Miscellany for deletion (MfD) is a place where Wikipedians decide what should be done with problematic pages in the namespaces which aren't covered by other specialized deletion discussion areas. Items sent here are usually discussed for seven days; then they are either deleted by an administrator or kept, based on community consensus as evident from the discussion, consistent with policy, and with careful judgment of the rough consensus if required.
Pages not covered by other XFD venues, including pages in these namespaces: Draft:, Help:, Portal:, MediaWiki:, Wikipedia: (including WikiProjects), User:, TimedText: and the various Talk: namespaces
Pages in the File namespace that have a local description page but no local file (if there is a local file, Wikipedia:Files for discussion is the right venue)
Any other page, that is not in article space, where there is dispute as to the correct XfD venue.
Requests to undelete pages deleted after discussion here, and debate whether discussions here have been properly closed, both take place at Wikipedia:Deletion review, in accordance with Wikipedia's undeletion policy.
Before nominating a page for deletion
Before nominating a page for deletion, please consider these guidelines:
Deleting pages in your own userspace
If you want to have your own userpage or a draft you created deleted, there is no need to list it here; simply tag it with {{db-userreq}} or {{db-u1}}. If you wish to clear your user talk page or sandbox, just blank it.
Duplications in draftspace?
Duplications in draftspace are usually satisfactorily fixed by redirection. If the material is in mainspace, redirect the draft to the article, or a section of the article. If multiple draft pages on the same topic have been created, tag them for merging. See WP:SRE.
Deleting pages in other people's userspace
Consider explaining your concerns on the user's talk page with a personal note or by adding {{subst:Uw-userpage}} ~~~~ to their talk page. This step assumes good faith and civility; often the user is simply unaware of the guidelines, and the page can either be fixed or speedily deleted using {{db-userreq}}.
Problematic userspace material is often addressed by the User pages guidelines including in some cases removal by any user or tagging to clarify the content or to prevent external search engine indexing. (Examples include copies of old, deleted, or disputed material, problematic drafts, promotional material, offensive material, inappropriate links, 'spoofing' of the MediaWiki interface, disruptive HTML, invitations or advocacy of disruption, certain kinds of images and image galleries, etc) If your concern relates to these areas consider these approaches as well, or instead of, deletion.
User pages about Wikipedia-related matters by established users usually do not qualify for deletion.
Articles that were recently deleted at AfD and then moved to userspace are generally not deleted unless they have lingered in userspace for an extended period of time without improvement to address the concerns that resulted in their deletion at AfD, or their content otherwise violates a global content policy such as our policies on Biographies of living persons that applies to any namespace.
Policies, guidelines and process pages
Established pages and their sub-pages should not be nominated, as such nominations will probably be considered disruptive, and the ensuing discussions closed early. This is not a forum for modifying or revoking policy. Instead consider tagging the policy as {{historical}} or redirecting it somewhere.
Proposals still under discussion generally should not be nominated. If you oppose a proposal, discuss it on the policy page's discussion page. Consider being bold and improving the proposal. Modify the proposal so that it gains consensus. Also note that even if a policy fails to gain consensus, it is often useful to retain it as a historical record, for the benefit of future editors.
WikiProjects and their subpages
It is generally preferable that inactive WikiProjects not be deleted, but instead be marked as {{WikiProject status|inactive}}, redirected to a relevant WikiProject, or changed to a task force of a parent WikiProject, unless the WikiProject was incompletely created or is entirely undesirable.
WikiProjects that were never very active and which do not have substantial historical discussions (meaning multiple discussions over an extended period of time) on the project talk page should not be tagged as {{historical}}; reserve this tag for historically active projects that have, over time, been replaced by other processes or that contain substantial discussion (as defined above) of the organization of a significant area of Wikipedia. Before deletion of an inactive project with a founder or other formerly active members who are active elsewhere on Wikipedia, consider userfication.
Notify the main WikiProject talk page when nominating any WikiProject subpage, in addition to standard notification of the page creator.
Alternatives to deletion
Normal editing that doesn't require the use of any administrator tools, such as merging the page into another page or renaming it, can often resolve problems.
Pages in the wrong namespace (e.g. an article in Wikipedia namespace), can simply be moved and then tag the redirect for speedy deletion using {{db-g6|rationale= it's a redirect left after a cross-namespace move}}. Notify the author of the original article of the cross-namespace move.
Alternatives to MfD
Speedy deletion If the page clearly satisfies a "general" or "user" speedy deletion criterion, tag it with the appropriate template. Be sure to read the entire criterion, as some do not apply in the user space.
Please familiarize yourself with the following policies
Please check the aforementioned list of deletion discussion areas to check that you are in the right area. Then follow these instructions:
Instructions on listing pages for deletion:
To list a page for deletion, follow this three-step process:(replace PageName with the name of the page, including its namespace, to be deleted)
Note: Users must be logged in to complete step II. An unregistered user who wishes to nominate a page for deletion should complete step I and post their reasoning on Wikipedia talk:Miscellany for deletion with a notification to a registered user to complete the process.
I.
Edit PageName:
Enter the following text at the top of the page you are listing for deletion:
{{mfd|1={{subst:FULLPAGENAME}}}} for a second or subsequent nomination use {{mfdx|2nd}}
or
{{mfd|GroupName}} if nominating several similar related pages in an umbrella nomination. Choose a suitable name as GroupName and use it on each page.
If the nomination is for a userbox or similarly transcluded page, use {{subst:mfd-inline}} so as to not mess up the formatting for the userbox.
Use {{subst:mfd-inline|GroupName}} for a group nomination of several related userboxes or similarly transcluded pages.
Please include in the edit summary the phrase Added MfD nomination at [[Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/PageName]] replace PageName with the name of the page that is up for deletion.
Please don't mark your edit summary as a minor edit.
Check the "Watch this page" box if you would like to follow the page in your watchlist. This may help you to notice if your MfD tag is removed by someone.
Save the page
II.
Create its MfD subpage.
The resulting MfD box at the top of the page should contain the link "this page's entry"
Click that link to open the page's deletion discussion page.
Insert this text:
{{subst:mfd2| pg={{subst:#titleparts:{{subst:PAGENAME}}||2}}| text=Reason why the page should be deleted}} ~~~~ replacing Reason... with your reasons why the page should be deleted and sign the page. Do not substitute the pagename, as this will occur automatically.
Consider checking "Watch this page" to follow the progress of the debate.
Please use an edit summary such as Creating deletion discussion page for [[PageName]] replacing PageName with the name of the page you are proposing for deletion.
If appropriate, inform members of the most relevant WikiProjects through one or more "deletion sorting lists". Then add a {{subst:delsort|<topic>|<signature>}} template to the nomination, to insert a note that this has been done.
Save the page.
III.
Add a line to MfD.
Follow this edit link and at the top of the list add a line:
{{subst:mfd3| pg=PageName}} Put the page's name in place of "PageName".
Include the discussion page's name in your edit summary like Added [[Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/PageName]] replacing PageName with the name of the page you are proposing for deletion.
Save the page.
If nominating a page that has been nominated before, use the page's name in place of "PageName" and add
{{priorxfd|PageName}} in the nominated page deletion discussion area to link to the previous discussions and then save the page using an edit summary such as Added [[Template:priorxfd]] to link to prior discussions.
If nominating a page from someone else's userspace, notify them on their main talk page. For other pages, while not required, it is generally considered civil to notify the good-faith creator and any main contributors of the miscellany that you are nominating. To find the main contributors, look in the page history or talk page of the page and/or use TDS' Article Contribution Counter or Wikipedia Page History Statistics. For your convenience, you may add
{{subst:mfd notice|PageName}} ~~~~
to their talk page in the "edit source" section, replacing PageName with the pagename. Please use an edit summary such as
Notice of deletion discussion at [[Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/PageName]]
replacing PageName with the name of the nomination page you are proposing for deletion.
If the user has not edited in a while, consider sending the user an email to notify them about the MfD if the MfD concerns their user pages.
If you are nominating a WikiProject, please post a notice at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council, in addition to the project's talk page and the talk pages of the founder and active members.
Pages currently being considered for deletion are indexed by the day on which they were first listed. Please place new listings at the top of the section for the current day. If no section for the current day is present, please start a new section.
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
To be clear, I’m not referring to the individual games. I’m referring to the disc that contains both games (which is what the page is about); not many people talk about that specific disc, they instead talk about the individual games. Hallowizer (talk) 02:02, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting, I didn't realize that. I thought only constructive edits counted (which is why I marked it for speedy deletion in the first place). Hallowizer (talk) 03:08, 28 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
Delete - It isn't clear to me that Dugin's organization is neo-Nazi, but it doesn't matter whether it is neo-Nazi or neo-Stalinist. As the conclusion to Orwell's Animal Farm commented, it was difficult to tell Napoleon the pig/Stalin and the neighbor (Mr. Frederick)/Hitler apart. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:30, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
WP:UBCR. Not remotely a civil userbox. Dismissing God as an "imaginary friend" is not remotely civil and is not at all productive towards Wikipedia editing. Per WP:CIVIL- namely "Take a Real-Life Check", "Be professional", and "Avoid condescension" are all violated in this userbox. This userbox should be deleted. BurritoQuesadilla (talk) 02:50, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
(theological comment: given Divine Omniscience, it's probably not necessary to notify the Creator; however, whatever He might put on his talk page, many churches doubt that he retired a decade ago) Elemimele (talk) 20:51, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The result of the discussion was: delete. The consensus of the discussion is that this essay took a WP:BATTLEGROUND approach that is inappropriate for Wikipedia essays. There was some support for re-using the title as a redirect elsewhere, but not a clear consensus, so I leave that for editors to pursue if they wish. RL0919 (talk) 05:37, 1 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Bigot is an uncivil word, this essay should be deleted
Delete since WP at Wiktionary[1] defines bigot in English as a noun meaning: "1. One who is narrow-mindedly devoted to one's own ideas and groups, and intolerant of (people of) differing ideas, races, genders, religions, politics, etc. 2. (obsolete) One who is overly pious in matters of religion, often hypocritically or else superstitiously so." as it can apply to ANY type of person or POV not just "religious" bigots. There are thus ideological bigots, racial bigots, gender bigots, and not just religious bigots. Thus, for example, definitely a Marxist, Freudian or Darwinian fanatic can easily be as big a bigot as a religious bigot, and therefore this essay written by tgeorgescu's who has an anti-religion POV aiming his attacks at any religion, its texts, personalities and ideas fails WP:NPOV, WP:CIVIL, WP:NOTBATTLEGROUND, and he fails the WP:SPIDERMAN test! As he likes to say, he can spout his views on his own personal blog, but he should not be allowed to create controversial essays using insulting words on WP and then use them in the guise of so-called fixed WP "policies" to bludgeon away in WP:IDONTLIKE fashion at opponents holding differing POVs to his. Thank you, IZAK (talk) 04:16, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete the language in the essay comes off as uncivil and is non neutral with a certain POV. Plus the essay is just way too long and hard to navigate through.
Not to mention it relies too much on quoting other users instead of trying to make its point.
Also if we should have a essay about criticism towards religion or explain to religious editors about our policy on religion. We should probably have write in a way that uses more formal language. CycoMa (talk) 05:27, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Again, bigots are being treated harshly here at Wikipedia. But this is certainly not something I have invented, but merely described. I called a spade a spade, that's my only fault. As Thomas Szasz stated in The Second Sin, speaking clearly was the second major sin of mankind: some people cannot bear clear and straightforward explanations of long-standing practice. There is nothing uncivil in stating that people who deface articles in religious history are unwelcome around here. They are unwelcome regardless of what I say and do. tgeorgescu (talk) 06:39, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Wait tgeorgescu: 1 did you just WP:PINGEIGHTEEN (count them!) other editors? that's a clear case of WP:CANVASSING! Or don't these rules apply to you when you feel like it. 2 You know tgeorgescu with all your essays you are overstepping WP:NOTFORUM for your POV, which I respect, but honestly now, we all got the point already with your famous essay Wikipedia:Academic bias with it's favorite part WP:CHOPSY starting in 2013! 3 Now you are branching out to clobber more religious enemies (mainly, you pick almost exclusively on Hebrew Bible topics that WP:IDONTLIKEIT, I hardly ever see you picking on Muslim Koran or Hindu Vedas ones!?) with this essay (Wikipedia:No bigots) that you launched in 2019 and have added to until this very time (2021). I have not been through your editorial history, but there may be more essays that I have not seen yet, but I am sure they all say the same thing: Down with religion, down with its texts, down with its heroes etc etc etc. 4 You know, what you are trying to do is squeeze 20 years of pretty normal functioning on Wikipedia and trying to distill and DICTATE to everyone within earshot that "This is an essay on the role of Wikipedia"! in one fell swoop abrogating for yourself the role of who, what, where, how, and why WP is all about? In Yiddish we call this Chutzpa! You set up for yourself what is NPOV in WP: "This is an essay on the neutral point of view policy" in Wikipedia:Academic bias, WHY? Is the tried, true and tested WP:NPOV that has worked so well in need of "repairs"? 5 Why do you have to re-combobulate what Wikipedia is with grand statements like "This is an essay on the role of Wikipedia" you are thus taking on yourself to assert that Wikipedia:Five pillars' "is not enough" because you have a WP:WAR to fight! FIVE PILLARS is not enough for you, no, we must have six pillars, seven pillars, eight pillars, as many as the emperor can squeeze out of his prolific pen when in fact wherever you show up you make your own POV very clear and you quite ably edit in the way you see fit, which is your right. But it is not your God-given right to set yourself up as the WP "law-giver" of your own agenda. 6 You then use your essays to back YOURSELF up when in conflict with editors who disagree with your POV and you make it seem like your are "quoting policy" when it's just an essay or two that you have been driven to write up to back yourself up when in a bind. 7 Think it over and Wikipedia:Drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass to quote an old funny essay, your are resorting to overkill, especially when you violate civil discourse by saying you are crushing people you disagree with "like ants run over by a bulldozer" or constantly kicking people out of WP by "showing people the door" or taking pride in trampling on the personal religious beliefs of other editors in violation of WP:CIVIL. 8 That is why I first suggested cutting this essay down by 3/4 but now it just shows WP is an exclusive elite as if to say: No wise people allowed from other religions or systems of thought is the message you send out to potential editors (with the WP:CHOPSY clause as well and as mush as you love it, it is sheer snobbery from your Ivory tower and gilded cage). So let's leave the golden policies of WP:NPOV and WP: Five pillars alone, they don't need improvement or fixing! Sincerely, IZAK (talk) 08:39, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Canvassing spoke the man who has e-mailed Debresser about this deletion request. You want to delete the statements of 18 other editors, don't you think they have the right to know about it? The burden of proof is upon you that they have recanted their statements.
The statement about only needing the five pillars does apply to all essays about the role of Wikipedia or just to mine?
You purposefully misconstrue how I defined the term bigot in this essay: not only being an enemy of higher criticism, but also trolling/defacing religious history articles (yes, both requirements have to apply, according to this essay).
So, what do I mean by that word? I mean people who write stuff like The whole topic is POV. It should be re-written from scratch if you want it to be NPOV. "YKVKism" is not a real religion. It should be under an article called "Blblical criticism theory". If you act like it's fact, then all Anti-Bible stuff should be off of article on Biblical books. Nazi Hitlerist theories can get on their pages and Jewish theology can get its own page. Separate but equal if you believe in segregation.tgeorgescu (talk) 14:13, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
In my opinion, if the concerns that have been raised, and with which I agree (as I wrote in these edits above), will not be dealt with, and I guess that is not going to happen, then this essay should be deleted or moved to userspace. Debresser (talk) 08:55, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete or (second choice) Userfy. I expected to see a variant of WP:NONAZIS but instead it's claiming that Wikipedia calls all religious believers who dispute academic work on religion (e.g. scholarly criticism) bigots? Da heck? I'm honestly not sure if this is meant ironically or unironically. Regardless, it doesn't have a place in Wikipedia space. It's possible that material in this essay could be used for an even handed essay (if drastically cut down, and the point made plainly and simply rather than cloaked in not-sure-it's-ironic phrasing), but such an essay probably wouldn't be called "No bigots". It should be "Wikipedia should take religious viewpoints more seriously" or "NPOV means putting experts centrally in articles, even ones on religion" or the like depending on what the actual point being made is. SnowFire (talk) 16:16, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. This essay does not belong in WP-space, and IMO, it does not belong on Wikipedia anywhere. First, Christianity is not the only religion where this is an issue; I know it comes up a lot with Islam, I've seen it happen with Hinduism, and it probably comes up in every religion up to and including Pastafarianism. There are times, like MOS:LDS and MOS:PBUH, where it's a style issue and is handled in the MOS for project consistency, but that's not the case here. Second, if we're going to set up some kind of guideline, it would best be addressed within WP:RS and clarifying when primary religious texts can be used as sources, and the (probably longer) list of times when they cannot. Finally, anything in WP should be in the broader voice of the project, and I read a lot of this essay as addressing a particular interaction between the primary contributor and another party. —C.Fred (talk) 17:35, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You may rephrase the essay as you wish, but of course there is a ban on fundamentalist POV-pushing. Some editors are afraid of writing it in plain speak. And of course it isn't a new rule. tgeorgescu (talk) 18:55, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete POV anti-religious rant by an editor who arguably meets the definition quoted at the top rather well: "One who is narrow-mindedly devoted to one's own ideas and groups, and intolerant of (people of) differing ideas...". Johnbod (talk) 17:56, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There is an IP writing at my talk page Your name is Adolf Hitler. Should we be tolerant of that, too? Should we be tolerant of people stating that Baruch Halpern, Richard Elliott Friedman, and Shaye J. D. Cohen write Nazi Hitlerist theories?
See? The IP who wrote that got blocked for two weeks. So regardless of this essay, admins already act for a long time like they believe bigots should be blocked from editing. tgeorgescu (talk) 14:07, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Special:Contributions/96.245.77.253. My critics display a poor reading comprehension of the way wherein I defined what a bigot means for Wikipedia: I do not mean faithful believers, I mean fundamentalists who troll and deface religious history articles.
Tgeorgescu in the essay you said stuff like this. Fundamentalist POV-pushers are a problem in religion articles and somebody has to tell them clearly that they do not belong here.
If proclaiming your true believer's POV in hard-core encyclopedias like Britannica, Iranica and Judaica stands the chances of a snowball in hell, then your POV is not welcome here. Mind your own business and go to Conservapedia, New World Encyclopedia or OrthodoxWiki.
Judging by these statements you are clearly trying to push some editors away. Have you ever considered that these editors are new and don’t know how Wikipedia runs. Please read in on WP:BITE. If new users are giving you issues maybe ask for help or something instead of pushing people away.CycoMa (talk) 14:32, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
When I was new to Wikipedia I remember you sending me a link to this essay. I was in my teens do you really think an essay like this is okay for a new user or a teenager.CycoMa (talk) 14:40, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete This essay is here only to be used by one particular user to bludgeon well-meaning but inexperienced editors who are learning the ropes of editing Wikipedia. Enough is enough. Rusdo (talk) 00:00, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Battleground? Admins already behave like they bought into my essay. If one wants to use other words to explain their behavior, that is okay with me. But bigots still need to be told what to expect from admins. tgeorgescu (talk) 14:42, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I’m pretty sure they aren’t tolerant of experienced users trying to push away new and inexperienced editors away either.CycoMa (talk) 14:52, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Well, if one abstains from bigoted POV-pushing, I welcome them back to the Community. However, due to ingrained personally traits, in the real world very few bigots recant from pushing bigoted POVs. E.g. Karma1998 had an unexpected change of mind, and I did not bother them since. But deconversions like that rarely happen. tgeorgescu (talk) 15:01, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Buddy you don’t own Wikipedia nor are you an admin. You don’t just say “I welcome back into the community”
Also I don’t think you understand what a bigot even is. Being a religious POV pusher isn’t okay on Wikipedia but, it’s not bigoted. Stop with distorting language to justify your made up rules.CycoMa (talk) 15:06, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You keep saying stuff like how you will welcome certain users back into the community. Unless your an admin or own Wikipedia you have no power over who is welcomed here or not. You act like you are the owner of all religion articles. Please read WP:OWN.CycoMa (talk) 15:12, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia is an Omnipticon: everybody oversees everybody else; admins have been simply empowered to solve problems which are usually reported by ordinary users. tgeorgescu (talk) 15:15, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You are NOT obligated to report anyone to admins (see WP:IGNOREALLRULES), you can deal with problems yourself. In all my years on WP I don't think I have ever run to any type of ANI admin noticeboard to report another problematic editor, and believe me I have faced many problem editors on WP! Yes, I have nominated articles for deletion, as I am doing now, but unlike you I am a WP Inclusionist, see this on Metawiki and I welcome input from all editors and I do not subject them to a politically correct litmus test. Also, take note of WP:NOTBURO where it says, inter alia, "While Wikipedia has many elements of a bureaucracy, it is not governed by statute: it is not a quasi-judicial body, and rules are not the purpose of the community." So your "job" as an editor is not to act as if you are in charge of WP's "ideology" nor to "report" bad editors to the "police"/admins for judgement/"execution"! Just contribute good content to the encyclopedia with following the golden WP rules of WP:RS and WP:NOR. IZAK (talk) 19:54, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete this essay, written in unencyclopedic and accusatory language, does not have anything to do with Wikipedia. It is simply a personal revenge of @Tgeorgescu: toward those who disagree with him and openly privileges some scholars (Ehrman, Spong) to others, dismissing all the opponents of the formers as "fundamentalists", despite the fact that both have received criticism from mainstream scholarship as well. I would like to point out to everyone that this is not RationalWiki, nor Vridar, nor Richard Carrier's personal blog. This is an encyclopedia that deals with scholars, including evangelical scholars if they are considered mainstream (like Craig A. Evans): we don't refuse someone's opinion only because of its religion or faith. Therefore, I vote for deletion.--Karma1998 (talk) 15:56, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Ask anyone who edits in this area: scholars following a non-mainstream, fundamentalist view are regularly removed from Wikipedia. --Ermenrich (talk) 00:53, 17 January 2020 (UTC)
Umm tgeorgescu, you and Ermenrich don't get it, editors are NOT removed from Wikipedia for their own POV's, because only violating the rules and policies of WP is a reason to be sanctioned or blocked. You, and Ermenrich, are again conflating YOUR own specific very strict POV with WP's policies when they are NOT the same thing. IZAK (talk) 20:08, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Hello! That's the problem, you don't get what you are doing! You have somehow conflated what you personally think with what WP is really all about, just read the comments of those above. IZAK (talk) 20:14, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
WP:CHOPSY (although it comes off as snobby and shoots itself in the foot by excluding great scholars from non-universities) I can see the logic of as it's needed to protect WP from a lot of nutty theories. But WP:NOBIGOTS is just a spiteful piece of nonsense. We already have WP:NOTFREESPEECH (as it says there: "The fact that Wikipedia is an open, self-governing project does not mean that any part of its purpose is to explore the viability of anarchist communities. Our purpose is to build an encyclopedia, not to test the limits of anarchism.") And WP:NOTOPINION (as it says there: "content hosted in Wikipedia is not for: Advocacy, propaganda, or recruitment of any kind: commercial, political, scientific, religious, national, sports-related, or otherwise.") Furthermore, WP:NOTFORUM (as it says there: "do not use Wikipedia for any of the following: Primary (original) research, such as proposing theories and solutions, original ideas, defining terms, coining new words, etc") and many such examples of tried and true meaningful WP policies that are more than sufficient to fight bigots and and other misfits. So your essay is not adding anything and you should rather look to how you can apply existing WP policies that are very effective to do just what you think "needs fixing". IZAK (talk) 20:29, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Your contention that these essays are aimed at fixing policies and guidelines is pulled out of thin air. The text does not claim anywhere that the policies and guidelines need fixing. You don't realize that these essays aim at explaining existing rules rather than at creating new rules.
I could describe the life from Communist Romania; it does not mean that I have invented Communism. The inventor of the CHOPSY-based encyclopedia is Jimmy Wales, not me. I only explained what he invented. tgeorgescu (talk) 20:34, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Again with the same problem, you keep conflating yourself with Jimmy Wales, who by the way did not invent all the policies of WP as you well know, they were incrementally over the years by balanced and knowledgeable editors. IZAK (talk) 20:47, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Tgeorgescu even if you weren’t inventing new rules there are still tons of more issues me and other editors are having.
Like one other user in this discussion mentioned how you how you are calling religious editors who disagree with academia bigots. Calling those people bigots is wrong and uncivil. Especially if those were newbies.
How you worded your essay is extremely unwelcoming to people who aren’t aware how Wikipedia works. I have seen you link this essay to newbies I mean you even linked it to me when I was new to this website.
I mean how do you expect new editors to change their ways if you say things like fundamentalists don’t belong here or go to conservatipedia.CycoMa (talk) 20:42, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
What you don't realize: CHOPSY and NOBIGOTS are the de facto standard of Wikipedia. Would you tell about it to new editors in plain speak or hide it under the carpet? tgeorgescu (talk) 20:44, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not conflating myself with Wales. Do you agree that the de facto standard of Wikipedia is that fundamentalist POV-pushing is banned? Yes or no? tgeorgescu (talk) 20:51, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Does Jimmy Wales even know you made that essay? Also what gives you the idea that you and your essays are de facto? You are just a typical editor just like me and everyone in this discussion.
Also didn’t IZAK mention something about how you want to set up more pillars. You saying NOBIGOTS is a de facto gives off the impression you are trying to create more pillars to make Wikipedia articles align more with your views.CycoMa (talk) 21:03, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, so now you downgrading your essays to "de facto' status, good line! As I said, WP:CHOPSY is useful in keeping fringe theories out of WP (not mainstream Christian and Jewish religious thought that you like to gratuitously and obsessively attack in violation of WP:OWN), however WP:NOBIGOTS is just one big stick to knock down editors, especially the newbies that are complaining that you violate Wikipedia:Please do not bite the newcomers with it. But bottom line, get it out of your head that you are either a "de facto" or "de jure" "spokesperson" for WP. You need to step back and just see yourself as a regular plain editor who only represents himself, nothing more and nothing less. IZAK (talk) 20:55, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
So you do agree that fundamentalist POV-pushing is banned. Then why don't you write an essay to that extent? Of course, you would not be creating any new rule. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:09, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Depends how you define "fundamentalist" -- I know how YOU do: ANYTHING from Christian and Jewish traditional Bible study is "fundamentalist" while you don't see how your own POV Wikipedia:Edit warring does not help WP. For example, you never battle Hindu texts or Muslim texts the way you battle Christian and Jewish religious texts, you are are focused on destroying ideas that (you) WP:IDONTLIKE that creates an atmosphere of WP:BATTLEGROUND whenever you are around editing those subjects you focus on. This bellicose and pugnacious. i.e. WP:UNCIVIL sense, intention, feeling, tone comes through loud and clear in your WP:NOBIGOTS personal essay and that is why it unsuitable as some kind of representation of WP's "voice" as you like to put it. IZAK (talk) 21:24, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You also stated that as a newbie you did not know that fundamentalist POV-pushing is banned. But the general agreement seems to be that it is banned. Don't like the essay? Rewrite it with gentler words instead of deleting it. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:14, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
POV pushing in itself is ban-able. Also I never once said I didn’t know it wasn’t.
Also how do you expect us to rewrite an essay that’s too broken. Even if I replaced harsh language with gentler language there is more issues with it. The name of the essay is odd, it’s full of walls of text, it’s hard to navigate through, and tons more. It would probably be best to rewrite the whole thing and start over.CycoMa (talk) 21:20, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Traditional religion is neither modernist, nor fundamentalist. Fundamentalism in an answer to (rejection of) modernity. So, we may only speak of fundamentalism after the beginning of modernity. E.g. fundamentalist Islam considers that pictures of Muhammad are banned, but that's not what traditional Islam considered. The rejection of such pictures happened only after the modernity began. tgeorgescu (talk) 17:35, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, and she doesn't say anything like what he said. The main impact of modernity was that wealthy Muslims stopped commissioning illuminated manuscripts, always the almost exclusive location of such images. So production reduced almost to nothing. Johnbod (talk) 15:08, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Close this MfD with keep I've killed my darlings. There is now just a short statement that fundamentalist POV-pushing is banned and three shortcuts to what POV-pushing means. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:22, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
He's not allowed to do that in the middle of a deletion discussion!!! He must await the WP:CONSENSUS of this MfD. What does the closing admin say? Very troubling! IZAK (talk) 21:31, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The content of the essay already revealed its purpose, reducing it in size does not solve the problem it only makes it worse, because now it can be cited by you and you will then pile on with the material you edited out as its "explanation" the word "bigots" itself is not WP:CIVIL and as I have pointed out WP:NOT is comprehensive and clear enough to keep out any type of bigot in any case. IZAK (talk) 21:39, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You blanked the page before the deletion discussion was closed, which is a big no-no since there are rules governing Wikipedia:Blanking before a final decision was made. I suggest you revert yourself to the full version of WP:NOBIGOTS so the closing admin can see what other editors here are talking about. You cannot set yourself up as the "judge, jury and executioner" of yourself as if you are a "de facto" admin! IZAK (talk) 22:55, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I do not have the power to delete the editing history of the essay. Your criticism is now that I took your criticism to the heart...
And that's all I found about it: Repeated, unnecessary page blanking may get a user blocked indefinitely.
I don't know why you think that I have engaged in repeated blanking.
It also wasn't unnecessary blanking, but a sincere answer to criticism.
To answer your accusation: yes, I may use wise words written by other editors, regardless of whether the essay is kept or deleted. So keeping the essay will have absolutely no effect thereupon. tgeorgescu (talk) 23:58, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I was NOT accusing you of "repeated blanking" as I know that you do abide by the rules of WP (you have summoned plenty of editors to various types of ANI complaint forums to get your way and you usually do) but this time you did something that is almost never done during a deletion discussion, and there are often-times deletion-discussion templates that include advice not to blank a page that is up for a deletion review. And it is fortunate that you do not have the power to delete the edit history of the subject, so that leaves a record of what you wrote in the edit history. Furthermore, what is to stop you one day down the line to decide all on your own to revert yourself back to the full version of the essay when you feel like? And as I have explained to you the word "bigots" is too abrasive and quite unnecessary as WP has enough policy to deal with all sorts of misfits and miscreants already. And, in what sense does a one-line sentence an "essay" make? A Sentence (linguistics) doth not an essay make. IZAK (talk) 02:54, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
NOTE TO CLOSING ADMIN: please see the full essay here [2] and please see introductory discussion that led up to this MfD at Wikipedia talk:No bigots#Suggestion; Cut this essay down by 3/4 at least where its author tgeorgescu was requested to trim down the essay to reasonable length, that he adamantly refused alleging all sorts of reasons to keep it at its full unabridged length. Now, following the onset of this MfD discussion that tgeorgescu sees is not going his way, without any warning he chops it down to ONE SENTENCE with his main goal to brand ONLY "fundamentalist" [3] i.e. agreeing that religious [4] POV editors that he does not like as: "The general agreement is that religious POV-pushing is banned. POV-pushing is defined at WP:NPOV, WP:ACTIVIST, and WP:ADVOCACY." First of all, one sentence is not an "essay"! Otherwise everyone will start putting up their pet slogan as an "essay" as a rider to or even as a possible future "policy". Second of all, the sentence tgeorgescu has saved contains in it the already existing and effective longstanding WP policy of WP:NPOV, and the good essays: WP:ACTIVIST, and WP:ADVOCACY that are just fine in fighting potential "bigots" of all stripes, so there no point in adding one-sentence repetition that targets just one class of bigots, the religious ones, placing religious bigots on a higher negative "order" than racial bigots, ideological bigots, anti-Semitic bigots etc, and if allowed to stand then it will spawn silly one-sentence "essays" like: "The general agreement is that RACIST POV-pushing is banned. POV-pushing is defined at WP:NPOV, WP:ACTIVIST, and WP:ADVOCACY." Or "The general agreement is that POLITICAL POV-pushing is banned. POV-pushing is defined at WP:NPOV, WP:ACTIVIST, and WP:ADVOCACY. Or "The general agreement is that ANTISEMITIC POV-pushing is banned. POV-pushing is defined at WP:NPOV, WP:ACTIVIST, and WP:ADVOCACY." etc. Finally,tgeorgescu can't have his way all the time, meaning having it both ways: He gets to decide that his longer essay version must stay and then change his mind in the middle of this MfD and say his minuscule sentence must stay, when neither are any good at this point by the WP:CONSENSUS here thus far. Thank you, IZAK (talk) 02:54, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Userfy. or Rename. I would've said to delete since it was pretty reaching for projectspace, but I'm more fine with the contents as it stands now. Regardless, the title should be changed to something more neutral sounding. –MJL‐Talk‐☖02:52, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Note that tgeorgescu has chopped the essay down to a single sentence and CycoMa has made an edit [5] (their only edit to this page) changing "fundamentalist" to "religious". While I still support redirect to Wikipedia:Don't be a WikiBigot or second choice delete for reasons stated above, I would advise everyone involved in this discussion to take a chill pill MarshallKe (talk) 12:02, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@MarshallKe: Thanks for pointing out Wikipedia:Don't be a WikiBigot written very well and in good English and it's very clear: "on bigotry, the state of mind of a bigot: someone who, as a result of their prejudices, treats or views other people with fear, distrust, hatred, contempt, or intolerance on the basis of a person's opinion, ethnicity, race, religion, national origin, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, disability, socioeconomic status, or other characteristics." and it warns: "Be careful linking other editors to this essay as direct accusations of bigotry can be interpreted as hostile, even when justified. An unfounded or speculative accusation of WikiBigotry is aspersion-casting and could be considered a WP:Personal attack." Your suggestion of a REDIRECT is a great one! IZAK (talk) 20:07, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@IZAK: It isn't that big of a deal that tgeorgescu cut the essay down so much. They originally wrote it almost two years ago, and it's only been seriously challenged this week. I really don't think that tgeorgescu has acted so unreasonably to actually try and respond to criticisms given here. I agree with MarshallKe; let's lower the temperature a bit. @MarshallKe: Btw, you !voted twice by bolding your comments a second time. –MJL‐Talk‐☖16:17, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@MJL: Thanks for your feedback. I think by now we are waiting for an uninvolved admin to close so everyone is calm. I will be glad to correct any errors in voting if you can be more specific about where the problem is. Basically, tgeorgescu by blanking his entire essay in the middle of this MfD discussion jumps the gun, while at the same time it is in fact an honest admission that the essay should in fact be deleted. The surviving sentence he left is worthless and embarrassing as the word "bigots" is part of the problem. I will give him the benefit of the doubt that his first language is Romanian and even though he is pretty handy with English he fails to see the negative nuances in the word "bigot" as directed against only "fundamentalist/religious" editors and not at other types of "fundamentalist" editors who have nothing to do with religion, although he does admit to being blunt and non-diplomatic with his language at times. WP policies while being strict are couched in polite English and all WP essays should be like that. Thanks again, IZAK (talk) 19:21, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I must admit I keep forgetting that his first language is Romanian.
I can’t speak for everyone but, where I am from calling someone a bigot is mostly used towards people who have prejudice towards a certain group of people. I guess when he was using the term bigot he probably means a person who is obstinately or unreasonably attached to a belief.
P.S. I just noticed that in fact tgeorgescu voted twice to "keep": Once when he states above, in bold, "Speedy keep" and then again below when he states below, in bold, "Close this MfD with keep"! IZAK (talk) 19:35, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I read the full version of the essay, prior to its drastic trimming; it was indeed quite strongly opinionated, and it was hard for me to understand what the argument was. However, in the {{essay}} template itself, you can see that an essay "contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors [...] Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints". Maybe it is stupid; essays are not deleted for being stupid. jp×g01:21, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
They're moved out of Wikipedia space if they're pointlessly incendiary, though. An essay called "no bigots" should be about not allowing bigots, not Some Other Group The Writer Doesn't Like. If there was an essay called "No bigots" that instead stated that "Pro-Irish POV pushing is banned on Wikipedia" that would also be deleted, even though the statement is technically true. (The revised form does not help because the writer casts such a wide net for what they consider "religious-POV pushing".) An entirely different essay in user space that discussed the proper usage of various types of sources would be fine, but it would essentially be a new essay with nothing from the old version - an essay that was so unconvincing I genuinely thought it was potentially a parody made from a religious POV about how they're treated on Wikipedia. That's a bad sign! SnowFire (talk) 01:58, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yup, irony and self-irony were not absent from the previous version. People should read it more attentively (i.e. one who isn't pushing POVs did not get defined as a bigot) and with a sense of humor. tgeorgescu (talk) 17:37, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Tgeorgescu: I don't think you understand. I'm not sure how much blunter I can be. Since it seems from your writings you genuinely do support inclusion of academic analysis of religion and careful attribution of claims that might be biased (which I agree with, as does Wikipedia policy), your essay was a complete failure. It is as if it was written by someone who disagrees with you on everything and was writing a mockery / straw man of the opposing argument as they saw it. It wasn't funny or ironic. It was and is counterproductive. If you genuinely want to propound such views (which, again, I agree with, but don't want seen done so shabbily), then you will do best by just {{db-author}}ing this and starting from scratch. (And, if you did try again, not calling anyone who disagrees with you a "bigot", which is incorrect, against Wikipedia collegiality of assuming good faith, and ensures your target audience won't be convinced since you just insulted them.) SnowFire (talk) 18:21, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@SnowFire: I'm apparently not good at that. I did ask others to rewrite the essay, because everyone seems to agree that fundamentalist/religious POV-pushing is banned. And I have an extra problem understanding you: about 40% of the text was mine, the rest of 60% are quotes from other people. tgeorgescu (talk) 18:51, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Userfy the current essay without a redirect, redirect title to NONAZIS I saw the subheader ("'bIgOt' iS uNcIVil!") and thought this would be a title dispute like the WP:ROPE discussion above, but looking at the original version it seems like something Guy Macon would (within his rights in userspace) say, which means this is better in userspace. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 20:33, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. the material, change the title. From the title, one would expect much more comprehensive and wide-ranging coverage of multiple forms of bigotry--to focus on religious fundamentalism as the principal meaning of the term is absurd. Ye s I think Fundamentalist POV pushing is barred, so is atheistic POV pushing, or anything in between. So is POV pushing to oppose a fundamentalist positionin any religion. DGG ( talk ) 22:47, 28 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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This article seems to be a hoax as far as I cannot find any proves for the mere fact of existence of this person. It does not look reasonable to keep it as it can mislead some readers. Andrei Romanenko (talk) 04:21, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Is properly DECLINED. No evidence of hoax. If no verification is provided, it will be deleted via G13. Readers don’t read drafts. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:38, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
People from out of the wiki community usually don't understand quite well what does it mean that some article is still a draft. They are free to suppose that this is just a normal article, only not completely prepared. You never know how a reader can find this page. Somehow or other Wikipedia is responsible for any information it contains. As for evidences, you can state that there are "no evidences of hoax" only if you did not bother to ask Google about that allegedly prominent poet. But if you rely on Wikipedia more than on Google, then just open the article Le Suicidé about Manet's painting claimed by the hoaxer to be "depicting the suicide of André Michard" and try to find that Michard mentioned there. Andrei Romanenko (talk) 09:09, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Readers don’t find drafts because mainspace never links to draft, and search engines mostly respect the _NOINDEX_ request. We can know from this that no one reads this page.
It is not possible to provide the evidence of no-existence, see Russell's teapot. But I bet there is not a single evidence of existence of this guy. That's why it is a hoax. And I have just pointed out that the claim about Manet's painting is completely wrong, Manet experts don't know about that alleged "sitter" of that picture. That's pretty good nobody reads this hoax article. But what is the reason to keep the page nobody can read? The only possible reason is that maybe one day some drafts would become normal articles. But this one would not. Andrei Romanenko (talk) 00:02, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It is possible to provide evidence. Extraordinary Writ has below. You did in replies, but not in the nomination. Evidence, not proof. Evidence includes details of your attempted searches, eg link a google search, minimally. Your didn’t do that, and you said “cannot find any proves”, you cannot find any proof. “Proof” is too high a standard. Evidence that you attempted and failed to verify please.
Delete. If this draft had just a kernel of truth, I would gladly !vote "keep per WP:NDRAFT". But this does appear to be a clear hoax: a clever one, but still an undeniably false one. Most obviously, a search finds zero results: it's difficult to believe that he "pass[ed] to posterity as one of the most intelligent and profound" French poets sub silentio. The idea that he was featured in two paintings by world-renowned artists borders on the preposterous, particularly since the not-inconsiderable literature on them fails to mention our putative poet. The melodramatic Van Gogh-like story of his life and death reeks of fabrication. And finally, the page history reveals that three Commons images ostensibly related to Michard were recently deleted as hoaxes. While most drafts are harmless, this one isn't: it has the potential to enter mainspace and harm our reputation. (Since the draft was convincing enough to cause a well-regarded functionary to twice postpone G13 deletion, the idea that it might enter and remain in mainspace is not at all far-fetched.) We don't need any more entries in the hoax museum. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 05:55, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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This wikiproject taskforce of bull riding was created incorrectly and never worked correctly by a new editor who immediately started adding it to rodeo articles but also to many inappropriate articles, such as Sitting Bull and Wild West show articles. I removed them. But every time I remove them, eventually another editor comes along to revive the task force and start adding the task force tag to articles. It is useless and never desired by the three editors who actually do substantial work on rodeo articles. Thank goodness for AWB though. We just need the WikiProject:Rodeo only. dawnleelynn(talk)18:55, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per prior consensus here that "projects that never were," like this one, should be deleted (as opposed to the consensus to keep ones with substantive project history, which this one is clearly not). UnitedStatesian (talk) 19:04, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment This summer I've been going through dead WikiProjects and we have dozens, no, hundreds, of inactive and defunct WikiProjects, many of which have been turned into redirects to more significant, larger active WikiProjects. I don't see this as a problem with a dead WikiProject but with an editor (or two?) who don't realize that the WikiProject is inactive and are trying to revive it. I think there is a precedence of leaving inactive WikiProjects alone rather than deleting them and I think the solution here might be a direct conversation with the new editor rather than deleting the history of an old WikiProject that is no longer active. Can't we just turn the Bull riding page into a redirect to Wikipedia:WikiProject Rodeo? That's what been done with other defunct WikiProjects and then you can retain the page history of the project. LizRead!Talk!06:30, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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The result of the discussion was: delete. The consensus is quite clearly to delete the userbox, but given the extensive discussion, it is worth going into why editors supported deletion (and why not). Editors point out that language cannot be removed from its historical context; the concept of "straight pride" like "white pride" arose historically as a reaction to the growing acceptance of marignalized communities, in the present case, the growing acceptance of non-heterosexuals. For this reason, the userbox functions as a dog whistle. For those who understand this historical context, it is a symbol of intolerance and exclusion, but insidiously, for those who do not understand the context it seems like an innocuous statement that furthers its use and makes support for homophobia seem wider than it actually is. With this in mind, editors advocated for deletion for largely two reasons. The first is its WP:POLEMIC nature as a signal of potential intolerance and exclusion which harms a collaboartive editorial environment. The second is that even if someone uses this template without underestanding the context, others may wrongly infer that the editor is intolerant of non-heterosexual editors which in itself harms collaborative editing. For these reasons, consensus developed that the infobox should be deleted.
The minority advocating keep were more diverse in their opinions. Some argue that the statement is facially benign and making the associative leaps required assumes bad faith and sets a bad precedent. These arguments largely ignore the main argument relating to the function of dog whistles. A comment by SnowRise, which met with some agreement, was well considered and took into account how our decision may or may not further the propaganda campaign of those whose dog whistles we seek to delete. As a propaganda tactic, dog whistles are facially benign, and actions taken to restrict them by those who understand their context can then be used to feed arguments that it is we who are intolerant. This was considered seriously, however consensus was against this "qualified keep" as editors largely believe the benefits of deleting are greater than the harms of feeding homophobic rhetoric.
As always, there was some murmuring about deleting all controversial userboxen related to politics or culture wars but this did not approach consensus. There was some discussion of redirecting to User:UBX/heterosexual which is simply a statement about the editor's sexuality, but insufficient discussion of that option occurred; redirection can be decided by normal editing. — Wug·a·po·des21:24, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The text of the userbox reads: This user is heterosexual, and is proud of it. (link and bold in the original). The userbox advocates "straight pride" and as such is or will be interpreted as homophobic. It will make other users feel unwelcome. It should be deleted.
For those not familiar with "straight pride", GLAAD writes that Super Straight, Straight Pride, and White Pride are examples of hate-driven ideologies that are built on a feigned ignorance of real-world social discrimination against marginalized groups and are a well-documented strategy of right-wing extremists for sowing discord and trolling the left[6].
My opinions on this userbox are summed up in a couple of op-eds:
From Chicago Tribune: "Gay Pride" is an antidote to gay shame ... because there is no corresponding concept of straight shame, the expression "Straight Pride" can only be read as a gratuitous and contemptuous response to the suggestion that gay people not be marginalized.[7].
From USA Today: ... the roots of straight pride, a movement launched about 30 years ago by conservative social groups to mock and ridicule gay pride — and people. Its goal has been laser-targeted: to denigrate the entire LGBTQ civil rights movement...[8].
More information about "Straight Pride," which had a resurgence in the last few years:
Delete. As I wrote at ANI: There's nothing wrong with a userbox that declares someone is heterosexual, or white, or is otherwise a member of some majority group. However when you get into statements of pride surrounding these groups, there is no ignoring the historical context (see straight pride, white pride, etc.) The best case scenario with this userbox is that someone who doesn't realize the connotations adds it to their userpage thinking it a direct equivalent to a gay pride userbox, and accidentally conveys homophobia that they don't hold to the rest of the community. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 17:16, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - Though it's ironic. Human nature preaches tolerance, yet practices intolerance. I hope these proposals are defeated (per tolerance), though likely they won't be. GoodDay (talk) 17:21, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If you don't want to reply to Levivich, then don't reply to Levivich. But you're telling him he shouldn't reply to you to challenge your statement. That isn't how it works. --Floquenbeam (talk) 18:10, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I'm not interested in mindreading or inferring ill intent based on someone's expression of pride in being who they are. Whatever part of themselves that may be. Arkon (talk) 17:31, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Adding, if someone would like to say people are unable to express pride in certain parts of their being, fine I guess? Where is that line? Arkon (talk) 18:00, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Here is the line: When that expression of "pride" stops being a reaction, by members of a majority group, to pride expressed by a historically marginalized/mistreated group. Whether the "pride" comes from a place of supremacism or misplaced "reverse discrimination" victimhood, the effect is more or less the same. — Rhododendritestalk \\ 18:22, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, I'm also not interested in applying broad brush bad faith to this editor. Bad actors co-opting things are only possible if we let them. Arkon (talk) 18:33, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There is no "co-opting" by "bad actors" here--straight pride was conceived of, implemented, and propagated by bad actors, in the same way (and for much of the same reasons) that "white pride" was. As I said below, the context here is unambiguous. It is absolutely possible that this user doesn't mean it that way; I personally find that hard to believe, but it's certainly fair to extend AGF to them in this. But that doesn't mean they should still be able to use it freely; that context will still do harm to others even if it's not intended by the person using the userbox. Or, if you want to put it another way, the way we stop letting bad actors co-opt this userbox is by deleting it. Writ Keeper⚇♔18:39, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Again, if you want to apply this broad 'historical context' (which I know very well exists) to this person's self expression, go for it. I don't care to do so. Also just to repeat what I said to another below, I'm down for deleting all this crap in general. Arkon (talk) 18:45, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"Where is that line?" cuts both ways. If we allow identity pride userboxes regardless of known harm, does that extend to 'white pride'? If not, where is the line? Firefangledfeathers (talk) 18:27, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not the one trying to draw a line. People should be able to be proud of who they are. Be it their 5 toes, or 6 if they happen to have them. The editor themselves will edit in a bad way, or not and be dealt with. Policing someone's expression of self is just a dumb waste of time. I mean the discussion this came from already stalled out when it came to someone just typing whatever is in this stupid box on their page themselves. P.S. If I had my way these boxes wouldn't even exist. Arkon (talk) 18:38, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep the super cringe userbox. Interpreting this message in a negative way requires a bad faith assumption. Popper meant his Paradox of tolerance to be applied only to ideologies that cannot be kept in check by public opinion, will not submit to rational discussion, and promote the use of violence. To promote the invocation of the Paradox of Tolerance to suppress speech that merely makes you feel bad, or speech whose meaning you have twisted, is itself a violation of the Paradox of Tolerance. While Wikipedia represents a voluntary association that can, in theory, eject whoever they want to, we have liberal values and I think removal of this form of expression is in violation of those liberal values, not in support of them. I should add that I personally think this particular userbox is cringy as hell and that nobody should ever use it. MarshallKe (talk) 17:48, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per Levivich and per the Chicago Tribune. If we continue down this road, we'll eventually get to a fuzzy area where I'll probably diverge from the delete side sooner than others, but this - like the similar "white and proud of it" - is still well short of the fuzzy area and safely on the "delete" side. It does not require attempted mind reading or assumptions of bad faith to know what straight pride means; it does not require attempted mind reading or assumptions of bad faith to know that "straight and proud of it" is functionally the exact same thing as "straight pride". --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:54, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per Floq and GW--the context of this userbox is obvious. While it's certainly possible that any particular user might be unaware of that context when they use it, that's not an argument to keep the userbox; better to delete it rather than let it sit as a trap for people to say things they don't mean. The context exists and will affect the people who see the userbox, whether it's intended or not by the person who uses it. And if people are aware of the context when they use it, well, then it should definitely be deleted. If you feel the need to express that you're heterosexual, then just have a userbox that says "This user is heterosexual"; we can infer any simple pride in that by the fact that you felt the need to say it at all rather than let it remain the default assumption (along with the last few thousand years of law, history, and religion). Don't worry, this doesn't mean that we mean LGBT commies are coming for all of your userboxes; even if we wanted to--and we don't--these discussions are exhausting to read and contribute to, almost as much as having to mentally justify my own existence and identity every time I stuble across the wrong userpage. Writ Keeper⚇♔18:07, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Regarding the "userbox wars" at the time around 2006, Jimmy Wales expressed a view that political and religious userboxes in general are wholly harmful to the project. I agree. I also disagree with the inevitable tit-for-tat userbox MfDs to come. I support mass deletion of political, religious, and social issue userboxes. MarshallKe (talk) 18:22, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with both of MarshallKe's comments. Delete all "culture war" userboxes or none of them. But don't selectively delete in a way that reinforces the cultural or political biases of our userbase. (And I say that as someone who largely shares those biases, and agrees with Marshall's description of the userbox under discussion as "cringy".) Unless we think it's equally valid for [insert other language here] Wikipedia to selectively prohibit atheism or gay rights userboxes because they offend local community standards. Colin M (talk) 18:46, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Does deleting all culture war userboxes or none of them mean delete "gay and proud" unless we allow "straight and proud", and delete "black and proud" unless we allow "white and proud"? Levivich18:56, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Speaking for myself on this point, deleting any userboxes that aren't of the sort meant to help find fellow editors is my preference. Like the 'Interested in Roman history from xxx-xxx' type that are actually useful should be all that exist. Arkon (talk) 19:08, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That's a good question. I don't think there's an easy answer here, since "culture war-ness" is a spectrum and is subjective. At first blush, I would say "This user is {gay,straight,black,white}" are fine, but the addition of "and proud" brings them into political territory? But it's further complicated by the fact that these judgements depend on cultural context. Even just identifying oneself as gay (setting aside the "and proud" aspect) would be a very divisive political statement if we were in the 1960s. This seems like a good reason to prefer the "allow all" approach.
I think there's also merit to Arkon's idea above of limiting to information that is relevant to building an encyclopedia. e.g. my user page mentions that I'm interested in and work on articles in the area of early 20th century gay culture, though I didn't bother to mention my own sexuality (spoiler: gay af). Colin M (talk) 19:26, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - As documented by Levivich above, the textual content of this UBX is clearly linked to a known hate group, thus constitutes a veiled form of hate speech, which in turn is directly linked with registered hate crimes. 'Culture wars'- and politics-related UBX's I generally dislike, and though I'm not one to prohibit what I don't like, I think there's a good argument for banning them all. The question raised by this particular UBX, however, is not one of dislike or disagreement, nor one of what is constructive or not on this project, but rather one of moral boundaries. I thought I'd grown out of this stuff, but on this occasion I'll say it: Good Night Straight Pride!☿ Apaugasma (talk☉)19:20, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per Levivich, et al. As I wrote above, it's relatively easy to draw a line about which "pride" slogans are/aren't appropriate here. If the expression of "pride" is a majority group's reaction to pride expressed by a historically marginalized/mistreated group, then it's probably inappropriate. It doesn't require an assumption that someone using this box means it in the sense of straight pride, just like someone who says they have "white pride" might accidentally do so without knowing history and context. But if they don't know the context of that concept, I'd think they'd be glad to be rid of the userbox. Likewise, we don't have to assume that a person using the "gee whiz, can't someone just have pride in who they are" argument is some kind of supremacist just because they're using a line long repeated by supremacists to disingenuously deny history/context or otherwise troll people... but I'd figure someone doing so without knowledge of that history might want to know. — Rhododendritestalk \\ 19:38, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, in particular agreement with the points made by nom, GW, and Rhododendrites. Per WP:UBCR, "Userboxes must not be inflammatory or substantially divisive." Userboxes that are dog whistles for hate groups are categorically divisive. Firefangledfeathers (talk) 20:31, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: Making leaps and bounds in logic in an attempt to associate X with Y is fallacious. For instance, there are users who support the Communist Party of Cuba, a party well-known for its persecution of LGBT citizens [9]. So, are the users who support the Cuban Communist Party in favor of LGBT persecution? No, of course not. WP:GF is still a core part of this project the last time I checked. Dr. Swag Lord (talk) 20:39, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I echo Colin M and Swag Lord. Interpreting userboxes as saying something they don't literally say is a dangerous precedent. This userbox does not actually wikilink to straight pride, the movement. I agree that this is cringey and reject the concept of straight pride (the world is already fully accepting of heterosexuality), but this propels us down the path of more and more limitations on what Wikipedians can say. What about a userbox that says 'this user is proud to be an American'? Is that unwelcoming to victims of 'US imperialism'? Is it supportive of a nation that some progressives consider white supremacist? How is this userbox different from 'this user is a proud Catholic'? The Catholic Church's doctrine considers only heterosexuality to be acceptable. What about being Muslim? Most Islamic sects do not accept homosexuality. Does a userbox supporting capitalism or one supporting communism endorse people starving to death and authoritarian violence? Opponents of either consider those to be inevitable consequences of the system they oppose. Once you open the door to "the userbox really means this", there are endless examples. Part of me wonders if we will start seeing some of even these arguments one day. There is little that cannot be considered too offensive depending on one's own point of view once we start reading into things. If we imagine a parallel world where Wikipedians are overwhelmingly religious and conservative, I would likewise oppose the deletion of a "proud to be gay" userbox, no matter how much it offended their deeply held religion/faith/values. Principles have to be applied consistently or they are subjective and worthless. Crossroads-talk-00:27, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It's not about opinions and beliefs, it's not about what's offensive, it's about hate and about moral boundaries. All the examples you've given can be and actually are often interpreted in ways very different from the interpretations you've given for them. Not so for this UBX, which for people familiar with white pride (familiarity with straight pride isn't even needed) has only one obvious interpretation. The only exception to this would perhaps be someone who does not know the anglophone cultural connotations of minority-related 'pride', as GorillaWarfare mentioned. It won't do to reduce Catholicism or Islam to gay-hate, and it certainly won't do to use this as an argument to tolerate something that is quite directly promoting such hate. Everything is open to interpretation, and as Floquenbeam noted, there will be a fuzzy area where it really means this becomes convoluted, but this is not it. ☿ Apaugasma (talk☉)01:24, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per the nom and Floq's excellent reasoning. No problem with putting your sexuality on your userpage or in a userbox, but when a movement's adherents say that their purpose is "protecting traditional gender roles, Christianity, heterosexuality, Western Civilization, babies, and the contributions of whites to Western Civilization from the malevolence of the homosexual movement" (see the page for Straight Pride, it makes the wiki a less-safe place. ThadeusOfNazerethTalk to Me!00:34, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete, any user that would use this template is either advocating for straight pride or unaware it exists, in which case it's better it doesn't exist at all so that they aren't inadvertedly promoting straight pride, which has been clearly stated to be discriminatory against gay people. Those using it and unaware of its implications will be just as well using the one that doesn't include and proud. —El Millo (talk) 01:57, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. As pointed out above, User:UBX/heterosexual already exists, and the difference between it and this one is the meat of the problem. We gain nothing by keeping the additional dog-whistle when there already exists something that expresses the good-faith sentiment instead. At best, at a very loose, fuzzy, potential best-case-scenario, this is redundant, and if that's the slim upside then we have no real reason to keep hold of it. Gʀᴀᴘᴘʟᴇˣ13:51, 24 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per the nom, GorillaWarfare, Rhododendrites, etc. There's simply no acceptable use case for this box: either it's used deliberately, making it hate speech, or it's used out of cluelessness, in which case it fosters poor communication and misunderstanding. Perhaps there's a middle case where it would be "edgy", troll-ish "humor", but that's also not what we're here for. The assumption of good faith stops when we have evidence of bad faith, and given what "straight pride" has come to mean, asserting it is evidence enough. XOR'easter (talk) 02:16, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete whether intentionally or not this is effectively an endorsement of Straight pride, which is essentially rejection of LGBT rights or LGBT people. WP:POLEMIC bars "Very divisive or offensive material not related to encyclopedia editing", which includes "statements attacking or vilifying groups of editors, persons, or other entities". This falls under that prohibition. Hut 8.518:57, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Deeply conflicted (and highly qualified) keep... I've been following this discussion (and the one from which it developed) the last few days and have found myself having a more difficult time than I can recall having with any other discussion for a long time, when it comes to parsing the right course of action here. I typically do not like to say much about who I am and what boxes I fall into off-project when I edit and participate in this community's discussions: aside from the fact that it helps me seal myself away from arguments from authority (which make for bad logic and are contrary to our processes here), the novelty and beauty of being able to participate in a community where all of my arguments stand or fail on their own (and are not filtered through the perceptions people have of me by virtue of irrelevant demographic details) is something that I cherish very much about this project, being a state of affairs that is quite uncommon and distinct from other areas of my personal and professional life. I wish that outlook was more ubiquitous here: if so, we probably would not be having this conversation. All of that said, on this occasion, I am going to to preface this discussion with the following sentiment and anyone reading this can choose how much or how little to read into it: I really do not take anti-LGBT bigotry (express or implied) lightly. And like just about everyone commenting above, I see the almost-certain dog whistle here for what it is.
The problem is, I'm not sure even absolute certainty would justify banning the statement in question here. I'm deeply concerned about the implications of such a course of action: it feels to me that by doing this, we are codifying and legitimizing exactly the rhetoric of the queer-phobic bigots that we take such exception to here, and thus play right into their hands. These people want us to associate the innocuous concept of a straight person expressing joy in their sexuality with their (the bigots') reactionary brand of discourse and jingoism; whether they merely feel irrationally threatened by other sexualities or are fully committed hatemongers, these people have put in a lot of rhetorical work to subsuming a concept of internal integrity and self-celebration into a twisted idiomatic fulcrum that they can strategically use to leverage people of good will against one-another. And I fear that if we accept their reasoning, if we concede their claim to that phrase even to such an extent as forbidding a class of person (whom the bigots unfairly claim as their own constituency) from expressing pride in a major part of their personhood, we are just empowering the division and rancor that they have already wrought with a term they have illegitimately appropriated from every straight person who would choose to love and respect both themselves and their non-heterosexual neighbour.
I am not prepared to head down the path of denying my fellow community members a statement of self-worth that they are entitled to, just to get into the semantic mud with small-minded provocateurs. Even recognizing the statistical possibility that the userbox may never be used in a fashion other than that noxious variety of identitarian extremism, I would still rather preserve the availability of those words rather than cede them to the force of intolerance. We cannot defeat ignorance (in this community or in the world at large), by sacrificing the rights of our sisters and brothers on the other side of an arbitrary divide of sexuality, thereby endorsing the factionalistic tactics of bigots. I think this community is stronger than that: I think we can let them have their dogwhistles (if the alternative is to rob a large portion of our community of their right to self-description) and can instead use the most time-tested strategy for dealing with people who erroneously claim to speak hate in the name of the majority: we ignore them, and rob the destructive flames of their atiloloquence of the oxygen that it needs to survive.
Mind you, if this discussion involved a broader and more uniform proposal for scaling back the scope of polemic and ideological statements in userboxes and similar content, I would be much more amenable to it: I've loooooong found these little signal flares of political and personal views to be highly problematic for this project--including, in fact, exactly the userbox we are discussing here, which I observed with some distaste when I first saw it in the userbox indexes. But what I am not prepared to do is support giving that freedom of expression to one class of editor and not to another, based on their sexual orientation. And since I don't see this entire class of subjective userbox going away any time soon, I must reluctantly, for the reasons detailed above, argue to preserve this one as well. I make this statement knowing the ship has apparently already sailed on this issue, but I hope I have done a good enough job above explaining to my fellow community members why I am respectfully deviating from the consensus here, and why I think this is the most prudent course of action, regardless of personal distaste for the phrase, as it is typically used. SnowRise let's rap03:39, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
by doing this, we are codifying and legitimizing exactly the rhetoric of the queer-phobic bigots that we take such exception to here, and thus play right into their hands - Strong disagree. By pretending there is an innocuous version of the "straight pride" slogan, we are "playing right into their hands." Terms like "straight pride," "white pride," "all lives matter," etc. exist as reactionary slogans responding to marginalized/oppressed groups fighting for their rights, but framed to be as innocuous as possible. That way, when someone objects to the obvious trolling, there is always a built-in response: "why can't I have pride in who I am?" or "why is it bad to think that all lives matter?" While some people have then taken up the slogans without knowing where they came from, "playing into their hands" is buying into the trolling and saying "oh, yeah, sometimes people just think all lives matter or have pride in who they are," not calling it out for what it is. — Rhododendritestalk \\ 14:27, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That way, when someone objects to the obvious trolling, there is always a built-in response: "why can't I have pride in who I am?" Yep, precisely: and when more substantial efforts are made to roadblock that expression, they begin to cry foul even louder, but at that point they no longer have their rhetorical opposition in mind as the main target audience; rather they instead at this point begin to use the situation as a recruiting tool. "Look!" they holler, "these people don't think we should even have the right to express our pride in who we are. The say they are just fighting for their own equal rights, but don't you believe them! Their real goal is the erasure of your identity as you know it!" And it is a depressingly effective technique--and not just with particularly credulous people or those already well-primed to be converted to bigots. Because people become very alarmed at even abstract threats to what they are used to perceiving as their rights of self-expression, let alone manifest rules prohibiting impacting them. "Wait, I can't say I'm proud of being straight now? I mean, I hadn't felt the need to say it recently (or maybe ever?), but why shouldn't I be able to if I want to? Maybe I ought to pay more attention to [insert crankpot here]". All it takes is some young and/or uninformed people who don't have the proper context to see this nonsense for what it is, and it becomes an "us vs. them" window through which all of the rest of the bigoted messaging and misinformation can begin to flow. That is exactly the chain reaction of emotionally manipulative rhetoric and moral panic that I am arguing we should be short-circuiting here, rather than catalyzing the feedback loop.
That's what I mean about not playing into their hands. And I would argue that, far from refuting my argument, your observations about those tactics actually support it: with no disrespect intended, you are dropping the line of reasoning too early and not following the reactions out to their likely conclusions, to get the full picture of exactly why these tactics are so successful and why playing the game on their own terms will only lend the queerphobes strength. Especially in this case, where we are not just objecting to the exact phrase "straight pride" (which appears nowhere in the infobox in question), but rather apparently any expression of pride in being straight: that's not just one step down the slippery slope, but several. We're excising far too much healthy tissue here, when this isn't even a winning strategy to deal with the malignancy in the first place. I just don't see the cost-benefit ratio here as having a positive return: humanistic values never prevail by trying to control the contours of the issue like this: the bigots will always turn the creation of any such obstruction into pyhrric victory, leveraging the ambiguities of the language involved and turning it against those who might otherwise be united against their nonsense, carving that natural opposition into smaller groups that can be pitted against one-another. That is the entire history of radical identitarian politics in a nutshell.
The only winning move here is not to validate the results of such rhetorical contortions at the outset. The only viable longterm response to these strategies (here on this project or in the greater world) is a principled stand against the idea that these divisive hatemongers can claim ownership of sexual pride terminology as a justification for their reactionary beliefs and biases. This nonsense can only be combated with critical thinking and express repudiation of their illegitimate use of such terminology. If we instead just take the easier (in the moment) route of letting them have their claim to that language, and then attempt to quarantine that language (now infected because of our laissez-faire attitude towards the tactic), all we will ever do (as a community here on Wikipedia, and a society at large) is play whack-a-mole with one set of facially valorous terminology (turned to bigoted purposes) after another. Letting the bigots have hard-fought-for emblems of the pride of repressed communities is NOT the solution here. Reappropriation is. And that solution, the only one with a historically proven track record for successfully undermining this variety of reactionary jingoism, would be thrown out (or realistically, will be thrown out) the window by adopting the proposal here. SnowRise let's rap00:31, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Snow_Rise has brought concerns not yet addressed by other editors. I concur with these concerns and until they are addressed, I will object to and pursue process against any closure other than "no consensus" MarshallKe (talk) 13:32, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That's...not how consensus works. But if you want a response: Snow Rise's fear that "we concede [homophobic bigots'] claim to that phrase" is unfounded, because it already happened. Their claim to the phrase was staked long ago, when they coined it and (tried to) promulgate it. To acknowledge that it is a dog-whistle, as Snow Rise does, is to admit that the game is over before it has begun. Pretty much all of the delete !votes have been on the basis of the pre-existing cultural context around the phrase, and to disregard that context out of a concern for freedom of speech and even-handedness...well, WP:NOTFREESPEECH and WP:UBCR seem to indicate that neither of those things are primary concerns when it comes to userboxes (or indeed, Wikipedia in general). We don't give people equal space to express themselves, and for good reason--although I would again point out that nobody here has expressed any issues with the simple "this user is heterosexual" userbox, so people are perfectly welcome to express themselves there--and allowing an admitted dog-whistle is not the place to start hand-wringing about it. (I should probably say that I don't doubt Snow Rise's good faith in making the argument for one second, even if I feel it's a bad one.) Writ Keeper⚇♔13:50, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Their claim to the phrase was staked long ago, when they coined it and (tried to) promulgate it. Did it, though, in reality? Coining a phrase is an inherently diffuse and informal linguistic and cultural process, and most communities do not have the kind of gatekeeping mechanisms that this one does to contemplate the validity of such ownership: I just can't accept that nothing more than the repeated vociferous use of a phrase for cultural currency in an ideological fight can stand alone as evidence for the fact that bigots who appropriated it now "own" that phrase--and indeed, according to this proposal, any syntactic variation thereof which looks remotely similar in tone--in perpetuum, and that we must all just bow to that reality because they are really committed to their theft. The non-bigoted straight people of the world certainly never ceded this state of affairs, that I ever saw: in fact, I think if we looked, we would find the record out in the wide world full of principled objections to this hijacking of the language. In any event, regardless of the nebulous state of affairs in the world at large, this is our first time contemplating how to deal with language on this project and in this community, and the situation is pregnant with possible knock-on effects, so we should consider very carefully whether we want to endorse the notion that a straight person discussing their pride in their sexuality is strictly verboten language.
I feel that (whatever the past milktoast response to this strategy by some others out in that wider world) we ought to reject the presumption that the hatemongers have claim to language of this sort--and indeed reject that principle in the strongest possible terms. We aren't talking about content here, so we aren't bound to descriptive precedent. We can choose whether we will, as a community, rubber stamp this appropriation, or to reject it on principle and take a more conscious and nuanced approached to the situation. Without meaning offense to anyone in this particular discussion, in a general sense I think a lot of people just want to pat themselves on the back whenever they recognize a dog whistle for what it is. Knowing how to utilize that knowledge and deal with the problematic language, on the other hand, is a far more challenging matter and requires a lot of contemplation (and perhaps some moral courage) to figure out how to purge our shared dialogue of such a taint. Certainly that's not in Wikipedia's job description, but now that this issue has crossed the boundary into our community, I think we need to be careful about what our formalistic response is going to be, and how it is going to affect our community and processes going forward. Because while this may relate just to userboxes in the present instance, I'm going to guess that some of the people !voting delete here would apply a similar line of reasoning to that extended here to a non-UBCR context, and when you consider that we're not just reacting to the exact idiom "straight pride", this begins to concern me regarding some pandora's box implications of just trying to stamp out the fire vigorously without taking stock of anything vital, by way of community needs, that may be caught up in the act. SnowRise let's rap00:41, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
nobody here has expressed any issues with the simple "this user is heterosexual" userbox True, but the obvious rejoinder here is that there is also no one arguing for the deletion of the multiple userboxes expressing pride in other sexual orientations aside from straight. You are quite right that this community has (for numerous reasons amounting to more than good cause) a WP:NOTFREESPEECH principle. But I know of not one community discussion which has ever abrogated the intuitive presumption that this principle be applied equitably: to the extent the community permits declarations of personal beliefs, no past community discussion has ever found that they should not be applied with equal vigor to groups divided along such an arbitrary demarcation line as sexuality. The NOTFREESPEECH principle runs in both directions: it's also the reason we have our WP:RGW guideline. And I understand (and am somewhat sympathetic to) what I perceive your likely response to that argument would be: the specifics of the phrasing here (and the historical context around it) make the difference not quite so "arbitrary" at all. That's fair enough, and there's plenty enough discussion of that context above: afterall, there's no denying it and we must simply each decide what the best strategy is for combating that kind of bigotry. But we can't pretend this is really a WP:NOTFREESPEECH policy issue at its core, because the community has clearly made express carve-outs (ill-advised in my opinion, but here we are) to many classes of infobox content, and those carveouts also greenlight the LGBT pride infoboxes, amongst other personal declarations. I should probably say that I don't doubt Snow Rise's good faith in making the argument for one second, even if I feel it's a bad one. Likewise, and with respect, WK. SnowRise let's rap00:42, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. On a personal level, I think that it's silly to be proud of anything that one cannot control, whether that be race, gender, sexual orientation, or place of birth. This includes being proud of being gay, which I think I have enough right to say – in my opinion, LGBT pride is being proud of the fact that you came out of the closet, which often takes a great deal of courage. The other "pride" userbox reflects this fact. But we are not arguing my personal opinion. As it stands, I think that the straight pride dogwhistle is obvious, and that falls under a violation of WP:UBCR. I also disagree with Snow Rise's "live and let die" argument, especially when there is an incredibly simple step that we can take (deleting a userbox). The sign-wavers who like to walk around preaching about "homos and whores" will show up outside of businesses whether or not they get shouted down by those on the opposing side. They only leave when somebody shows up, says this is private property, and asks them to leave. — GhostRiver13:55, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I want to keep this brief, having already responded at some length to two responses to my own !vote here and not wanting to become a distraction, but I do want to say that I don't think that "live and let die" is quite an accurate description of my own perspective on this matter: I don't think favouring opposition to letting bigots have the language in question here is the same thing as turning a blind eye to what they are trying to do, any more than a nonviolent resistance can be accurately described as a passive response. I am very stridently opposed to the use of "straight pride" as a banner call to bigotry. I just have a difference of opinion with the emerging consensus here as to appropriate strategy for shutting such jingoism down. SnowRise let's rap00:45, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The sign-wavers who like to walk around preaching about "homos and whores" - the vast majority of straight people are not these sign-wavers; most do not give much thought to LGBT issues in favor either. While some here may feel they are just fighting bigotry, the optics of this to that vast majority appears to say that straight people can't think positively of their sexuality like a LGBT person can. That plays right into the bigots' hands. Crossroads-talk-18:22, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete deleting a userbox isn't going to fix bigotry, but it could very well prevent a well meaning, but naive editor from inadvertently posting something on the their user page that expresses a sentiment they don't agree with. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vexations (talk • contribs) 20:46, 26 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and modify Assuming good faith that the creator and users were not aware of the unsavoury connotations of the "straight pride" slogan, we should provide them with alternative wording to express a positive view of themselves. For instance: "This user is heterosexual and feels confident in {{their}} sexuality". Cheers, gnu5712:56, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I've struck my comment as you're right. I misunderstood the conversation but should have investigated properly before commenting. I apologise to the actual creator, the Gnu57 and everyone else for any confusion from my earlier incorrect comment. Nil Einne (talk) 02:11, 28 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
This seems to be a growing trend by that individual. Challenging RFC & MoD decisions, that he/she dislikes. How does that saying go? - "Thou does protests, too much". Oh well, something to ponder. GoodDay (talk) 17:20, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
No, this was an indisputably bad closure by a new user who didn't justify their close at all, much less why they closed a still-active MfD 4 days early with a result starkly against the surface-level consensus. Writ Keeper⚇♔17:23, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The first two objections were raised 9 minutes and 11 minutes after the close (so, basically simultaneously), by two editors who have not !voted here, so it's not part of the trend you describe. Also, of course people challenge decisions they don't like; it'd be weird if people challenged decisions that they liked. Levivich17:39, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Something else to ponder: Perhaps hold off on throwing out a bunch of incorrect assumptions, including [still standing] accusations of bad faith, until doing even a tiny bit of research to figure out what actually happened? — Rhododendritestalk \\ 18:11, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per nom, and per WP:NONAZIS and IamRageSparkle. As Levivich wrote more eloquently, there is already a "this user is heterosexual" userbox, the only reason to add "and proud of it" (bold in original) is to advertise straight pride, a hateful ideology which only exists to attack gay pride and LGBT culture. A person who wants to advertise that they're proud of their heterosexuality really wants you to know they're proud they're not some other sexual orientation that they consider inferior. Hateful sentiments do not belong on Wikipedia. Ivanvector's squirrel (trees/nuts) 18:21, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Clarify: Given a real world example - If you had a rainbow flag in your yard & I had a straight flag in my yard & we lived across from each other, with no trees to block our view? Do both flags get to remain, or do both have to be taken down. GoodDay (talk) 18:26, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure how that is a useful analogy, since much of the nuance in the current situation lost (e.g. Wikipedia is an explicitly collaborative space that you do not own, not even your user page), and also not sure why "remove both" or "keep both" are the only two choices you offer. Writ Keeper⚇♔18:30, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) That's a flawed analogy. The first amendment protects an individual's right to expression on their private property; but that doesn't apply to a private website like Wikipedia. To use a more extreme example: At least in the US, someone could fly a Nazi flag on their own property if they so desired; that doesn't mean our community has to accept Nazi userboxes. But if I saw a straight flag in a neighbor's yard, I would take it to mean that they were actively hostile to me (a queer person), and would avoid interacting with them. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 18:31, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't be the first to tell you on this page that you have completely misunderstood Popper's paradox, so I won't try again, but you should stop trolling this discussion with your hateful comments. Ivanvector's squirrel (trees/nuts) 18:41, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
By describing my comments as hateful & trolling, you're proving the paradox. You'll note. Not once, have I tried to have a rainbow flag or proud to be homosexual userboxes, deleted from anyone's userpages. Anyways, we're heading into a circular argument. Neither of us is going to convince the other. GoodDay (talk) 18:48, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
We have a habit here on Wikipedia of judging things on how they would be used ideally, ignoring how they are used in actuality. But, to climb on my favourite hobbyhorse, how does this userbox look to a new editor who is confused by our arcane processes and slang and the like and goes to an editor who is using it for help or advice? It's an edge case thing, but around 10% of new editors will be LGBT+ and the wording of this userbox says "go away, pervert, [I'm exaggerating for effect] this place is for Normal People only!" And for, what, 3 or 4% of the population, the wording [again exaggerated for effect] says "Welcome! Come be a fucking Nazi here since you're a Normal Person and they are not!" Neither is useful to the overall goal of our encyclopaedia. ◦ Trey Maturin19:05, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
This is not a vote. The closing admin is expected to read the arguments put forward by each participant and come to a judgment, not count whose arms are in the air. So, no, it would not be better for me to include ‘Delete’ or anything else at the start of my comment. ◦ Trey Maturin22:07, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
We ought to be far more concerned for new editors unfortunate to stumble upon this nonsense and read what, to 97% of the population, effectively says: "Go away, normal person wanting to build an encyclopedia, this place is only for those committed to rooting out and crushing any and all dissent from woke orthodoxy expressed by your kind!"Elle Kpyros (talk) 22:13, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Hard to take seriously arguments that it's acceptable to announce pride of one's membership in group, but only if it's one currently described by some GLAAD-type political advocacy organization as "oppressed" or "victimized"—and that to express pride in an otherwise-identical "non-marginalized" group is akin to being a "Nazi". How many of these are verboten: "proud American", "proud North American", "proud Native American", and/or "proud native American"? What about "proud disabled, queer, Muslim American"? "Proud heterosexual cross-dresser"? What about a "proud Homo sapiens"? "Proud Christian"—in or out? "Proud billionaire"? A "proud man"—in, but only with "trans" in between? "Proud white rapper"—"Nazi" or no? "Proud Boer farmer"? "Proud white anti-racist"? And, of course, what about plain-old "White pride"—but from a black man named "Mike White"? Is it not obvious that policing individual infoboxes is, under cover of strict "tolerance" enforcement by an enlightened group of do-gooders, both a massive waste of time and an ugly political witch-hunt? What would have been the effect of it in, say, 1950? Or will it be in 2030? Elle Kpyros (talk) 22:02, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
How is that comment helping anything? Rather than just telling them to go away, destroy their position. This editor is missing the nuance and reason for the MfD: the phrase "and proud of it" and the negative connotations it has with straight pride. Merely saying one is heterosexual is not being scrutinized nor are the literal words "proud" or "pride," as the editor wants to argue, it's the usage of the word(s). They gloss over that in their emotional soapbox argument and do not focus on this userbox. When you just say "go away," then you have no impact but to strengthen their resolve. That is a useless comment. Rgrds. --Bison X (talk) 12:57, 28 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete as transparently WP:POINTy and incompatable with an open, collaborative project. Slippery-slope and paradox-of-tolerance arguments miss the point that this userbox is obviously intended to provoke conflict. The idea that someone would post this because they are legitimately and innocently proud of their identity as a straight person is ludicrous. Generalrelative (talk) 22:27, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per Crossroads. There is nothing inherently offensive about proud of your sexuality regardless of which one it is, it seems editors are reading for too much into this userbox ... Spy-cicle💥 Talk?16:54, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
They're very socially conservative, almost to the point of being right-wing? I mean, imagine if someone said "Keep" about a "white pride" userbox because "There is nothing inherently offensive about being proud of your race regardless of which one it is, it seems editors are reading far too much into this userbox." I find that extremely, extremely offensive, whether we're talking about white pride or straight pride. Just as white pride is extremely racist, straight pride is extremely homophobic. There is definitely something very wrong with straight pride, and with anyone who would tolerate it. Levivich17:19, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
All the editors here, who've chosen to Keep, are not haters or intolerant individuals or have anything else 'wrong' with them. GoodDay (talk) 17:31, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
While this may be true, Wikipedia is a collaborative project. While you may see this sentiment one way, a significant number of your fellow contributors have made it clear they see it as harmful and hurtful; you most certainly do not need to change your opinion on the matter and no argument should be made from that position, but ultimately this boils down to whether or not you, or the other handful of keep voters, want to knowingly retain something that causes discomfort for a swathe of others here. Gʀᴀᴘᴘʟᴇˣ18:19, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm one of those who opposes preaching of tolerance while practising intolerance. Anyways, If you want to discuss my views on userboxes any further? you're welcomed, at my talkpage. GoodDay (talk) 18:17, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Not me, Baseball Bugs, and both you and Levivich absolutely must stop casting WP:ASPERSIONS on your opponents via political labeling per WP:NPA#WHATIS: Using someone's political affiliations as an ad hominem means of dismissing or discrediting their views, such as accusing them of being left-wing or right-wing, is also forbidden. Not long ago, my fellow American liberals were generally able to comprehend the difference between defending the content of speech and defending the principle of minimizing restrictions on speech. Unfortunately, since the rise of Trump and his lies and populism, nuance and complexity has gone out the window in favor of the culture-war, good vs. evil, 'whoever isn't with me is against me', 'anyone who disagrees with my side is evil' mindset. Wikipedia is turning into Twitter. Crossroads-talk-18:39, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I don't agree with the "keep" voters here either, Bugs, but I agree with Crossroads that comments like "I wonder how many of the "Keeps" here are not Trump supporters?" are not helpful in advancing the discussion. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 19:19, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed it gets increasingly frustrtating that experienced editors need to repeteadly be reminded of WP:ASPERSIONS and WP:AGF. It is why more often then not I just do not bother to contribute to culture war-ish discussions (though ended up voting in the recent deadname RfC with a strong warning of uncivil attacks will lead to ANI as I was previously attacked in other gender discussions). There is a difference between a face value meaning, and what editors twist to become offended by. Also we are not discussing white pride here, but it is almost as if we have editors from contries around the world contribute to English Wikipedia, not just white majority ones like the US and UK. Spy-cicle💥 Talk?19:33, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
In your view, but not everybody's view. Not you or anyone else, should try to put a number of editors (in this Keep editors) under one roof. We're individuals, not a group. GoodDay (talk) 15:34, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Really, it's everybody's view. Straight pride and white pride are hate speech. This isn't something reasonable people disagree about. I posted sources BTW, I bet you can't find any source anywhere that says straight pride is not hate speech or that it's ok to be proud of being straight (or white). Users would get thrown off any other website (Twitter, Facebook, etc.) for posting expressions of white pride or straight pride; I'll be damned if Wikipedia.org is the one website that provides safe haven for bigoted views. Levivich17:06, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
But it's not everybody's view. Haven't you been reading my posts? I don't see straight pride & white pride as hate speech. Just like I don't see gay pride & non-white pride as hate speech. GoodDay (talk) 17:21, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Haven't you read the sources? The whole world thinks it's hate speech. I posted sources that agree with me, can you find even one source that agrees with you? That you wouldn't be too embarrassed to post? Because I can think of some sources that agree with you but you're not gonna wanna post them because of who they're written by and where they're published... Levivich18:02, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Haven't you read over this MoD? Not everyone has voted to 'delete'. This has developed into a circular argument & you have not convinced me to change my position, here. GoodDay (talk) 18:11, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Many in our community have rallied around the idea that diversity in the Wikimedia movement is essential to its mission (per WMF parlance). What should we do to bridge the "Trump-supporter-gap"? How to incite (pun intended) Trump supporters to edit Wikipedia? Pavlor (talk) 05:32, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. The only way this userbox could be worse is if it stated, "This user is super straight." It is inherently inflammatory and attempts to delegitimize the social, economic, and legal struggles faced by the LGBTQIA+ community. Just another example of the oppressors feigning oppression. ✗plicit07:00, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per Snow Rise and others above, as well as per various arguments at Wikipedia_talk:Userboxes#Restrictive_language. Accusations of hate speech are serious enough to require an unambiguous, explicit evidence. Simply being proud of one's own sexual orientation is not one of them (and may potentially result in defamation lawsuits, if the accuser still insists). PS: I'm neither American nor a Trump supporter. Brandmeistertalk12:31, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You may not be a Trump supporter, but you've certainly nailed his tactic of making ridiculous, blustery legal threats. We block IPs and new accounts for this shit all the time. I'm not in favor of those blocks - no one should take a silly threat like this one seriously - but I'll be curious to see how an uninvolved admin handles this, and whether your experience insulates you. --Floquenbeam (talk) 13:44, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not threatening anyone. What I mean is that accusing someone publicly of hate speech without unambibuous and clear evidence, for no good reason, just because of a userbox, may be regarded as libel. Unless one is a mind reader. Brandmeistertalk14:41, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sounds like an indirect legal threat, considering the recent ANI thread concerning your use of userboxes that were considered as having homophobic content. Isabelle🔔14:53, 30 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Simply links to each country's wp requests / todo pages for every country save for Brunei. Another list like this is available on the main page of wp: sea. Nathanielcwm (talk) 05:26, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Weak Delete as a copy in user space. Does not contain alternate history, and the mere mention of alternate history is not the problem. But did the nominator have the sandbox watchlisted to see when alternate history went up in it? We don't need ragpicking, or policing of user sandboxes. Robert McClenon (talk) 12:52, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Delete Per nom. There does not appear to be any real interest or need in an arbitrarily chosen article for improvement, especially given the sheer volume of Good Articles constantly coming from the WikiProject. ZXCVBNM (TALK)11:44, 21 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Something improper is going on here. There already is an article on Chondhi. This draft has a different latitude and longitude for the village than the article. The submitter of this draft, logged out, changed the latitude and longitude for the village and some other information, in a way that appears to be sneaky vandalism, but has been reverted. This draft may also be vandalism or a hoax, but is not so obvious that G3 would be appropriate. Should this draft be deleted, and should sources be found for the article, or should the article be corrected, or is this draft about a different village? Are there two villages with the same name in different districts in the same state, in which case disambiguation is in order? Robert McClenon (talk) 23:48, 20 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - There are multiple villages with this name. The submitter of the draft, in changing the latitude and longitude of the village, seems to have been, in mistaken good faith, hijacking the existing article to replace it with another article, when the necessary action was to disambiguate. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:42, 21 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep (and probably un-reject) seems like it's just a case of two places having the same name and a newcommer using an existing article as a template. 192.76.8.74 (talk) 21:35, 23 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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The majority of this draft is copied from an old revision of FC Barcelona in 2019. Old revisions of articles aren't allowed in userspace per WP:COPIES. Otherwise, the first paragraph of this draft has phrasing like "enthusiastic fans" which doesnt seem appropriate for an encyclopedic article. MrLinkinPark333 (talk) 23:26, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Old business
Everything below this point is old business; the 7-day review period that began 13:25, 25 July 2024 (UTC) ended today on 1 August 2024. Editors may continue to add comments until the discussion is closed but they should keep in mind that the discussion below this marker may be closed at any time without further notice. Discussions that have already been closed will be removed from the page automatically by Legobot and need no further action.
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Draft resubmitted three times after streaks of being declined to move into draftspace. I'll not nominating this draft for notability failures, but the repetition of being submitted, and being re-submitted. User:Ahthga YramTalk with me! I want to change my name!15:36, 16 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Can you please point to the policy that says a draft should be deleted for "repetition of being submitted, and being re-submitted"? Thanks, --DoubleGrazing (talk) 16:09, 16 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
User:SmokeyJoe - DoubleGrazing asked JuliaSusser about COI on 7 August at 1648. JuliaSusser resubmitted on 13 August at 0029. Hatchens then declined it, and RebeccaWhellen resubmitted it. DoubleGrazing asked RebeccaWhellen about COI on 16 August at 1006. So there had been a resubmission by an editor who had seen a COI inquiry. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:11, 17 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I think this is too complicated, multiple editors, asking in weird places. I would like to see the record of COI enquires on the talk page, Draft talk:RISE Financial Technologies, whether done there with pings, or links to user_talk posts.
I think deletion at this point, as punishment for not responding to a poorly defined process of COI Q&A, is not justified.
"repetition of being submitted, and being re-submitted" does not clearly meet the standard of "tendentious resubmission", which usually means resubmission without improvement. SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:38, 17 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I do not see tendentitious resubmission, just resubmissions after improvements, which is exactly what the templated instructions tell the author to do. The question about COI appears to have only been asked on the last decline. Comments and questions at the top of the draft are a pretty weird to communicate. If you want to penalise the author for note answering a question, I think you should ask the question, directly WP:pinging them, in a new section on the draft talk page. If you ask at their user_talk, then link to that. If you just ask on the draft header, it is unclear how the author is supposed to respond. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:12, 17 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment If anyone has a problem with the way I query COIs, they can take that to my talk page, not complain at XfD, thanks. In any case, the question here isn't whether there is a COI, and whether that has been declared or queried correctly and in what order; the question is whether this draft should be deleted (or should even have been nominated for deletion). I'm not aware of the policy that says a draft should be 'punished' for suboptimal behaviour of the creating editor or draft submitter, but I'm happy to be proven wrong. --DoubleGrazing (talk) 05:26, 17 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I changed my mind, I'll withdraw this nomination for good and rewrite the content if possible, if the sources are notable enough and covers significant content on the company itself. Moving this into the mainspace is unlikely even they rewrite the full content. Thanks. User:Ahthga YramTalk with me! I want to change my name!08:47, 17 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I have no problem with the way that User:DoubleGrazing queries conflict of interest, which they did with a template for the purpose on the user talk page of each submitter, and I thank them for asking. I don't think that User:SmokeyJoe is criticizing DoubleGrazing, but rather is criticizing the COI process. I disagree with SmokeyJoe if they are saying that an editor's user talk page is a weird place to ask about COI. I do think that there is a conduct issue with an editor who resubmits a draft, ignoring a COI inquiry. Maybe partially blocking the editor is more appropriate, but MFD is a content forum. If SmokeyJoe thinks that we need a better COI inquiry process, maybe Village Pump is where to discuss? Robert McClenon (talk) 15:47, 18 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Querying COI using a template on someone's user_talk page sounds perfect. The problem here is that this is not linked.
I criticise a comment about a COI query in the draft header comments being used as as a reason to delete a draft, which is what I read . Robert McClenon (18:58, 16 August 2021) as doing.
A comment about User:DoubleGrazing's COI queries, is that I cannot find them. It's not that his querying is a problem, or his mention of the query is a problem, but it is a problem that non-response is given as a reason for deletion without the queries being linked.
My preference would be for these queries to be done on the draft_talk page, or linked from the draft_talk page. If the draft is ever mainspaced, these COI enquiries are forever relevant history. If the draft is to be deleted with these queries as evidence, they need to be easily seen. SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:55, 18 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Keep. There is a recent rush of news reporting, eg at indianexpress.com and www.indiatoday.in. It is plausible that the GNG will soon be met. I do not think the GNG is yet met. Another solution is required for the over-eager resubmissions. Authors might consider WP:DUD. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:09, 18 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Agree with both above As has been noticed, it is HIGHLY unlikely that there will be an article on this person given what their career so far. One event, flash of fame and nothing that sustained the notice outside of gossip / tabloid mentions. Between the UPE desperately trying to earn their fee and fanboi edits, I have no doubt we'll see variations of the title created, but if the main space title and this draft are both redirects and protected, it may make it easier to speedy delete future drafts. Ravensfire (talk) 15:19, 16 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete and SALT - This is a content forum, and the issue is a conduct issue, spam. Salting the title in draft and article space is at least as important as deleting the draft, as is blocking the spammers and socks. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:44, 16 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - The title is already salted in article space. It should be salted in draft space, and consideration should be given to the Title Blacklist. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:13, 17 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Comment - The originator has edited since this page was nominated for deletion, and was properly notified, so that the originator apparently has no comment. Leaving !vote unchanged. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:33, 15 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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The result of the discussion was: delete. Redirect is not required for attribution since this page copies the older page that is now in mainspace (rather than vice-versa). RL0919 (talk) 15:46, 27 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment The title of the draft is totally misleading and has nothing to do with the article (which is about an Indian Air Force pilot notable for combat achievements); a redirect would be inappropriate (Ghandian activities = combat?!). Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 21:47, 3 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Delete per my original speedy. It is not the article – it is an ancient development copy under the Talk page and I can see literally no value in its continued existence. I only stumbled over it because of a spelling check. Have a look at its edit history! It's all there. Cheers DBaK (talk) 08:43, 21 July 2021 (UTC) Blimey. See below ...[reply]
Replace with explanation as kindly offered by Graham87 below. My revised bid having read Graham's comments and having had a quick and horrified look at the 2004 discussion. I am kind of wishing I had not noticed this ... DBaK (talk) 12:01, 21 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep (and explain) (per Graham87). Possibly turn into a talk page archive page? This is mostly talk, and we don't usually delete talk pages without good reason. I think looong ago (mid 2000s?) there was some incentive to use this kind of talk page subpages to discuss and try out improvements (anyone knows of some old WP page saying so?). Maybe this is one of those attempts? - Nabla (talk) 19:12, 26 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment How is it mostly talk? It is not. Per Robert, it is a content fork. It's all there in the history and you can see the ancient 2004 discussions about how it got forked and reunited and G*d knows what else. Please see Graham's explanation and link. I have come round to the view that it should be replaced with an explanation so that the history is not lost, but I cannot see the argument for keeping its actual content, which is I think without value. Otherwise why don't we just keep full copies of every stage of everything, everywhere? DBaK (talk) 22:51, 26 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Oh... I got it wrong, it looked like a series of short talk sections discussing each item. It is not. My mistake. So, (or) delete if there is no edit history to keep (working on a dfraft is probably editing, even if did not got to the 'final' version, I don't know.). And we do keep everything, only not everything on plain sight :-) - Nabla (talk) 17:26, 28 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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first submitted 6 months ago. being declined 3 times for the same reasons, WP:NOTNEWS and one event. last submission was rejected because still WP:NOTNEWS/one event and there isn't any significant update since the last submission. – robertsky (talk) 11:20, 12 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per above. When you reject a draft, it's rarely helpful to simultaneously MfD it: rejection is usually adequate to discourage recreation. MfD is an inefficient use of volunteer time (which is our project's most scarce resource), so it should generally be used only when all other available means have been exhausted. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 06:23, 25 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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Spam. This article (now draft) was written by someone affiliated directly with the article subject, per his userpage. WP:COI. He also has repeatedly recreated it after it has been deleted. ♟♙ (talk) 03:01, 5 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
User:SmokeyJoe - I thought that the analogy was clear, but it clearly was not clear. I meant to see the AFD as the equivalent of rejection, because both AFD and Rejection are based on GNG. The G4 was the equivalent of a resubmission after rejection, a tendentious effort to continue to push the article. So the AFD and G4 are the equivalent of rejection and resubmission, and so are a basis for MFD. I understand that you may disagree as to how close the analogy is. But there is a history of pushing the article after a consensus decision (and AFD, unlike a rejection, is by the community). Robert McClenon (talk) 02:51, 8 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
AfD deletion is not to be conflated with AfC Rejection. The criteria are very different. The editor being slow to understand stuff is not a reason to delete. You analogising here is really bad.
It is now a draft. It has been declined, correctly. Has it been tendentiously resubmitted after declines, or resubmitted with no improvement, or resubmitted often rejection? If not, MfD is premature.
Keep. The AfD deletion decision was for GNG and COI issues. Both of these mean that draftspace should be used, and neither are a deletion reason in draftspace. “Repeatedly recreated”? Please provide links. “Creator refuses to accept consensus”? Evidence of this is not provided. I disagree that the draft is spam. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:21, 8 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
See the G4 after the AFD, and then see another creation in article space, which was then moved to draft space by User:John B123. The evidence of the creator refusing to accept consensus is the two re-creations in article space after the AFD, which is a consensus process. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:58, 8 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It has been submitted once only, and is declined, with a suitable comment. It was not rejected. It has not been tendentiously resubmitted. Standard AfC process says to leave it, for improvement or G13. Bringing it to mfd prematurely is wasting editors time. SmokeyJoe (talk) 14:13, 8 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
SmokeyJoehere is what I take as a clear refusal to accept consensus that his newspaper is not notable. If it were notable, people unconnected would want to write it, not need to be begged since 2017. StarMississippi14:17, 8 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, threading issue. I was responding to your request: Creator refuses to accept consensus”? Evidence of this is not provided.. I respect that we disagree and wasn't disagreeing with your keep, as neither of us is objectively correct. StarMississippi01:35, 9 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I do not consider it to be spam. It is not a candidate for G11. My !vote to Delete is based on other reasons. I understand SmokeyJoe's defense; I just disagree. Robert McClenon (talk) 12:44, 8 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete as G4 recreation and resubmission of the same content as what was up for AFD. If the draft was completely rewritten from editors without the COI then consider leaving it alone. AngusW🐶🐶F (bark • sniff) 15:32, 15 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
This is true. I wish it was in policy that subtopics should have to have a mention, a stable mention, in a parent article before someone starts drafting. Same if they want to write directly into mainspace. This is similar to my belief that forking to draftspace, unless with the notification and agreement at the article talk page, is a bad idea.
Delete and salt. The author's 2-year-old group blog was not notable when it was deleted, is not notable now, and is not going to become notable in the next six months. G13 is usually a good way to delete such drafts. However, given the author's many-year history of disruptive editing and attempted self-promotion (illustrated by the warnings on User talk:Gonzafer001 and their recent topic ban from creating new articles on any subject with which they are connected), prompt deletion is appropriate to avoid wasting further community resources. We don't want the author to create another sockpuppet to push this topic, and it would be regrettable if any honest draft rescuer wasted their time on it. --Worldbruce (talk) 17:19, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Keep, needed to be declined, was declined, and should now be ignored. There's been some mainspace tendentiousness, but thus far that hasn't extended to draftspace resubmission, if it later does then bring things here, otherwise no need to take up anyone's time with an mfd, in the absence of an WP:NMFD reason just leave for g13. Regards, 81.177.3.8 (talk) 17:11, 15 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
The result of the discussion was: no consensus defaulting to keep. I tried to put my biases aside, but didn't really need to struggle too much with it, tbh. I don't think the delete side got a consensus against retaining this item in user space (where standards are far more lax, of course). The TBAN is a non-issue, seeing as the author's last edit to the page was a day before it was recorded in the log. Any violations to it by the page's author in the course of this discussion are exempted. I realize that this is a terse close. If I see fit, I may expand my reasoning further upon request, but this is really the crux of it. El_C14:12, 29 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
While we allow a wide leeway for opinions in user essays, they are not a free ticket to bypass WP:MEDRS for biomedical claims, which the origin of the Covid-19 virus is. --Guy Macon (talk) 15:01, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Whether/how MEDRS applies to COVID-19 origins in the mainspace is a controversy in itself, see, e.g. [14]. MEDRS is even less relavant when the page in question is merely a personal essay of mine in the userspace. Normchou💬15:55, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If there is any mockery, it's a mockery of those who utterly failed to grasp the real world as an independent person. Normchou💬14:42, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
On the other hand, the comment above this one is a clear mockery of basic requirements of civility (which are not something limited to Wikipedia but also to the actual real world) and also of the fact that Wikipedia is an collaborative project which must be run in a spirit of mutual respect (see the opening paragraph of WP:NOT). Not in a spirit of casting aspersions on other editors. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 02:50, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. This is what appears to be a humor essay masquerading as a serious one. Links to John Stewart diatribes, a parody of Bayesian inference... No WP:MEDRSes to speak of. Only opinion pieces and OR. It's also claiming that it's a matter of common sense that Virologists have a "COI" and we shouldn't trust scientific sources on this questions. Instead we should rely exclusively on the author's preferred sources (opinion pieces and yellow journalism), which the community has repeatedly decided are less reliable and of lower quality. And yet, this essay is a textbook example of why the very next section applies, WP:NOCOMMON. We have discussed this before, and decided as a community that this is not what wiki is supposed to be. It should follow, not lead. If the scientific sources are wrong and driving us off a cliff, we will follow, because it makes us right more often than not. It feels like every time we have a new pandemic, we must rehash and relitigate these same WP:FLAT arguments. Very similar things happened with Zika in 2015 and with Ebola in 2014. In the last two months, it is only the news coverage that has changed, not the underlying facts. Only more aspersions, speculations, and opinions, very few facts. We must use the most reliable sources available for these questions. Wikipedia is not a free forum for conspiracy-laden evidence-free speculations.--Shibbolethink(♔♕)16:26, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Aside from the numerous distortions in your above statement—any user can read my essay and make a judgment on whether your accusations are valid—you own reply here shows you are not treating this piece merely as a humor essay masquerading as a serious one. You realize that my common-sense argument makes sense, so you try to discredit it by raising objections to its premise. It is perfectly acceptable to have good-faith arguments regarding my essay, but trying to erase it simply because you disagree is not. Normchou💬
This is the most unconvincing counterargument I could imagine. I was wondering whether to !vote to delete or keep this, because as long as it's in userspace, it's not really harmful (it just shows how well the author understands the subject). After reading this, however, I'm convinced that this is not a simple case of some inability to understand the subject, but actual POV pushing in essay form. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPantsTell me all about it.19:07, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia is not a free forum for conspiracy-laden evidence-free speculations...thank you, I needed a good laugh this morning. Hyperion35 (talk) 14:45, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Wait/Keep There is an active RFC on whether the MEDRS applies to the origins of COVID-19 as mentioned by Normchou (which seems to be leaning against it). Zoozaz1talk17:32, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Zoozaz1: If you look at the RfC question, it asks only whether "origins of a disease are unambiguously a bio-medical topic". This is strictly unrelated to an essay which ignores even the basics of WP:RS and makes broad-ranging WP:FLAT claims as an attempt to suggest we should ignore not only MEDRS but even WP:RS (see WP:SCHOLARSHIP. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 22:49, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
My focus was on MEDRS as the deletion nomination was exclusively about violating MEDRS, which is not a settled question. That being said, so what if it challenges WP:RS? It's a userspace essay. Speaking as a strong supporter of the policy, someone challenging any Wikipedia policy with the goal of making the encyclopedia better should be allowed (within reasonable boundaries, of course). Essentially no policy (outside of civility policies) should be so set in stone that there is no place for dissent/disagreement from it because ultimately, even if it might be hard to see in a particular instance, that is how our policies improve and evolve over time. Oral history projects are a great example of where our RS policy may fail.
For this particular instance, I generally agree with DGG below. Ultimately, it either came from a lab leak or it didn't, and I believe it is wrong to shut down differing opinions on the issue. Others editors have brought up that this is advocacy; of course it is. An essay, according to Wikipedia, is an argument. Every essay advocates for something, and that's absolutely fine. My problem is when we deem one particular argument acceptable and a different, still plausible, argument unacceptable. Now of course one hypothesis is supported much more in reliable sources, but again, so what? This is not a definitively settled issue, and people should be allowed to express differing opinions on it in userspace even if those opinions depart from the majority viewpoint. Zoozaz1talk01:08, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete The author's response to Shibbolethink's !vote above has convinced me that this is a WP:ADVOCACY. It's basically a POV-pusher's argument, in essay form. And the math... Dear god, no self-respecting encyclopedia should allow that travesty called math to remain anywhere within its bounds. The assumption of a conspiracy among scientists to suppress The TruthTM is really just the icing on the cake.
As a final point, the essay suggests we use "common sense" when editing articles on Covid-19. I actually agree with that. Common sense tells us that the scientists have a firmer grasp of the realities than the press, and so far, it seems to be almost entirely the press who's pushing the lab leak theory, and those rare few scientists who have supported it have all either A) qualified their statements to the point that the press' insistence that they support the theory is questionable; B) turned out not to have relevant expertise, making their opinions no better than anyone else's or; C) already been known as conspiracy theorists within the scientific community.
Delete User space has some leeway, yes. However, Wikipedia is not a debating forum or an advocacy website. It's a collaborative project. Essays which attack the fundamental policies of the project by engaging in blatant WP:ADVOCACY in an attempt to discredit them, which even suggest that the whole of scientists are engaging in a conspiracy, and which make a travesty of mathematics... are, plain and simple, not acceptable, and only further the case that the author needs a break from this topic area. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 22:48, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The content of the WP:ADVOCACY page strongly suggests that it is not meant to apply to userspace, it is meant to apply to article space. Your reference to WP:FLAT below fails for the same reason, as that applies to article space, not userspace. And criticism of Wikipedia policy is 100% permissible in userspace as long as it is done respectfully. Your arguments would create a very strong case for deletion if this were an article, but it isn't. Mlb96 (talk) 03:07, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Nowhere in any of these pages does it say that the advice therein is limited to mainspace, and WP:NOTSOAPBOX certainly applies everywhere. Also, the spirit of the policy is far more important than the letter, and I'm not convinced that saying this applies only to articles is correct even if you can provide an out-of-context quote to the contrary. Cheers, RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 12:05, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't need to be explicitly stated when the implication is obvious. For example, the title of WP:FLAT is "Why Wikipedia cannot claim the Earth is not flat." This implies that it is meant to apply to things claimed by Wikipedia (i.e., things in article space), not by Wikipedia's users. WP:ADVOCACY talks about the goal of Wikipedia being to create "high-quality, neutral, verifiable articles," and the things that the policy is intended to prevent are "edit-warring and other disruptions." None of these apply to userspace. It should be abundantly clear that neither WP:FLAT nor WP:ADVOCACY apply to userspace, even if they do not explicitly say so. And your citation to WP:NOTSOAPBOX is puzzling, as that policy very clearly states that "Non-disruptive statements of opinion on internal Wikipedia policies and guidelines may be made on user pages." This essay presents the user's opinions on Wikipedia policy, at least to the extent that it would satisfy the precedent set by Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/User:Adoring_nanny/Essays/Lab_Leak_Likely, so WP:NOTSOAPBOX does not apply. Mlb96 (talk) 22:44, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. There is bias here, and the bias is in those proposing to remove the article. When I saw the preceding MfD, I said I had never seen such an unparalleled attempt on WP to shut off discussion of a topic . This is far worse, almost to the point of parody.. This is worse because it is an attempt to imposer sa particular narrow orthodoxy on not only what the encyclopedia can include, but on what can even be discussed here about what should be included. The deletion proposal is entirely antithetical to the very idea of science and of a NPOV encyclopedia, or of civilized discussion of any sort. The question of what we should cover can always be discussed, and any heretical views can be expressed that are not outright bigotry (and in user space, there's a very wide tolerance for even that) . The proposal to remove this essay--that is outright bigotry. It's the very essence of bigotry, a refusal to admit even the possibility that one might have been wrong, and a refusal to let anyone who disagrees with oneself expres their opinions. . Ift here ever was censorship here, this is it. If there ever was prejudice and bias and POV editing here, this it. If there ever was an attempt to make us look foolish in the eyes of the world, this is it. If there ever was an example of the harm that could be done to the encyclopedia by editors who have lost all sense of proportion, this is it. DGG ( talk ) 00:13, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@DGG: Have you even read the essay or are you just arguing to make a point? The essay literally begins by quoting a satirical comic show, then makes a parody attempt at Bayesian probability, before arguing that WP:SCHOLARSHIP and WP:RS should be conveniently ignored because "scientists are an unethical bunch full of conflicts of interests" (if that isn't WP:FLAT, I don't know what is). It then complains about "unfair treatment" of editors who go out of their way to irritate fellow contributors, by making dubious essays and attempting all sorts of other, non-consensus building activities... RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 00:20, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I never said I agreed with the essay, but yes, I do think that even that opinion can be expressed. And I would say that scientists who try to supress the opinion of the public about their work--even the most benighted opinion of the public about their work, are acting in defiance of the norms of their profession. Fortunately, most scientists do nothing of that sort, except that a few seem to be trying to do it on WP. DGG ( talk ) 00:34, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep This is an individual's userspace. Wikipedia:Verifiability is not required in userspace.
"All material in Wikipedia mainspace, including everything in articles, lists and captions, must be verifiable."
The policy is WP:NOTWEBHOST" "Wikipedia pages, including those in user space, are not personal web pages. Wikipedians have individual user pages, but they should be used primarily to present information relevant to work on the encyclopedia."
You can't create an essay that consist of arguments as to why Hitler was a great guy (which he wasn't), why The Princess Bride is a great movie, (which it was), why we should hire you, or why the holocaust never happened. You can't use Wikipedia to host material that is pro-choice, pro-life, pro-gun, anti-gun, or your claim that the Moon landings were faked. You appear to believe that you can put anything in your userspace. No. You can't. You can only present information relevant to work on the encyclopedia. This essay isn't even close. --Guy Macon (talk) 04:01, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Guy, there is for almost all of these a connection with how we present these issues in WP. This is especially true when written in connection withs actual editing in mainspace or article talk space. DGG ( talk ) 06:13, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
One indent level per reply, please. Would you venture to guess what the consensus would be if I were to post an RfC at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) asking whether the opinions in the above list have "a connection with how we present these issues in WP" and therefore are allowed in userspace? I have strong opinions on a number of topics which I never talk on Wikipedia other than staying away from articles where I might have trouble remaining neutral. In your opinion, would Wikipedia be good choice for a free web host to present these strong opinions to the world? --Guy Macon (talk) 15:35, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The examples you gave are fundamentally different. The moon landings being faked is supported/deemed plausible by exactly zero reliable sources and will never make it into the encyclopedia. The others are just expressing opinions on political issues which are quite irrelevant to Wikipedia (which does not give political opinions) and which therefore fails WP:NOTWEBHOST. This essay is advocating for a specific piece of information, that is at least vaguely plausible, to be included on Wikipedia and I have no problem with that at all. Zoozaz1talk15:45, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above argument (many things are not allowed in essays but this specific thing is allowed) is a perfectly reasonable argument. I may not agree but we are both arguing within existing policies. DGG's argument (that pretty much anything is allowed in an essay) is not reasonable and goes against multiple existing policies. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:45, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Addendum: Concerns have been raised that the essay violates the policy What Wikipedia is not. Specifically,
"Wikipedians have individual user pages, but they should be used primarily to present information relevant to work on the encyclopedia."
Volteer1 below has addressed this concern by noting the following quote from the essay
This unique WP:COI editing issue, if unsolved, is bad for Wikipedia, which relies heavily on scientists and their publications to provide information on COVID-19.
The essay presents information relevant to work on the encyclopedia. No convincing argument has been provided for why this essay in an individual's userspace should be deleted. --Guest2625 (talk) 09:02, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Oh. Sorry for the confusion. The essay as a whole passes the requirement as "presenting information relevant to the work on the encyclopedia". I highlighted "primarily" as an aside that Wikipedia also has room for humorous non-work related essays. --Guest2625 (talk) 09:36, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The word "primarily" is, yes, part of the policy, and you didn't answer my question. I therefore assume from your !vote you do think this user-space item is primarily presenting information relevant to work on the encyclopedia. Alexbrn (talk) 09:44, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. That is correct. This essay is presenting information relevant to work on the encyclopedia. However, I was also stating that the policy clause even has room for essays in userspace that are not relevant to work on the encyclopedia. I am interpreting "primarily" to mean that most of an individual's userspace pages should be work-relevant; however, some userpace pages can be non-work-relevant. It would be in error if this policy was used to delete humour from wikipedia's userspace. --Guest2625 (talk) 11:28, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That seems like either WP:WL or a misunderstanding, as if you're reinterpreting "they should be used primarily" to mean "a majority of them should be used". By your reading it would be possible to have (say) 5 pages of relevant content allowing a "free hit" page of personal blog or company advertisement. This goes against the onward text of the policy which says user pages should provide "a foundation for effective collaboration". Do you believe the page under discussion provides such a foundation? Alexbrn (talk) 11:54, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I was discussing "primarily" specifically in regards to the phrase "relevant to work". Most of an individual's userpages should be work-relevant; however, some of an individual's userpages can be, for instance, humorous or light-hearted wikitrivia of little work-relevant benefit.
It would not be possible to have a "free hit" page, a personal blog page, or company advertisement. Wikipedia has policy and guidelines which do not allow these types of userpages (e.g. WP:Attack, WP:UP#GOALS, and WP:UP#PROMO, respectivley). A new concern that you raise is that the essay violates the What Wikipedia is not policy clause:
"The focus of user pages should not be social networking or amusement, but rather providing a foundation for effective collaboration."
The essay provides a foundation for effective collaboration. If one wishes to know more about the editor's views, they have provided an essay which presents their opinion in a friendly and collaborative fashion in their userspace. If one is not interested in the editor's opinion one can also avoid reading their userspace opinion. --Guest2625 (talk) 13:15, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Guest2625: There's a very large difference between legitimate criticism of policies to further improvement of them and pieces whose sole purpose is to dispute those policies to push a point of view. Wikipedia is "an online community of individuals interested in building and using a high-quality encyclopedia in a spirit of mutual respect". This essay is not a means to that end: it shows disinterest in building a "high-quality" encyclopedia, it shows disinterest in mutual respect (of other editors, of scientists, of policy), it shows disinterest in the fact that Wikipedia is not a blog, and it shows disinterest in collaboration (WP:NOTBATTLEGROUND). To that extant, there's no justifiable reason to keep this, unless we're also going to allow userspace to become Blogspot 2.0. And that's not going to happen. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 17:54, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep (1) Users opinions should not have to please others. Readers can judge for themselves the validity of this opinion. (2) MEDRS should be for issues that affect health. No one is going to get better or sicker based upon where the disease came from. (3) There are large, large number of issues that affect the likelihood of a lab leak. The number of people traveling from bat caves to Wuhan. China's various censorship, jailings and "disappearances" of critics. The reasonableness of the wet market claims. Conflicts of interest among many "scientists". The recent emails of many scientists. Attempts to mislead readers as to who was writing a journal letter. The significance of any of these. Virologists are no better at determining the significance of most of these than the next person. In some cases they are less so. The significance of these are largely matters of opinion, not mathematics. (4) This is part of a large pattern of users being reverted, censored, deleted and banned on this issue. 2601:5C4:4301:217C:50A8:1452:FBBC:C5C (talk) 04:07, 20 June 2021 (UTC) — 2601:5C4:4301:217C:50A8:1452:FBBC:C5C (talk) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]
Did you actually read it? This unique WP:COI editing issue, if unsolved, is bad for Wikipedia, which relies heavily on scientists and their publications to provide information on COVID-19. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 05:48, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah right, let's just remove everything scientists say from all articles about science, since they have a conflict of interest. And then let's write whatever we want that has nothing to do with improving encyclopedias, and add a single sentence that does, justifying all the offtopic editorializing. --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:43, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, as I said the essay is very bad, but it's not just one line that's directly related to Wikipedia: One suggestion is to use WP:COMMONSENSE when editing articles on COVID-19 origins. A related suggestion is not to exclusively rely on "peer-reviewed scientific journal articles" for sourcing purposes. Ridiculous? Yes. Off-topic? No. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 08:55, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I mean, that particular line just makes it clear that there are also some CIR issues here, although admittedly I have to question whether competence has ever truly been required to edit Wikipedia. Hyperion35 (talk) 14:56, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, just as we kept Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/User:Adoring_nanny/Essays/Lab_Leak_Likely.Edit: I've struck my Keep !vote, as the pertinent issue now seems to be Normchou's topic ban, and I don't know enough about the breadth of that topic ban (or TBANS in general really) to comment on how it should apply to pre-existing userspace essays. To be clear I still don't think there's a policy based reason, (potentially) outside of their topic ban, to delete the essay. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 08:25, 25 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The arguments in the essay are very bad, but this is well within the leeway we allow in userspace. The essay doesn't violate policies like WP:NOTWEBHOST or WP:NOTADVOCACY, you are allowed to make on-topic essays in your userspace even if you argue them badly, and there is nothing even remotely tangential to medical advice readers could try and extract from it.
As an irrelevant note to people calling this a "travesty of/called mathematics", while that shouldn't really be relevant, it is not true. The math here is correct, albeit unnecessary and (probably intentionally) obfuscatory when the only purpose it serves is to cement the intuition that if "an outbreak of a novel coronavirus disease is first detected near a lab that studies novel coronaviruses", your credence that it leaked from a lab should be higher than before you knew that fact. Bayes theorem is exactly correct, and his application of it correct, the problem is just that when doing bayesian inference you can update priors off a very limited amount of information, plug in random numbers, and get out really any result that you want; this kind of thing only serves to misleadingly bolster what is a very simple and mundane point. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 05:47, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. As per WP:NOTWEBHOST, user pages should present information relevant to work on the encyclopedia and I found the information presented on this page very relevant for my work here. CutePeach (talk) 11:34, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Wikipedia is not a soapbox. Wikipedia is not a forum. Wikipdia is not an opinion site. At least, in theory and according to the rules that seem to get ignored whenever it's popular or politically convenient to do so. Generally speaking, user essays should be allowed, but not if they violate Wikipedia's rules and especially when the entire point of an essay is to violate multiple rules and act as a soapbox for conspiracy theories. I had strong opinions about the last US elections, would I have been allowed to write an essay about it? There are plenty of politicians and government officials who I think are liars and crooks, but Wikipedia is not the place for me to write an essay about that either. I have strong feelings about the F1 race I just watched, but Wikipedia is not the place for that either (by contrast, an essay about the proper way to cover the race would be appropriate). Hyperion3514:51, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Wikipedia is not your blog. We open a can of worms by allowing heavily opinionated essays like this to squat in userspace.--WaltCip-(talk)15:20, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment It is also worth pointing out that the NOLABLEAK essay, in contrast to this one, is primarily aimed at providing a repository of sources, as well as relevant PAGs, for the purposes of building better and more accurate articles on the subject, and specifically building articles in ways that fit within those various PAGs. It is an example of why user essays exist, as it assists us in building better articles. By contrast, this essay is primarily an opinion. To the extent that it says anything about building better articles, it explicitly advises against Wikipedia PAGs, in ways that would objectively make articles worse.
And make no mistake, people WILL take essays like this and pretend that they are official PAGs, just look at the number of times that people have pretended that there is a real rule requiring three good sources to keep an article at AfD (there is no such rule, there was a user essay on the subject, one that has since been pulled back to userspace, I think). So sure, keep this essay, if you're willing to deal with dozens of people citing it as a reason to ignore PAGs when writing articles, and the inevitable drama that will follow. Sure, edit-warring by CIR editors egged on by a lowest-common-denominator user essay is exactly what I woke up this morning thinking Wikipedia was lacking! Hyperion35 (talk) 15:42, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. The essay is ridiculous and only portray its creator in a negative light, but it is not a violation of any policy. It may became a violation (and probably will be deleted) if the user will be topic banned from the corresponding subject area. My very best wishes (talk) 16:24, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Overlooking for a moment that it is a user space, nowadays there is an overabundance of material that guides us to the hypothesis of a laboratory leak, whether they are official sources or simple logical reflections on the large and evident attempt to cover up of the matter. I am not speaking only of Chinese organs, but also of leading international figures, just look at the Andersen case: He publicly denied that the virus was engineered and after 9 hours he wrote privately to Fauci that it could have been. I don't want to push any particular theory, especially that of genetic modifications, but the circumstantial evidence is really too much and the absence of minimally decent evidence in favor of a zoonosis now weighs a ton.--Francesco espo (talk) 21:57, 20 June 2021 (UTC) — Francesco espo (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic. [reply]
So what? There is also an overabundance of material that guides us to the hypothesis of astrology, homeopathy, creationism and so on. The problem is that the quality of all that material is not high enough to make Wikipedia articles say, yes, homeopathy works, or yes, the lab leak is probably true. Is moving the profringe advocacy to user space the right solution? --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:41, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
RandomCanadian i don't know what to do with your sources, i have experienced these events firsthand, i was there. Politifact is the same one who was able to define the lab leak theory as "pants on fire" last year, and then run miserably for cover in the last month after having demonstrated that it has implemented a disinformation campaign for over a year. Andersen publicly said that Cotton was crazy for speculating about the lab leak and after 9 hours he privately wrote to Fauci that maybe the virus could be engineered. Full stop. And please, stop tagging me as a SPA. It is rude and unprofessional. --Francesco espo (talk) 23:23, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The only thing that is rude and unprofessional is you trying to get your opinion above that of the sources. Politifact and the BBC are reliable, (see the relevant article) and they, as well as other sources, describe how those emails have been misinterpreted. You have no valid reason to dismiss them. As for the Andersen email, the sources and the scientist himself clearly describe it as a preliminary hypothesis, before proper application of the scientific method ruled it out. Now stop engaging in OR. What you or I think about it is irrelevant, and you should not use Wikipedia to spread your own opinions, especially not when you self-admittedly also run an advocacy website on the subject, giving you a clear conflict of interest. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 01:51, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
RandomCanadian the sources are not the word of God, they are written by humans like you and me and, as they have shown, they have not been able to understand anything about the theory of laboratory leaks for over a year. Now we're looking at their goofy U-turns. Really reliable on that one! My site is totally ad-free, I don't make any money from it, I had to build it to overcome the enormous censorship present almost everywhere in the past. At the time it could not be talked about on Facebook, partly on Twitter, obviously zero on Wikipedia, fot newspapers was all about conspiracies, and it was bad enough for those who experience science firsthand and just need some sort of investigation to reveal the truth. Can you call it COI? If one day you push like us for an investigation and find out that a zoonosis has occurred I'll be a happy boy and apologize to the other fence of thinkers, but please, let's argue and investigate, don't censor! Francesco espo (talk) 10:50, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't really matter whether the sources are factually correct or not. Reliable sources reflect the best understanding of authoritative and learned figures/bodies as of the time they were written. Wikipedia is a tertiary source that summarises secondary sources. Editors who have novel thought, research or investigation to share should do so by contacting a reliable media outlet or scholarly journal to get their work published. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 11:30, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That is ok in theory but in practice editors like you and RandomCanadian want to censor some sources so that Wikipedia presents only your POV. These selfish choices are not in favor of the world population who read wikipedia. Many RSs and even MEDRSs published addendums and corrections, but that doesn't effect Wikipedia editors like you, RandomCanadian and the OP of this discussion that have just made an edit to Drastic Team claiming that they are "promoting COVID-19 conspiracy theories". I hope that those closest to this discussion understand what is going on here.--Francesco espo (talk) 00:10, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Of course we have opinionated stuff in userspace, and it is about Wikipedia. Oh well, Wikipedia is a good place to look up things like nucleotides. Art LaPella (talk) 22:32, 20 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it's trolling, doing bayesian analysis for what would otherwise be a very simple point and plugging in random numbers is a common thing people do on the internet. See for instance "Is Bernie Sanders a Crypto-Communist? A Bayesian Analysis", argued in good faith by Bryan Caplan (which I can't link to because econlib is blacklisted). It is, unfortunately, a thing. ‑‑Volteer1 (talk) 00:53, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You keep doing that, and it is becoming a serious problem. WP:NOTMADEUP says:
"Wikipedia is not for things that you and/or your friends made up. If you have invented something in school, the lab, your garage, or the pub, and it has not yet been featured in reliable sources, do not write about it on Wikipedia. Write about it on your own website, blog or social media instead."
You are reading far too much into someone's decision to add a page to a particular category. Yes, we especially don't want things that you and/or your friends made up in articles because that is what the readers see, what is indexed by search engines, etc., but any reasonable person reading that would conclude that Wikipedia -- all of Wikipedia -- is not for things that you and/or your friends made up. Policies that are for articles only usually start with "Wikipedia articles are not for..." instead of "Wikipedia is not for...". Again, WP:NOTWEBHOST and WP:UPNOT specifically prohibit you from hosting things that you and/or your friends made up in your user space. Get your own website, blog or social media account and post the things that you and/or your friends made up there. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:03, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Re we especially don't want things: Who are "we"? Per User:Jimbo_Wales/Statement_of_principles: "There must be no cabal, there must be no elites, there must be no hierarchy or structure which gets in the way of this openness to newcomers." I thought everyone was here because of a clear understanding of WP's principles, but now I see what is really going on. Normchou💬17:32, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I believe Guy was using "we" as in "the project of wikipedia" AKA "all editors" in a casual fashion. I don't really see any reason to read a "cabal" into that. WP:TINC certainly applies.--Shibbolethink(♔♕)17:42, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There Is No Cabal (TINC). We discussed this at the last cabal meeting, and everyone agreed that There Is No Cabal. An announcement was made in Cabalist: The Official Newsletter of The Cabal making it clear that There Is No Cabal. The words "There Is No Cabal" are in ten-foot letters on the side of the International Cabal Headquarters, and an announcement that There Is No Cabal is shown at the start of every program on the Cabal Network. If that doesn't convince people that There Is No Cabal, I don't know what will. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:55, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
You mean, because specific editors are interested in a topic and happen to have somewhat similar opinions that means there is some sort of "cabal" among them? I just don't see how that makes any sort of sense. Zoozaz1talk14:54, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead." (Benjamin Franklin) I can imagine scientists reluctant to bite the hand that feeds them, but that wouldn't require the secret communication of a cabal. Art LaPella (talk) 16:48, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete Wikipedia is not a free web host, particularly for screeds that argue for the undermining of Wikipedia policies and guidelines. XOR'easter (talk) 17:05, 21 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Note that WP:TBAN states the following: "Unless clearly and unambiguously specified otherwise, a topic ban covers all pages (not only articles) broadly related to the topic, as well as the parts of other pages that are related to the topic, as encapsulated in the phrase "broadly construed"." This means that further edits to this page by the OP are not allowable. However, I don't think that alone constitutes an argument for speedy deletion, since TBANs cover future edits and not previous ones.--WaltCip-(talk)13:49, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
...Which means that I, or anyone else, could delete the content of the page and replace it with an essay based upon the material at User talk:Novem Linguae/Essays/There was no lab leak. Normchou would then technically not be allowed to revert the edit. In my opinion, that would be unfair, and if I noticed such a thing I would revert the edit.
I am going to make an official decision in my role as King of Wikipedia:[CitationNeeded] Normchou, may offer an opinion regarding whether this page should be deleted without violating their topic ban. But only on whether the page should be deleted, not re-arguing why you think you are right. If anybody complains, tell them that I said so, preferably with a citation to a reliable source that supports my claim to the throne. :) --Guy Macon (talk) 14:18, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete I'd like to point out that there's precedent for banned users having troublesome COVID-19 related talk-space content removed (though I think these were instances of total bans, not topic). A list of pro-lab-leak links comes to mind as the most notable example. I would agree it should not be an automatic/default blanking of talk-space content, but it should be taken into account if the content is problematic. Given the explicit linkage to the topic user was banned for (it's not a general 'use common sense' essay, it's a 'COVID-19 lab leak because common sense' essay), and that the essay was written after the ArbCom case was filed, I think this is justifies labeling the content as inherently problematic enough to delete. Bakkster Man (talk) 14:24, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
While the WP:VOTE count is noteworthy, my understanding is it shouldn't be the primary determining factor in the decision. Policy arguments can (should?) outweigh votes. Bakkster Man (talk) 14:53, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Leaving aside the somewhat unfocused discussion above, the relevant site policy applying to this material is WP:USERPAGE, which states in part that userspace pages may not contain "statements attacking or vilifying groups of editors, persons, or other entities (these are generally considered divisive and removed, and reintroducing them is often considered disruptive)."It's arguably legitimate for Normchou to express his opinions, however misguided or statistically unsound, about the origin of Covid-19. But the page in question goes further, and vilifies virologists by implying a conspiracy on their parts to suppress investigation into the lab-leak hypothesis. The essay would probably pass muster (as misguided but allowable) if the "conflict of interest" section were removed, or edited to be less blatantly conspiracist.Separately, as a practical matter, Normchou has been topic-banned from pages related to Covid-19 indefinitely via WP:AE. His topic ban renders him unable to edit the page, and it should probably be removed on that basis alone. MastCellTalk18:08, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. I do not think this is a Wikipedia:Attack page. Should it be deleted because of the topic ban? I am not sure because the topic ban does not apply retroactively. But in any case, why would anyone care (or should care) about his essay? Just let it be. My very best wishes (talk) 19:08, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It just seems weird, and untenable, to leave a page in Normchou's userspace that he is forbidden to edit because of his topic ban. MastCellTalk19:40, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The essay clearly includes material related to editing Wikipedia. Also, WP:WORTH says that "Writings that contradict policy are somewhat tolerated within the User namespace.", which tacitly imply that essays in user space do not necessarily need to adhere to policy. I can see this essay as a useful step towards a reform to the use of reliable sources when a particular scientist is suspected of conflict of interest. This is the case with the review (a MEDRS) written by Shi Zheng-Li on COVID-19 origin in which she exonerates her lab of all responsibility. If we were to strictly follow WP:MEDRS, if the journal considered that her declaring no COI when publishing that review was Ok, we are not qualified to override their decision, and should also believe there is no COI. However, by common sense, we have chosen to be cautious citing that paper. With the case of Peter Dazsak possible COI, we also lack the tools to do anything but trust that RS are wiser than we are in dealing with his statements being non-COI. Perhaps, this essay will lead to a discussion in which editors can reduce the weight given to scientists currently under investigation of COI charges (that seems to be happening with Daszak this week, with the Lancet editorial that asked him to declare againg possible competing interest to a previous letter, or him being recused from a team investigating the origin). If we supress this essay we would hurt the inputs that would ultimately be used in those future discussions, even if the community is to decide that our current policies are fine, the preemptive censorship of ideas is against the collaborative spirit of the Wikipedia project, in my opinion. Forich (talk) 23:15, 22 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Material related to editing Wikipedia should be broadly related - not just related to a user's displeasure with a consensus, lack thereof, etc. While Wikipedia should be tolerant of viewpoints and not sanction users over the views they hold, that does not mean that a user is free to use their userspace to merely act as a blog to discuss their viewpoints. Merely including a few points that are somewhat related to editing Wikipedia does not make an essay appropriate. Furthermore, when a user has now on two occasions shown that they are not able to edit constructively in a topic area, it seems that any keep rationale based on the fact that it's "related to editing Wikipedia" falls flat - if someone can't edit constructively (and in this case has been topic banned a second time), they shouldn't be permitted to use their userspace to attempt to bring people along with their unconstructive editing style. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez (User/say hi!) 02:47, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. Not even close to a hard decision. Normchou being indefinitely topic-banned from COVID-19 topics alone should be sufficient, without even touching violation of the MEDRS guidelines and the misuse of Wikipedia as a substitute blog. As well, the Warriors Fighting For Free Speech, For Freedom are in the wrong place. --Calton | Talk07:54, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: Jon Steward is not an expert on the topic, for starters. In general, this page is not relevant to the encyclopedia and would be best housed on the user's personal blog. --K.e.coffman (talk) 18:20, 23 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
comment This page mentions Bayes' theorem, but what is the probability that a coronavirus will occur in nature and cause a pandemic?--SilverMatsu (talk) 11:38, 24 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It keeps happening again and again.
Many coronaviruses cause disease in animals. Seven are known to cause disease in humans, and all seven appear to have animal origins. Four of the seven (229E, OC43, NL63, and HKU1) cause 15-30% of cases of the common cold, and occasionally cause bronchiolitis and pneumonia, which can be fatal in the elderly and those with suppressed immune systems.
Three of the seven human known coronaviruses cause severe -- sometimes fatal -- respiratory infections. They are:
Just to add to this, coronaviruses appear to be highly promiscuous zoonoses. SARS-CoV-2, for example, has features that have often been characterized as suboptimal for infecting humans, but "good enough" for infecting a wide variety of mammals (including, obviously, humans). It's sort of like how in sports, you might have a guy who can play one position and play it very well, and you might have another guy who can play multiple different positions, but he's not the best guy for any of them. The second guy often has a long career across a wide number of teams because they can slot him in just about anywhere that they need an extra player. Coronaviruses are like that, they're the "utility infielder" of viruses. They're not as specialized as viruses that infect only certain specific species, but their ability to cross species barriers makes them exceptional candidates for emerging zoonotic diseases, and zoonotic diseases tend to be deadly because we have no existing immunity, and also because viruses that cross species barriers tend to behave in unpredictable ways (for example, Ebola probably doesn't cause acute hemorragic fever and death in its natural host population, although we haven't definitively located it yet).
Coronaviruses and influenzaviruses are the two main groups of zoonoses that epidemiologists and public health workers have been worrying about, and those worries have been here for several decades now, it's why people panicked about SARS, MERS, Bird Flu, and Swine Flu, all in the past 20 years. Basically, according to the experts, a deadly worldwide respiratory zoonotic virus pandemic has always been a matter of "when" not "if". Also, these things don't have any sort of "double jeopardy" rule, and this current pandemic does not mean that we "reset" and get another century until the next one. If the next coronavirus outbreak is sufficiently different from SARS-COV-2 to get past our vaccines, or if there's a new and incredibly dangerous variant of influenza, we could easily find ourselves doing this all over again in another decade or two if we are not vigilant. Hyperion35 (talk) 17:42, 24 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the advice. This time it was natural vs. lab, so I should have said it on "the earth". And I overlooked thinking about "when". And I don't sure if this essay (A simple calculation) takes these conditions into account.--SilverMatsu (talk) 01:10, 26 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Neither of those arguments is convincing to me either, but they're also sort of beside the point. The material fails WP:UP#NOT, specifically by vilifying groups of people (in this case, virologists and scientists). More to the point, since Normchou was topic-banned for disruptive editing around Covid-19, I don't see how keeping an inflammatory set of his assertions on the topic in his userspace is helpful to the project in any way. And since he's not allowed to edit the page anymore, anyone else can come in, change the page, and Normchou wouldn't be able to do anything about it. All in all, this seems like an untenable situation on a practical, common-sense level. MastCellTalk21:50, 24 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Raising the issue of potential biases and conflicts of interest among virologists is not vilifying them, especially considering many reliable sources have highlighted these same potential biases and conflicts of interest[17][18][19][20]. As for keeping a user's subpage that discusses a topic from which the editor has been topic-banned, I agree that it's a little weird, but that doesn't strike me as a satisfactory reason to delete it. Stonkaments (talk) 07:37, 25 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep; how many times must we have the exact same argument? Which circle of Hell are we trapped in? Suffer not the misinformatsiya and disinformatsiya to live... in all seriousness, I can't imagine meaningfully distinguishing between "essays" (essays we agree with) and "screeds" (essays we disagree with) -- at that point, why don't we just abolish userspace entirely, or make every userspace page go through an AfC process where the Council of Proper Thought needs to sign off on it? Boy, that'd be fun!!! In the meantime, getting into arguments with people about politics and then prowling around their userspace to find things you can nominate for deletion seems to be pretty bad form. jp×g18:18, 25 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I don't much understand it, but it's not harmful (some people act like even talking about some aspect of the lab leak theory without immediately calling it a conspiracy theory will cause their mom's teeth to fall out and their house to burn down). --Animalparty! (talk) 18:29, 25 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - WP:USERESSAY - According to Wikipedia policy, "Essays that the author does not want others to edit, or that are found to contradict widespread consensus, belong in the user namespace." These are similar to essays placed in the Wikipedia namespace; however, they are often authored/edited by only one person, and may represent a strictly personal viewpoint about Wikipedia or its processes (e.g., User:Jehochman/Responding to rudeness). It can be contradictory, it's strictly a personal POV. Relative to POLEMICS - nothing. It's an essay in user space - a topic ban cannot be retroactive as was already pointed out above - he just can't edit it or talk about it while under the t-ban. Lab leak? Circumstances of the debate have changedaccording to NBC. Even when there's no smoking gun (yet), we handle it just like we did with the Russia collusion theories, we included them all and we cite the sources. The lab leak theory is a notable and relevant topic that has gotten worldwide attention. Atsme💬📧00:32, 26 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - Largely because of the rather convincing arguments presetned by Stonkaments & JPxG. The argument presented at the top is of course no applicable, MedRS does not cover this. I am also not seeing any inappropriate use of user space here or use of it to attack people. Just a user essay. While rather unfortunate that the creator was infinitely topic banned from covid, as well all know indefinite is not the same as infinite and that is not a legit reason to delete. So baring any policy based arguments, of which I see shockingly few, I see no reason to delete. PackMecEng (talk) 01:19, 26 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - At face value, it's indistinguishable from pseudoscience. It doesn't matter whether some parts of it might be true, it's still pseudoscience. The use of Bayesianism is a specific form of modern pseudoscience associated with Internet "rationalism". Wikipedia's purpose is not served by hosting pseudoscientific essays. Grayfell (talk) 04:16, 27 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Grayfell: I'm not sure what you mean here. Bayes' theorem is very well-known among mathematicians and programmers (who use it often; Bayesian Network Classifiers (Friedman 1997) has over 6,000 citations). If you think that Normchou has applied it in a stupid or incorrect way here, that's fine (I am not an expert in statistics and can't vouch for their reasoning), but to be casually anti-science in this way makes no sense to me. jp×g04:55, 28 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
There is no anti-science in Grayfell's comment. It's just that certain legitimate scientific and technical concepts are widely appropriated by pseudoscience proponents.
So if you see someone talking about...
Lines of energy / energy fields
The second law of thermodynamics
Quantum mechanics
One-time-pad
Blockchain
Computer model
Bayesian probability
"Supporting the body's natural ability to..."
...they may be a sceintist or engineer talking about the real thing, but the odds are that they are someone spewing out incredible amounts of bullshit with a sciency topping. Which this essay's use of the phrase "Bayesian" clearly is. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:31, 28 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Bayes' theorem is not in itself a valid argument for or against anything. It's just a formula which takes some input probabilities and calculates other probabilities based on them. The input probabilities are things which are usually easier to calculate/estimate than the output probabilities. It is very much subject to the garbage in, garbage out principle: if the input probabilities are very wrong then the answer will also be very wrong. Here there is no basis whatsoever for the input numbers, as Normchou made them up, so the outputs are also just Normchou's personal opinion. However presenting them in a sciency way with lots of equations makes it look a lot more convincing than one person's personal opinion, in a way which can be easily exploited by pseudoscience proponents. Hut 8.512:06, 28 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, thank you, this is what I was trying to get at. Bayes' theorem is a mathematical toolbox, and like any tool it can be used or abused for different purposes. These tools are widely abused to make something seem more scientific than it actually is. This essay is another example of that abuse. That's why I described it as pseudoscience. Grayfell (talk) 19:09, 28 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete per WP:NOTWEBHOST and WP:UP#POLEMIC. This essay has very little relevance to Wikipedia at all, it's just an attempt by the author to advocate their own opinion on a topic which has nothing to do with Wikipedia but which they'd like to see in Wikipedia articles. If that is an acceptable use of userspace then there's nothing to stop people writing essays advocating their opinion on any topic whatsoever, since Wikipedia's aim is to cover the whole of human knowledge. Furthermore the logic used in the essay is completely antithetical to that actually used by Wikipedia, since it starts with some original research based on numbers the author made up before moving on to arguing that Wikipedia should disregard the scientific consensus on scientific topics (contradicting WP:UNDUE / WP:FRINGE). Hut 8.515:10, 27 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I do have to disagree with the idea suggested below that the essay should be kept because it's "contextualised in terms of editing Wikipedia". This essay is only relevant to Wikipedia in that it advocates giving greater weight to the author's POV in Wikipedia. If that's enough then userspace essays can be used to advocate almost anything. A creationist could write a userspace essay advocating creationism and justify it by saying they want to see more creationism in scientific articles. A supporter of a politician could write an essay about why that politician is so great and justify it by saying that Wikipedia's coverage of that politician should be more positive. Hut 8.516:56, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
This relates to my comment below, so I will reply here. The comment was in reference to why NOTESSAY does not apply (not as part of a keep !vote) since it explicitly excludes essays in userspace. Polyamorph (talk) 18:09, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - Normchou can perfectly use his space as draft/sandbox or to manifest his POV. Essay is succinct, it does not take a lot of space. Topic contained is pending scientific concensus and still hotly debated and cannot be labeled ad fringe. Sgnpkd (talk) 19:56, 28 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Three points: First, Normchou currently topic banned from Covid-19. This essay was written as an extension of the kind of behavior that lead to a topic ban. Even if Normchou changes his POV, he cannot update his essay, nor can he even correct any errors. Therefore this isn't even an accurate manifestation of his POV.
Second, using pseudoscience to come to conclusions is still pseudoscience, even if those conclusions may, eventually, turn out to be correct. In this sense it is WP:FRINGE, and fringe content interferes with Wikipedia's goals as a fact-based encyclopedia.
Third, since Wikipedia is not a webhost, nor a platform for original research, nor a social networking platform, this essay is not in line with Wikipedia's goals or policies and doesn't improve the project, nor does it even directly discuss how anyone would improve the project. Grayfell (talk) 20:51, 28 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Delete These sorts of personal opinion essays don't belong on Wikipedia. This is just the sort of thing that resulted in their topic ban in this very area. HighInBCNeed help? Just ask.06:36, 6 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep per WP:UPGOOD, personal essay in userspace that holds zero weight in any discussion. People are allowed to express opinions, even if they are wrong! In some sense at least this lays bear the users' bias.Polyamorph (talk) 09:12, 7 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Being in user space does not give carte blanche to write whatever one wishes. See WP:UP#GOALS: "Extensive writings and material on topics having virtually no chance whatsoever of being directly useful to the project, its community, or an encyclopedia article. (For example in the latter case, because it is pure original research, is in complete disregard of reliable sources, or is clearly unencyclopedic for other clear reasons.)". This essay ticks of, at the absolute very least, the first two of those... RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 12:11, 8 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Of course it doesn't, especially in the case of harmful/abusive content. But this is a users' opinion related to wikipedia content. Users are entitled to free expression, even if it is a minority viewpoint. Polyamorph (talk) 06:37, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it says (Personal essays on Wikipedia-related topics are welcome in your user namespace or on the Meta-wiki.) I don't really think this fulfils that criterion. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 10:43, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The essay is contextualised in terms of editing Wikipedia. You might not like what it says, but NOTESSAY certainly does not prohibit it. Polyamorph (talk) 11:42, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
If the other lab leak essays are editing-related, then so is this one. If an argument that something is WP:FRINGE is editing-related, than the counterargument that it's not FRINGE is also editing related. If "no lab leak" is editing-related, then so is "yes lab leak." (Same for flat earth, fake moon landing, whatever.) It doesn't matter how good/bad the argument/counterargument is. We can regulate topics but we can't regulate viewpoints on those topics. (Which is why we shouldn't have essays about why topics are or are not fringe. But in my view we've made that sickbed and now must lie in it.) Levivich12:13, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
They're slightly distinct in my eyes. One has 50 references to high quality sources on a specific matter hotly debated on talk pages for over a year and provides a comprehensive summation of arguments. For the most part, it does not make any original claims, and most claims are cited to a source. Hence it has a project-improvement purpose. The other is the author doing their own novel Bayesian analysis on probabilities they made up, and also citing themselves (As Normchou pointed out in January 2021), and the only thing actually cited to a reliable source is one short sentence about a BLP having a COI.
It is not that inherently any essay that argues for a lab leak is contrary to policy, but this specific one happens to be. And somehow most essays created to argue this specific viewpoint happen to be. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 13:44, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The essays are very distinct in my eyes and I agree with your analysis of this one. What I disagree with is deciding whether a userspace essay should be deleted based on the quality of the argument it makes. I think when it comes to userspace essays, we should be content-neutral, we shouldn't delete an essay because we disagree with or aren't persuaded by or don't approve of or don't like its message. If a topic is related to Wikipedia, then all views on that topic should be allowed in userspace essays, regardless of how well sourced or well argued the view is. Otherwise we are engaging in censorship: allowing people to write essays about a topic but only if we agree with/are persuaded by/approve of/like it. That the "foo" essay makes a good argument and the "not foo" essay makes a bad argument is not a good reason to delete "not foo." It's a good reason to ignore it, but not deleting it. I actually think deleting this page is more harmful to the project than the page itself. The precedent of censorship is harmful in my view, but the essay is harmless (particularly because it makes such a poor argument). Levivich14:24, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I do believe that PR's whole point was not about the quality of the argument, but about the very obvious focus of it. WP:NOLABLEAK is focused on editing Wikipedia. This essay is focused on arguing in favor of the lab leak. It doesn't provide any resources for editors and doesn't cover common arguments on WP about the subject. It just argues (incredibly badly) that the lab leak is likely. Even if it were incredibly compelling, instead of incredibly bad, it would still not be about editing. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPantsTell me all about it.14:52, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I gave this one a lot of thought. I nearly wound up on the keep side of this, erring on the side of not policing userspace except when egregious, but after reviewing the content and rereading our guideline on the subject, I find it hard to come down anywhere but delete. Here's why: WP:UP#GOALS outlines how we don't permit Writings, information, discussions, and activities not closely related to Wikipedia's goals. From the outset, it's hard to see this essay as "closely related" to Wikipedia's goals regardless of the rest, in that it's largely a plea to use common sense about a subject irrespective of those pesky Wikipedia policies. But I'm specifically looking at the line Extensive writings and material on topics having virtually no chance whatsoever of being directly useful to the project, its community, or an encyclopedia article. (For example in the latter case, because it is pure original research, is in complete disregard of reliable sources, or is clearly unencyclopedic for other clear reasons.) - If this were a careful outline of an argument to include material on the lab leak theory, citing sources that have been deemed undue, etc. that would be one thing, but it combines a dismissal of basic policy with original research (a mathematical exercise based on made up numbers, for example) such that it has "virtually no chance whatsoever of being directly useful to the project". The subject may be why this is attracting a lot of attention, but the subject is ultimately not relevant here. It might as well be some fan theory about Game of Thrones based on common sense, with fabricated probabilities, and "so that's why Wikipedia should consider fandom.com a reliable source" tacked onto the end. (Not to trivialize what is ultimately an important subject by comparisons to fiction -- I'm making a point that the subject is secondary in [at least my] decision to come down on the side of delete.) — Rhododendritestalk \\ 18:58, 9 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep - User Essays are an important part of Wikipedia. Unfortunately Normchou has been the subject of targeted and specific editing attacks by other users who adamantly dismiss the various lab leak theories, despite the WP community having already discussed these at length and reached consensus they are valid for inclusion in mainspace. The grounds proposed to delete this user essay is that it doesn't adhere to WP:MEDRS, but no reasoned argument with any justification or evidence has even been made as to why it *should* adhere to WP:MEDRS(!),.. and as other editors have pointed out there is ongoing debate with regards to the extent in which WP:MEDRS should apply to mainspace. I can therefore only come to the conclusion this is yet another targeted editing attack against the user by other editors pushing their POV, and I am committed to fighting WP:CPUSH regardless what editing space it exists in! Aeonx (talk) 05:15, 19 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I believe that this essay now qualifies as "closely related to Wikipedia's goals" per WP:UP. As the SNOWing AfD demonstrates, the lab leak hypothesis is no longer considered WP:FRINGE but is rather held by a significant minority; productive debate is healthy regardless of what side you fall on. He ultimately advocates for a change in Wikipedia policy, which is very relevant regardless of how likely said change is to be implemented, so the essay is not simple political advocacy. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠20:31, 21 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Since the author himself is topic-banned from his own essay, he cannot contribute to any productive debate. He cannot discuss any changes to the essay, either. Since the essay is in user-space, nobody else will be able to edit it, as any changes would misrepresent the author's intent.
Whether or not some versions of the lab leak hypothosis are fringe, the essay's methods are fringe. Therefor, the essay's version of the hypothosis is fringe. Likewsie, using fringe methods to support a non-fringe conclusions is still fringe, and this is precisely why pseudoscience interferes with Wikipedia's mission as an encyclopedia. Further, this is a problem which cannot be proprly resolved, since, again, the author is topic banned. Grayfell (talk) 02:45, 22 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I did consider the fact that the author is topic-banned, but ultimately, I just don't see the benefit of suppressing one particular viewpoint from public view. The application of Bayes is mathematically correct, and I don't think the author ever tried to argue that the probability of a lab leak is actually 50%, but rather that a going from a uniform likelihood to a biased likelihood will change the posterior distribution even as the prior distribution is held constant. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠02:54, 22 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Strong keep, because this is NOT an American Wikipedia. Honestly, many of us in the rest of the world don't give a damn about the idiotic US political games and their sandpit fight about whether the virus has been made in China or not, which is just another unimportant matter cleverly pumped up in order to polarise the US electorate alongside party lines. I personally believe that the esssay's premises are incorrect, the reasoning wrong; and the conclusions, unwarranted, but for heaven's sake it's not Orwell's world here, to discuss implausible theories is no crime against democracy nor against humanity folks! Yes this is userspace and yes, this essay does not cross the boundaries of the sort of content we allow in userspace. — kashmīrīTALK01:12, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Kashmiri: Would it affect your vote if you knew that the user is topic banned from COVID-19, broadly construed, and therefore cannot edit their own essay? If you don't think it matters, I understand and that is of course completely up to you. But I just wanted to make sure you were aware, because you did not address it in your comment.--Shibbolethink(♔♕)13:10, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It wouldn't affect my vote in the slightest. We don't delete editors' previous contributions if they get a topic ban.
Just to offer additional perspective – where I live (Europe) neither politicians nor ordinary people give a damn about the source of SARS-CoV-2 virus. It may have well originated in Europe, Africa, Australia, outer space, wherever. It's a non-issue here, just like nobody cares about the exact origin of HIV, bird flu, African swine fever, and so on. Would anyone care if an editor wrote an essay that argued (with sources) that African swine fever actually originated in Australia? I guess nobody except a few Australians.
Similarly, I am all in favour to remove US politics from the COVID-19 pandemic on Wikipedia wherever possible. While the essay is not free from politics, neither are those (mostly US editors, I venture to guess) who push for its deletion. — kashmīrīTALK13:34, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate your perspective, though, respectfully, I am not sure you are completely right that Europeans/Australians don't care about the virus' origin, or that this is just a US-politics issue. Some prominent examples include international (Spanish, Italian, French, Indian, New Zealander) members of DRASTIC,[1][2][3] and politicians from G7 countries.[4][5] The scientists involved in the investigations also come from a wide variety of countries.[6][7][8] Indeed, the editors involved from all perspectives in these articles come from a variety of countries. Many are not native english speakers (though of course their contributions are still appreciated). It's definitely not just a US politics issue... It may have started that way, and been fueled heavily by political operatives like Steve Bannon, but I don't think that's what the current state of affairs is all about.--Shibbolethink(♔♕)14:45, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, this is also a valid research question. Much like the origins of other viruses. But I hope you will agree that the current discussion, including this AfD, is not fuelled purely by academic interest. — kashmīrīTALK16:49, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It is mostly a US politics issue, tbh. It rarely appears in non-US newspapers, and usually with low prominence. Look at Google Trends for keywords and most the hits are from within the US, with one spike from China. Other countries are practically 0 for search interest. No other countries are dedicating intelligence efforts to this. For the most part, it's just the US that cares, and probably just for the usual reasons. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 16:58, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Google trends is a flawed tool in assessing interest from worldwide audiences, especially in the global south and Asia. In China, for instance, Baidu is much more popular [22]. In Russia, Yandex is more popular [23]. In South Korea, Naver is more popular [24]. I would not dispute that this is a more popular topic in the United States vs elsewhere, but I would dispute that it is not really a topic of discussion elsewhere.--Shibbolethink(♔♕)18:06, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Which means that outside of he US, the default idea - zoonosis - rules. The pro-lab-leak camp is a US-specific thing. Like creationism. So, "this is US-specific" is not a valid reason to keep pro-lab-leak essays. --Hob Gadling (talk) 17:56, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Hob Gadling: Sorry, I don't think there are "camps" outside the US. There are simply various opinions among academics, although the zoonotic hypothesis appears to be the leading one, the only one widely accepted. You know, still, no two scientists agree with each other :D
Your grammar suggests that you are contradicting me, but how is I don't think there are "camps" outside the US not a confirmation of The pro-lab-leak camp is a US-specific thing? --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:13, 26 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
It very much doesn't live up to the cost-benefit principle. It's an MfD of a page of very little import and minimal visibility. The time wasted in debating it, the closes, and the time spent by whoever closes this last, doesn't compare to the disruption created by the page at all. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 00:51, 19 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
