User talk:NightHeron: Difference between revisions

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Welcome! (We can't say that loudly enough!)

Hello, NightHeron, and welcome to Wikipedia! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages you might find helpful:

If you have any questions or problems, no matter what they are, leave me a message on my talk page. Or, please come to the new contributors' help page, where experienced Wikipedians can answer any queries you have! Or, you can just type {{Help me}} on your user talk page, and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions.

Please sign your name on talk pages and votes by typing four tildes (~~~~); our software automatically converts it to your username and the date.

We're so glad you're here! Meatsgains^(talk) 01:24, 14 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome

Welcome to Wikipedia and Wikiproject Medicine

Welcome to Wikipedia! We have compiled some guidance for new healthcare editors:

Please keep the mission of Wikipedia in mind. We provide the public with accepted knowledge, working in a community.
We do that by finding high quality secondary sources and summarizing what they say, giving WP:WEIGHT as they do. Please do not try to build content by synthesizing content based on primary sources. (For the difference between primary and secondary sources, see WP:MEDDEF.)
Please use high-quality, recent, secondary sources for medical content (see WP:MEDRS). High-quality sources include review articles (which are not the same as peer-reviewed), position statements from nationally and internationally recognized bodies (like CDC, WHO, FDA), and major medical textbooks. Lower-quality sources are typically removed. Please beware of predatory publishers – check the publishers of articles (especially open source articles) at Beall's list.
The ordering of sections typically follows the instructions at WP:MEDMOS. The section above the table of contents is called the WP:LEAD. It summarizes the body. Do not add anything to the lead that is not in the body. Style is covered in MEDMOS as well; we avoid the word "patient" for example.
More generally see WP:MEDHOW
Reference tags generally go after punctuation, not before; there is no preceding space.
We use very few capital letters and very little bolding. Only the first word of a heading is usually capitalized.
Common terms are not usually wikilinked; nor are years, dates, or names of countries and major cities.
Do not use URLs from your university library's internal net: the rest of the world cannot see them.
Please include page numbers when referencing a book or long journal article.
Please format citations consistently within an article and be sure to cite the PMID for journal articles and ISBN for books; see WP:MEDHOW for how to format citations.
Never copy and paste from sources; we run detection software on new edits.
Talk to us! Wikipedia works by collaboration at articles and user talkpages.

Once again, welcome, and thank you for joining us! Please share these guidelines with other new editors.

– the WikiProject Medicine team Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:12, 24 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Had started discussion on the talk page.

There are concerns with the sourcing. One of the books used is self published it appears.

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:28, 24 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Ann Hibner Koblitz

Sure, it's my pleasure. The article looks great - all I really needed to do is a little work on categories. Nothing major at all.

Keep up the good work, and happy editing! --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 16:46, 24 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Recent sources

Sources should generally be from the last 10 years. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:52, 25 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Two notes

Hi and thanks for your contributions.

Would you please stop adding content like "it should be noted that..." to articles? Please see WP:EDITORIALIZING.

Would you please not use terms like "today" or "now" and the like, per WP:RELTIME? Wikipedia articles have no datelines, so everything must be anchored in time.

Thanks. Jytdog (talk) 17:44, 25 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Formatting citations

Everything comes down to sources in Wikipedia, and it is very important to provide complete citations, so that other people can use them. Other editors use them to verify the content and to build more content, and readers use them to dive deeper into the subject matter. (some readers use Wikipedia only to get quick access to the sources and pretty much ignore the content!)

There are templates for citations that are very useful. If you look at them and try to create them manually, this looks like a nightmare. I avoided templates for years and just did simple ones like this:

Begley CG, Ellis LM. (2012-03-28) Drug development: Raise standards for preclinical cancer research. Nature 483: 7391. 531–533 doi:10.1038/483531a PMID 22460880
which looks like this in wikicode: Begley CG, Ellis LM. (2012-03-28) Drug development: Raise standards for preclinical cancer research. Nature 483: 7391. 531–533 {{doi|10.1038/483531a}} {{pmid|22460880}}

But then I learned that there are automated tools that will create templated citations for you super fast and this is how I work now... and it is good for you and everybody if you use them. Below is a description first of how to autoformat refs in the "Visual editor" interface, which many new users use, and then in the older Wikitext editor. In either editor, if you are writing about health, the part of the citation we care about the most is the pmid. Please be sure to use it.

We really value references that are available free-full text, so if there is free full text version please be sure to include the pmc field for biomedical refs or a URL to a free full-text if it exists elsewhere (but don't link to a version that someone has posted online in violation of copyright - see WP:ELNEVER).

Wikitext editor

If you are working in the older Wikitext editor, in the toolbar at the top you will find near the right-hand side, the word "Cite" with is a little triangle next to it. If you click the triangle, another menu appears below. On the left side of the new menu bar, you will see "Templates". If you select (for example) "Cite journal", you can fill in the "doi" or the "PMID" field, and then if you click the little magnifying glass next to the field, the whole thing will auto-fill. If there is a pmc version of the article, this tool does not pick that up. You have to expand the "additional fields" at the bottom of the citation-creator -- you will see the "pmc" field down there, to the right. There are auto-fill fields in the templates for news, websites, and books, too.

The resulting citation will look like this:

Begley, C. Glenn; Ellis, Lee M. (2012-03-28). "Drug development: Raise standards for preclinical cancer research". Nature. 483 (7391): 531–533. doi:10.1038/483531a. PMID 22460880.

the underlying wikicode looks like this (a nightmare right? Thank goodness you don't have to generate this by hand):

{{Cite journal|last=Begley|first=C. Glenn|last2=Ellis|first2=Lee M.|date=2012-03-28|title=Drug development: Raise standards for preclinical cancer research|journal=Nature|volume=483|issue=7391|pages=531–533|doi=10.1038/483531a|pmid=22460880}}

Visual editor

If you are working in the Visual Editor, as many new editors do, there is a similar function.

Please note if you use the "Re-use" function of the Cite tool in VisualEditor, it will create a "reference name" for the original instance of the citation and the subsequent ones, that looks something like this: <ref name=":0"/> Please know that this is a software bug that the editing community has tried to get the developers to fix for a long time now because those reference names are not useful, for a bunch of reasons. (see note below for why) When you are done, please go back and change them to something that is unique and meaningful.

So if the VisualEditor did this to the original citation when you Re-used:

<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last=Begley|first=C. Glenn|last2=Ellis|first2=Lee M.|date=2012-03-28|title=Drug development: Raise standards for preclinical cancer research|journal=Nature|volume=483|issue=7391|pages=531–533|doi=10.1038/483531a|pmid=22460880}}</ref>

and did this for subsequent instances: <ref name=":0"/>

please go back and change both ref names to something like <ref name=Begley2012> for the first one and <ref name=Begley2012/> for the subsequent ones. You can just search the source text for ":0" etc to find them. The VisualEditor just counts up in the reference names, so you may find ":0", ":1", ":2", etc, depending on how many references you re-used.

I hope you find that useful Jytdog (talk) 17:54, 25 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

New article?

I see you're running into trouble on the Alternative medicine article. While there are overlaps between some of the legitimate criticisms of mainstream medicine and alt med, I think we'd be better served with a separate article, which would get a section in the alt med article and a link to the new article. Give it some thought. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:50, 25 April 2018 (UTC) BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:50, 25 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@BullRangifer: I could do that, but the article would just be a stub, which hopefully other people would add to. I could title it "Shortcomings of mainstream medicine". But I'd be worried that some editors would see it as hostile to the medical community or to Wikipedia's medical project (which of course is not my intent) and would immediately propose it for removal. My experience so far suggests that some people are hyper-sensitive about even legitimate criticisms of mainstream medicine and their "trigger finger" is at the ready to revert content that includes criticism (an example is the repeated removal of the Ernst quote on CAM as a critique of mainstream doctors' therapeutic relations with patients). But you've been editing much, much longer than I, so if you think it would be worthwhile for me to create a short article on "Shortcomings of mainstream medicine", I'll do that.NightHeron (talk) 00:46, 26 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You may not know much about me, but I have two health care educations and am a very firm skeptic against alternative medicine, but I also realize that mainstream medicine has its shortcomings, some of which make people seek alternative medicine and feed into their skepticism of mainstream medicine.

BUT, none of that has anything to do with whether there should be an article. What counts is if the subject is notable (it is), and is mentioned and discussed in multiple RS (it is). So start collecting your sources. I'll be happy to provide some advice and tips. I think the article is needed here.

I understand your concerns about deletion and possible AfD. Most new articles on controversial subjects have to survive such an ordeal, and it can be stressful. So before you move anything from your userspace, it must be as bulletproof as possible. I can also help with tips about that.

I suggest you use a sandbox, for example User:NightHeron/Shortcomings of mainstream medicine. You can also change that. Right now it's a redlink, but once you start writing there, it turns blue. I will watchlist it and may check in from time to time. So collect RS, then spread them "out on the floor", so to speak, and see what type of picture they form, then write your article using that as your outline. Make sure the RS, not your POV, dictate the article's form. Your job is not to document your POV, but to document the main major and minor POV found in RS on the subject. To satisfy NPOV and Due weight, it must also include criticisms and debunking, so it will consist of point and counterpoint.

A big caution: Most such content is found in alternative medicine, fringe, quackish, fraudulent, and other unreliable sources. You can't use them, BUT you can get cues and objections from them. Then find those objections in mainstream RS.

Feel free to ping me or use my talk page. I'll be rooting for you. I have written a number of articles. If you succeed, this will be a real feather in your cap. You will have improved Wikipedia and the world. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:46, 26 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@BullRangifer: Thanks a lot, I appreciate the suggestions. I'll put together a short article in the next few days. In the meantime I made another attempt at a very short section on "Shortcomings" in the CAM article, hopefully this time avoiding the OR problem.NightHeron (talk) 04:27, 26 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@BullRangifer: I have a draft of a "Shortcomings" article at User:NightHeron/sandbox. When you get a chance to look at it, I'd welcome your suggestions.NightHeron (talk) 03:18, 27 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I have watchlisted it, and un-watchlisted my suggestion above. I'll take a look at it and now I'll notice it whenever you make changes. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 03:33, 27 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Shortcomings of mainstream medicine

I have changed the name of this article to Criticisms of mainstream medicine to make it more encyclopedic. I suggest that you tweak the wording to make it clear that the article does not itself claim these deficiencies, only that others have claimed them. In other words, less opinion, more neutral. ... discospinster _talk 22:56, 30 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Nomination of Criticisms of medicine for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Criticisms of medicine is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Criticisms of medicine until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Alexbrn (talk) 16:41, 1 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I would note that the closing editor, while recommending the article be deleted, suggested it might be "userfied", which I take to mean putting it into your user space, so content from it may be used elsewhere.--agr (talk) 22:10, 18 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@ArnoldReinhold: Thank you for pointing that out. I'd wondered what that meant. I'll ask for that if/when my appeal of the deletion ruling is turned down. In that case I'll work on improving it and eventually try again to get an article on Criticism of mainstream medicine (I don't think the word "mainstream" should have been removed earlier).NightHeron (talk) 23:08, 18 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

CAM article

What, are you nuts or what??? I first came across you at the abortion article where you made some excellent posts, so I know how good you are. But to attempt to work on the alt med stuff, how can it be that after all this time you have not yet figured out that is a total waste of your talent and your energy? There will be no improvements at the CAM article. I note that even the Tag you added was removed for some sort of weird reason. I tried to improve the article years ago when I complained that a Southern Dr. that actually turned out (as I did research) to be a Doctor of English writing on the folklore of his state, was the author of the lead sentence in the article. That did not disturb those that held rein over the article, pretty much the same editors as now, in the least. Here is how I handle the misinformation in the article: Anyone with enough brainpower to check out the WP article is going to immediately see how biased the WP article is. So I figure that the worse it is, the better it is...and it's pretty bad - to say the least. This is not ideal but it's the best we can do for now... Gandydancer (talk) 19:33, 23 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Gandydancer: Thank you for the kind words about my abortion edits. My biggest surprise since beginning to edit Wikipedia is that it's been harder (more stubborn resistance) to edit alt med than to edit abortion articles. My first exposure to arrogant and illogical veteran editors came not in the form of an anti-abortion zealot, but rather in the form of an administrator who's very active in WikiProject Medicine who admonished me that I should not use sources that are more than 10 years old (erroneously citing WP:MEDRS). Misinforming a newcomer about Wikipedia policy is not what an administrator is supposed to do. If he were correct, I couldn't cite Eve's Herbs by Riddle (who's a leading authority on the history of contraceptive and abortifacient herbs) because the book predates 2008. Then when I started working on the alt med article and later wrote an article Criticisms of medicine (the deletion of which is currently under appeal), I kept encountering more and more arrogance, illogicality, and accusations against me (of being an "altmedist", being "disruptive", having a "problematic agenda", being "anti-science"). But for me, a heated debate can be enjoyable (in line with the quote from Jimmy Wales at the top of your userpage) even when the other side sometimes resorts to insults. However, I also believe that the immature behavior of many veteran editors is partly responsible for the low number of editors who are women, U.S. minorities, or from the Global South. I made a comment to that effect on the recent WP:Signpost article about systemic bias. BTW I much liked your essay on your userpage.NightHeron (talk) 20:31, 23 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, I've been following your edits here and I know about the delete of the article and Doc's 10 years comment. Well, if you really enjoy endless arguments that get you nowhere, this is the place for you to be, that is for sure. I don't enjoy that. I predict that you will wear out after not too much longer when the fun of the fight dims and leave... I've seen it happen before. Gandydancer (talk) 21:23, 23 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Gandydancer: Your prediction may come true. I'm awaiting the outcome of my appeal of the deletion of Criticisms of medicine; also on both Talk:Alternative medicine and the NPOV noticeboard I've proposed that the discussion be moved to mediation. I haven't given up quite yet. I also posted a related comment on Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2015-05-06/Blog#Query: Have any surveys tried to get at the reasons for the gaps?NightHeron (talk) 17:24, 24 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not holding my breath... As you have already seen, to speak out for any alt med automatically connects you to Dr. Oz and...what's his name, the Indian guy (both of whom are more interested in money than in health, IMO). It is frustrating but it is the way things are here on WP. Gandydancer (talk) 18:29, 24 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I think of you frequently as I follow your edits. It should be plain by now that the way to meet this WP problem is not head-on or even sideways (like your excellent probs with med article). I'd sure hate to see WP lose such a good editor. Have you considered joining a group so that you too could call on your "friends" to take a look at certain issues just the way that the med group does without having it be called canvassing? What do you care about? If you care about "family" there is a new group forming that you may have an interest in. If I remember correctly it seems to me that you made some excellent observations about the reasons that more women don't edit WP, is that correct or do I have you mixed up with someone else? I recently watched an interview on PBS regarding this new book [ http://theconfidencecode.com/] and was just glued to everything that was said because they were "killing me softly" with the story of my life. But if your interest still lies mainly with altmed, keep in mind that it is the women who mainly are in charge of the families medical choices, not the men. But on WP it is the men who are in charge of the WP altmed article, not the women. Gandydancer (talk) 21:08, 26 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Gandydancer: Thank you very much for your kind words and support, which I especially appreciate on a day at the receiving end of a form of "cyberbullying." Sorry if I repeat what you already know. After the initial deletion closing of the AfD, the appeal process went smoothly. The vote (as I recall) was 6 to 4 for overturning the deletion and restoring Criticisms of medicine, with the 5 participating administrators voting 4 to 1. After an uninvolved admin restored the article, within minutes the original nominator of deletion made 18 quick deletion edits, vandalized the article (reducing it to an incoherent stub), and then immediately proposed it for deletion a second time. Within hours a bunch of like-minded users all called for deletion, in a few cases apparently citing the stub and in a few cases the restored version. There were garbled explanations of why it should be deleted -- some utterly ridiculous claims that it lacked sources (there were 44 sources in a short article) -- and many allegations that it was really a pro-CAM article.

When I started editing and chose to do so strictly anonymously, other than a few miscellaneous articles my main interest at first was abortion-related articles. I expected that that's where I'd encounter viciousness, illogicality, disregard for WP policies, and cyberbullying. But not so -- that was relatively easy. Sure, the zealots would vandalize on a regular basis (one of them deleted an edit of mine with the explanation "Deleted kike lesbian sources"), but the vandalism would be reverted within minutes by someone. The medical editing wasn't my original intention, but came from looking into what Wikipedia had on abortifacient herbs (leading to the alt med article). Then, irony of ironies, it was some WikiProject Med folks and fellow travelers who behaved in exactly the manner I would have expected of the anti-abortion zealots.

I made a complaint yesterday at ANI, but I doubt that anything positive will come of that. Trying to reign in a clique of arrogant cyberbullies would be a difficult and thankless task for an administrator, and it would undoubtedly take a whole group of administrators with real clout to do it. I simply don't know enough about Wikipedia to make a guess about whether this will happen internally. Perhaps some off-wiki criticism (such as the one on Slashdot that led to the NPOV noticeboard discussion of the alt med article) would help. I assume that the higher-ups in Wikipedia are sincerely interested in solving these sorts of problems, and don't want Wikipedia to get the reputation that the gaming subculture has. But as a newcomer, I don't really know what's going on in the WP subculture. All I know is that anyone off-wiki whom I tell about my experiences with the alt med article and my "Criticisms of medicine" article will have a much-diminished opinion of Wikipedia (that's an understatement). A friend who knows of my interactions with Alexbrn, CFCF & Co said to me "What, Wikipedia editors aren't adults?"NightHeron (talk) 06:03, 27 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Gandydancer: If you've been following my woes and don't need this update, please forgive me. I wanted to let you know that our little discussion right here is now being used (by an admin) to justify an escalation of the retaliation against me to an indefinite site ban. Actually, the admin who suggested the escalation referred to two things as proof of how terrible I am -- the discussion itself of a 6-month med-topic-ban against me, in which I'm defending myself rather than accepting the charges and pleading guilty, and my user talk page, where the only item that could possibly have offended him is this discussion. The retaliation started when the editor I'd complained about for disruptive editing went to Abortifacient to delete an edit I'd made there two months ago. I put it back with an explanation of why RS rather than MEDRS should apply to a statement about effects of herbs on animals and a second edit inserting a clarification, at which point I got the two warnings below (one for "edit-warring" on Abortifacient, i.e., my two edits). Then the same guy whom I'd complained about nominated me for rather draconian sanctions on AN/I. When finally one editor entered the discussion to suggest that maybe draconian sanctions weren't called for, one of the supporters of the sanctions (an admin) answered that the milder punishment suggested by that editor (a 1-week block) "feels punitive," and so the "logical" thing would be to ban me from Wikipedia altogether. On AN/I there's little point in my continuing to defend myself, since the very fact of my defending myself is used as evidence of my disruptiveness (see the last comment with all-caps and obscenities just above the beginning of the subsection about banning me). So I'm reduced to venting my frustration to you. Anyway, thanks.

BTW, when I went to WP:IDHT, prompted by the editor who suggested only a 1-week block, I saw that the only picture in the whole article was of a woman saying "I can't hear you." I went to the talk page to suggest that, in view of all the on- and off-wiki comment there's been about systemic bias against women on Wikipedia, maybe that photo should be deleted or replaced by a photo of a man.NightHeron (talk) 14:32, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I have not recently been following your WP experience. Please provide the diff re our conversations on your talk page. I will check the picture/article you mention. Gandydancer (talk) 17:36, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Gandydancer:

"(first edit)".

and

"(clarification)".NightHeron (talk) 19:10, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Nomination of Criticisms of medicine for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Criticisms of medicine is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Criticisms of medicine (2nd nomination) until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Alexbrn (talk) 17:55, 25 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Criticism of medicine AFD

Hi, it was very unfortunate your article was deleted like that, mine was threatened with a CSD within 3 minutes for no sources when I haven't have time to put sources (no draft space then) and taken nearly to AFD within 4 hours. I give you my full moral support, and I suggest using AFC for any articles. However, as far as policies go, I can't defend that article anymore, so sorry . --Quek157 (talk) 18:27, 26 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Nightheron, I started to write this to you over at that AfD but once I re-read it, I realized it was a bit of a derail from the topic at hand, so I've posted it here instead.

Thanks for continuing to thoughtfully engage, NightHeron. I don't think w're going to wind up on the same side of the line this time, but maybe next time we will.

I hope you don't think this is condescending (it's certainly not intended to be such) but you're casting this debate in quite dramatic terms: censorship, travesty, illegitimate. Nobody wins every debate on Wikipedia. What makes Wikipedia work is when people lose a debate, then pick their tools back up and get on with something else. For experienced Wikipedia editors, this is just another debate of the many thousands happening here today. Trying to win people over to your side with thoughtful engagement and a good attitude will get you a lot farther than trying to grab some non-existant moral high ground and declaring the discussion itself to be immoral.

To get to your points on the merits: hoping that external criticism will swing the debate in your favour is unlikely to happen or to win sympathy from your fellow editors. Wikipedia has been around a long time and seen controversies a lot hotter than this one, which is about as warm as yesterday's pot roast. Wikipedia is home to a lot of different viewpoints, but there's some that we simply don't allow: racism and hate speech, for example. And definitely not psuedoscience. This is not censorship, anymore than it would be if you stopped someone from using your personal Twitter account to run a scam. We have a responsibility to not allow Wikipedia's platform to be used to lead people down paths that are indefensibly wrong.

This debate probably isn't going to go your way, but that's not the end of the world. There's plenty of other work to be done around here. You've got moxie and that's a good thing. You just need to pick a better hill to die on.

PS -- It's strange to hear that "social justice warrior" is a "common pejorative". That sounds like a fine thing to be. A Train^talk 23:20, 27 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@A Train: I'm happy to discuss this with you, especially since you're taking a respectful tone. I don't think you're being condescending, but I think your analysis is wrong. First, the only reason I'm using strong language is that there was a violation of process, namely, refusal to accept consensus. As you correctly point out, it is important on Wikipedia to be able to accept losing an argument. Alexbrn lost his argument for deletion when the consensus of the appeal discussion was that there had been no consensus to delete after 2 weeks of AfD, and therefore the article should be restored and subjected to normal editing. Instead of accepting that, he engaged in disruptive editing and immediately renominated the article for deletion. That is obviously a refusal to accept consensus (meaning the 4-to-1 vote among admins for restoration, followed by the decision of the closing admin). He's refusing to accept the result of the proper Wikipedia process, and other editors who participate in this illegitimate AfD are effectively (though not intentionally, that is, not thinking of it this way) abetting a refusal to accept consensus.

I've had edits discussed on discussion pages and rejected by consensus. I accepted that, and did not complain or use strong language after that occurred. You're completely correct that that's a normal process of Wikipedia. But this AfD2 is not.

I agree completely that Wikipedia must never condone fraud or pseudoscience. Please show me one place in Criticisms of medicine that does that. The fact is, there is none.

I'd like to clarify what I mean by external non-wiki pressure. I certainly didn't mean for the purpose of saving my article from censorship. Nor did I mean that I would personally try to create external pressure. What I meant was that there has already been external commentary about the refusal of a group of editors to permit fixing the NPOV problem of Alternative medicine, and I would welcome more. I raised the procedural issue on AN/I, but I doubt that'll lead to anything. The Alternative medicine article is an embarrassment and an obvious attack point for anyone who wants to criticize Wikipedia. It also plays into CAM's hands, because, as I mentioned in a different venue, a reader who loses interest in the Wikipedia article because of its polemical and unscientific tone will probably go to a source such as WebMD, and just look what they have there on "alternative medicine." I don't think you'll like it; I certainly didn't.

I gather that you're probably not in the U.S., and I really apologize for inadvertently assuming familiarity with something that's very common now in U.S. political discourse, but probably not elsewhere. Conservatives have popularized the term "Social Justice Warriors" as a sarcastic reference to people on the left (especially on college campuses) who consider themselves morally righteous and try to prevent speeches or publications that they find offensive. I prefer the term "pseudo-leftist" for them. I made up the term "Anti-CAM Warriors" as a similar pejorative for people who seem to think that opposition to CAM is such a worthy cause that their Wikipedia article doesn't have to comply with WP:NPOV and that the Criticisms of medicine article should be blocked at all costs because it allegedly will make CAM promoters happy.NightHeron (talk) 00:47, 28 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry to disappoint you but you are not the first to posit vast conspiracies on this topic. Lots of people come here, edit badly on alt med topics, get reverted, make a stink, get blocked or banned or leave angry, and go out onto the internet and Explain How Wikipedia Is Secretly Controlled by A Conspiracy, Nay An Evil Cabal, That Hates Alt Med. It is very easy to find their rantings - GIYF. (hint - search for skeptic Wikipedia). I am sure they will welcome you.

Please do read WP:Lunatic charlatans. Jytdog (talk) 16:34, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Jytdog: I am sorry that I have not made myself clear enough. They would not welcome me. I oppose them. My comments on the alt med article have had only one purpose, that of contributing to making it a credible source for the public that they'll perceive as unbiased and that will be effective in educating people about pseudoscience. There's one last thing I wanted to do on the subject of alt med, which I'd postponed, but I'd better do it now in anticipation of being banned.NightHeron (talk) 19:22, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

What you don't seem to understand, is that there is nothing new under the sun in WP. If a person is here for a while and observant, one can see typical trajectories and behaviors that humans in WP follow and do (some such observations are here for example).

This is so clear here because everything here is a) written and b) saved forever, and because how people behavior here matters, and when problems arise people actually go look at the record of what people have done. So unlike pretty much any other place you go - everyone else can see everything you do.

There is no hiding here. And it doesn't matter what you say about what you have done, because everyone can see what you actually have done.

One human behavior that is clear even outside WP, is that people often perceive themselves and describe themselves, in ways that don't reflect what they actually do. We see this all the time and this is how WP:BOOMERANG came into existence. If you read a bunch of ANIs you will see so many cases where person X shows up very upset with person Y, and when the community looks at what has happened, person X is has acted terribly and their behavior gets dealt with, and person X protests more and more and more as the thing progresses.

This sort of thing happens over and over.

The things you are actually saying and doing are exactly like the alt med advocates who come here and self destruct and go complain about it on the internet. This diff is almost a perfect expression of it. You don't describe or see yourself that way, but that is what you are actually doing. Jytdog (talk) 19:46, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I understand what your viewpoint is. There's been a listen-but-not-hear problem behind the acrimony and insults that have come my way. At the very beginning of my participation on the alt med talk page and several times since, I made it clear (I thought I did anyway) that I fully support the objective of WikiProject Medicine of combating fraud, pseudoscience, and quackery, and I thought it important for scientists (medical or otherwise) to safeguard their credibility if they want to be listened to by the public. That's all. I had no other motive. You're free to think I'm hiding something or lying, but there's no evidence that that's the case. From early on, several editors assumed bad faith on my part, a "problematic agenda" of promoting fraud and quackery. This assumption of bad faith put me on the defensive, and predisposed those editors to think the worst of anything I said. Since I'm not an experienced editor, I frankly did not know how to handle that well. My impression is that on Wikipedia the presumption of bad faith often leads to acrimony. I guess that's the reason for WP:GF.NightHeron (talk) 21:37, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think much at all about what people say their motivations or real world qualifications are, and nobody else who is experienced does either. (We learned to ignore self-representations through the WP:ESSJAY thing, if you care about background there). When there are problems, we look at each other's edits and how people interact with others, including how well their arguments and behavior are grounded in the policies and guidelines -- not just their letter but their spirit (see WP:CLUE). Jytdog (talk) 21:43, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Of course. As I said, there is no evidence based on my article or talk page edits that I'm an altmedist. What I was trying to say, and what another editor said recently on the NPOV notice board better than I could, is that a polemical article on alt med plays to the advantage of altmedists, because it lacks credibility with the people who need to be convinced (the potential customers of the altmedists) and makes the altmedists' false accusations against the medical profession appear more credible.NightHeron (talk) 21:56, 2 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Facepalm. I tried here, I tried below, to have a discussion about what you are have actually done here, to help you see it, so you can change and edit better. I will not be replying further. Jytdog (talk) 01:14, 3 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You started this thread by telling me to read WP:Lunatic charlatans, which I did (I think I'd already read it a while ago). You implied that I was in the ACEP camp, which is ridiculous. No, I agree with Jimmy Wales. In the thread I've tried unsuccessfully to convince you of that. You seem to think I'm lying. Because I'm refusing to accept your view that my participation in discussions is promoting fraud and quackery, you say I won't "change and edit better." No, I'm eager to "change and edit better," and I think I understand the process much better than when I started in March. All that's moot, of course, if I get banned from virtually all the editing I'd wanted to do (e.g., on abortion-related articles). You're punishing someone for refusing to accept your opinions, not for refusing to accept help with editing better.NightHeron (talk) 01:37, 3 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

There was no statement at AN/I saying what I'm accused of, so I have to guess based on the negative comments about me. It seems to be based not on article edits, but on my participation in the alt med talk page and later in the AfD and AfD2 for Criticisms of medicine. The main problem seems to be my persisting in arguing against the notion that my suggestions for the alt med article (these weren't edits, just suggestions on the talk page) as well as my work on the Criticisms of medicine article were promoting CAM. I repeatedly asked for evidence, such as sources that I was using in either case that were pro-CAM, but it seems that that wasn't the point. Rather, many people thought that the very idea that there should be a change in tone and balance in the alt med article and the very idea that there should be an article on criticisms of medicine are pro-CAM ideas. I argued against that, but ultimately the majority disagreed, so there's no Criticism of medicine article and the alt med article is as before. Fine. That's how it goes. Then there's a rush to ban me because I argued on these issues. That has nothing to do with the quality of my edits.NightHeron (talk) 04:27, 3 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

May 2018

Hello, and welcome to Wikipedia. You appear to be repeatedly reverting or undoing other editors' contributions at Abortifacient. Although this may seem necessary to protect your preferred version of a page, on Wikipedia this is known as "edit warring" and is usually seen as obstructing the normal editing process, as it often creates animosity between editors. Instead of reverting, please discuss the situation with the editor(s) involved and try to reach a consensus on the talk page.

If editors continue to revert to their preferred version they are likely to be blocked from editing Wikipedia. This isn't done to punish an editor, but to prevent the disruption caused by edit warring. In particular, editors should be aware of the three-revert rule, which says that an editor must not perform more than three reverts on a single page within a 24-hour period. Edit warring on Wikipedia is not acceptable in any amount, and violating the three-revert rule is very likely to lead to a block. Thank you. Alexbrn (talk) 06:17, 30 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sourcing

Hi NightHeron. So - a bunch of us have tried to call your attention to MEDRS - the sourcing guideline for content about health.

This guideline has broad and deep consensus in the community, and you don't seem to be engaging with it.

I do understand there is a lot that you want to do, content-wise, and those may be difficult things to do no matter what. But if you start with poor sources, you are going to be dead in the water.

Everything here depends on sources, for content about health, we look for recent literature reviews published in good journals, or statements by major medical or scientific bodies. Textbooks can be useful too.

If you don't understand something about that, please ask. Really, I will be happy to help you understand this. It will save everybody trouble. Jytdog (talk) 06:24, 30 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

June 2018

This message is to inform you that you are now banned from making any edits related to the topic of medicine, broadly construed, until December 3rd, 2018. This editing restriction has been logged at WP:EDRC. Please note that this restriction applies to you as a person, so it does extend to your alternate account. Please note that topic ban violations are generally considered minor offenses that are handled with short blocks, but if you are suspected to be editing in the subject area with your undisclosed alternate account, you will be subject to significantly harsher penalties for sockpuppetry and ban evasion, with the most likely result being an indefinite block. Swarm ♠ 21:47, 3 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 208: / Line 208: @@
 If you don't understand something about that, please ask.  Really, I will be happy to help you understand this.  It will save everybody trouble. [[User:Jytdog|Jytdog]] ([[User talk:Jytdog|talk]]) 06:24, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
+== June 2018 ==
+This message is to inform you that you are now banned from making any edits related to the topic of [[medicine]], broadly construed, until December 3rd, 2018. This editing restriction has been logged at [[WP:EDRC]]. Please note that this restriction applies to you as a person, so it does extend to your alternate account. Please note that topic ban violations are generally considered minor offenses that are handled with short blocks, but if you are suspected to be editing in the subject area with your undisclosed alternate account, you will be subject to significantly harsher penalties for sockpuppetry and ban evasion, with the most likely result being an indefinite block. [[User:Swarm|<span style='color:black;text-shadow: 0.0em 0.0em 0.9em black'><big>'''S'''</big><small>'''''warm'''''</small></span>]] [[User talk:Swarm|<span style='color:black;text-shadow: 0.1em 0.1em 0.2em red'>♠</span>]] 21:47, 3 June 2018 (UTC)