing or distracting to one might not seem that way to another. Either "~or" or "~our" sit comfortably with "~ize" and "~ection" so, yes, the option should be considered open, but "~or" does seem odd next to "~ise" and "~exion" (I don't believe Kiwis write this way no matter what the New Zealand Oxford might say), so, "~ise" and "~exion" entail "~our" (unless the editor can come up with a good reason for "~or"). Jimp 03:13, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

• You are certainly right about New Zealanders writing "colour". The question is whether to delete the u in suffixed forms such as colorise, by analogy with humorous and other cases. I think they're exactly like Britons as regards color appearing alongside organise. Joeldl 14:41, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

• It depends on the suffix. The u is always dropped when you add an ~ous and never dropped when you add an ~ed (you wouldn't write colour & colored), when you add ~ise/~ize, though, you'd usually keep the u but I'd have to admit that dropping it may be possible (Is this the norm in NZ?). Of course, never say "never" nor say "always". Jimp 15:56, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose. Complicated, unnecessary, and subjective (who says what's confusing or distracting?). --Mel Etitis (Talk) 12:10, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose Current system is unequivocal, which is definitely necessary in this regard. Quadzilla99 12:12, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose. I find "honor" and "centre" jarring ("honour" and "center", which can both occur in high-formal AmE, and I think in some CE, would be less so.) Note that AmE "college" differs from "university": "University" implies graduate schools; "college" suggest that there are none. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:12, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

• I don't know if honour and centre are possible in the U.S., but they are both the majority spelling in Canada, with honor and center in the minority. I agree with the U.S. distinction you've drawn between college and university in the U.S., except that all universities are also colleges, but not conversely. It is common in the U.S. to say, "He's going to college next year," even if the "college" is Harvard. I think there are some newspapers in Canada where you would find honor and centre together, so this would be an acceptable combination under any rules. Joeldl 21:47, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

  This source says that centre is preferred 93%-7% in Canada. Honor predominates in newspapers, while honour is in the majority in academic publications. So honor and centre are an acceptable combination. Joeldl 22:09, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

"First major contributor"

• Assuming the "one dialect" rule is relaxed as above, it becomes less important to look at the first major contributor in Rule 5, and we can look at the first contributor instead. In fact, in deciding whether to write organise or organize, determine whether -ise or -ize predominates in the article (rather than identifying a hypothetical dialect). If this is impossible to determine or disagreement persists, just look for the first ever occurrence in the article of a word in the -ise/-ize family. This is an objective rule that will make it unnecessary to determine the nationality of the first major contributor, and, if they turn out to be Britsh/Australian, etc., to guess whether they would have preferred -ise or -ize. (The Oxford prefers -ize, though this is a minority spelling in Britain, Australia, etc.) Also, one criticism I see of the "first major contributor" rule is that there may have been many contributors before the article stopped being a stub, and the person who removed the "stub" template may not have done much at all. If all we have to do is look for the first occurrence of petrol/gasoline for example, without regard to the significance of that editor's other contributions, we have a simple criterion that is not unfair, given that the effect will be limited to the determination of a single vocabulary choice rather than the dialect of the entire article, and the criterion does not call for an evaluation of the importance of various editors' contributions. Joeldl 12:45, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose - needless rules creep. "first significant contributor" is fine. this is a last resort already — Omegatron 02:11, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

• In this case, the new rule is not any more complex to state than the other one. We are just deleting "significant". It is useful because it provides a more easily and objectively applied criterion. Joeldl 08:53, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
  • That would enable people to go around writing substubs to "claim" the article for their particular dialect. There are some who think the entire encyclopedia should be in their dialect because it's more common among internet users or more "correct" for historical reasons. The current wording is best. — Omegatron 12:48, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

• With the previous proposal, they would only "claim" it for -ize or -our or whatever words they happened to use. Also, the current system says nothing about what happens when many people contribute before it stops being a stub. In that case, which is frequent, "major" remains undefined. Joeldl 18:25, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

• Support. It makes sense to have an objective criterion, easily settled. --Mel Etitis (Talk) 11:44, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
• Weak Oppose The level we mean is objectively defined: the first to make more than a stub; and this would make it more difficult to rewrite an article in the appropriate dialect - an article about an MP should use British parliamentary proceedure. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:16, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

"Nationally predominant form"

• Relax the rule about a "nationally predominant form". The reality is that any English written by academics or journalists in an English-speaking country is, with few exceptions, easy to understand. I don't think we should have to determine whether soda or pop is "nationally predominant" in the United States. Either could be found in academic writing or in the press anywhere in the United States. Although pop is more common in Canada, English-speaking Quebecers say (and write) "soft drink", never "pop", and "soft drink" would also be understood anywhere. Along the same lines, eaves troughs is more common in Canada than gutters, but not in Quebec. Scotland in particular is well known to have its own vocabulary distinct from England's, not only in informal contexts, but appearing in academic writing, etc., as well. The press and academic authors "self-censor" somewhat so that regional words they think unlikely to be known to outsiders appear less often in their writing. But on the other hand, there are some well established regional words which people may consciously or unconsciously retain in their writing. Since, ultimately, the press and academic authors are our model at Wikipedia, there is no need to expect people to self-censor beyond what they already do naturally when writing for a national or, in the case of articles of international interest, international, audience. I would rename the entire section to "Geographic varieties of English", and say that there is no preference among geographic varieties of English, so long as usage conforms to what might be anticipated from a speaker of a particular variety writing in an academic context or in the press. There is little doubt that this includes the use of some regional words as well as "national" ones, and Wikipedia should allow this. Joeldl 12:45, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree, to a degree: it is clear that there is no clear standard for what constitutes "American English", "Canadian English", "British English", or "Australian English", and editors have some leeway within the standards, allowing for certain variations within the regional mix. On the other hand, there are some really unlikely combinations that don't generally occur, and those really need to be avoided: -or -ise mixes, for example: very rarely is the word "colorised" seen (I think that was mentioned). We don't care about an exact definition of what constitutes any Canadian English, for example, but we need a standard to which to keep articles. I support this idea, but only to the extent that it acknowledges that individual varieties are themselves unstable - anything more, and we are arguing to allow gross inconsistency in articles. Nihiltres^(t.c.s) 17:32, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I think spelling does tend to be more of a national thing rather than regional within countries, so this is really much more about vocabulary than spelling. As far as spelling is concerned, I don't think it's worth trying to prevent -or/-ise mixes for reasons explained under "Haphazard mix". Joeldl 18:46, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I must say that I believe that the opposite of relaxation should happen. Wikipedia needs a standard form of the language to use. If it is not a standard form of a language, confusion can result. All of the English posting should be done on one standard, for example BBC English; without uniformity, a encyclopedia is nothing.Spacedwarv 01:50, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

I think the inclusive nature of these guidelines is something for Wikipedia to be proud of. If a single standard were chosen, there is little doubt that it would be American English, the form used by two-thirds of the world's English-speakers. Currently, the guidelines lead to the result that about two-thirds of what's written is in American English, for that very reason, and that seems fair. Joeldl 10:17, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

• Yeah, the words "nationally predominant" should be changed to something not related to nations, like "officially defined" or something. Like a dialect for which an official dictionary exists. — Omegatron 02:13, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

There are no "official" dictionaries of English, just dictionaries that claim to record usage. Good dictionaries record words specific to places like Scotland, New England, etc. Joeldl 08:50, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

A provision for common sense may be useful; but do we really want to write Daniel Webster in New Hampshire dialect? Written subnational dialects really don't differ all that much; and soda/pop really only falls under the "leave it alone" parts of this rule anyway; it's not (now) tied to any particular variety of English. (Local brands, like Moxie, probably should follow local dialect; adding translations might be a good thing.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:23, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Written subnational dialects do differ, most notably in Scotland, but elsewhere as well on issues of vocabulary. I think one of soda or pop might well fail the "nationally predominant" criterion, but common sense tells us that its application, at least in this case, makes no sense. Let me turn this around. It is understood that in the context of the Manual of Style, we are only talking about written Scottish English, etc. In what cases would the "nationally predominant" criterion disallow something in a way that was justified? Joeldl 21:58, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

References

When did the MoS start explicitly to endorse the gimmicky templates for references? Was there discussion of this?

As these templates produce very small references, creating problems for those with visual impairment and for readers using small screens, shouldn't they be deprecated rather than endorsed? --Mel Etitis (Talk) 10:08, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

By “gimmicky templates,” are you referring to the citation templates, the <ref> and <references/> tags, or the {{reflist}} template? Fyslee added the text that now resides under the “Footnotes” heading on November 15.[2] Not quite a week later, Gunslinger47 added the link to Wikipedia:Footnotes for further information.[3]

The <ref> tag produces superscripted links to full references elsewhere on the page. If the superscript appears small, it’s because your browser is configured to show text in <sup> tags that way. The <references/> tag doesn’t do anything with font sizes. The {{reflist}} template wraps the <references/> tag in a <div> with class “references-small,” which sets the text smaller.

Firefox and Opera both allow users to specify minimum font sizes. When I set a minimum in Firefox, it seems to be effective at making the superscript text no smaller than the normal text.

Discussions about the visual appearance of references occurred in February 2006: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 45#Changes to Cite., Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 46#Changes to Cite. (continued). I didn’t check at Wikipedia:Footnotes, but it seems there wasn’t much discussion here about citation style. So let’s discuss it now. What exactly are you objecting to? --Rob Kennedy 19:14, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

The list of references produced by the templates (such as {{reflist}}, {{ref2}}, etc., is in a very small font, and creates problems for those with visual impairments and for those using small screens (see [[Wikipedia:Footnote3#Footnotes|Footnote3, n.4). <References/> produces a perfectly acceptable and readable list without this handicap. Those insisting on its use say, essentially, that that's a small price to pay for the supposed prettiness of the results, and anyway visually impaired people can increase the size of their fonts. The first part is simply unacceptable; the second part isn't a good response — why should such readers have to read using a much larger font than is comfortable for the main text just so that they can read the notes? That some browsers offer a way round this isn't enough; it would have to be all browsers (or, at least, all browsers that show different font sizes; Lynx, for example, isn't affected). I don't think that IE allows this, and (like it or not) it's extremely common.

The reason that many printed publications use a smaller font for the notes is to decrease the space taken up; Wikipedia isn't a paper encyclopædia, and I can see no good reason for using anything but <references/>. --Mel Etitis (Talk) 08:55, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Notes and references are usually by convention smaller in font size. To increase font size in Internet Explorer, simply go to "View" menu, then the "Text Zoom" option, then just change the desired font size (100%, 200%, etc). RaNdOm26 15:18, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

To be honest, it will be very foolish for an internet browser that cannot modify font sizes. ALL internet browsers I've used CAN do it, and i'm currently using both Safari and Internet Explorer. RaNdOm26 15:42, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Random, you’ve missed the point. When you simply increase the browser font size in order to make the small text readable, you also make the normal body text larger than needed. That’s what Mel said “isn’t a good response,” above, and I agree. What I pointed out before that was that some browsers let the user specify a minimum font size, so requests for smaller text will be ignored. Set the minimum size equal to the normal size, and no text will be smaller than what’s readable. Internet Explorer doesn’t support that feature, apparently, which is unfortunate since it’s really the best solution. By setting a minimum font size, users affected by small fonts will benefit on all sites they visit, not just Wikipedia. --Rob Kennedy 01:59, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

The desire to take up less space isn’t just about the danger of using too much paper. That danger obviously isn’t an issue on a Web page. I see some large reference sections and think, “wow, this is taking up a lot of space.” It’s not because I’m afraid of running out of space at the bottom of the page, but simply because I find the section bulky and clunky. The smaller text lessens that effect. I won’t try to judge whether the price is large or small.

Your reference to the fourth footnote of Footnote3 doesn’t make much sense. For one thing, page it links to says almost nothing about font size, and certainly doesn’t advise that fonts can become too small to read or that footnotes should not be set smaller. And the footnote merely says that “if footnotes are too small, then they are difficult for some people to use.” That’s pretty vague because it doesn’t say how small “too small” is. Is it your position that any size smaller than the browser’s default should be considered too small? --Rob Kennedy 01:59, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Mel Etitis keeps on insisting that reflist should not be used per MoS but if you check the MoS it could be used and almost all articles including featured and good articles use reflist! He says that only the references/ should be used per MoS!-chris^_^ 02:04, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Er, this is the MoS Talk page; it's not a question of checking it, but of deciding what it should say. --Mel Etitis (Talk) 08:55, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

It's very clear to me that if someone wants to change the size of EVERY references section, the way to do it is by changing the CSS, not by wrapping them all in tags. — The Storm Surfer 03:53, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Is the change in size that great? Have there been complaints that reflist is too small to read? I can hardly tell the difference so i don't think people who are able to read the normal text unassisted would have a issue with reading the reflist text unassisted.Harlock jds 10:37, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

"Further reading"?

I've been working on American Goldfinch, and there is an extensive section at the end called "Further reading", which consists of a list of books, articles, and thesis papers concerning the bird. None of them are links, it's just a list of articles. I've cut it down to just the ones that directly concern only the American Goldfinch, but it's still huge, and I'm not sure what to do with it. Nothing in the Manual of Style really addresses it. Any advice would be appreciated. Hey jude, don't let me down 00:25, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Redlinks in disambiguation pages

Discussion moved to Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (disambiguation pages).

Possible MoS Issues

Posted at VP

---

Non evident risk in articles lacking critical references

Related: [Risk disclaimer] [Manual of Style] [Biographies of living persons]

Terms: Non Evident Risk – a risk that that has an established reality, but which within a given context is not apparent.

Current Position: Wikipedia has well established practice in how it approaches ‘risk’ and this is addressed through the use of the Disclaimer statements.

Need for Change: The matter of risk applies predominantly to articles dealing with some form of human activity and in most of those articles the risk that attaches to the activity discussed is entirely self evident, for example Rock Climbing will be understood by an reasonable person as an inherently risky activity. However there are some articles where the tone of the article and/or the absence of critical references, coupled with a received wisdom regarding the activity which endorses it as risk free, effectively disguising the risk even where medical, scientific or reasoned observational evidence suggests that risk exists.

Scope for Change: Any change would necessarily be limited to matters of established physical and psychological risk, as would be understood by as such by any reasonable person.

It seems unlikely that there would be any appetite amongst editors to change the way that Disclaimers are currently used, although it would not be overly problematic to introduce a more prominent display of the Risk Disclaimer for articles where critical references are lacking.

The obvious response is to say that relevant articles be improved by the inclusion of critical references, however without policy change this may not always be achievable as editors may be reluctant to include references which do not precisely link to the subject of the article. (see example)

A further and unequivocally desirable improvement also depends upon an improvement in reference discipline – that is to ensure references and links to organisations which are active in risk reduction in an appropriate field. Here we can return to the example of Rock Climbing where numerous sport bodies actively promote and discuss the reduction of risk in an inherently risky pursuit.

Example of a number of associated problem articles: [[4]] [[5]]

The core article is a Biography of a Living Person and although a number of critical references are included, none address an activity which is presented in positive terms within the core article and six associated articles – that is the practice of meditation, an activity which the subject of the Biography has a long history of promoting. Neither the core article, nor the associated articles use a wikilink to the Wikipedia article [[6]], which itself does include an Adverse Effects section which clearly demonstrates potential risks in meditational practice. Clearly there are editors who have decided that there is some constraint upon linking to the Meditation article, demonstrating either that there is a need to challenge the thinking behind that execise of constraint, or otherwise if wikipedia rules require such constraint, then to re-examine the how the Risk Disclaimer is displayed within certain articles.

Nik Wright2 14:48, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Who vs whom?

Does MoS have a view? - Kittybrewster (talk) 10:59, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't see anything in the manual stating that the word whom should be replaced by who, but I do see the word whom in the text of the manual. — The Storm Surfer 05:05, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

It is, however, an increasingly archaic usage - especially in standalone form without a preposition - that only hangs on because prescriptivists won't let it die. The Guardian manual of style says Use of "whom" has all but disappeared from spoken English, and seems to be going the same way in most forms of written English too. This is also the view of Geoff Pullum, the linguistics professor who's the co-author of The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language. We're talking about Malcolm Arbuthnot:

• following her adultery with the poet John Gould Fletcher, whom she later married.
• following her adultery with the poet John Gould Fletcher, who she later married.

Tearlach 14:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

It's not considered "archaic" by British English dictionaries (or at least, Chambers and Oxford), although I see that it is considered so by dictionary.com. In some languages they have several of these cases; it doesn't seem too unreasonable to expect people to know how to interpret two... ;) – Kieran T ^(talk) 14:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I guess it's a prescriptivism vs descriptivism thing. The Oxford, as dictionaries go, is quite prescriptive (as in its stance of supporting "-ize" endings against the general trend of UK usage). Tearlach 15:07, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Please, let's not fall to the level of the Grauniad. This is formal writing; when whom is correct (as in the sample sentence), use whom. --Trovatore 08:28, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The joke's on Tearlach. The sentence containing "... only hangs on because prescriptivists won't let it die" is one of the most prescriptivist things I've seen in many a long day. It's probably best if descriptivists stick to describing the language and grammar that people actually use. "Whom" is very healthy in my world. I could not possibly do without it. JackofOz 13:00, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Let's stop inventing linguistic –isms and focus on formulating a sensible solution using both descriptive and prescriptive frameworks. Anyone who labels themselves as a "prescriptivist" or a "descriptivist" as if there are two opposing poles should probably not be editing here. Strad 01:17, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

It's not considered archaic in American English circles. I forget her full list of citations, but a Grammar Girl podcast stated that whom is alive and well as a pronoun when used as an object. —C.Fred (talk) 01:22, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Cannabis v marijuana

There is a debate going on at Talk:Legal history of marijuana in the United States over whther the article should eb called cannabis or marijuana. One editor is claiming that as the article relates to the US it must be marijuana whereas another editor (me) argues that it should be cannabis as all the cannabis articles (eg Cannabis (drug) are callaed cannabis. The other editor has gone so far as to say that MoS insists that because the article relates to the US MoS demands it must be callaed marijuana whereas I think allt he articles should be callaed cannabis for consistency. I cant see that MoS comments on this particular tyope of issue and absolutely should do so, SqueakBox 20:04, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure if a good case could be made that marijuana is the American version of cannabis. — The Storm Surfer 05:07, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm sort of sure that a good case could be made that it isn't. Jimp 05:33, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

As stated on Talk:Legal history of marijuana in the United States:

In 1937 Marihuana Tax Act Section 1. B "The term 'marihuana' means all parts of the plant Cannabis sativa L., whether growing or not; the seeds thereof; the resin extracted from any part of such plant; and every compound, manufacture, salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation of such plant, its seeds, or resin- but shall not include the mature stalks of such plant, fiber produced from such stalks, oil or cake made from the seeds of such plant, any other compound, manufacture, salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation of such mature stalks (except the resin extracted therefrom), fiber, oil, or cake, or the sterilized seed of such plant which is incapable of germination."

Marijuana is the term that has been used in most all scientific reports in the United States (see Decriminalization of marijuana in the United States#References for examples) and in United States Government titles such as, the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse, most every publication from the DEA regarding marijuana.

Wikipedia:Search engine test

• On Google, which also searches non-American web sites, marijuana returns 2,900,000 more articles than cannabis (as of May 16)
• On Google news, 'marijuana' returns 18,528 articles, but 'cannabis' only reterns 2,879 articles (as of May 16).

Marijuana is listed in multiple dictionaries (WordNet, American Heritage, Random House Unabridged Dictionary) and there is no reference to it being slang, because is the most common word for cannabis in the United States. —User:Christopher Mann McKay^{user talk} 07:13, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, this is necessarily subjective but: Yes, I agree that "marijuana" is not slang. However "cannabis" sounds more formal, dispassionate, "scientific", "clinical". Therefore, to my ear, "cannabis" is preferable in an encyclopedia. I am American. --Trovatore 07:30, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Original spelling

We've just had the semi-annual WP:LAME debate at Talk:Yoghurt, in which some editors claimed that the usage of the original conmtributor was a reason to overturn the established spelling. I propose to add a few words to "If all else fails", denying this; if anyone disagrees, revert. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:31, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Making the MOS into a guiding hand usable by human editors

Our Manual of Style is lengthy, comprehensive and really sucks to read. Compare to something really readable, like Fowler's or Strunk & White. Or even Chicago. Have you ever picked up those books and thought "this is really good, I can use this stuff"? I'd hope you had.

But, rather than being a guideline for thoughtful application by editors seeking guidance in writing effective encyclopedia entries, it's become a sequence of programming instructions for bots.

Our MOS should be something that editors will want to read.

Here's my attempt to make the intro readable.

Anyone want to help recast the rest of the megabytes of MOS as thoughtful guidance in English, rather than programming instructions for bots? - David Gerard 15:21, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

It's been noted on wikien-l that the structure is apparently good for looking stuff up. So it's mostly a matter of tone - David Gerard 00:38, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I do want to help; micro-trimming and copy-editing is required throughout. The shorter the better, particularly for non-expert readers. Tony 01:58, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

• I suggest that, bit by bit, the language of the MOS be changed from imperative (orders such as "Do this", "... should be ...", etc.) to indicative (descriptions of practice, such as "This is done", etc). It's friendlier, is more likely to engender the kind of attitudes that the Manual is striving for, and matches changes over the past year to all of the featured criteria. If people agree to this change, gradually altering the tone thus has the advantage that it probably won't jar when only part of the Manual is indicative. See my changes to "Article names" at the top for an example. Tony 22:48, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

• I've just been gung-ho in editing the "Sections and headings" section. The "Compare edits" is all red, and thus useless for this purpose. I've set out the previous and the new versions here, subsection by subsection, to make it easier for you to check. Tony 06:23, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

• Quadzilla ponts out that the bit about initial a, an and the is now inflexible:

• articles (a, an, and the) are typically avoided, and never occur first;

It might have something like this added:

• articles (a, an, and the) are typically avoided, and never occur first, unless they begin an italicized title;

Does that do the trick? 06:49, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Seems like a good idea, it would even remind editors to italicize novel and movie titles in section headers. Sometimes they forget like in Philip K. Dick. Quadzilla99 11:09, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Lots of ugly, messy bolding at openings

Under "Article titles", we have:

"Use boldface for the first (and only the first) appearance of the title and any important synonyms (including acronyms)."

This appears to encourage openings like this:

"The Great Lakes Storm of 1913, historically referred to as the "Big Blow," the "Freshwater Fury," or the "White Hurricane," was a ...

which serves no purpose but to make the all-important top harder to read smoothly and of unattractive appearance. This is better:

The Great Lakes Storm of 1913, historically referred to as the "Big Blow", the "Freshwater Fury" or the "White Hurricane", was a ...

Lots of bold also interferes with the formatting of titles.

Does anyone object if I remove "and any important synonyms"? I they do, can we know what the purpose is? Tony 01:56, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

One purpose is for naming controversies, like Gdanzig, in which the first paragraph is:

Gdańsk (; IPA: [ɡdaɲsk]), also known by its German name Danzig () and several other names, is the sixth-largest city in Poland and is Poland's principal seaport and the capital of the Pomeranian Voivodeship.

I would put nicknames, like Tony's example, in italics, but the difference between a nickname and an alternate name gets controversial; see for example Democratic-Republican Party (United States). Regards, Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:44, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Democratic–Republican Party (note my en dash) is a good example of how speckled bolding ruins the appearance at the top. Just removing the item from the rule won't prevent people from doing it; it will just remove the compulsion. I don't think anyone would mind the "Danzig" example, with only two items bolded, short ones at that. It's a matter of good judgement, so shouldn't be overleaf, I think. Tony 22:20, 22 May 2007 (UTC) And whether in quotes or italic, who cares if it's consistent within the article? Anything but bolding, which stands out like polkadots. Tony 22:22, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Tony, I don't agree with this change; the bolding of important synonyms provides consistency in formatting in the lead; introducing italics or quotes (besides necessitating changes to almost every single article on Wikipedia) is much messier and uglier. Rather than one fontface in the lead, we'll have a mixture of bold, italic and quotes. I don't like it at all, don't see it as an improvement, and don't want to have to change every article I come across for what doesn't appear to be an improvement. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:42, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Then what about a compromise that doesn't require the dehighlighting of equivalent names, but just doesn't force it? Thus:

If possible, the article’s topic is the subject of the first sentence of the article, for example, “This Manual of Style is a style guide” instead of “This style guide is known as …”. If the article title is an important term, it appears as early as possible. The first (and only the first) appearance of the title is in boldface, including its abbreviation in parentheses, if given. Equivalent names may follow, and may or may not be boldface. Highlighted items are not linked, and boldface is not used subsequently in the first paragraph. Tony 14:27, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

That sounds good; I just don't want to introduce a whole series of fonts and types and punctuation in the lead, as I think that will look worse than several bolded terms, which are at least confined to one font style/face/type. I really don't think synonyms should be in italics or quotes. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:52, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Prematrue archiving

Spebi (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) appears to have archived this discussion, while it was still on-going. I;ve asked him to fix that. Andy Mabbett 15:11, 23 May 2007 (UTC)