Talk:United States

Frequently asked questions

Q1. How did the article get the way it is?

Detailed discussions which led to the current consensus can be found in the archives of Talk:United States. Several topical talk archives are identified in the infobox to the right. A complete list of talk archives can be found at the top of the Talk:United States page.

Q2. Why is the article's name "United States" and not "United States of America"?

Isn't United States of America the official name of the U.S.? I would think that United States should redirect to United States of America, not vice versa as is the current case.

This has been discussed many times. Please review the summary points below and the discussion archived at the Talk:United States/Name page. The most major discussion showed a lack of consensus to either change the name or leave it as the same, so the name was kept as "United States".

If, after reading the following summary points and all the discussion, you wish to ask a question or contribute your opinion to the discussion, then please do so at Talk:United States. The only way that we can be sure of ongoing consensus is if people contribute.

Reasons and counterpoints for the article title of "United States":

• "United States" is in compliance with the Wikipedia "Naming conventions (common names)" guideline portion of the Wikipedia naming conventions policy. The guideline expresses a preference for the most commonly used name, and "United States" is the most commonly used name for the country in television programs (particularly news), newspapers, magazines, books, and legal documents, including the Constitution of the United States.
  • Exceptions to guidelines are allowed.

• If we used "United States of America", then to be consistent we would have to rename all similar articles. For example, by renaming "United Kingdom" to "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" or Mexico to "United Mexican States".
  • Exceptions to guidelines are allowed. Articles are independent from one another. No rule says articles have to copy each other.
  • This argument would be valid only if "United States of America" was a particularly uncommon name for the country.

• Well-established encyclopedias in the English language appear to generally use a "common name" policy for article titles. More specifically, the following use "United States" for the title of the corresponding article: MSN Encarta, World Book, Encyclopedia Americana, Columbia, Grolier, and the Micropaedia and online versions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. In our effort to make Wikipedia an "encyclopedia of the highest possible quality," (Jimmy Wales, "Wikipedia is an encyclopedia", March 8, 2005, <wikipedia-l@wikimedia.org>) we would do well to emulate what these well-established encyclopedias do.
  • The Macropaedia version of Britannica uses "United States of America" for its article title.

• With the reliability, legitimacy, and reputation of all Wikimedia Foundation projects under constant attack, Wikipedia should not hand a weapon to its critics by deviating from the "common name" policy traditionally used by encyclopedias in the English-speaking world.
  • Wikipedia is supposed to be more than just another encyclopedia.

Reasons and counterpoints for the article title of "United States of America":

• It is the country's official name.
  • The country's name is not explicitly defined as such in the Constitution or in the law. The words "United States of America" only appear three times in the Constitution. "United States" appears 51 times by itself, including in the presidential oath or affirmation. The phrase "of America" is arguably just a prepositional phrase that describes the location of the United States and is not actually part of the country's name.

• The Articles of Confederation explicitly name the country "The United States of America" in article one. While this is no longer binding law, the articles provide clear intent of the founders of the nation to use the name "The United States of America."

• The whole purpose of the common naming convention is to ease access to the articles through search engines. For this purpose the article name "United States of America" is advantageous over "United States" because it contains the strings "United States of America" and "United States." In this regard, "The United States of America" would be even better as it contains the strings "United States," The United States," "United States of America," and "The United States of America."
  • The purpose of containing more strings is to increase exposure to Wikipedia articles by increasing search rank for more terms. Although "The United States of America" would give you four times more commonly used terms for the United States, the United States article on Wikipedia is already the first result in queries for United States of America, The United States of America, The United States, and of course United States.

Q3. Is the United States really the oldest constitutional republic in the world?

1. Isn't San Marino older?

Yes. San Marino was founded before the United States and did adopt its basic law on 8 October 1600. (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/sm.html) Full democracy was attained there with various new electoral laws in the 20th century which augmented rather than amended the existing constitution.

2. How about Switzerland?

Yes, but not continuously. The first "constitution" within Switzerland is believed to be the Federal Charter of 1291 and most of modern Switzerland was republican by 1600. After Napoleon and a later civil war, the current constitution was adopted in 1848.

Many people in the United States are told it is the oldest republic and has the oldest constitution, however one must use a narrow definition of constitution. Within Wikipedia articles it may be appropriate to add a modifier such as "oldest continuous, federal ..." however it is more useful to explain the strength and influence of the US constitution and political system both domestically and globally. One must also be careful using the word "democratic" due to the limited franchise in early US history and better explain the pioneering expansion of the democratic system and subsequent influence.

The component states of the Swiss confederation were mostly oligarchies in the eighteenth century, however, being much more oligarchical than most of the United States, with the exceptions of Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Connecticut.

Q4. Why are the Speaker of the House and Chief Justice listed as leaders in the infobox? Shouldn't it just be the President and Vice President?

The President, Vice President, Speaker of The House of Representatives, and Chief Justice are stated within the United States Constitution as leaders of their respective branches of government. As the three branches of government are equal, all four leaders get mentioned under the "Government" heading in the infobox.

Q5. What is the motto of the United States?

There was no de jure motto of the United States until 1956, when "In God We Trust" was made such. Various other unofficial mottos existed before that, most notably "E Pluribus Unum". The debate continues on what "E Pluribus Unum"'s current status is (de facto motto, traditional motto, etc.) but it has been determined that it never was an official motto of the United States.

Q6. Is the U.S. really the world's largest economy?

The United States was the world's largest national economy from about 1880 and largest by nominal GDP from about 2014, when it surpassed the European Union. China has been larger by Purchasing Power Parity, since about 2016.

Q7. Isn't it incorrect to refer to it as "America" or its people as "American"?

In English, America (when not preceded by "North", "Central", or "South") almost always refers to the United States. The large super-continent is called the Americas.

Q8. Why isn't the treatment of Native Americans given more weight?

The article is written in summary style and the sections "Indigenous peoples" and "European colonization" summarize the situation.

1619 image / cotton gin image

After reading the recent justification for a non-consensual removal of the 1619 image of slaves landing at Jamestown (now in the TP archives despite taking place less than 30 days ago):

If we're going to add another picture related to slavery, it should be in relation to the cotton gin. 1619 had little long-term impact on American slavery. KlayCax (talk) 17:02, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

I added an image of just that It was deleted by the same user without discussion. [diff] In their edit summary, they mention "other images of slavery" in the article. There are none: only a map which shows free states and slave states more than 200 years after slavery in the US began. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 18:54, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

Thank you SashiRolls.

 Note: KlayCax has also recently inserted their comments into the conversation above about WWII images, distorting the conversation and obscuring the clear consensus, and until now refuses to re-organize them. إيان (talk) 21:16, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

SashiRolls, I retrieved the conversation from the archive and placed it below, in case you would like to contribute your perspective. إيان (talk) 21:40, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

While the 1619 image seemed to me like a good one, the argument that slavery primarily served Europe's sweet tooth until the invention of the cotton gin is not wrong. As such, adding a photo of slaves operating a cotton gin seemed like a reasonable compromise. Perhaps @KlayCax: could comment on their reversion of two people who added an image of what they themself had suggested. Let us also be clear: a map of free states and slave states is not an image of slavery. I forget whether wp:ose is uniquely focused on AfD, but the recourse to comparison with articles about Sudan or Singapore (death penalty) is misguided. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 09:19, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

I'd that this image is quite fair. It shows both American slavery and its relationship to the cotton gin, and I am not opposed to its reintroduction. The Night Watch (talk) 13:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

If there are no objections, I am going to revert this edit.  — Freoh 00:35, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm writing a new section on it now. @Freoh: @The Night Watch: @SashiRolls:

It'll be up in the next 24-36 hrs. I've been busy with residency. KlayCax (talk) 02:02, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Actually may be more like 48 hrs. Sorry, something came up and I was busy with other things on here today. (The post is going to be 1,500+ words, likely.) KlayCax (talk) 06:41, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Having seen no objections, I reverted.  — Freoh 14:05, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't object to the cotton gin image. @Freoh:. As I wrote above: If we're going to add another picture related to slavery, it should be in relation to the cotton gin. 1619 had little long-term impact on American slavery It's the nuclear testing photo/1619 picture that's problematic. KlayCax (talk) 22:30, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

For the other stuff: I'm almost done writing a full response to the other problems related to the article. Residency's kept me pretty busy and there's a lot on my plate right now.

Sorry for the slow response time. KlayCax (talk) 22:31, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

image restored (May 6). For some reason Pizzigs deleted it despite the consensus here. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 20:28, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Once again, other countries with a history of slavery, in some cases far longer than that of the U.S., do not have such images in their history sections. There's no consensus, and I'm vehemently opposed to these additions. Pizzigs (talk) 09:05, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

One person objecting vehemently and edit-warring is not how Wikipedian consensus works (see WP:1AM).

No mainstream publisher would try to market an illustrated history of the United States with no pictures of slavery or the cotton gin. As for your claim about other countries on en.wp it is simply wrong. See Jamaica, Haiti, and Brazil for example. Unlike the page on Brazil, the image is not being added to show the cruelty of slavery (there the image is of a slave being whipped). What is being illustrated is a major historical invention which changed history. (I live in a region where wool, silk, and hemp were the major textiles until the market was flooded with cheap American cotton.) Of course the boll weevil would later have an inverse effect which led to the beginning of the Great Migration...

If you wish to start a neutrally worded RfC such as "Should the page United States contain any pictures of slavery?" to gather support for your view that this page should contain no images of slavery I suppose you could. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 10:02, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to the inclusion of a cotton gin image per se, provided it has a balanced description (although it is questionable whether it is notable enough to be included in this article); however, it is concerning that the major Atlantic slave-trading nations (Portugal, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, the Netherlands and Denmark) do not have such a disproportionate focus on slavery in their articles compared to the United States that had slavery in the first place because America had been colonized by the Europeans. Pizzigs (talk) 11:55, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Could you please say what you find imbalanced in the caption "William L. Sheppard "First Use of a Cotton Gin" (1790–1800), Harper's weekly, Dec. 18, 1869"? Thank you.

Your argument (that the page on the US should not include information on slavery because pages like those on France do not) is quite unlikely to convince me since I have added information about France's role in the slave trade to the page on en.wp and to pages on fr.wp long before you created the Pizzigs account. I also notice that you have gone beyond 3RR (three reverts) again today on this article. One major difference with many of the countries that you mention is that what remains of the country is not where the slavery took place, and as a result the practice did not fundamentally change the country's culture as in the case of the United States. (cf. Sectionworker's comments on the African-American role in shaping American music below in the section on yet another image you deleted). This is a large part of why the "it's just so unfair!" argument is misguided / irrelevant. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 15:27, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

With due respect, my point still stands, and I doubt that image passes WP:DUE for this article. Perhaps, it would be better suited for History of the United States or other related subarticles. I've already pointed out that a railroad image is, in my opinion, more relevant for the U.S. history of the 19th century, if you feel there's not enough images already. Regarding your unilateral introduction of a new image to the music section, it was controversial and violated MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE. Regarding your accusations, I believe Freoh has already ventured down that path. Pizzigs (talk) 16:31, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

The cotton gin was invented in the 18th century, as the caption of the image makes clear. There is nothing preventing us from including an image of both the cotton gin in the 18th C. and folks building railroads in the 19th C. Perhaps @Sectionworker: would be willing to help with that, given that her pseudo is directly related to the question? :) -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 19:27, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I'm okay with that. Pizzigs (talk) 20:57, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

SashiRolls, help with what? And what does "given that her pseudo is directly related to the question" mean? Sectionworker (talk) 17:10, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I read somewhere on the internets that "section hand" or "section worker" was a more formal name for a gandy dancer, and so thought you probably had some expertise to lend on the question of straightening sections of track that had been pulled out of place by passing trains in the pot-melting heat. Quite an apt metaphor for wiki-editing really. :) But to answer the question more simply and directly, I thought you might have a favorite 19th C. photo (or video) of the railroad to add... -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 20:27, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Every time I've tried to add anything about our rich AA heritage I get a response such as "Hard to believe, given your propensity for cherry picking and manipulating data to push a certain anti-American agenda to the article." I'm sick of it and have mostly given up on this article. Another editor and I wrote the Gandy dancer page. It was a lot of fun. There is no fun here. Sectionworker (talk) 21:38, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Territorial acquisitions image

E-960 recently added an image that sandwiches another image, and I think that it should be removed. The image presents a Eurocentric point of view, depicting the European powers from which the United States bought the land rather than the Indigenous peoples who occupied and used that land. The map is also incomplete, as it does not include the Philippines. Can I remove it?  — Freoh 14:18, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

This is a longstanding map and it was reverted back into the section, as it presents very useful information about the growth of the US. --E-960 (talk) 16:44, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

It is still sandwiched, but I've changed it to a map that avoids the presentism issues with the inclusion of modern US state borders over the territories. There is also appropriate mention of what US expansion meant for Native Americans. إيان (talk) 21:54, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I agree with that change, though I would not be opposed to removing the image outright or replacing the Declaration of Independence image.  — Freoh 13:20, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

إيان, this new map is not optimal it's a slow animation instead of an all-in-one overview image, and btw it's already used in the Territorial evolution of the United States article. Also, it appears that this is turning into a POV push, the last comment by user Freoh just sounds revisionist; removing the image of Declaration of Independence? Please note that this is an article about a modern state. --E-960 (talk) 17:47, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree with إيان & Freoh that the more detailed image was a considerable improvement (better use of space). -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 19:23, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Please note that "consensus" is not a tally of a simple vote. Having said that, there are several issues with the new map. On a technical side it's slow as heck and I watched it for like 2 minutes as it gradually goes from one display to another, so it's not better than the original all-in-one map in terms of easy readability. Then on the historical side, this new map creates undue weight, this article covers the history of Native Americans quite comprehensively, we have the "Early history" section and an image of the Cliff Palace, then subsequent text in other sections regarding the American Indian Wars, Indian removal policy, Indian reservations, and California Genocide. So, no one can argue that the topic is being sanitized. However, someone could just as well come in and add a different map and a caption saying that all of Western US was taken from Mexico, so a simple map which shows the territorial expansion of the US is the most neutral in this case. --E-960 (talk) 12:35, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the slow animation is less than ideal, but I think that your preferred map is misleading, which is more important than the technical inconvenience. If you can find or make an all-in-one overview image that does not have the problems that we have discussed here, then I would be happy to take a look.  — Freoh 01:02, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

Freoh, what problems? You objected to the original longstanding map because "it does not include the Philippines" and that it was "Eurocentric". This new map you and user إيان jammed through also has those exact "problems". You turned consensus into a simple vote count and replaced a longstanding map after a short discussion just because someone wrote "I also agree with Freoh and إيان. That's not consensus and the burden is on you to prove that the new map is better, which btw it is not, for technical reasons, and that it appears to have those exact same "problems" you raised about the original longstanding map. --E-960 (talk) 19:18, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

Let's not get angry. I like the new map, because it shows Panama, the Philippines, the evolution of names and territories (Louisiana, Indiana, Northwest, Oregon, Arizona, Arkansaw, Porto Rico, etc.), and the back and forth and back again of secession. For the same number of characters, it conveys *a lot* more information, including about the civil war (treaties between the CSA and Indian nations...) ... though I grant that it is likely to lead people to view the map full screen. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 20:11, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

SashiRolls, let's not cast aspirations about who is angry or not, what just happened is a battleground tactic of forcing a change and POV pushing when there is no consensus (read the Wikipedia definition of what consensus should be, and the Bold, Revert, Discuss approach). Why in the image caption إيان and Freoh decided to write about the conflict with Native Americans and the loss of territories there, when just a well they could write about the US-Mexico war, or the US-Spain war and highlight territorial losses there? Long story short, not only is the new map of poor technical quality, its POV-ish to just select this one issue when talking about a map showing many territorial changes. --E-960 (talk) 11:39, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

The reference (Princeton University Press) provided in the caption looks like an excellent read. I see that several links to sub-pages were added that were not in the article before. All in all a very good edit, which does indeed, at least for the moment, seem to have consensus. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 13:18, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

What do you think of this, @SashiRolls: @E-960: above? It would simultaneously show the cotton gin, U.S. expansionism and the desire to equally balance free/slave states, the Battle of Gettysburg during the Civil War, and the Nadir of American race relations. (With quote from Birth of a Nation) I haven't been involved in this discussion (I saw I got tagged. Sorry for not responding, I didn't see the ping until now.)

This seems to me a clear instance in which multiple image formatting is necessary. The above four images seem to hit all of the main points. KlayCax (talk) 15:01, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

I think the easiest option is to add an image related to the Trail of Tears (which was a major event at the time related to the removal of Native Americans from across the South) and restore the original map. --E-960 (talk) 15:41, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax's proposed image selection would absolutely not be an improvement. Aside from being cluttered, there is no reason to give the Ku Klux Klan propaganda film The Birth of a Nation pride of place on this article, even if it were given significant critical context.

I also oppose E-960's suggestion while appreciating their idea. The current map is not perfect but it is sufficient and better than the alternatives proposed. إيان (talk) 15:53, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

WP:Due weight—The scholarly estimate is that 12 million Native Americans were killed in the territory that is now the US as a result of colonization and territorial expansion from 1492 to 1900. Meanwhile, deaths of the US-Spain War numbered in hundreds of thousands; of the US-Mexico War tens of thousands. The figures are beyond comparison. Besides, when dealing with a time scale of centuries, we have to focus on trends instead of isolated wars. إيان (talk) 16:11, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

Whatever that estimate suggests and regardless of its accuracy, 1492–1776 simply has nothing to do with the United States. Pizzigs (talk) 01:44, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Pizzigs, you should read the reliable source cited. It explains the relationship. You can access the source through WP:The Wikipedia Library or the Wikipedia:WikiProject Resource Exchange/Resource Request. إيان (talk) 12:53, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

So, a book named "Endless Holocausts: Mass Death in the History of the United States Empire" is a reliable source? According to whom? Written by an obscure professor who I couldn't even find on Google. Furthermore, the single page where his works are listed suggests his views might have been heavily biased against the United States. And what's with this Holocaust trivialization? When someone points out the horrors and death toll of Stalinism, Wikipedians accuse them of trivializing the Holocaust, but it's fine when applied to the United States, correct? Pizzigs (talk) 00:09, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Good to see a real estimate [https://www.se.edu › 2019/09PDF

Counting the Dead: Estimating the Loss of Life in the Indigenous Holocaust, 1492-Present - Oklahoma State University]. But to keep the article as a resource for students and researchers is beyond my time. As has User:Mason.Jones and a few other academic editors... We simply don't have the time to watch over the article anymore. We are at the point again that the article is full of media sources over academic publications to further our reader's knowledge. Moxy- 23:41, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax is back to edit-warring, claiming there was no preference for the GIF and caption with citations of academic literature. SashiRolls, Freoh, and myself have endorsed the edit here in this discussion, and Moxy has expressed appreciation for the academic source. KlayCax and E-960 have expressed disagreement, but have so far been unsuccessful in convincing other editors of their views. The image text is supported by the academic sources:

• Building an American Empire: The Era of Territorial and Political Expansion (2017) published by the Princeton University Press
• Endless Holocausts Mass Death in the History of the United States Empire (2023) published by New York University Press

إيان (talk) 20:08, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

In general we need academic contributions. As for the Imaging in question ..... it's not accessible to 30% of our readers..thus in my view an alternative should be found. Overall the article is a time sink and not on a positive path....we have 2 ongoing sock puppet investigations....... that I think is a waste of time we should be focusing our energies on educating editor's not banning them as they would just be back.....best we know who we're dealing with. Moxy- 20:16, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Please, remove that file until a consensus is reached. Pizzigs (talk) 21:43, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Personally, I would prefer replacing the image with File:Cotton gin harpers.jpg.  — Freoh 01:00, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Opposed to this proposal. Pizzigs (talk) 01:44, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Too many indents to follow on mobile. I see that you deleted this image on 12 April. You are probably unaware (due to the rapid archiving of this page) that consensus was established for its use at the end of March. I'm outdenting and reinstating that part of the talk page so that you can explain why you oppose the consensus.

The cotton gin image, for which consensus was established several weeks ago, was removed on 12 April (diff) with the edit summary "Added periods and other minor improvements." I've pulled the discussion back out from the archives and added it below.

US territorial evolution map (converted to .ogg)

Also, it is possible to convert an animated .gif to an .mp4 / .ogg so that it is possible to move the territorial map forward and backwards. I'll try to do that in the near future. I found a tutorial showing how to do this in ffmpeg, but haven't tried it yet. The only difference (if en.wp is like fr.wp) is that the video does not autoplay... and if you press play the media player pops up to nearly full screen. This may not be better than the current animated .gif. @Moxy:, you say above that 30% of people can't view the gif. Why is that? (It works for me both on mobile and desktop, but I suspect you may be talking about something I haven't thought of.) -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 07:49, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree that a video format would be better than a GIF.  — Freoh 15:26, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for reposting it, but I see no consensus. Furthermore, it appears to me as another attempt to push a certain viewpoint that slavery was a uniquely American evil, given that other countries with a history of slavery do not have such images in their articles. I do not agree with using the cotton gin image; given the importance of railroad in America's 19th century economic development and westward expansion, I propose adding this image instead. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax has removed the file again, with the edit summary Copied more from User:Rockstone35/United States and Missouri Compromise. Citations are about to be added. Don't revert in meantime. Thanks. إيان (talk) 17:00, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Now KlayCax's partner-in-crime Pizzigs is edit-warring to remove the accurate and comprehensive map video that SashiRolls made after Moxy mentioned that some users would not be able to see the GIF, and its well-cited caption—clearly to push their nationalist apologist POV that they have explicitly made manifest, to the detriment of the article. This time, the rationale given is that the Trail of Tears and the policies of Indian removal are already covered in the section. إيان (talk) 16:05, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

I like the map except that it moves too quickly for me. It is very appropriate as placed because it creates a visual of information rather than just a list of facts. Sectionworker (talk) 20:11, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax's unexplained "trimming"

KlayCax, under the pretense of "trimming" you selectively removed important, cited information about race, social inequality, wealth inequality, homosexuality, and same-sex marriage in the section United States#Culture and society. This smacks of POV pushing and masking these edits with the edit summary: Copied wording from Great American Novel. Further trimming is WP:disruptive editing. Please explain yourself. إيان (talk) 14:19, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. I have restored some of the relevant material, some of it long-standing.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 14:33, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

Hi, @إيان: @C.J. Griffin:.

race, social inequality, wealth inequality

Mention of those topics surrounding the United States were not removed in the edit. They were removed from the culture section. Since it just reinstated what is already said. The fact that there's social/wealth inequality is already present in the Income and Poverty section. I wouldn't be against reinstating the citations themselves. But the vast majority should be reinstated there.

Homosexuality and same-sex marriage

Cutting out:

A late 2022 Grinnell College poll found that 74% of Americans agreed that same-sex marriage should be a guaranteed right while 13% disagreed. Approval of same-sex marriage is higher in younger generations; among 18-34 year olds, 76% are in favor of legal recognition and 7% oppose. In 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage bans were unconstitutional.

While leaving in the article:

LGBT rights are among the most advanced in the world, with public opinion and jurisprudence on the issue changing significantly since the late 1980s. LGBT rights are among the most advanced in the world, with public opinion and jurisprudence on the issue changing significantly since the late 1980s.

Seems entirely justifiable to me. Both connotate the same concept; one just does it in a whole lot less words.

This smacks of POV pushing

There's a lot of American policy I disagree with. That being said - as @E-960: and other editors have mentioned - this article is quickly becoming WP: Undue. Compare the wording for Japan, Brazil, Canada, and other countries to the present U.S. article. No one here is denying that the United States has not committed atrocities/doesn't have problems.

But absolutely none of these things were downplayed in the edit. In fact, the majority of the removal was increased American support for same-sex marriage/homosexuality. KlayCax (talk) 06:15, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Bruh, the section is called Culture and society. Those are well-sourced, long-standing statements about dominant features of US society you unilaterally decided to remove. You also surreptitiously attempted to mask your edit with the summary Copied wording from Great American Novel. Further trimming and now that you've been called out on it, you're equivocating and obfuscating and refusing to acknowledge your wrongdoing and apologize for it.

You need to get beyond this idea that an article is somehow a moral judgment or condemnation of its topic. It's simply intended to be an NPOV reflection of what is recorded in current, authoritative WP:Reliable sources. The content of other articles is not a valid argument because WP:Wikipedia is not a reliable source. If you have issue with that content, take it up on those pages. إيان (talk) 18:45, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. I don't understand why there is all this insistance that NPOV information is somehow moral judgement and/or condemnation all of a sudden. Shoreranger (talk) 19:08, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

There's general agreement that this article is too long and needs significant trimming. This article should cover only the absolute broadest strokes, with very little in terms of detail. That's what WP:SUMMARY style is for. My only complaint with KlayCax's edit is that they didn't remove enough. I'd like to take a hacksaw to this article, but every detail is really important to one person or another, and everyone wants their own "most important issue" to be as prominent in the article as possible. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 00:41, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, me to. @Thebiguglyalien:. I get that — as you said — that every detail is really important to one person or another. But it appears that any substantial cuts will have to be painstakingly go through months-long RFC's. Essentially any removal or trimming is immediately challenged. It's unfortunate. KlayCax (talk) 10:52, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax is at it again, unilaterally making massive changes to the article, and in so doing making all kinds of wild WP:OR WP:POV claims and not bothering to cite WP:reliable sources, from here to here. This time they're not selectively removing cited information they don't like under the pretense of "trimming," but rather adding what they like without bothering to cite sources or seek consensus. إيان (talk) 04:28, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

A net negative time sink all over. WP:BRINK. Moxy- 05:26, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

@KlayCax: at this point we are going to ask you to propose any changes here first...including copy pasting, change of content or images. Thank you. Moxy- 06:15, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax and Pizzigs are back at it again, as soon as the full lock was lifted. إيان (talk) 16:56, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Please, go through the edits and summarize your objections if they're any. Pizzigs (talk) 17:02, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

is America a floor wax or a dessert topping?

Some may remember a 1976 SNL fake commercial in which Dan Ackroyd and Gilda Radner argue whether a can of whipped cream is a floor wax or a dessert topping, whereupon Chevy Chase enters to say, "hey, hey, calm down, you two. New Shimmer is both a floor wax and a dessert topping!"

So we have it with whether the United States is a democracy or a republic. It's both,[1]] and representative democracy should be included in the infobox, along with Federal presidential constitutional republic. I've read through the Talk archives a bit and see the discussions largely assume it's a mutually exclusive proposition, it's one or the other. It's not. Our Talk FAQ loudly proclaims: "The United States is not a democracy!" Of course it is. Why else would we bother to hold elections?

The republic article reads a state in which power rests with the people or their representatives; specifically a state without a monarchy, and the Constitution says The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government. So, no kings, no emperors, but rather a democracy: a form of government in which the people have the authority to deliberate and decide legislation ("direct democracy"), or to choose governing officials to do so ("representative democracy")

Now, there are initiatives and referendums in the United States, a form of direct democracy, but in the vast majority of cases laws are created by representatives elected by popular vote. The electoral college is irrelevant, because presidents don't make law.

Some may be aware that there has been a great deal of discussion in recent years asserting America is seeing "attacks on democracy," with a counter-assertion that America isn't even a democracy in the first place, so democracy can't be under attack. I assert America is clearly a democracy, as well as a republic, and the infobox should reflect that. soibangla (talk) 00:11, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

I tend to agree, and the FAQ answer is the laziest possible way to address this: "look at the archives!" Well, I did, and I find a lot of the arguments given in the archives to be lame (e.g. "democracies tend to be more left-leaning than the US"; as if that has anything to do with anything), but it feels like a tall hill to re-litigate millions of disorganized archived arguments. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 22:29, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Hearing no objection from any of the 5,117 article watchers, I am adding representative democracy to the infobox and removing "The United States is not a democracy!" from the Talk FAQ. soibangla (talk) 03:49, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

It's worth noting what other sources say: "constitutional federal republic," (CIA Factbook)[2] "federal republic," (Encyclopedia Britannica) Can you show that any sources use your description?

The problem with the term democracy is that it is on a continuum. For example, various indices list "flawed democracies." Was the U.S. a democracy when only 10% of men over 21 were entitled to vote? Was it a democracy when 10% of the population was enslaved? If you relied on the original Greek meaning, then it was, but it probably doesn't meet modern criteria.

You say that democracy and republic are synonyms. If so, why use both terms? TFD (talk) 17:21, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

@The Four Deuces: representative democracy and republic are synonyms Republic#United_States which is why the infobox is redundant. 131.193.138.181 (talk) 18:36, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

It is a liberal and representative democracy. Both can be mentioned. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Request for comment on culture subsection

The below subsection on African American culture has been suggested for inclusion and was removed. A good faith request for mediation did not receive participation from opposing editors and so the edit was restored with the following from the mediator: "At this point, there seems to be a rough consensus for the inclusion of the subsection." After mediation closed additional editors joined the opposition after the fact, removing the below again, participated in edit warring, resulting in this RFC. Shoreranger (talk) 13:40, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

The mediation was closed because no one attended. There was no closing of finding a facts. Moxy- 21:59, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

False to claim "no one attended". No one *in opposition* attended, despite invitation. The above clearly states "did not receive participation from opposing editors." Shoreranger (talk) 14:24, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

African-American culture

Main article: African-American culture

See also: Black Codes (United States), Slave codes, Anti-literacy laws in the United States, Education during the slave period in the United States, Treatment of slaves in the United States, and Partus sequitur ventrem

Further information: The Negro Motorist Green Book, Historically black colleges and universities, and Separate but equal

Unique among population groups in the United States due to a history of enslavement and ensuing marginalization including legalized segregation, African-Americans had been likewise prohibited from participating meaningfully in mainstream artistic expressions and so developed their own parallel artforms. Eventually, many African American artistic expressions, forms and styles would become mainstream and be enjoyed and adopted outside the subculture that formed it. African-American music, dance, art, literature, cuisine, and cinema all created significant bodies of work that has a great influence on the culture at large that can stand alone or be considered in conjunction with the broader culture that surrounds it.

References

Shoreranger (talk) 13:40, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

There seems to be a preponderance of support for inclusion. How long do we need to let this discussion continue before the content can be restored? Shoreranger (talk) 13:56, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Poll

• Opposed Slavery was not unique to the United States, and other countries with a history of slavery/racial segregation/systemic racism don't have these sections. Pizzigs (talk) 14:21, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  The point is not that slavery was unique in the US, that is not claimed.

  The point is that slavery and the legacy of slavery forced the creation of a unique culture/subculture in the US in a way that has not played out in other countries. The fact that Wiki articles for other countries with a history of slavery doesn't have "these sections" is not germaine because: a) This is not a section on slavery, it is a subsection on culture, b) those countries don't have half-dozen or more pages comparable to African-American culture, African-American dance, African-American literature, etc. that clearly indicates something unique and notable is going on, c) sins of omission on other pages is no excuse for omission here. Shoreranger (talk) 15:40, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  As Shoreranger notes above, Slavery was not unique to the United States is a straw man—it does not bare on the matter at hand and such a claim was not made anyway. Also, because WP:Wikipedia is not a reliable source, the content of Wikipedia articles about other countries is irrelevant. إيان (talk) 16:12, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a reliable source is an essay not a guideline, as stated in the article itself. However, WP:DUE and WP:PROPORTION give a better understanding of what can be included in a Wikipedia article, especially of such significance as the United States. As of now, there are already two distinct paragraph covering the cultural developments mentioned in the proposed text: "In the 1920s, the New Negro Movement coalesced in Harlem, where many writers had migrated (some coming from the South, others from the West Indies). Its pan-African perspective was a significant cultural export during the Jazz Age in Paris and as such was a key early influence on the négritude philosophy." and "The rhythmic and lyrical styles of African-American music have significantly influenced American music at large, distinguishing it from European and African traditions. Elements from folk idioms such as the blues and what is known as old-time music were adopted and transformed into popular genres with global audiences. Jazz was developed by innovators such as Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington early in the 20th century. Country music developed in the 1920s, and rhythm and blues in the 1940s.". As such, I do not see what new the proposed section brings to the article, aside from putting an additional emphasis on the legacy of slavery. Pizzigs (talk) 16:54, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  The emphasis is on the unique circumstances and extent of suppression and externally imposed dangers, even death, in order for AA culture/subculture not only to develop but to persist. That is unique in at least the US experience, and deserves attention in and of itself, not just the artforms that are now celebrated and accepted despite such active and coordinated attempts to prevent and destroy them. Shoreranger (talk) 17:57, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  I do not believe any additional content should be added regarding the unique circumstances beyond what is already described in the history section. The dictionary you're using as a source covers American culture and its history as a whole, therefore you need to provide specific pages that back up your claims, and there also should be concrete evidence to support your suggestion that this topic "deserves attention in and of itself, not just the artforms that are now celebrated and accepted despite such active and coordinated attempts to prevent and destroy them." Pizzigs (talk) 20:04, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  Being unique in the US experience is not sufficient "in and of itself"? Shoreranger (talk) 20:28, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  However, I do believe that a shorter version of the proposed text can be incorporated into the United States#Culture and society section. "Many African-American artistic expressions, forms and styles, that had existed as parallel artforms, later gained mainstream acceptance and following. African-American music, dance, art, literature, cuisine, and cinema all created significant bodies of work that have had a great influence on the American culture at large. Pizzigs (talk) 17:09, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  Why is it that African American cultural activity existed as parallel artforms? Just so happened? There are reasons and the text that was removed is essential to understanding why:

  Unique among population groups in the United States due to a history of enslavement and ensuing marginalization including legalized segregation, African-Americans had been likewise prohibited from participating meaningfully in mainstream artistic expressions and so developed their own parallel artforms...

  This is not pushing a "US is evil POV." This is simply necessary context as described in the reliable source, and cutting this context out clearly lessens the article's encyclopedic value. إيان (talk) 06:44, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

  Unlike many other countries with issues related to slavery, the US is unique in how its past still affects the future. Considering that the US has the largest prison population, where the percentage of African-Americans arrested relative to their total population in the country is much higher, and the effects on culture that this has resulted in, it definitely needs to be mentioned. RPI2026F1 (talk) 14:56, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

• Comment Although I consider the inclusion of information on African American culture in this section to be of essential importance as per cited reliable sources, including its unique historical context in US history as influenced by enslavement, racism, segregation, etc., it’s current formulation has issues with WP:Due weight and needs reworking. However, there has been some flagrant denialism and it’s apparent that some editors commenting on the matter have not examined the reliable sources provided in earlier discussions. Of the comments in opposition, I find only Asqueladd’s to be in any way convincing, and they did not advocate for the complete removal of the material but rather for revisiting its formulation and hierarchy. For me, this is the direction in which we need to go. إيان (talk) 16:22, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  I heartily endorse a re-working to be in compliance with WP:Due weight. In the meantime, we need something for editors to work from, not wholesale deletion. Shoreranger (talk) 16:26, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support the inclusion of this section. As an uninvolved editor, I'm not sure how it's supposed to be objectionable. Loki (talk) 21:48, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
• Opposed just a generic statement with link after link after link. Looking for academic contributions. The article has been overwhelmed lately with copy and pasting..... and non-academic additions. sources have gone downhill real quick. Not sure why this ethnic group requires more attention than the 250 other ethnic groups. I understand segregation is a big problem in the United States but it shouldn't be done in our articles.Moxy- 22:02, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

  The crux of your arguement, "Not sure why this ethnic group requires more attention than the 250 other ethnic groups. I understand segregation is a big problem in the United States but it shouldn't be done in our articles."

  • No other "ethnic group" was enslaved for centuries in the US
  • No other "ethnic group" was specifically prohibited by law to learn how to read for centuries in the US, and then denied the opportunity to do so for an additional century, yet created its own unique literary body
  • No other "ethnic group" was specifically prohibited by law to publicly assemble or be out after dark, but still was able to create an oral tradition of poetry, dance and the performing arts of its own despite centuries of being denied audiences for any works
  • Most, if not all, of the "250 other ethnic groups" were actively encouraged to assimilate into American culture, while AAs were actively being excluded by law, tradition, culture and practice from it for hundreds of years.
  • Lynching. For the perceived transgression of any of these. Death at the hands of a vigilante mob was not regularly and widespread against any other "ethnic group"
  • There are plenty of other of social, political and cultural exclusions beyond mere "segregation" that were used to suppress an AA culture that developed nevertheless, but these alone justify inclusion.

  This isn't segregation to include, it is entirely unique among any group in the US and therefore deserves to be specifically addressed. It is a matter of inclusion, not segregation. Shoreranger (talk) 12:56, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

• Comment This article is overflowing with subsections, another single paragraph one seems poor. I haven't read through any high-level sources but it certainly sounds like it could be due. If so, better to integrate it into the existing text. The current section has the sentence "Mainstream American culture is a Western culture largely derived from the traditions of European immigrants with influences from many other sources, such as traditions brought by slaves from Africa", followed by "More recent immigration from Asia and especially Latin America has added to a cultural mix that has been described as a homogenizing melting pot...". My reading of the suggested text seems to suggest it fits in between those sections (possibly modifying the first one): a historical "parallel artform" that "later gained mainstream acceptance" fits between the European immigrants (the culture(s) to which it was presumably broadly parallel) and modern immigration. CMD (talk) 07:59, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  For centuries, African Americans were denied by law, tradition, and politics from participating in US culture, certainly not encouraged to "assimilate" into it, while "European immigrants" were encouraged to a contribute to the "melting pot", because the powerful did not want any indication that AAs had any culture worth assimilating or adding, promoting and encouraging and legally codifying AAs as more like animal than human.

  It was not until centuries later, despite all attempts to dehumanize and suppress AAs, that the subculture was accepted and eventually prized, even though its roots ironically predated the "European immigrant" contributions by centuries. *That's* what deserves recognition. Shoreranger (talk) 13:04, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  I'm not sure what any of that has to do with my comment, which is not about and does not use the word "assimilate", despite that word being put in quotation marks. CMD (talk) 13:30, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support Proposed additions seems reasonable, well-written, well referenced, neutrally worded, obeys WP:SUMMARYSTYLE, and passes WP:DUE. Looks solid. --Jayron32 13:09, 12 April 2023 (UTC)
• Opposed; no new section, but... A lot of this information could be incorporated into the article. Particularly under the present cultural section of the article. Additionally, a lot of this information is already present in the article (much more naturally). The present one already has problems with length. Repeating the same concepts a multitude of times is the wrong way to go about it. KlayCax (talk) 15:47, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  Just to add, I think this may be a reasonable compromise; the information is fine, but it isn't necessary to give it its own section. Finding ways to incorporate it otherwise into the existing structure of the article, where it would present a better narrative flow, is a good idea. --Jayron32 16:19, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  Not sure if this makes any difference in your thinking, but this is suggested as a subsection of "Culture and Society", *not* its own section. Shoreranger (talk) 17:49, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  My point is that it doesn't really need a header. A paragraph of text, properly integrated into the wider narrative, is usually better than a small, standalone paragraph with its own header; the header and hatnotes aren't really necessary. --Jayron32 17:59, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  Possibly, but it is my point that integrated into the wider narrative has not suitably conveyed the uniqueness within US culture and is not likely to. The "hatnotes" might benefit from editing, but the topics add context. Shoreranger (talk) 18:23, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  The contention is precisely that this concept is in fact *not* covered, and that "a lot of this information" as you put it is presented out of context and does not express the unique circumstances from which AA culture arose, nor the unique open and legalized opposition to it. Shoreranger (talk) 17:58, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  The purpose of headers is not to highlight, but to organize. --Jayron32 18:47, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

  Great. Let's organize, and not diffuse and decontextualize. Shoreranger (talk) 19:38, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Curious to know: what reputable sources (academic literature, textbooks, etc.) about US culture and society have those in opposition read that don’t have dedicated African American chapters/sections? إيان (talk) 16:53, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

This is not a book about US culture, it is a very much shorter format in which Culture is just one of seven main topics. The entire section would be shorter than the introduction of one of those books. CMD (talk) 01:11, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

Nobody said it was a book, but it has to summarize and represent what is in reliable, reputable sources—books, encyclopedias, textbooks, journals, etc. إيان (talk) 14:48, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose – To start with, the sectional hatnotes link to articles that have little to do with the influence that African Americans have had on the general culture. Those links should sit with subsidiary articles on A.A. culture, which are already linked from the article. The text itself merely establishes the unusual conditions under which black culture developed but doesn't say how that culture came to resonate with the population at large. Some of that text is contestable, such as "African-Americans had been likewise prohibited from participating meaningfully in mainstream artistic expressions...", as certainly some of that expression was a deliberate, rebellious refusal to assimilate. And the last sentence is quite confusing. What does it really mean? Add to that the fact that the culture section has had no ethnically specific subsections, which don't even exist in Culture of the United States, where you would expect such subsections in greater detail if they are to be here. Dhtwiki (talk) 06:05, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

  "To start with, the sectional hatnotes link to articles that have little to do with the influence that African Americans have had on the general culture."

  • The hatnotes are there precisely to address your common presumption "Some of that text is contestable, such as "African-Americans had been likewise prohibited from participating meaningfully in mainstream artistic expressions...", as certainly some of that expression was a deliberate, rebellious refusal to assimilate." African Americans were prevented by law, custom, and threat of vigilante lynchings from assimilating. It was deliberately denied to them by the society at large legally, politically, socially, and culturally. All of the things in those hatnotes demonstrate the means and the methods used to prevent AAs from assimilating, they weren't just being - to paraphrase - "deliberately rebelliously refusing to assimilate".

  "Those links should sit with subsidiary articles on A.A. culture, which are already linked from the article."

  • The fact that despite supposedly "already linked from the article" the continued common presumption you espouse that AAs maintained a "deliberate rebellious, refusal to assimilate" en masse on their own accord, rather than being legally and systematically denied by those in power to opportunity or ability to assimilate even unto the threat of violence or death, proves the need to direct the reader to a more accurate depiction of the truth. It almost sounds like you are saying AAs were too "uppity" to be assimilated, so it was their own fault, which I hope is not the case.

  " The text itself merely establishes the unusual conditions under which black culture developed but doesn't say how that culture came to resonate with the population at large."

  • Agreed, it should probably be added, but let's work on getting consensus on the foundational text first.

  "And the last sentence is quite confusing. What does it really mean?"

  • Presumably the sentence you refer to is "African American music, dance, art, literature, cuisine, and cinema all created significant bodies of work that has a great influence on the culture at large that can stand alone or be considered in conjunction with the broader culture that surrounds it." No one else has expressed confusion, but the sentence acknowledges that African American culture as a body is large and influential, even internationally, and can be and in fact *is* considered by some observers as its own entity, but is equally and logically considered a subculture and therefore a part of US culture - both are true.

  "Add to that the fact that the culture section has had no ethnically specific subsections, which don't even exist in Culture of the United States, where you would expect such subsections in greater detail if they are to be here."

  • AA culture, as demonstrated and discussed above, is unique among all other ethnicities in the US because it is the only one that was actively and specifically oppressed and suppressed by law, and regularly and pervasively enforced by vigilantes with impunity. That's the point, and it's also the reason why it deserves its own subsection. Also, the lack of inclusion of anything in another article is not justification to avoid it in this article. If anything, it may indicate a shortcoming in the other article that needs to be addressed, as well.

  Shoreranger (talk) 13:41, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

  • Shoeranger: You are overwhelming the discussion. Your involvement should have ended with your initial proposal and comment, and then allowed other people to weigh in with their feelings. Consensus is not built by one person monopolizing the discussion and sucking all of the oxygen out of the room. We need a variety of different people giving their opinions on the matter, not the same person giving the same opinion over and over again, with increasing vehemence. Please stop. It is becoming disruptive. Stop responding to every single comment, and allow the process the time to work itself out without having to make it all about you. --Jayron32 14:34, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

    I didn't even know that was a thing on Wikipedia. A little surprising, but I think I get the purpose. A little far to accuse me of 'having to make it all about me', when that is not the idea, but fine. Certainly hope it helps get a variety of different to participate, somehow. I'll step back to conform. Shoreranger (talk) 15:10, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

  I'm reading from The Slave Community in asserting that blacks didn't always want to assimilate. They held to their own cultural forms to signify their ability to assert themselves against their masters, who generally did not care how slaves entertained themselves as long as it didn't interfere with the harvest. The ending sentence I questioned is somewhat redundant, within itself ("a great influence on the culture at large that can stand alone or be considered in conjunction with the broader culture that surrounds it.") as well as with regard to the preceding sentence, and somewhat ungrammatical (e.g. for "bodies of work that has" read "...have"). While African Americans were uniquely subjected to the peculiar institution of chattel slavery, there are other forms of economic subordination and emotional suffering inflicted on other groups, none of which explains how the cultures of marginalized people came to influence the culture at large; and inclusion of the proposed subsection would set a precedence that may lead to the inclusion of other such subsections for other groups, thus possibly greatly lengthening an article that is always too long. And, yes, the detail on this article should be a mere summary of what exists in separate articles devoted to American culture generally or that of constituent groups. Dhtwiki (talk) 08:37, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support in principle. I think that we should avoid single-paragraph sections in general, and I would prefer that we organize this material a bit differently, but this content deserves due weight. Until we can come to a different consensus, we should go back to status quo mediation consensus that included this material.  — Freoh 22:03, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

  I was not know where to find that guidance. Thank you, and agreed. Shoreranger (talk) 14:57, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

  WP:QUO is not having it there ,,it was added and reverted...and there was NO mediation..was closed with no participation. Slavery is mentioned 17 times...what is missing?Moxy- 12:09, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

  It was closed with no participation from you. There was a consensus among those who participated.  — Freoh 00:35, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

• SUPPORT inclusion of AA subsection to the culture section. There are many places in the page as a whole that bits of this information could be incorporated (and let's do that also), like adding African Americans' influence on the Jazz age of the Roaring Twenties in the History section or woven into each subsection of the culture breakouts, but going through that weaving process alone would dilute why African American culture is not only notable (and necessary for inclusion in its own subsection) but distinctly relevant. I agree that the notability of AA culture should be called out as distinctly unique from American culture generally for the reasons listed in the og edit, followed later by the bulleted list above by Shoreranger. Pistongrinder (talk) 19:08, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

  Yeah, no would've noticed it without all caps. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

• opposed as the African American community isn't a separate part of the United States. Very concerning that white people still think that Africa Americans are a have not of today's society. Should be mentioning the strides they've taken over the centuries. 208.96.81.171 (talk) 17:24, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
• SUPPORT inclusion of section. I've done quite a bit of reading and I am certain that we need a section on AA influence. Like most Americans, I love my country and I want our article to show not only the history of our savage enslavement and discrimination of people of color, but also the richness of their contributions to the arts which could not be repressed and eventually even came to be appreciated and imitated. In my reading, I was reminded that Jewish people have also faced discrimination and have responded by being some of the leaders of our art/cultural heritage. Perhaps we need a section on their contributions as well. Sectionworker (talk) 17:20, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I like this quote: "This interest in Black heritage coincided with efforts to define an American culture distinct from that of Europe, one that would be characterized by ethnic pluralism as well as a democratic ethos. The concept of cultural pluralism (a term coined by the philosopher Horace Kallen in 1915) inspired notions of the United States as a new kind of nation in which diverse cultures should develop side by side in harmony rather than be “melted” together or ranked on a scale of evolving “civilization." [3] Sectionworker (talk) 18:23, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Hard to believe, given your propensity for cherry picking and manipulating data to push a certain anti-American agenda to the article. The latest is here. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose Reviewing the article and page size this article already too long which is why there's already an article for Culture of the United States where this information can be included. This article should only summarize what's in Culture of the United States. This request appears to be putting the cart in front of the horse. Nemov (talk) 17:39, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

  Are you saying that African American culture is not notable enough to be worthy of summarizing in this article because it is not discussed at length in the culture of the United States article? Personally, I would support expanding or restructuring that article as well.  — Freoh 21:28, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

  The culture section in this article should be a very high-level summary of Culture of the United States. That seems an uncontroversial statement, not sure how thoughts on article notability come into that. CMD (talk) 01:37, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

  I don't have a strong opinion about the content other than it's not included in Culture of the United States which this section is supposed to summarize. Nemov (talk) 17:20, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

  The solution to this problem is to add the material to culture of the United States. We should base our arguments on reliable sources, not other content.  — Freoh 02:14, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

• Support as things stand now. The paragraph is suitably short and summarizes the issue in a way suitable to the context of the larger article—leaving the details and subtleties for the linked article dedicated to the subject. I would also not be opposed to similar and proportionate paragraphs if anyone could write and source them. But there is no denying that African Americans have been a unique group in larger American culture in both the magnitude of their contributions and the response from the majority. Darkfrog24 (talk) 22:45, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I read some of the other comments here, and I think I should add, why black Americans and not other groups of Americans? 1) Some treatment of other groups of Americans may be appropriate. 2) Because of what's going on in-country. This is exactly the kind of information that is being taken out of American schools in Florida, Oklahoma, and other states. For some readers, Wikipedia might be their only readily available avenue for this kind of information that isn't trying to sell them something and gives a darn about verifiability, and it should be there to find when they look for it. Darkfrog24 (talk) 00:19, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Please, read WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. Do you understand that your statement contradicts the very purpose of Wikipedia? Pizzigs (talk) 01:09, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for reminding me about WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS, but I think we're in the clear here: "If, however, the wrong that you want to address has already been sorted in the real world, and if you have the reliable sources to support it, then please do." I do not propose that we use Wikipedia to solve the problems described in the passage under discussion. I propose that Wikipedia, by functioning within its preexisting policies, can mitigate a problem that emerged after they were written. If the wrong in question is "there isn't enough free access to verifiable, encyclopedia information presented neutrally, uninfluenced by advertising or censorship laws," then Wikipedia has always been meant to right it. Darkfrog24 (talk) 11:50, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Censorship in public schools of some red states does not amount to a full-blown censorship of media and the Internet, like in many countries where you can get prosecuted for criticizing the government; therefore, "Wikipedia might be their only readily available avenue for this kind of information" does not apply here and "If the wrong in question is "there isn't enough free access to verifiable, encyclopedia information presented neutrally, uninfluenced by advertising or censorship laws," then Wikipedia has always been meant to right it." is simply not the case in the United States. Honestly, the America-centered anti-American bias is so prevalent among some American editors that I'd honestly support a temporary ban on Americans editing this article, because they simply cannot provide a neutral and accurate assessment of their own country from an international perspective. This is not a serious proposal of course, just a feeling I have. Pizzigs (talk) 13:21, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia's principles apply to Americans within the United States just as they apply to countries with what you call full-blown censorship. Making reliable information accessible is not righting great wrongs.  — Freoh 20:24, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose in current form. Not accurate to claim that African-American and white culture did not influence each other and share common elements during slavery and segregation, and the section is in general badly phrased. The same applies to its claims about the uniqueness of discrimination against African-Americans. Also far too many hatnotes.--Eldomtom2 (talk) 10:50, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

  The proposed text does not claim that African-American and white culture did not influence each other and share common elements during slavery and segregation.  — Freoh 10:30, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

• Comment. Shoreranger Before proceeding, you may want to establish from good sources that at the top overview level, African American culture is significant and distinct enough by itself compared to the rest of the United States. From there, we can go into the background and other details. CurryCity (talk) 00:42, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Deleted image related to this question

The banjo and the electric guitar were first mass-produced in the United States. The Old Plantation, an 18th-century painting attributed to slave-owner John Rose, shows a hand-made precursor to the banjo in use on a plantation.

A few days back this image was deleted in the first of four reverts made by a single user that day. The user in question has so far refused the addition of any image of slavery being included on the page on the mistaken grounds that other country pages do not have images of plantations, slavery or slave revolts (cf. e.g. Jamaica, Haiti, Brazil, etc.). It might be good to establish whether there is consensus to refuse any image of slavery for the en.wp article on the United States and to update the FAQ if there is such a consensus.

I chose this image to illustrate a paragraph talking about African-American contributions to music after reading the discussion here about minstrelsy being a distinctive American form, which according to the source cited led directly to the widening popularity and mass-production of banjos. The source includes the same illustration, which has its own en.wp page and is hanging in a folk-art gallery in Virginia. It is true that The Banjo Lesson is a more famous painting which could also illustrate the Music sectio on the imagen of culture. Thoughts? Thoughts on whether or not we need to update the FAQ to explain why there are no images of slavery on the page? Should we include instruments created/popularized in the US, such as the banjo and the electric guitar, in the section on music?

I have not yet !voted above, because I think it would be great if we could incorporate the cultural contributions of different groups into a single text without excessively compartmentalizing things into air-tight sections. Given the difficulties encountered trying to accurately represent history though, I have to admit not being overly optimistic. I did not think that the existence of plantations in the US prior to the civil war was controversial, yet for some reason efforts to illustrate that aspect of history have been treated as polemical. NB: this image takes no "position" on slavery. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 08:17, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

I can't understand it either. I thought the the Smithsonian Institute would help to settle the matter of African American musical roots and yet the information was ignored One music historian says, "Every genre that is born from America has Black roots associated with it, from rock 'n' roll to blues to disco. The fingerprints of Black creators are all over what makes American music so unique."[4] The photo is great but similar efforts in the past have not been successful. Sectionworker (talk) 23:30, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

References

Airing grievances (reversed American exceptionalism)

So, this sentence was removed because apparently it's POV, which I doubt because it's seems like a reliable source, but whatever. However, what really incensed me is that edit. Here, after cleansing the culture section of moderately positive content, the editor decided to write a separate paragraph on slavery and how the Founding Fathers' views on liberty and equality were incompatible with some of them owning slaves and discriminating against women, and being overall awful.

Some users like invoking Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a reliable source, despite it being an essay and in now way a guideline, to reject proposals for having consistent guidelines on nation states articles. When I ask why other nations that practiced slavery, and in fact participated in the Transatlantic slave trade long before the United States of America was founded (e.g. the United Kingdom, the country that smuggled slaves to its Thirteen Colonies), don't have these scathing sections on their past evils and long sentences in the lead, describing all the possible problems in the country, they say it comes down to RS. Well, okay. Try finding something about the fact that Britain only finished paying off debts to slave-owning families in 2015 in the United Kingdom article. I imagine if something like that happened in the US, some editors would place that information in the lead and also repeat it in the history, culture, and wealth and poverty sections just to make sure no one misses it.

I feel like a few editors here are so obsessed with the evils of America, that they somehow assume they are unique to the US, completely ignoring all the good things and leading the article to being an unbalanced mess with multiple WP:UNDUE issues. Pizzigs (talk) 23:34, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

If an editor is incapable of seeing edits beyond the simplistic prism of positive - negative, to the point where they become defensive of some idealized vision of the topic and work against what is in current authoritative, reputable sources (academic literature, textbooks, peer-reviewed journals, etc.)—to the detriment of WP:NPOV—then that editor is participating in WP:Advocacy and possibly WP:Disruptive editing.

From WP:NPOV:

Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources. (The relative prominence of each viewpoint among Wikipedia editors or the general public is irrelevant and should not be considered.)

Academic and reference sources such as the Oxford encyclopedia of American cultural and intellectual history are for more prominent, reliable, and reputable, and therefore carry a lot more weight and importance, than middle-market newspapers such as USA Today, especially for the section on US culture and society.

If you feel that the article United Kingdom is missing WP:Verifiable information, show up at that article with reliable sources, but don't attempt to use a mercurial, publicly-edited Wikipedia article as a metric or a source for this article.

Editors don't need to have read Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil to edit Wikipedia, but they do need the intellectual maturity to respect what is in reputable sources—even if it's critical, even if they find it negative—because Wikipedia is WP:NOTCENSORED. إيان (talk) 15:44, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

With due respect, what you are doing now is using policies and guidelines (contrary to their intent) to conduct Wikipedia warfare against people to "get" them. You're perfectly aware of WP:UNDUE and WP:BALASP. Therefore, mentioning slavery, and specifically its incompatibility with the Constitution's stated ideals, in the Culture section amounts to undue weight. Slavery is already mentioned in the lead and History sections, and there're multiple standalone articles dedicated specifically to slavery in colonial America/United States, as well as a Constitution of the United States#Criticisms section. Pizzigs (talk) 16:49, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. Clearly there is a small group of highly motivated, deeply anti-American editors devoted to promoting their POV of this page. This has to stop. --Jatkins ^{(talk - contribs)} 18:56, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Writing objectively about the US and its history, based on current academic sources, is not "anti-American". This kind of misinformed hypersensitive sentiment of nationalism or patriotism is useless in building an NPOV encyclopedia. إيان (talk) 05:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

User:Pizzigs is "incensed" about the following:

"However, many historians have noted that the Declaration's pronouncement of "all men are created equal" did not apply to either women or slaves. The men who wrote the Declaration were mostly slaveowners, perhaps accounting for the fact that slaves were not even mentioned. Thirty-four of the forty-seven men depicted in the 'Declaration of Independence' painting were slaveholders and in 1776, while slavery was condoned (“condemned”? - ed.) in every Western country, including France and Britain, all thirteen colonies still permitted it."

They've already expressed a contempt for too much faith in Wiki essays, but Wikipedia:Let it go might be the first thing to address here. If anyone is getting "incensed" they should take care of themselves.

Beyond that, its true that the offending content needs citation, but beyond that, it serves to put some important facts into context.

The real crux of the issue is revealed in the statement 'after cleansing the culture section of moderately positive content", referring to edits by [[User:]]. This is in the broader context of an ongoing effort by other editors recently to "trim" the article down, which have notably *not* to my knowledge been categorized by anyone as "moderately positive" or in contrast 'negative' - because it doesn't matter. As long as it meets Wiki:Due criteria, judgements of positive or negative are irrelevant.

"I feel like a few editors here are so obsessed with the evils of America, that they somehow assume they are unique to the US, completely ignoring all the good things and leading the article to being an unbalanced mess with multiple Wiki:UNDUE issues."

Can anyone genuinely argue that this article doesn't already have enough content that popularly conceived as "moderately positive" or even 'strongly positive'? I objectively don't think so.

How the articles for other countries do or do not address slavery is irrelevant to the US article. There are multiple reasons, but among the most important is that the US experience with slavery was different and is a defining factor in US culture, history and society and that context is precisely what is necessary to be included in this article. There is no unifying content that connects all of the dispersed references to AA culture, so that where those references do show up they seem disjointed and unexplainedly diffuse. The reasons for the development of an AA culture arguably unlike any other subculture in the world is the context that is missing. The fact that other countries have had slavery over history is not germaine, but the way slavery played out in the US and the impacts it had and continues to have on the US is precisely what needs context. The question that needs answering for the reader, in effect, is "If other countries have had slavery why is the AA cultural legacy in the US so unique among nations?" Put that in context and the article will be doing its job.

The argument has been made that slavery was not unique to the US, and its been made over and over and over again, but nobody is making the claim that slavery was unique to the US. Nobody. And therefore, it is not an argument against putting the contemporary and legacy impact of slavery into context in this article. Its NOT a value judgement. The AA experience is different from the experience of all other Americans because of slavery, and that manifested itself in a lot of ways and continues to manifest itself. That is not a 'positive' or a 'negative' necessarily, it just 'is', and has been substantiated with valid citations. Shoreranger (talk) 19:23, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

The However, many historians have noted that the Declaration's pronouncement ... line could work (as a single sentence at absolute most), but I think a whole paragraph devoted to it is very undue. The line thirty-four of the forty-seven men depicted in the 'Declaration of Independence' painting were slaveholders and in 1776, while slavery was condoned in every Western country, including France and Britain, all thirteen colonies still permitted it seems wrong to me for two reasons – one, no need to list the exact number in an article so focused on WP:SUMSTYLE as this one, and two, the existence of slavery in the U.S. in 1776 is already very much established in the article. DecafPotato (talk) 20:43, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

I was reading this article last night, and when I came back to read more today I seen a neutrality issue has been added to it. I assumed the issue was the article has a celebratory version of US history, as has been the case with various books I’ve read, so it’s surprising to see it’s the opposite being argued here. I felt compelled to comment because of this. Bit of background, I’m Irish, and my parents marched in the 1960s civil rights marches in Northern Ireland which were directly inspired by those partaken by minorities in the US. At that time catholics were heavily discriminated against (“Negroes of Northern Ireland” was a phrase associated with the movement), and given this somewhat shared history I’ve been heavily interested in US history. There are a number of issues I see in this article but I will limit it to three: first, Pilgrims seeking “religious freedom”. My question, freedom for who? Here is a quote from historian Kenneth Davis in the article “America's dark and not-very-distant history of hating Catholics“: “We want to show this patriotic view that we were this melting pot of religious freedom. Nonsense. People wanted their own religious freedom, not freedom for others.”. I’d have had a death sentence hanging over me. They were an extremist, persecuting sect intolerant of the beliefs of others. Second issue: “Consent of the governed”, “Self governed”. Unless you were among the white male elites, you consented to nothing as you were not part of any form of governing as highlighted in this article: The "consent of the governed" meant propertied white men only. Third issue: the “melting pot”, “diversity”, “welcoming to immigrants”. Yes, if you were white (prior to 1965). Due to immigration and citizenship restrictions, in 1965 the US population was almost 90% white, and most of the remaining 10% were descendants of slaves. Here is an article titled “The Immigration Act of 1965 and the Creation of a Modern, Diverse America": “Since Congress restricted citizenship to white persons in 1790, the immigration system has been a cornerstone of American Apartheid.” So that’s three issues that this article, the way it is currently written, completely distorts history. I’d like to see those issues I’ve highlighted addressed in the article so we can get closer to an accurate version of events. Thank you. J Sullivan77 (talk) 20:31, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Regarding point 1, when the Pilgrims arrived in New England, there was no one there except for the Native Americans. Their idea of fleeing to the New World for religious freedom (from the rest of Europe, for what it's worth) predates even a concept of "(the United States of) America" as we know it today. DecafPotato (talk) 23:09, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

The culture section is also primarily about the country today. @DecafPotato: @J Sullivan77:. For instance, Canada's culture section is much more a product of Pierre Trudeau (1968-1979/1980-1984) than John A. Macdonald.(1867-1874/1878-1891). It would be similarly undue to have Canadian Indian residential school system's mentioned in that section. KlayCax (talk) 00:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Sullivan, indeed there are problems of bias in this article. It is known that Wikipedia has a racial bias. See Racial bias on Wikipedia. Also read our Samuel P. Huntington article and his latest book Who Are We? The Challenges to America's National Identity, and especially what he has to say about the Catholic/Protestant problem. This is not the sort of historian that we should be using to make statements in Wikipedia's words. Sectionworker (talk) 00:36, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I didn't realize the discredited Huntington was being used as reliable source material here. Yikes. Shoreranger (talk) 14:14, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Hello. I’m the same user as above (J Sullivan 77); couldn’t remember my password so had to register a new account with the same name but just added an initial. Another issue, a fourth if you will, and it relates directly to this heading here, Jefferson’s line “all men are created equal”. We know he wasn’t referring to Natives as he labeled them “savages” in the Declaration. A Native community leader responded to this racist section of the Declaration and the dehumanizing label on his brethren (a legacy of which would continue throughout the next century and be echoed by politicians), with “Any holiday that would refer to my people in such a repugnant, racist manner is certainly not worth celebrating. July Fourth is a day we celebrate our resiliency, our culture, our languages, our children and we mourn the millions — literally millions — of indigenous people who have died as a consequence of American imperialism.”. As a pioneer of scientific racism we also know Jefferson wasn’t referring to blacks as he wrote “blacks are inferior to whites in the endowments of body and mind”, and on blacks becoming mixed with whites he wrote “the improvement of blacks in body and mind, in the first instance of their mixture with the whites, has been observed by everyone, and proves that their inferiority is not the effect merely of their condition of life”. That just leaves whites (as being equal) who he was referring to. His views of other races being lesser than whites would also be reflected in the period with white only governance and white only citizenship. This legacy of white superiority and domination left other races marginalized, with Leland T. Saito, Associate Professor of Sociology and American Studies & Ethnicity at the University of Southern California, writing, "Throughout the history of the United States race has been used by Whites for legitimizing and creating difference and social, economic and political exclusion.” (quote from: Leland T. Saito (1998). "Race and Politics: Asian Americans, Latinos, and Whites in a Los Angeles Suburb". p. 154. University of Illinois Press). It’s essential to record history with a full scope, and not pluck out a line that is most comfortable (especially to white eyes). The truth often isn’t comfortable (which applies with my own Irish history), but it is the truth nonetheless that we must report on. Again, this article propagates a distortion of reality, a distortion of the foundation of America, and the legacy of that foundation which so many unfortunate millions then had to endure. Similar to the aforementioned issues in my prior comment, I’d like to see this issue properly looked at, and rectified in the article. Thank you. JB Sullivan77 (talk) 20:38, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree that this article could do a lot more to clarify the social hierarchies that permeate U.S. history. Exceptional claims require exceptional sources, and Samuel P. Huntington's American exceptionalism should not be in this article. I have tried to remove it, but Pizzigs re-added it in their edit war.  — Freoh 15:13, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Can you explain why Huntington should be removed as a source? TFD (talk) 17:26, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

He is most notable for his controversial opinions, and Wikipedia prioritizes facts over opinions. If this article were significantly shorter, it might make sense to balance his perspective with others, but this article is too long, and this seems like a natural place to start cutting.  — Freoh 20:33, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

I realize it's not the best source. But, surely. Individualism et al. are pretty indisputable aspects of American culture?

If there's a better source with a similar statement - then that should be added in its place. KlayCax (talk) 05:46, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

That's the point. Huntington's views on the post-Cold War world order are controversial. That doesn't diminish his stature of a widely cited academic. I added another source a week ago, but let me be clear: what is stated in that paragraph of the culture section is no way related to those views of Huntington that are considered controversial. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Other authors characterize the American Creed differently from Huntington, and this article should focus on agreed-upon facts rather than Huntington's opinions.  — Freoh 02:42, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Re: Huntington. A distinction must be made between opinions and facts in a source. Inclusion of the first is determined by weight, while the second is determined by rs. In this case, in "American Creed" (pp. 66 ff.), Huntington writes about the American Creed as it is understood by social scientists. He refers for example to Gunnar Myrdal, who coined the term, Daniel Bell, and Seymour Martin Lipset. As a professor of political science, Huntington is qualified to summarize what social scientists have found about U.S. political history. It's only when he starts expressing his own opinions (which is not the case here), that we have to assess how accepted those opinions are. In any case, there is nothing controversial about what Huntington wrote about the American Creed. It's generally accepted that the U.S. was founded on specific principles that had consensus support and continue to be accepted by most Americans.

Notice that the argument is whether or not in practice America met the principle's in its creed, not whether or not the creed existed. Bourbon France for example did not have to explain how slavery and religious discrimination fit with the belief in freedom and equality because they were not part of their creed. The U.S. creed has become so broadly accepted that many people see it as self-evident.

TFD (talk) 13:20, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

The Puritan concept of freedom of religion was based on the view that the individual had a direct relationship with God rather than an indirect one through a priesthood and was therefore free to choose how he or she worshipped. But there were limitations. Catholicism was not accepted because it required allegiance to a foreign ruler (the Pope), while heresy (such as unitarianism) and atheism were seen as an affront to God. While modern liberalism rejects these limits, it does so by arguing from principles that the Puritans established. TFD (talk) 13:37, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

References

Sectionworker's edits

User:Sectionworker, yesterday you introduced outdated Social Progress Index rankings to the Culture section. I moved it to the Economy section and cited the 2022 report as opposed to the 2020 report you had used. Today you went even further, unilaterally removing mentions of HDI and education from the lead, despite there having been no consensus to do so. Furthermore, you added a sentence to the Education section, citing a 2017 report. As one can guess, all these edits followed a pattern of removing content that presents the country in a moderately positive light and adding content that does the opposite, with no regard for WP:UNDUE issues. Instead of editing Education in the United States where the American system's shortcomings might or might not already be covered, you for some reason assume that every possible criticism should be listed on the main page. Can I ask why? Pizzigs (talk) 18:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Why? Because I want our articles to be accurate. The lead, now that you have reverted my edits, states "The U.S. ranks very highly in international measures of quality of life, income an wealth, economic competitiveness, human rights, innovation, and education;" Please show me the stats that show that the US measures very high in the quality of life and education. Thanks. Sectionworker (talk) 19:34, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

We really need all to look as sources in all matters not direct editors to Wikipedia pages or old stuff. An article of this nature is not the place for guess work or to learn the Wikiways. Talk after talk above just full of Pov's over citing sources.

• Amadeo, Kimberly. "U.S. Education Rankings Are Falling Behind the Rest of the World". The Balance. Retrieved 2023-04-18.
• "OECD Better Life Index". OECD Better Life Index. Retrieved 2023-04-18.
• "LGBT Rights by Country / Best and Worst Countries for LGBTQ+ Rights 2023". 2023 World Population by Country (Live). 2005-07-20. Retrieved 2023-04-18.

Moxy- 19:53, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It seems that you choose to ignore me. Please furnish the stats that I asked for or I will need to remove the education and standard of living mentions from the lead. Sectionworker (talk) 14:41, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

The U.S. education system ranks very high and the country's HDI is literally 'very high' (check the infobox). Pizzigs (talk) 14:51, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

OK, one at a time. You choose to use the World Population Center while I use the Pew Research Center. Do you see the difference here? We must strive to use only RS in order to make our articles as accurate as possible. Sectionworker (talk) 15:14, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

The 2015 (upd. in 2017) PRC article you cited is too narrow, giving specific data for elementary and middle school students in select subjects, completely ignoring higher education. The WPC article I cited uses rankings from U.S. News & World Report, so I do not get why you would redlink WPC to imply they are unreliable. Pizzigs (talk) 15:22, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Don't you find it odd that the red linked source finds the top ten to be:

• The United States
• The United Kingdom
• Germany
• Canada
• France
• Switzerland
• Japan
• Australia
• Sweden
• The Netherlands

While the blue linked Pew finds Norway, Denmark, Sweden, etc. at the top [5] ? And please don't again say that wpr uses a blue link article. If a tabloid uses CNN for a quote, is the tabloid then OK? Sectionworker (talk) 16:17, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Do you consider these rankings reliable? Pizzigs (talk) 16:35, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

No I do not. I do not see CNN as an expert on global education ratings. PEW is well known and is used repeatedly in many of our Wikipedia articles. CNN, as a ratings expert, is not. See this [6] Sectionworker (talk) 18:55, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I was unable to find any mention of CNN there. Can you quote a specific paragraph? In any case, there're no up-to-date and reliable education rankings by country, the scope is too broad. The 2017 PRC article you cited features a report that "measures reading ability, math and science literacy and other key skills among 15-year-olds in dozens of developed and developing countries" and "[The study which] tested students in grades four and eight every four years since 1995. In the most recent tests, from 2015, 10 countries (out of 48 total) had statistically higher average fourth-grade math scores than the U.S., while seven countries had higher average science scores. In the eighth-grade tests, seven out of 37 countries had statistically higher average math scores than the U.S., and seven had higher science scores." Too narrow and dated, in my opinion, and suits individual section in Education in the United States better. Pizzigs (talk) 22:48, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

The Programme for International Student Assessment test for 2019 does not show the US in first place, and in fact they are not even in the top 10 for reading or the top 20 for math. [7] [8] Sectionworker (talk) 03:55, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree that we should not say that the U.S. ranks very highly in education, especially not in the lead.  — Freoh 15:29, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

There has been no comment from the objecting editor so I plan to fix the claim that the US ranks first in education and instead use the Pisa information, since they are considered to be the best source. Now I plan to move on to the claim that the US ranks so high in the quality of life stats. According to Numbeo we are number 17. [9] The article is now using the Human Development Index, which does not measure quality of life. Sectionworker (talk) 19:06, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I think the reports measure different things. One measures perception based on polling, while the other was completed by experts. The U.S. of course remains the top choice for foreign students, so would poll well.

The U.S. ranking on the expert report is fairly high relative to other countries, but is low compared with other Western developed nations. I think the reason for this is that while the U.S. has leading educational institutions, it also has an unevenness of quality in public education. TFD (talk) 20:47, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. That should be reflected in the article. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

The AP Poll is mentioned here: [10] Sectionworker (talk) 21:30, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Also, an update on altruism. We are not longer in the top ten. [11] Sectionworker (talk) 13:09, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for once again manipulating data and providing an old CAF report where the US ranks 19th out of 144 countries instead of the latest October 2022 report where it ranks third. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm getting really sick of your lack of respect for other editors. I did not mean to manipulate data when I entered the 2021 report. Thank you for finding a later report. Sectionworker (talk) 16:47, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Also, an update on altruism. We are not longer in the top ten. implies that altruism should be removed from the culture section, despite the U.S. being ranked third in the world. If you had searched for the latest report, you would've easily found the 2022 rankings. Instead, you apparently searched for those rankings that back up your claims of altruism no longer being a defining feature of the American culture. Pizzigs (talk) 16:57, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Feel free to rant on and on, bringing in more and more accusations. I've said what I have to say. Sectionworker (talk) 18:50, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Complete rewrite?

Part of me wonders if this article could benefit from being completely rewritten. The problem is that at this point, everyone has thrown everything and the kitchen sink into the article and it's a nightmare. Maybe completely starting from scratch and following the pattern of our feature articles like Japan is our best bet. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 20:24, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes Derrick your academic rewrite would be much appreciated. ...... wondering if this should be done in draft first. This way any points of contention can be dealt with in the draft space over article space. We have a slew of new editors who will need guidance and explanation of why things are done a certain way. Moxy- 20:29, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Support The article in its current form is biased. I hope User:KlayCax is okay with me posting excerpts from our discussion on their talk page.

• Compare the Japan treatment of the country's respective atrocities during WWII to the U.S.

Japan's simply states:

Amidst a rise in militarism and overseas colonization, Japan invaded China in 1937 and entered World War II as an Axis power in 1941... On December 7–8, 1941, Japanese forces carried out surprise attacks on Pearl Harbor, as well as on British forces in Malaya, Singapore, and Hong Kong, among others, beginning World War II in the Pacific. Throughout areas occupied by Japan during the war, numerous abuses were committed against local inhabitants, with many forced into sexual slavery. After Allied victories during the next four years, which culminated in the Soviet invasion of Manchuria and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, Japan agreed to an unconditional surrender...

The United States article has been recently changed to have all of the worst aspects of U.S. history highlighted.

It's not a perfect estimate. But from my calculations:

United States's has around 400-500 "positive words" (vs. ~2,000 negative)

Japan's is 771 words positive. (vs. 360 words negative)

Canada's is 800 words positive. (vs. 278 words negative.)

• Compare the U.S.'s coverage during WWII to Japan's.

• How the American, Australian, and Canadian treatment of indigenous people is covered. (Considered by most historians to be roughly equitable. Canada's and Australia's minimizes it as a natural part of their respective histories. The United States article goes on a multiparagraph, detailed response to it that outpaces the entire American Revolution and Founding. (2x-3x when you count slavery)

• First Nation (Canada) inequalities are minimized in the article. Despite First Nations peoples farring either similar or worse than America on the metrics cited. See this chart.)

• There's other problems as well. But these are the ones that immediately jumped out to me. The U.S. article has changed in a radically negative direction since 2016.

• Another example is the coverage of slavery in the United Kingdom article (just a single paragraph in the history section): "Britain played a leading part in the Atlantic slave trade, mainly between 1662 and 1807 when British or British-colonial slave ships transported nearly 3.3 million slaves from Africa. The slaves were taken to work on plantations in British possessions, principally in the Caribbean but also North America. Slavery coupled with the Caribbean sugar industry had a significant role in strengthening and developing the British economy in the 18th century. However, with pressure from the abolitionism movement, Parliament banned the trade in 1807, banned slavery in the British Empire in 1833, and Britain took a role in the movement to abolish slavery worldwide through the blockade of Africa and pressing other nations to end their trade with a series of treaties." [The paragraph] is almost laudatory, with a huge emphasis on the government's role in ending slavery. And this sentence is straightforward slavery apologia: "Slavery coupled with the Caribbean sugar industry had a significant role in strengthening and developing the British economy in the 18th century." Pizzigs (talk) 21:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

• The above is the reason we would need this done in draft.....would need to explain that coverage should equate to scholarly publications. Moxy- 21:47, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Whether or not treatment of aboriginals deserves more attention in articles about Canada and Australia is irrelevant.

Your metrics chart compares conditions for aboriginal Canadians and African Americans, which shows that aboriginal Canadians fare worse on most metrics and all metrics when compared to the national average. But a more fair comparison would be with American Indians, who fare far worse than African Americans and aboriginal Americans on all metrics.

Historically American treatment of aboriginal people was far worse than Canada's. Canada for example never went to war against them with its attendant atrocities or had a Trail of Tears.

Furthermore, villianization of Indians by politicians and the entertainment industry has been ubiquitous.

The findings on aboriginal residential schools have become a topic of major concern in Canada recently. Yet the U.S. had its own Indian boarding schools, which took in more than twice the percentage of aboriginal people and were the same or worse.

TFD (talk) 02:31, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I would have given more credence to your views on the subject if your edit history did not show such an obvious anti-American bias. I spent literally 5 minutes browsing your edits, and that was enough to establish some patterns. Here you attempted to introduce your POV on documented Russian war crimes by adding "alleged" to the tile; on the other hand, when an opportunity arises to add controversial information about American war crimes, you support it with little hesitation. According to you, Russia did not commit war crimes in Ukraine and RT is not propaganda. Russia of course did not occupy the Ukraine, because it was just another republic of the USSR (saying 'the' Ukraine in 2022 is just reprehensible); it seems the Ukrainian war of independence never happened in your reality). And some defense of Vladimir Putin to sum up your editing patterns. Pizzigs (talk) 14:22, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Stop accusing others of bad faith please, see WP:GF. Oh, and LOL. Commies, commies everywhere!--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:16, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I've agreed with you below regarding WP:GF. As for the Red Scare, I can link Moscow trials, to show that excesses can occur on both sides (and I don't remember the Hollywood blacklist members being subject to show trials, torture and execution, but it's not a competition I suppose). Pizzigs (talk) 15:27, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Do you want the article to say that excesses in the U.S. were not as bad as those in the USSR under Stalin? Don't you think that even comparing the U.S. to Stalin's USSR is anti-American? TFD (talk) 16:03, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

IOW you are not interested in the strength of arguments but who made them. See argumentum ad hominem for why this is not a good idea. Otherwise, you have misrepresented my edits. In most of your examples, I asked for sources for statements that editors wanted to add which btw I do for any article regardless of topic. Also, when I said Ukraine was part of the USSR, I was merely stating the position of (ironically) the U.S. government, which recognized the USSR in 1933 with its then current borders. Ukraine recognizes this under its Law on the Succession of Ukraine and this position is (ironically) supported by the U.S. government. Anyway, can you explain why a comparison of the status of aboriginal Canadians with African Americans says anything about how the U.S. treats and has treated American Indians? TFD (talk) 15:58, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Please, participate in the writing process. The issue of past evils (slavery/genocide/racial segregation etc.) needs to be covered in an objective, impartial and balanced way, without giving undue weight to specific events at the expense of other events of equal, if not greater, importance. It has been decided to use featured articles such as Japan and the United Kingdom as examples of the quality the United States article should possess. Pizzigs (talk) 17:31, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Racial inequality continues to be a major issue in the U.S., more than in other Western democracies. The Best Countries report 2023 for example rated the U.S. 9.8/100 in racial equality, compared with Canada, which scored 98.6/100. I don't know what rank the U.S. was, but in 2020, it was ranked 10th worst. Meanwhile, the report rated the U.S. as the fourth best country, so you cannot claim it is "anti-American." TFD (talk) 21:47, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Then it should definitely be mentioned, in addition to other categories -> attributes such as religious freedom, low corruption, and well-developed digital infrastructure. Pizzigs (talk) 23:00, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

If you check the archives, I argued in favor of including "it has low levels of perceived corruption," which is still in the article. You can check the archives for the lengthy discussions. What's interesting about the U.S. is how it ends up as one of the best countries in the world: it surpasses most countries in many areas yet falls well below average in others. It's not anti-American to point that out. TFD (talk) 02:08, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. And that should be reflected in the article. Areas where the U.S. dominates and falls behind the rest of the (developed) world should be mentioned. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

That ranking is weird and questionable to say the least. It lists Serbia, Bosnia–Herzegovina, South Africa, Malaysia, India, Oman, and Lebanon favorably than the U.S. in racial and ethnic equality/equity. Anyone who knows anything about those countries know that's an utterly ludicrous conclusion.

Correct me if I'm wrong here. @TFD: @Pizzigs:. KlayCax (talk) 17:32, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax, do you have reliable sources supporting your dismissal of this source as an utterly ludicrous conclusion?  — Freoh 15:33, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

It measures racial equality, by which it means relative outcomes in criminal justice, health care, economics and education. You might be thinking about racist attitudes among the general public, where I image the U.S. would rank better. Do you have any reason to believe that there is greater inequality in these areas in those countries? TFD (talk) 16:26, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it certainly seems so, and the source is reliable, which once again confirms that the United States ranks very high in education and remains the top international destination for foreign students. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Do you have any reason to believe that there is greater inequality in these areas in those countries

South Africa has a much higher Gini coefficent on those metrics - both racial and overall. Crime/murder, economics, education, and criminal justice are score (ranging from) similar to far, far worse than the U.S. Much of that index seems to be based on "vibes" than actual data or methodlogy. For example, U.S. somehow ranked similar to European countries until 2016-2017 or so. Whatever one's opinion on the current state of American politics — and, yes, it's a mess — it is ridiculous to rank the U.S. worse than Bosnia or South Africa in racial or overall equality. Both score far, far worse on all of these metrics. KlayCax (talk) 03:03, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

 Question: is there a full source that contradicts information currently in the article? A lot of this seems like original research involving other content.  — Freoh 13:56, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

References

Gaps in coverage

Since I've been twice reverted for attempting to address a failing of this article, I figure I should leave a note and back off. The Transportation section has no mention of the Interstate Highway System, which is used by a majority of the country's citizens daily and has been the driving factor (pun intended) behind the post-1960 development of urban and suburban areas, nor the US's unusual lack (for a developed country) of high-speed rail. The urbanization section fails to mention suburban sprawl, a major ecological and livability issue that plagues every metropolitan area in the country. While going into too much detail would run afoul of the summary style, surely we can at least try to integrate some improvements into the article instead of reverting on sight and forcing readers to use subpages just to find out about basic facets of American life. SounderBruce 20:32, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I can't see anything wrong with this edit. IMO it should go back in the transportation section. Sectionworker (talk) 21:33, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps, when the article becomes a joke like Human rights in the United States because everyone randomly adds whatever failings or criticisms of the country they can find on the Internet, you will understand the short-sightedness of that approach. Pizzigs (talk) 22:39, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

"nor the US's unusual lack (for a developed country) of high-speed rail." Personal transportation in the United States is dominated by automobiles, that is well explained in the subsequent paragraph. The U.S. also has many of the world's largest and busiest airports, meaning air travel is popular. Rail travel is not, hence the lack of high-speed rail, that's how market economy works. Just because you feel it's bad doesn't mean the article should have yet another critical paragraph (see WP:DUE). Pizzigs (talk) 22:32, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

That's an obvious chicken and egg scenario. If the US had better rail systems, rail travel would inevitably be more popular. HiLo48 (talk) 02:01, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

That is speculation and clearly undue. Pizzigs (talk) 02:18, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

No it's not. I wouldn't put it in the article, but it's a perfectly rational thing to say. HiLo48 (talk) 02:23, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Mentioning how the U.S. differs from other Western democracies is not criticism. The fact that there are reasons for the differences does not mean they should not be mentioned. We wouldn't strike out for example that the U.S. is the third largest country in the world because this can be explained by the fact that only two other countries were larger. TFD (talk) 01:54, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

That section's purpose is overviewing transportation in the United States in accordance with Wikipedia:Summary style. Mentioning a lack of high-speed rail "compared to other developed countries" is WP:UNDUE. One can cover many economic, cultural, political, and social aspects where the US leads/does not lead compared to other developed nations and nations in general; only the most critically important should be in the article. Pizzigs (talk) 02:18, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Leaving you (or me) to be the one to decide what is due or undue would be undue. I can assure you that the lack of high speed rail is often discussed by visitors to the US and the travel agencies they use. HiLo48 (talk) 02:26, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Relying on hearsay is not the best course of action. I've explained why rail travel is unpopular in the United States, and it is completely normal given the prominence of highways and air travel. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I have to agree that we visitors often find the American railway system a bit curious, and I'm used to quite some stuff from german and italian railways. But here's an idea: Why not just change the choice of words? A "lack" does sound negative or at the least critisizing, but if we went with "a comparatively small amount due to the dominating use of cars", or something like that, couldn't we all agree?CarolingianCitizen (talk) 16:00, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Maybe that would work, but I don't think we should try to include a reason. We may not agree on that. I have perceived quit negative stigma AGAINST trains in the US, and feel that's at least part of the reason. HiLo48 (talk) 23:19, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

There are expert opinions from people who study matters such as these to be found in WP:reliable sources and that is what should shape the article, not WP:OR from editors. إيان (talk) 23:26, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I know perfectly well what a reliable source is. Please find me one that addresses this matter and is not written by an American. HiLo48 (talk) 02:19, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:ONUS states that The responsibility for achieving consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content—that means you need to find reliable sources and present them yourself to convince other editors. You can access sources through the Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library.

You can start your research with rail historian H. Roger Grant's The Railroad: The Life Story of a Technology (2005) or Transportation and the American People (2019). إيان (talk) 15:29, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Or even better his Railroads and the American People (2012). إيان (talk) 15:32, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

There would still be the good old "various reasons", though that's a wee bit too vague and perhaps not the most elegant solution... alternatively, just leave out the comparison entirely and say that there's a more established motor vehicle infrastructure than railway system, that's neutral and as far as I can say from a european perspective not wrong. After all, it's about the US and not a comparison of countries CarolingianCitizen (talk) 12:54, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed here. That's what I tried to explain. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree that this information is worth mentioning. This is neutral and notable information, not yet another critical paragraph. With that said, this article is quite long, and it would not hurt to tighten this section and limit it to key details.  — Freoh 20:20, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree for all the reasons given by Freoh. To intentionally omit such a glaring contrast to transportation in other developed nations is editorializing by omission. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shoreranger (talk • contribs) 13:31, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

 Disagree for the reasons stated above. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

 Disagree I'm not opposing to adding it on another Wikipedia article. But this page is already way, way too stuffed. KlayCax (talk) 03:04, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I object to total lockdown of the article

I recommend it be downgraded to administrator review of pending edits. soibangla (talk) 02:30, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

You can object all you want, but unless and until you can force the people involved in the edit war to stop editing the article, it will not be unprotected. While it may be inconvenient for you to have the article fully protected, it is more inconvenient to have to deal with the kind of disruptive activity that led to the protection. It's okay though, in 1 short week, you'll be able to edit it just fine. --Jayron32 15:37, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Why not just block the editors breaking WP:3RR? It's not like uninvolved editors are flocking in by droves to edit war this article RPI2026F1 (talk) 00:11, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I think there’s concern they’d return as sock puppets and waste more time. إيان (talk) 02:03, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

If someone has an army of extended-confirmed sock puppets I would be very concerned. RPI2026F1 (talk) 17:13, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

When there are more than a small handful of editors edit warring, page protection is easier. In this case, as you can see in the page history, there are a large number of people edit warring over various aspects of this article rapidly and without cessation, at least until the moment it was protected. Now, those people have to come to a consensus on the talk page if they want their edits to be enacted, rather than merely rapidly and disruptively trying to repeatedly force their own edits through by wearing down their perceived opponents. --Jayron32 12:39, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I think that reporting and blocking individual users may be necessary if the disruptive behavior continues. Some of the edit warriors expressed no intention to stop when I confronted them on their talk pages.  — Freoh 20:12, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

• I broadly agree with Jayron's comments. In most cases, a short period of protection is preferable to issuing a small pile of blocks. Also, usually if you object to an admin action, the place to start is talking to that admin, in this case @Deepfriedokra:. They aren't necessarily watching the talk page. All that being said, if the same users start up with the same behavior when the protection expires, I'd suggest reporting them at WP:ANEW. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:24, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

1) No, not watching this talk. Was not approached on my talk. 2) I see no indication the edit warring would not resume, but would not object at all if another admin unprotected. 3) Agree with Beeblebrox. 4) I thought trying to give everyone a chance to to calmly discuss content and avoid cyclical edit warring was preferable to blocking. If blocking some people is what's needed, then they can and should be blocked. All I am saying, is let's y'all work together so blocking won't become necessary. 5) The protection expires Thursday. Let's hope that disputes are resolved before then and that blocking will not be needed. 6) I for one am not gonna review and approve pending edits as picking and choosing content would WP:INVOLVE me and that ain't happening. Was not aware such a feature was available, but it's not my job to dictate/gate keep content. Deciding what to leave in and what to leave out is the job of the editors of this page. If they need someone to help them resolve these disputes, they can seek WP:DRN They can open an WP:RFC on the appropriate Wikiproject(s} talk page{s). So on and so forth. 7) I'm here in response to @Beeblebrox:'s ping, which required an WP:ADMINACCOUNT reply, but I've been ill on the one hand and I try to take Sundays off anyway on the other. 8)As I am aware of the "objection" to the FP of this page, the next step is to request unprotection at RfPP. I think it would be a tough sale, but not my decision. Best. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 18:17, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Rockstone35: Rewrite of U.S. article

• [Moved to new section by KlayCax] Yeah, the problems with NPOV (on both sides) is the main reason I was proposing starting over. I have created a draft article here: User:Rockstone35/United_States. --Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 21:54, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Is there a consensus for such a rewrite? Is the template at the top of the article justified? I don't think so. I'm all for improving the article, but see a total rewrite as unnecessary, and I would vehemently oppose such massive changes to the article based on what I see now with the link above.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 12:51, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

The rewrite has already been commandeered by a WP:tendentious editor and is rife with WP:OR WP:POV editorializing. The process should have been begun with gathering and discussing reliable sources and establishing an outline, which is standard for writing any research paper. Otherwise, the whole point of the rewrite of producing a fresh, clear, WP:verifiable, balanced NPOV article is lost. إيان (talk) 13:21, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. The current article is the product of relative consensus. Some editors do not like a perceived trend in content inclusion and now wish to throw the baby out with the bath water. I suspect the hope is to then dominate the rewrite process more easily than the existing editing process. Shoreranger (talk) 13:47, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I think you hit the nail on the head, especially with your last comment. This is immediately apparent when you look at the edit history of this "rewrite" and see who has been most aggressively contributing to it. My one edit has already been put into brackets, meaning that there is "no consensus whether to add," even though consensus on this material has already been established by myriad discussions on talk and an RfC. To be clear, I see this as an attempt by some editors to subvert the established consensus and remove material they don't like, and in some cases have been attempting to remove for months with no success. And some of the comments in this very thread by some of the most prolific contributors to the "rewrite" are also quite telling.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:32, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

There's no established consensus, and the article has become a battleground for editors of various political bents. Instead of being written by academics in accordance with Wikipedia guidelines and using reliable sources, the article degraded into a fight over the perceived goodness and evil of the country with little regard for WP:DUE or WP:PROPORTION. Furthermore, the article was delisted in 2020, and the concerns raised back then have not been addressed since: it is still a mess, and instead of reducing its size, editors keep adding more and more information. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

To voice my opinion on this, I agree with the concerns voiced by C.J. Griffin and Shoreranger. DecafPotato (talk) 02:59, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

In any case, I see a pattern. Users who frequently edit Mass killings under communist regimes and defend pro-communist positions on its talk page, tend to oppose any changes to the United States article. If anything, this convinces me that changes are urgently needed. Pizzigs (talk) 14:29, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Cute. Although I would be careful to accuse others of POV pushing when it seems you have been doing quite a bit of this yourself in articles such as Whataboutism, Soviet Union, Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 14:35, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I do not think introducing sourced content is POV, especially when it is done to adhere to WP:PROPORTION. On the other hand, cherry picking and consciously adding only negative stuff is definitely POV. Pizzigs (talk) 14:43, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Here you reverted edits under the pretext of them having been introduced by an IP (despite that not having been the case), and another user reverted you afterwards. Your entire editing history follows a simple pattern of introducing content related to criticisms of capitalism/the United States (primarily wealth inequality, poverty etc.) and minimizing/erasing criticisms of communism. Pizzigs (talk) 14:48, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

LOL Okay. Yeah, I only edit on those topics and nothing else. The one edit was a mistake on my part; I revert unconstructive IP and SPA edits quite a bit. Again, take a look at your own edit history before leveling accusations, and stop accusing others of bad faith please (See: WP:GF).--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:01, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, you're right with regard to WP:GF. We should respect our differences and collaborate to produce a balanced and impartial article. However, it is also important to remember WP:RGW, given that some users introduce content because they feel some underrepresented aspects need to be specifically highlighted. Pizzigs (talk) 15:11, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

WP:RGW, you mean like your contributions to articles pertaining to communist regimes you have been hitting recently?--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:23, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

"cherry picking and consciously adding only negative stuff is definitely POV"... So, what have you added to communism related articles other than stuff that is overtly negative?--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:54, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Maybe read Russian famine of 1921–1922? Pizzigs (talk) 14:59, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Maybe read Wealth inequality in the United States?--C.J. Griffin (talk) 15:10, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Without experienced editors helping it won't work out. Need editors with collaboration skills.Moxy- 14:40, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

When experienced editors with collaboration skills agree to mediate and invitations to participate are ignored it won't work out either, and also exposes those who refuse to participate as disdainful of the process at best and intent on sabotaging the process at worst. Shoreranger (talk) 16:20, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

When I find an article needs a lot of work, I find it's easier to rework it one section at a time rather than doing a rewrite all at once. With that said, I've never attempted to rewrite an article anywhere near this size. And on that note, I think a lot of the "rewrites" really just need to be more concise summarizing and removal of undue content. This article has dozens of immediate subarticles where the excess can be moved. The WP:DETAIL guideline is our friend. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 02:59, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

That is an option given some editors' reluctance to accept a full rewrite. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

• If I had known that this was going to result in a bunch of drama, I wouldn't have bothered making that page. The goal of the rewrite was simply to bring this article to the same quality as all the other Featured Articles, which I think I might just have to accept is never going to happen. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 04:19, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

There's still a path forward, @Rockstone35:. I propose (provided everyone else here can agree) that @Rjensen: crafts the 1820-1861 section. (If he's okay with it.) He's been completely uninvolved from the drama, is a historian, and has extensive knowledge of the era.

Writing more on it tomorrow. I really want to get this article to GA-tier status by the end of the year/early 2024. KlayCax (talk) 05:32, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Alternatively, we go section by section - even if it requires RFC's - in order to improve the page. KlayCax (talk) 05:34, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm flattered but I have other big projects to work on. The trick is to get a recent university textbook and follow its outline. (a NEW textbook costs $150, but a used older edition will cost under $10 at abe.com. ) Rjensen (talk) 18:40, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

@Rockstone35 United States is the most-viewed article on Wikipedia to-date, and as such is going to be a target for debate and discussion until the end of the project. Unless you expect to be constantly updating the article and reviewing new edits on a regular basis, gaining and maintaining a Featured quality article over the long term will be extremely difficult. I'm not one to suggest that obtaining B-Class or even GA status is impossible, but concentrating your efforts elsewhere may be more productive. I took a break from this talk page back in July 2022 (Under my old username CollectiveSolidarity), and with the time on my hands I was able to curate a FA of small size and attention, which still proved to be a tricky task to perform. Perhaps you could try something similar? The Night Watch (talk) 02:50, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

@The Night Watch: It's just frustrating because other country's articles are Featured Articles. Of course, unlike Canada, I suppose everyone has some type of opinion of the US. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 03:16, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

@Rockstone35 I would read in between the lines on those articles. A lot of them were promoted more than a decade ago, and FAC standards were much looser then. I'd say at least two of them would not survive a WP:FAR without some work, and all of them may need updating at the very least. The Night Watch (talk) 03:29, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Well, as a relatively new editor (similarly to me), you cannot know that for sure. Unless those articles are delisted, they remain featured, unlike the United States. Furthermore, your reply does not address the key concern here, which is this article's WP:DUE and WP:PROPORTION issues, in addition to several editors violating WP:NPOV by pushing their agenda using cherry picked and/or manipulated data. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

When did the us gain indepdence

It was 1776 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Numberblockfan22323 (talk • contribs) 19:04, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Who is saying that the U.S. didn't gain independence then? KlayCax (talk) 16:48, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Not sure what this is about, but it declared independence in 1776—there was still the small matter of fighting off the British Empire. The Treaty of Paris wasn't signed until 1783. إيان (talk) 05:23, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

True, but if you win the war, effectively you get to declare your independence date as the date you declared it. In addition, the US was recognized internationally by France, and prevented any meaningful occupation of territory by the British following declaration of independence (really the only exception is NYC, and for a while at the end Charleston), so by most standards independence in this case is concurrent with declaration. Shoreranger (talk) 16:14, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

While British law considers independence to have occurred in 1783, the year usually given in reliable sources is 1776, which is the year used in U.S. law. TFD (talk) 21:08, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

A path forward

Taking Thebiguglyalien's advice to rework it one section at a time, we should focus first on the United States#Culture and society section as it seems to be the most hotly-debated section at the moment. I propose that the first step should be to collectively identify and select a handful of recent (last few years), highly reputable tertiary sources to be synthesized and subsumed into a new text in WP:summary style. Once we have our best of the best sources, in Moxy's words, then we can start to compose a text derived strictly from those highly reputable academic sources. Hopefully this approach with harmonize dissonant energies to the benefit of the article. إيان (talk) 05:46, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

One source I propose, one I have cited several times, is:

• The Oxford encyclopedia of American cultural and intellectual history. Joan Shelley Rubin, Scott E. Casper. Oxford. 2013. ISBN 978-0-19-976436-5. OCLC 835227416.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)

I'd also like to remind active editors of the wealth of high quality academic sources available to them through the WP:Wikipedia Library. Remember, for summary style we're looking for encyclopedias and textbooks. I'm interested to see what such sources others might recommend. إيان (talk) 05:50, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

WP:PSTS—Best to write about historical concepts and events using high quality, academic secondary publications while saving tertiary sources as aids for clear and concise expression. (While acknowledging the current political context makes for a protracted task). One section at a time is a very good idea. — Neonorange (talk to Phil) (he, they) 09:31, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Great suggestion and thanks for the opening to agreement. For starters, the first few lines are problematic. I removed them because of poor sourcing and was reverted. One of them is, "colonial college scholar" J. David Hoeveler and the other is controversial political scientist Samuel P. Huntington. Sectionworker (talk) 13:43, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

As with writing any research paper, let’s focus first on selecting our sources before concerning ourselves with writing text. Using the most recent reputable sources will naturally resolve issues such as those. إيان (talk) 13:53, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree. First, reliable, non-partisan and neutral RS need to be identified. Discrediting authors behind some of the sources already in the article is not a way to begin this process. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

For more specific history articles, absolutely. But for the Culture and society section in a WP:Summary style article such as this, highly reputable tertiary sources are most useful, at least for creating a basic initial framework that’s balanced for WP:due weight. إيان (talk) 13:50, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

That liberty, equality under the law, democracy, social equality, property rights, and a preference for limited government are professed U.S. ideals doesn't seem very disputable to me.

I don't know of any historian that denies that liberal democracy, property rights, and limited government are fundamental U.S. principles. (Or that equality under the law/social equality aren't part of its professed ideals.) Huntington is a controversial source: but that's not necessarily problematic if we're citing relatively uncontroversial subject matter. KlayCax (talk) 06:37, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax, what's your high quality current academic textbook or encyclopedia that supports the above statement, which differs from how the material is actually presented currently in the article:

Americans have traditionally been characterized by a unifying belief in an "American creed" emphasizing liberty, equality under the law, democracy, social equality, property rights, and a preference for limited government.

This statement has grave WP:NPOV issues by giving WP:undue weight to this particular POV at the introduction of the section. It also has issues with WP:balance because experts would disagree on the extent to which liberty, equality under the law, democracy, social equality, property rights, and a preference for limited government are materially applicable to US culture and society, and those expert critical views are not represented. To explicitly state that values such as these are professed would probably be fair, but if it's not given prominence in current, high quality encyclopedias and textbooks, it's WP:undue in this small section of a WP:summary style article. إيان (talk) 15:07, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

democracy and liberty

The data comes from V-DEM institute. (See here.)

property rights

Seems indisputable. Replicated by many reliable sources.

a preference for limited government

Seems indisputable. Replicated by many reliable sources.

As one text book puts it: American values are "the sanctity of personal property, the rule of law, self-determination, the rights of the individual against the power of the state, freedom of speech and religion, freedom of the press, due process rights..."

Another put it like: Although the list of what America stands for varied somewhat from writer to writer, there was agreement that American values include democracy, tolerance, freedom (including free speech), pluralism, individualism, and secularism.

Another says: To review from Chapter 2, predominant American values include personal independence, limited government, meritocracy, and incrementalism

Another says: The United States has one of the most individualistic cultures in the world. Americans are more likely to prioritize themselves over a group and they value independence and autonomy.

Equality/equality under the law

Raymond Arsenault says America has: bedrock... values of fairness and equality under the law.

Edward I. Sidlow states: The ideals and standards that constitute American political culture are embodied in the Declaration of Independence, one of the founding documents of this nation, presently in its entirety in Appendix A. The political values outlined in the Declaration of Independence include natural rights (to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness), equality under the law, government by the consent of the governed, and limited government powers. In some ways, the Declaration of Independence defines Americans' sense of right and wrong. It presents a challenge to anyone who might overwish to overthrow our democratic processes or deny our citizens their natural rights. The rights to liberty, equality, and property are fundamental political values shared by most Americans.

And so on and so forth. KlayCax (talk) 04:07, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

KlayCax, don't seem to have gotten the point. Many scholars and experts have said many things that are true about the US, but it doesn't all necessarily go into this tiny section. The task before us is to isolate a handful of the best tertiary sources upon which to craft a super short summary of US culture and society for this article; otherwise we're putting the cart in front of the horse, which would surely cause WP:due weight issues. You mention anonymous textbooks—are any of these recent, highly reputable sources you'd like to present for our collective consideration? إيان (talk) 16:24, 27 April 2023 (UTC) إيان (talk) 16:24, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree that we should not overemphasize the American Creed.  — Freoh 19:54, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Another high quality source for this section, also published by Oxford University Press though:

• Avila, Eric (2018-08-23). "American Cultural History: A Very Short Introduction". Very Short Introductions. doi:10.1093/actrade/9780190200589.001.0001.

إيان (talk) 15:26, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

The two RS that you have suggested are five and ten years old. That's fairly recent, and yet when one considers that so much has occurred in the last five years, for example the killing of George Floyd, take a knee, the 2017 Women's March, mass shootings, and others, where would one find the RS that you find acceptable for these cultural events? Sectionworker (talk) 21:01, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

That's a fair concern. I found these:

• Engerman, David C.; Friedman, Max Paul; McAlister, Melani, eds. (2022). The Cambridge History of America and the World: Volume 4: 1945 to the Present. The Cambridge History of America and the World. Vol. 4. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/9781108297554. ISBN 978-1-108-41927-7.
• Morse, Kimberly J. (2022-08-23). The Americas: An Encyclopedia of Culture and Society [2 volumes]. ABC-CLIO. ISBN 978-1-4408-5239-8.
• Bronner, Simon J. (2021). Americanness. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-429-45297-0.
• Dix, Andrew (2022). American studies : the basics. ISBN 978-1-138-77504-6. OCLC 1250429807.
• Sut, Jhally; Angus, Ian H (2022). Cultural politics in contemporary America. ISBN 978-1-000-72635-0. OCLC 1351659130.
• U.S. American culture as popular culture. Astrid Böger, Florian Sedlmeier. Heidelberg. 2022. ISBN 978-3-8253-4927-1. OCLC 1357069015.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)

إيان (talk) 04:29, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Human rights

I'm curious why a country that owns a torture camp (Guantanamo Bay detention camp), few healthcare rights, institutional racism, the largest prisoner population on the planet, detention without trial, and mass surveillance, is described as having a positive human rights record in its lead.

What was the decision making process behind that laughable description? The History Wizard of Cambridge (talk) 04:53, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Indeed. I read this article quite by chance and could see right away that the lead was far from without bias. For example, it is well known that the US is lagging behind the world in education, not "ranked very high". Same thing for the quality of life, which is not using the appropriate rating system. The more you look at the lead, the more errors you see. You bring up human rights. Once again we see a "very high" rating, and yet when one looks at the Freedom in the World survey we rank quite low, in the 80s, lower than 40 other countries. Sectionworker (talk) 20:14, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

WP:CHERRY-PICK again. In communist countries, which you defend, speaking out against the government could get one killed or at least sent to a slave labor camp or, since the 1970s, exiled and/or forcibly institutionalized. The United States has a positive human rights records not because of its excesses or past evils, but because it is a free country that is ranked high by international organizations where saying things like I'm curious why a country that owns a torture camp (Guantanamo Bay detention camp), few healthcare rights, institutional racism, the largest prisoner population on the planet, detention without trial, and mass surveillance, is described as having a positive human rights record in its lead. What was the decision making process behind that laughable description? is constitutionally protected free speech, while in many other countries one can get jailed or killed for that. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Hi, @The History Wizard of Cambridge:. I agree with you in principle that Wikipedia not list "human rights" in country's leads. Inevitably, it's going to reveal (or imply) a certain view of the world. (Which I would think would go against WP: NPOV - even with how it is interpreted presently.) But it's been an implicit consensus for awhile now that V-DEM Institute's Regimes of the World data should be the primary way a country's "human rights" record is described - and that should be transcripted into the lead. Presently, the United States is listed as one of the 28 liberal democracies in the world. KlayCax (talk) 03:47, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

...Can someone explain to me why the US is listed as a liberal democracy on that map, but Canada is just an electoral democracy? That seems strange. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 04:02, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

You can be a democracy and still have all the problems listed above. Sectionworker (talk) 10:07, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Pizzigs, perhaps you judge freedom only by the freedom of speech, but the world freedom rating uses a much broader definition:

"Human freedom is an inherently valuable social concept that recognizes the dignity of individuals. Human freedom enables and empowers people to do as they please, free from constraints or punishments, so long as it does not impinge upon the freedom of another. Human freedom plays a huge role in human progress.

This is the one our WP article must use. Sectionworker (talk) 09:41, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, and the United States is ranked high by various organizations, which renders THWC's cherry-picked and unsourced argument invalid. Pizzigs (talk) 11:54, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Please list those various organizations because I could not find any of them. Sectionworker (talk) 15:32, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Please, see List of freedom indices. Pizzigs (talk) 22:22, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

V-DEM Institute's Regimes is a democratic index. What your looking for is this. Moxy- 22:26, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

What we are looking for is a just the fact summary approach Wikipedia:Purpose.

• 
  Country ratings from Freedom House's 'Freedom in the World 2021 survey
• 
  2021 Index of Economic Freedom.
  Source: Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal
• 
  Press freedom in 2022 according to Reporters Without Borders
• 
  Democracy Index map in 2020 according to The Economist Intelligence Unit
• 
  2022 World Happiness Report
• 
  2022 Social Progress Index
• 
  Human Development Index 2022
• 
  Better Life Index 2020
• 
  Good Country Index 2020
• 
  Global Peace Index 2022
• 
  2020 Legatum Prosperity Index.
• 
  Global Gender Gap Report 2020
• 
  Environmental Performance Index 2020
• 
  Ease of doing business index 2020
• 
  Income inequality Gini index 2020.
• 
  Infant mortality rates 2019

Moxy- 22:38, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

The United States ranks relatively high in most of those indexes. Pizzigs (talk) 22:51, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Most? I didn't look at all of them, but the ones that apply to the question that I looked at did not show that at all. Please post the ones that you found to support your claim. Sectionworker (talk) 23:35, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Most of the above, except for Gini and Global Peace Index, perhaps. Pizzigs (talk) 23:59, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree. The statement that the US ranks high on measures of freedom is a true statement, especially if you compare it to all countries, not just its peer liberal democracies. I think the lead is perfectly fine; especially since we do mention where the US falls behind its peers (inequality, incarceration, lack of universal healthcare). -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 04:02, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

I wish I could say I'm surprised, but I'm not. OK, the first six: 1) Yes, we are a free democracy just like any other developed country in the world, with numerous developing countries, as well. Nothing special to go around bragging about. 2)This comes to us from the Heritage Foundation, which still does not accept the scientific climate change conclusion and supports and even promoted the voter fraud claims. 3) Press freedom--same as #1. 4) Same as #1. 5) ′Neither low nor high, but the poverty in so much of world could hardly be expected to have people report any degree of happiness. Here it is. (I went down to the UK to show we ranked above them). 2 Denmark 3 Iceland 4 Israel 5 Netherlands 6 Sweden 7 Norway 8 Switzerland 9 Luxembourg 10 New Zealand 11 Austria 12 Australia 13 Canada 14 Ireland 15 United States 16 Germany 17 Belgium 18 Czech Republic 19 United Kingdom Number 6, On Social Progress we came in at number 25, quite low. Sectionworker (talk) 21:44, 28 April 2023 (UTC) I didn't look at every one of the following maps. I felt that looking at the maps alone gives a pretty good idea. I did look at the Human Development Index and found that we are behind Japan, South Korea, and the UK...so not so good. Looking at the Better Life Index we ranked 10, so pretty good. Our Environment Index is very concerning--we ranked 24 out of 32. Also concerning, we ranked 129 out of 163 on the Global Peace Index. I knew that our child death index would be high because I often work on women and infant articles. It is 6.3 which puts us 47th in the world, although UNISEF notes that reported figures from some countries may not be accurate. Sectionworker (talk) 00:22, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Many of your assessments are misleading. For example, On Social Progress we came in at number 25, quite low is strange to say when there were 169 countries ranked...thats better than over 85% of countries, which I'd consider "ranking highly". DecafPotato (talk) 22:43, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing that out. Pizzigs (talk) 09:09, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Agree that we should omit human rights from the lead given that reliable sources challenge this characterization.  — Freoh 17:32, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

• I really wouldn't call Noam Chomsky a reliable source on this issue. Please do not remove mention of US human rights rankings without a new consensus to do so. Also, the lead discusses international measures; even if he were a reliable source, that citation involves his own personal analysis. --Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 20:13, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

No one had responded to my survey of the maps so it appeared that the discussion had ended. As for Chomsky, the title makes it clear that it is about US policy. And then you state it is only his opinion. He is a historian, and like all historians he is only offering his opinion. I am still waiting for comments on why I was not correct about the maps...Sectionworker (talk) 22:47, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

@Sectionworker: Pizzigs and I both responded to your maps and argued that yes, the US compared to most nations ranks high on these indices. The lead says the US ranks high in international human rights comparisons, which the maps definitely back up. Also, the rankings necessarily involve more than just one person's opinion, and unless Chomsky's book ranks every country by its human rights record, it's irrelevant. Also, even if he did, 1999 was 24 years ago. Countries change. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 23:08, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

More recent academic sources have also documented human rights violations within the United States. If reliable sources disagree, then the V-DEM Institute's favorable opinion does not deserve lead prominence.  — Freoh 00:30, 5 May 2023 (UTC)  — Freoh 00:30, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

@Freoh: We're saying that the US ranks high in human rights on a global scale, not that the US has an unblemished human rights record; of course it doesn't. The lead is stating that it statistically ranks very high in human rights, which the data bears out. Perhaps we can tweak the lead slightly so it just says the US ranks highly instead of "very highly" though? It is kind of a fluff word. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 00:01, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

In other sources about human rights in the United States, a "relatively low ranking has been consistent across the surveys."  — Freoh 00:44, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

You have been intentionally ignoring all the arguments made by other editors, including references to international rankings where America ranks high. Pizzigs (talk) 09:08, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, what you said exactly. The article isn't comparing the human rights rankings of the US compared to other developed democracies (although even by that metric the US isn't ranked poorly). It is comparing all nations in the world. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 23:13, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I am not ignoring all the arguments made by other editors; please remember to assume good faith. I agree that some sources rank the U.S. highly in human rights. You ignore the sources that rank the U.S. poorly. Given the disagreement in reliable sources, it would be best to omit human rights from the lead entirely.  — Freoh 10:09, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

@Freoh: The problem here is that there is not a disagreement in reliable sources regarding US rankings. The sources you are providing are 1) very old, and 2) are not an analysis of rankings. Almost all of the attempts to systemically rank countries by different facets of human rights (User:Moxy kindly provided a summary of these results) show the US as being ranked high; that's why it should stay in the lead. If you can find recent sources that indicate that the US is not ranked high (as in, outside of the top quartile when compared to all of the countries evaluated) for a number of human rights metrics (I don't think you can), then we can reevaluate. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 04:20, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

References

American Blackface minstrelsy

"Blackface" is a makeup.
"Minstrelsy" is a style.
"American blackface minstrelsy" is a unique theatrical artform.

Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a reliable source by its own standards. Original research is irrelevant. The existing source is sufficient, but here's more supporting information and additional citations.

The Darker Image: American Negro Minstrelsy through the Historian's Lens Author(s): George F. Rehin Source: Journal of American Studies , Dec., 1975, Vol. 9, No. 3 (Dec., 1975), pp. 365-373 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the British Association for American Studies Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27553195

"The minstrel mode was regarded as America's national poetry,8 and to judge from the constant reiteration of its unique American character and contribution to the theatre by historians of all hues and interests, it has continued, until recently, to be a necessary part of American identity."

• 8) American Vernacular Dance ', Southern Folklore Quarterly, 30 (1966), 227. 8 J. K[innard], Jr., ' Who Are Our National Poets? ', Knickerbocker Magazine, 26 (1845), 331-41. See also Y. S. Nathanson, ' Negro Minstrelsy, Ancient and Modern ', Putnam's Monthly, 5 (1855), 72-9. Both these are conveniently reprinted in Bruce Jackson (ed.), The Negro and his Folklore in Nineteenth-Century Periodicals (Austin, 1967)

"The pre-1940 response of black writers was similar to that of white scholars and critics; both reflected the long-established place of minstrelsy in popular esteem. Its status as ' the only branch of the dramatic art ' originating in America and the role of its melodies as the ' only approach to a national music '" 15

• 15) Laurence Hutton, Curiosities of the American Stage (London, 1891), pp. 89-144, 99.

Shoreranger (talk) 14:07, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

The information may (or may not) be okay, but I think the concerns over putting it specifically in the overview article of the United States raises concerns; I mean one could write several thousands of pages of text about the United States; it is unreasonable that all of it should end up in this one article; instead, seek to put the information in other articles where it may be more appropriate. As an overview article, the topic is too specific for this article, IMHO. In other words, on the matter of whether Wikipedia should cover this information: sure. On the matter of whether this article here titled "United States" should cover this information, no, there really isn't room to cover a topic of this specificity in a general overview article. --Jayron32 16:17, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I'd agree, if it wasn't the only regularly-identified American theater form labeled as unique. Shoreranger (talk) 17:45, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I mean, you can find some sources that so label it. A good thing to do is to look for general reference works and how they discuss the United States of a similar length and purposes expected of a Wikipedia article. The preponderance of mainstream source material on the general topic of the United States don't really give it any mention at all. I mean, you can find a reliable source that says such a thing, which means that somewhere at Wikipedia it seems like a valid topic. However, just because it has a source doesn't mean it belongs in this one article. It seems far too niche a topic for a general overview article. There's other US culture which is generally to be expected in an article of this type, I don't see that this one topic is frequently discussed in similar works outside of Wikipedia in an omnibus work about the US in general and as such, there is no evidence it belongs here. All of your sources, while reliable, are fairly specific, specialist, niche sources, which is fine for including the information in Wikipedia articles about such topics, but not in a high-level overview such as this article. --Jayron32 17:57, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Its the uniqueness to US culture that makes it Wikipedia:Due. There are international pop stars from other countries, that's not unique to the US, but there is plenty of space dedicated to them in the article for example, despite lacking in any uniquely US characteristics identified. A uniquely US artform deserves this minor inclusion. Shoreranger (talk) 18:05, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

WP:DUE says, and I quote, "Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources." (bold mine) Being noted as unique in a small number of niche publications is not prominent enough to pass the standards laid out there. WP:DUE says nothing about "unique" being a criteria. Only about how much the concept is covered by mainstream reliable sources. This topic is reliably sourced in relation to other topics, but not in the general sense for an overview article about the United States. --Jayron32 18:18, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

"proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources"

There is a trove of published reliable sources covering American theater, theater history, African American studies, sociology, and more that support the text. The quote you provided says nothing about "mainstream" or "niche", only "published" and "reliable". An overview of United States theater should certainly include mention of the *only* uniquely American theater form, as identified in published reliable sources. Shoreranger (talk) 18:29, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Most published reliable sources about The United States don't discuss the topic. There may be published reliable sources about American theater, theater history, African American studies or sociology that cover the topic to include the concept in perhaps one of those (or any of a number of other articles). Just not this one. --Jayron32 18:49, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

"Most published reliable sources about The United States don't discuss the topic."

Does not require that this article avoid it.

Wouldn't that actually be an incentive to include it, in a certain sense. Should not Wikipedia be unique, partly because it may correct such omissions of the past?

Either way, it still does not justify avoiding the topic by Wikipedia standards, which are the only ones that count here. Shoreranger (talk) 19:08, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

The Smithsonian Institute would of course be considered RS. Here is what they have to say: "Describing the African-American influence on American music in all of its glory an d variety is an intimidating—if not impossible—task. African American influences are so fundamental to American music that there would be no American music without them. People of African descent were among the earliest non-indigenous settlers of what would become the United States, and the rich African musical heritage that they carried with them was part of the foundation of a new American musical culture that mixed African traditions with those of Europe and the Americas. Their work songs, dance tunes, and religious music—and the syncopated, swung, remixed, rocked, and rapped music of their descendants—would become the lingua franca of American music, eventually influencing Americans of all racial and ethnic backgrounds. The music of African Americans is one of the most poetic and inescapable examples of the importance of the African American experience to the cultural heritage of all Americans, regardless of race or origin" [12] Sectionworker (talk) 19:37, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

The canvassing you're currently engaged in on talk pages of other articles is quite unethical. Pizzigs (talk) 19:29, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

What evidence do you have to accuse me of Wikipedia:Canvassing? I am strictly following the procedures for RFC as given by Wikipedia, and in good faith. it specifically calls for, and provides templates for, using talk pages. I don't even have the ability to change the text of the template except to include the article and the talk page section. I wonder if you would be so free with your insults were it not for the anonymity of this venue. Shoreranger (talk) 19:35, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Plus, you've violated WP:3RR how many times already? Pizzigs (talk) 19:34, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Oh, so YOU'RE the one I've been told is bad-mouthing me in chats. Have fun. Shoreranger (talk) 19:36, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a reliable source is an explanatory essay, not a guideline. Just saying because you tend to invoke it quite frequently. Pizzigs (talk) 20:30, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I've referred to it once, and never claimed it was a "guideline". Now you are confusing me with User:إيان

Maybe you need to go outside and get some fresh air. You seem frazzled. Making random (false) observations and "just saying" instead of staying on topic.

How's it going in the chat rooms? Just saying... Shoreranger (talk) 20:42, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Putting in 2 cents. Segwaying from a general paragraph on US theater to a specific style (minstrelsy) is bad paragraph structure, so the addition of some minstrelsy sentences is bad writing. The section should also follow WP:SUMMARY, section wording should reflect the lead at Theater in the United States. Fountains of Bryn Mawr (talk) 20:34, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Most of the content in Theater in the United States that relates to this doesn't have any citations. Unless you are referring to the one outlying sentence "At the same time, America had created new dramatic forms in the Tom Shows, the showboat theater and the minstrel show. which would be clunky if the "section wording" were to reflect that. Shoreranger (talk) 20:49, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree that minstrel shows are worth mentioning in this article. It is "a distinctively American contribution to theatrical history", which is exactly the kind of thing that this article should cover.  — Freoh 19:41, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

 Disagree As usual, User:Freoh supports the inclusion of highly disputed content because it presents the United States in a negative light. And as usual, the user seems to be unaware that a discussion have taken place where editors objected to incorporating that content into the article. Pizzigs (talk) 00:06, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, "distinctly American". Europe had a rich heritage of theater, but we had a mix of cultures able to come out with our own new art forms while the Europeans were stuck in the past. For the Black population here in America, minstrel shows offered their first opportunity for people of color to go out on their own (The Christy Minstrels). Early gospel groups also toured the country. Then came tap dancing and jazz. I was surprised to learn when I worked on the yodeling article: When the European Tyrolese Minstrels toured the United States for several years in the early 1840s and created an American craze for Alpine yodeling music, four unemployed white actors decided to stage an African-American style spoof of this group's concerts. Calling themselves Dan Emmett's Virginia Minstrels, the performance was wildly popular and most historians mark this production as the beginning of minstrelsy in the U.S. According to jazz historian Gary Giddins:

Though antebellum (minstrel) troupes were white, the form developed in a form of racial collaboration, illustrating the axiom that defines – and continues to define – American music as it developed over the next century and a half: African American innovations metamorphose into American popular culture when white performers learn to mimic black ones.[30]

Also, it would surprise most people to know that Jimmy Rogers, who was known as the Father of Country Music, created his sound by combining Southern blues with Austrian yodeling and songs of the railroad section workers, gandy dancers, that he had heard as a boy and then later when he did railroad work himself. Really, we have plenty to be ashamed of here, as have many if not most countries, but when it comes to music, I rate us number one of the world. Sectionworker (talk) 03:10, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Do you have reliable sources to back up your view that this information is highly disputed? I support inclusion because it is distinctively American, not because it presents the United States in a negative light. In my opinion, a picture like File:Minstrel PosterBillyVanWare edit.jpg (a featured picture) would be more illustrative than a lot of the images in this article.  — Freoh 14:06, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

References

First patent issuance

The line "In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was awarded the first U.S. patent for the telephone" in the Economy section: there is no way that is true. Patents existed for a long time before 1876. The first patent laws in the US were passed in the 18th century. This link from the US Patent Office reports Samuel Hopkins to be the recipient of the first US patent. I apologize if I have misinterpreted the line. Willster2400 (talk) 14:45, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

This is a misreading. Perhaps it could be worded better. He received the first telephone patent (in the US), if that makes more sense. Maxx-♥ talk and coffee ☕ 15:44, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

yes it was first in terms of telephones--and there was a lot of litigation. Rjensen (talk) 22:38, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

E-lock

Why did the extended-confirmed lock in the top-right corner disappear? LOOKSQUARE (talk) 14:59, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Because the fаggετs (Personal attack removed) who put it there in the first place forgot to add the template back. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.204.232.184 (talk) 18:36, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Why is transgenderism, abortion and black lives matter treated as exceptionally important things in this article?

This discussion has been closed by Freoh. Please do not modify it.
Hate is disruptive.
The transgender movement in the United States has no basis in reality because it's the freest country in the world. Wanting to use a restroom while not looking like a real female (and still having male genitalia) is not a reason for protest because the person is anatomically male, so why does the article treat it like it's an institutional barrier? Abortion access isn't entirely illegal, as at the state level it is legal in those places. The fight for abortion isn't some issue that is killing millions a year, yet quite the opposite. Black lives matter has done nothing but riot and cause disruption to justify million dollar thefts from retail stores. There isn't any institutional racism at all because it is illegal. A white cop shooting a dangerous and armed suspect who happens to be a black isn't any cause for concern. Really, this article makes it look like that these issues are the biggest problems in America, yet alone there is a debt over 30 trillion dollars and black issues/LGBT/abortion politics are apparently the biggest problems. Black lives matter is not a legitimate movement, and the transgenderism ideology isn't either as it is legal and there is not federal law against it. Blacks here are lucky that they were brought over from slavery since if it wasn't for whistling dixie, they would still be in the stone age. This article is extremely biased in what issues it presents as a problem and it should be removed. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and not a place to push political bias, right? Or am I mistaken? Black lives and identity politics and abortion shouldn't be on here since it has no historical precedent as most of this is recent (except for the civil rights movement of the 60s). Please tell me why and maybe inform other reasons why this point-of-view pushing exists. Is it on purpose or is it blissful ignorance of what Wikipedia is supposed to be? GrandCoaxial (talk) 20:07, 27 April 2023 (UTC) Do you have reliable sources to support your suggestions? Sectionworker (talk) 20:35, 27 April 2023 (UTC) I left a welcome message on your talk page which provides links to information about Wikipedia. Please read the policy of Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. What goes into the article is what is found important in reliable sources, which have chosen to give prominence to civil rights issues over the deficit. Whether or not they should do so is not an issue that we can question here. TFD (talk) 20:53, 27 April 2023 (UTC) I honestly hope you are just a troll because I don't think somebody can be more hypocritical than the guy who calls this article biased saying that BLM, identity politics, and abortion aren't important? Just because there are some things you define as "not a reason for protest" that doesn't disprove the fact that they are still being widely protested and debated around the country. Considering the Roe v. Wade overturning and the multiple protests that have bloomed from that controversial Supreme Court decision as well as multiple legislating bodies passing abortion-banning or -restricting laws, I would definitely define that as important. Black lives matter & police brutality also were very notable topics worldwide since the untimely death of George Floyd in 2020, with protests breaking out in large cities across the U.S. and the world, so I think I'd consider that pretty notable. To combat your claim that institutional racism doesn't exist because it's illegal: Child labor is illegal in India, yet this article provides researched claims about millions of child laborers still working in the country. In the United States, heroin is illegal, yet the CDC says that over 143,000 people died from heroin overdoses from 1999-2020. Just because something is illegal doesn't mean it doesn't happen. That's why we have prison. Also please, use some citations the next time you want to promote a very unpopular and critical opinion (especially one that's outwardly biased toward trans people, black people, and women). I am an ally and a friend to many people of whom you described so poorly. phrogge 'sup? edits 05:15, 28 April 2023 (UTC) Transgenderism is mentioned once, blm protests are linked to once, and abortion 4 times in two areas. All instances are in the context of central political issues since 2010, or while noting that states can have vastly different laws on even hot button issues (like abortion), and they are pretty far down and in the middle of paragraphs. This does not seem to be "treated as exceptionally important" to me. 142.115.142.4 (talk) 02:38, 29 April 2023 (UTC) The article appear to have changed since GrandCoaxial posted their complaint. Transgenderism is currently a single-word link. BLM is not included at all. They seem to be under-mentioned. CurryCity (talk) 00:06, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Why the down grade?

The down grading of the quality level and the addition to the opening of problem banners makes the article look like a FOX is involved. 204.237.49.178 (talk) 23:10, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

FOX = Full of Xenophobia... have not seen this acronym used in a decade or so. Can you give any example? Moxy- 01:21, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Or explain what that means... xenophobia against the US or from the US? That said, my quick perusal (and I mean really quick) had me notice several not quite accurate statements. I'm not super interested in engaging this article, but, maybe someone saw a lot more and decided the quality grade needed an adjustment. Happy editing. 142.115.142.4 (talk) 02:46, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

I am assuming it's related to Xenophobia in the United States.... more at Lee, Erika (2021). "America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States by Erika Lee". The Radical Teacher (120). Center for Critical Education, Inc.: 102–104. ISSN 0191-4847. JSTOR 48694889. Retrieved 2023-04-29. Moxy- 03:11, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 28 April 2023

Add the official flag File:Flag_of_the_United_States_(DoS_ECA_Color_Standard).svg Loganp23 (talk) 00:22, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

There has been an edit war over this for a while and now that there is an official source you can not reject it anymore Loganp23 (talk) 00:24, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: If there has been or there currently is an edit war over this then all involved editors should stop immediately and instead have consensus discussion on this talk page. Any edit which is likely to be contentious / contested precludes it from being performed via an edit request. Even if there isn't an edit war, changing images within an article is generally considered contentious de facto due to the prominence of their placement, and in this particular case changing the variation of country's flag is even more likely to be challenged. Please establish consensus before creating another request. —Sirdog (talk) 03:57, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

 Question: who opposes this change, and why?  — Freoh 20:15, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

From what I've just read, the colors of the flag currently on the article aren't based in a specific guideline (besides just 'blue'), so I wonder why the DoS color would be opposed. DecafPotato (talk) 03:57, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

DecafPotato and Freoh, to clarify, I am not currently opposed to the flag being changed as I'm not really invested one way or another. I also didn't check to see if an edit war happened or not. Editors are free to perform edit requests that were declined by others if they are comfortable or willing to do so; declines are not formal rejections. I simply declined this one as it is my experience patrolling WP:ER for awhile that any alteration of an image that isn't an overwhelming unambiguous correction - like reverting vandalism - falls under changes that are likely to be controversial from WP:ER. Cheers! —Sirdog (talk) 11:01, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

It was from before the DoS version was added, a few months ago. I added the flag since it was listed on another official website, and it was immediately changed back. This happened a lot more over the next couple days 2605:59C8:1C4:7A10:989A:2C83:4DF2:E8A7 (talk) 01:31, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

 Done because nobody opposed this change.  — Freoh 19:31, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Pizzigs, could you explain your opposition?  — Freoh 20:18, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Government type infobox

United States
Government	Federal presidential constitutional republic under a liberal representative democracy

Does having "liberal representative democracy" as it currently does seem redundant to add to this section? I don't see this added to infoboxes of other countries that are liberal democracies Bokmanrocks01 (talk) 13:30, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

United States
Government	Constitutional, federal republic under a presidential system

It is redundant as its akin to say "Western-style democracies" ......what readers need to know is what type of "Liberal democracy" . Moxy- 13:51, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Please see the reference for that. There is an ongoing vital debate particular to the US as to whether it is a republic or a democracy. It is both. soibangla (talk) 14:47, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

A fun read....Volokh, Eugene (2015-05-13). "Is the United States of America a republic or a democracy?'". Washington Post. Moxy- 21:00, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

@Soibangla: My main issue is with this “under a” language. That would suggest that it is NOT a republic in reality, which is not correct. How is it “under” a democracy? What does that mean? Your source does not contain this terminology. 25stargeneral (talk) 03:30, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

United States
Government	Constitutional, federal republic and a presidential system

"and a" Would be fine with me. The article needs to be as simple as possible.[13]. Will be a hard change as the article has been overwhelmed with tedious editors.Moxy- 03:40, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I understand; "and" is better. Under was not the term I added. soibangla (talk) 03:55, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

US territorial evolution animation

I have removed it for the time being given that its description largely repeats the content of the section, and the Trail of Tears and policies of Indian removal are already explicitly mentioned in the body. Pizzigs (talk) 15:48, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

There is already a discussion about this, including your apologist POV-pushing, above. إيان (talk) 16:17, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

@إيان: we can strongly disagree without accusing people of POV-pushing... --Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 20:22, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

Pizzigs has candidly and repeatedly declared their motivations to combat what they perceive as portrayals of the US as evil, both in their edit summaries and in a talk page section they used as their personal soapbox. If that can't be called "POV-pushing" (an accusation they themselves have flung at another editor on this page for having committed the grave anti-American sin of editing articles about communism, and at me, for that matter), it can be called something else—perhaps WP:Advocacy—but it's disruptive editing and it needs to be called out and it needs to stop. إيان (talk) 04:30, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough. But I think we should still assume they're coming in good faith. One thing about this page is that you do see a widely disparate set of views, but through compromise we can create a decent article; at least I hope we can. We did it for the lead: I'm sure that if it were up to Pizzigs, we wouldn't mention inequality, incarceration, or the lack of universal healthcare (actually, if it were up to me, we wouldn't mention the lack of universal healthcare in the lead, but I digress); but through compromise I think we have a good lead section, that adequately describes where the US stands in the rankings while also pointing where it falls short. I wonder if there's a compromise when it comes to the territorial animation? Maybe we can speed the animation up or something? --Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 08:05, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

As User:Fountains of Bryn Mawr stated in their edit summary, your animation does not meet MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE, as "articles are not media hosts for long animations that are less than half about 'Early national period'." Pizzigs (talk) 01:07q, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

How exactly do you find the MOS link suggests that the map does not meet the suggested WP manner of style? As I stated above, I found it relevant and helpful and fulfilling of the MOS guideline when it states "Images must be significant and relevant in the topic's context, not primarily decorative. They are often an important illustrative aid to understanding." Sectionworker (talk) 03:17, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

"Images should look like what they are meant to illustrate" - The image is a single frame from an 11 minute animation and shows nothing of what it caption claims it illustrates re: "As it expanded further into land inhabited by Native Americans, the federal government often applied policies of Indian removal or assimilation". It literally matches the example of the way not to use an image. Fountains of Bryn Mawr (talk) 12:06, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Fountains of Bryn Mawr, does the media file not illustrate the federal government's expansion into land inhabited by Native Americans? Does its caption not also establish its relevance to the article and provide context for it per WP:CAPTION? Please explain. إيان (talk) 13:40, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

There is no apparent issue with it from what I could see aside from the length, perhaps. Numerous contextual material discusses territory, and I do not see what makes this one so much worse that it warrants entire removal. Maxx-♥ talk and coffee ☕ 13:11, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Per Maxxhiato, the primary problem seems to be with the caption and the placement, perhaps. The animation itself seems like it would be highly relevant to the article, especially the history section. I think returning the animation to the article, with a simplified caption, is best. --Jayron32 13:15, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

How could the caption be improved? إيان (talk) 13:52, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

The original caption was a bit wordy. If it just said "An animation of US territorial expansion over time." and stopped there, it would be sufficient. --Jayron32 14:02, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

So it could be improved by cutting out all mention of the populations that were dispossessed, removed, or assimilated in order for that expansion to happen, as if nobody had been there? The westward territorial expansion of the US is concomitant with discussion of its consequences for Native Americans in all current reputable sources that even broach the issue, and to exclude it from the caption conforms with repudiated narratives of denial.

Mention of the consequences of US territorial expansion for the populations inhabiting the territories into which it expanded is WP:Verifiable and WP:Due essential context that should stay in the caption per WP:CAPTION. إيان (talk) 15:21, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

side discussion moved to user talk page. --Jayron32 16:17, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The article should certainly mention that information. The caption of an image or animation is a tool poorly fit to the purpose. Your personal attacks against me notwithstanding, I never said that the article should not mention those things, it absolutely should. --Jayron32 15:25, 4 May 2023 (UTC) I certainly didn't mean to attack you personally, and though I don't see it myself, I'm sorry I made you feel personally attacked. إيان (talk) 15:32, 4 May 2023 (UTC) You attempted to paint me, because I disagree with the formatting and organization of the article exactly as you want it, as "conforming with repudiated narratives of denial". Please don't poison the well by bringing unrelated matters into a discussion over formatting and organization issues. Trying to decide where in the article to write material is not engaging in "denial", and your attempt to "win" by painting me as such, when I have done nothing of the sort, is a personal attack. This isn't a battle, I'm not your enemy. If you want to include the material being cut out of the caption, propose a way to incorporate it in the article text. As I said, the caption is a tool poorly fit to the purpose to discuss such matters. Instead, it should be properly integrated into the running prose of the article itself. --Jayron32 15:40, 4 May 2023 (UTC) In order to keep this discussion on topic, I've responded to the accusation of personal attacks on Jayron32's talk page. إيان (talk) 16:00, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

The caption length was a bit long. I understand wanting to include things like native displacement and conflict, but the longer caption would have to address it properly. It doesn't seem common in other articles. The British Empire and French Colonial Empire—or even just France and the United Kingdom—articles, for instance, lack the same style of captions on their territorial expansions. The way I see it, Jayron32's suggestion is probably the best fit. Maxx-♥ talk and coffee ☕ 16:15, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

 Question: given that all of the proposed images depicting U.S. colonization have some sort of problem, can we add File:William L. Sheppard - First use of the Cotton Gin, Harper's weekly, 18 Dec. 1869, p. 813.png instead?  — Freoh 19:13, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Not sure why this would be an either/or. There was already consensus to add this image (see the top section of the talk page). Pizzigs made this change despite the TP consensus here. Will reinstate. 20:23, 6 May 2023 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by SashiRolls (talk • contribs)

Regional languages

New "information" added to info box is pure disinformation. English is not a regional language at all but the de facto national language. French has a protected status in Louisiana but is unofficial. The other bulleted languages listed are actually official elsewhere. Even the footnote is wrong: 31 states officialize English, not 28. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.77.71.234 (talk) 15:52, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Please sign your username after posts. This page already says that English is the de facto national language. This page does not say that French is an official language in any region of the US, but merely says that it is a regional language. As it has a protected status in Louisiana like you said, I don't see anything wrong with calling it a regional language then. And regional languages can be official elsewhere, like in the case of Turkish, a regional language in Kosovo being the official language in Turkey. The footnote is not wrong as well, it says 28 states only recognize English as an official language, with 31 states in total recognizing English as an official language. 2601:600:9080:A4B0:91D2:667:AE13:349C (talk) 17:58, 6 May 2023

In no way is English a "regional language". It's the main language of all 50 states and most territories, and it cannot be listed as "regional." French being introduced as a "regional language" does not agree with French in the United States--it's a minority language, spoken in a very small area of two states. A "region" in the U.S. is the South or the Midwest. Territorial languages like Samoan are not "regional" either. Spanish, the only true regional language here, is listed well after its place of importance. The accurate wording should be Minority languages, with English deleted, Spanish first, French second, and Native languages including Hawaiian, Alaskan, and Samoan next. You bring up Kosovo, but the two dominant languages are not even listed in the info box as "regional". There is far worse to see in this United States article, but the erroneous "regional languages" (explained nowhere in the text) is one more example of this article's recent decline. 173.77.71.234 (talk)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 4 May 2023

Because there are some new things about the USA that they missed out on and some other things. [[User:Joe Biden|Joe Biden] (talk) 01:09, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

The U.S. is a country of 50 states covering a vast swath of North America, with Alaska in the northwest and Hawaii extending the nation’s presence into the Pacific Ocean. Major Atlantic Coast cities are New York, a global finance and culture center, and capital Washington, DC. Midwestern metropolis Chicago is known for influential architecture and on the west coast, Los Angeles' Hollywood is famed for filmmaking. ― Google Speaker: Kevin McCarthy (Republican Party) Trending Capital: Washington, D.C. Dialing code: +1 Population: 331.9 million (2021) Attorney general: Merrick Garland Gross domestic product: 23.32 trillion USD (2021) World Bank — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dallesk1ng (talk • contribs)

Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. -- Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 01:15, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 6 May 2023

Hi, I'm adding USA into a category list of "G7 nations". Thank you! 田中まさこ (talk) 02:41, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

 Not done for now: That category was recently deleted per the deletion discussion here and appears like you have recreated a version identical to the original. I have tagged the category for deletion for this reason, but if it is not deleted then I'll add this page to the category. Tollens (talk) 02:54, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Redundant tag?

 Question: could we remove the {{cleanup rewrite}} tag? Unless I am mistaken, all of the proposed rewrites center around WP:NPOV issues, which are already covered by the (more informative) {{NPOV}} tag, and it seems redundant to include both. I tried to remove the redundant tag, but Pizzigs re-added it [14]. Rockstone35, could you explain what your {{cleanup rewrite}} tag covers that the {{NPOV}} tag does not?  — Freoh 19:51, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• WTC 21-632.TIFF

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 01:24, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

 Removed the image from this article and replaced it with a free one.  — Freoh 00:11, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Source for 2023 prison population update

It is apparently disputed which country has the highest prison population in this source. When I click on the source and select prison population total and entire world the US comes out on top with a prison population of 1,767,200 and China in second place with a prison population of 1,690,000. Am I the only one seeing this? Now I recall this being flipped a few months back with China ahead of the US, although I don't remember the numbers. As such, I'd say this does not qualify as a reliable source for major articles like this one and Incarceration in the United States. — Preceding unsigned comment added by C.J. Griffin (talk • contribs) 18:29, 7 May 2023 (UTC) EDIT: It looks like the source is accurate, confirmed by Timeshifter's edit to Incarceration in th United States.--C.J. Griffin (talk) 20:23, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Change image of territories?

I think the current infobox image used to depict U.S. territories (File:US insular areas.svg) could be replaced with File:United States (+overseas), administrative divisions - en - colored (zoom).svg, which shows the territories themselves as opposed to just circles on a map indicating their location on a map, and also showing specific states. Thoughts? DecafPotato (talk) 02:34, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

It's notable that the content of these two diagrams are different; specifically that disputed guano islands are listed in the proposed diagram but not the existing. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 03:37, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Foreign relations

The last two sentences are less than accurate. US-Indian relations have little to do with poor relations with China -- there's no cause and effect as inferred. Why no mention of the Uyghurs, the South China Sea, Taiwan? The last sentence seems to suggest that the US (one of several "key allies of Ukraine") is alone in making Russia suffer "badly deteriorated relations." Deteriorating relations were there before the Ukraine War and the annexation of Crimea, and Russia has contributed to them. 173.77.71.234 (talk) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.117.227.17 (talk) 19:58, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

It does not state that Russia has suffered "badly deteriorated relations" in general. It states that Russia has suffered "badly deteriorated relations" with the U.S., which is true. DecafPotato (talk) 21:34, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, and that's another problem: the US isn't a key "ally" of Ukraine but one of many supporters. "Allies" of the US are France, the UK, South Korea, not Ukraine. Most of the entire Western World supports Ukraine and opposes Russia. The current wording fully implies that the US stands practically alone as an "ally" (erroneous term) and bears major responsibility for deteriorating US-Russia relations, though Russia has the key role as an invader. The Kremlin couldn't write it better. If the preceding sentence re India isn't bad enough, both sentences illustrate this article's recent cognitive decline. 63.117.227.17 (talk)

Although I don't agree with your interpretation of the last sentence's implied meaning, the sentence is problematic in other ways. First being WP:OR; neither of the two cited sources describe the US as a key ally. The Carnegie source does go into detail about how US-Russia relations deteriorated after the annexation of Crimea, but does not cover the more recent conflict. The CNBC source merely summarizes US military aid to Ukraine and doesn't directly support the claims. In addition, the sentence in general feels like recentism in the context of the rest of the section. I think the sentence can be safely removed altogether, and if warranted, re-written with proper sourcing and moved to Foreign relations of the United States. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 09:46, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

"The country began expanding across North America, spanning the continent by 1848"

Isn't this just a little bit euphemistic/question-begging? I mean I know the lead section needs to be kept short but shouldn't the Mexican war be mentioned more explicitly than this? How about: "The country began expanding across North America, and following their 1848 victory in the Mexican–American War spanning extended across the continentby 1848." (additions in underline, deletions in strike-through) FOARP (talk) 12:39, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I mean, the article later expands on the whole "manifest destiny" thing. The lead is not the place to write the whole article, and picking a single event/war/whatever begs a greater question "why that one war, when my favorite war is more important?" Best to just leave it as a basic summary, so people can read more later. We can't put everything in to the lead. --Jayron32 12:51, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

And if you want to get really technical, the continent was "spanned" two years earlier, when the Oregon Treaty was settled. It was 1846 when the U.S. got its first stretch of Pacific coast. --Jayron32 12:53, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi Jayron, thanks for your response. I take your point, but aren't we mentioning the war obliquely with the 1848 bit anyway? And like you say, the sentence is technically not accurate. I get that the article does discuss the war in the body-text, but the lead section is supposed to summarise that, and I'm not sure it's doing so properly here. FOARP (talk) 13:01, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

The body text mentions a lot of wars. Summarizing them all in a few words in the lead is probably not great. I might merely rewrite the information as something like "During the nineteenth century, the United States political philosophy was informed by the concept of manifest destiny, as the country expanded across the continent in a number of wars, land purchases, and treaties, eventually reaching the Pacific Ocean by the middle of the century." Sometimes being less precise is more useful here. --Jayron32 13:08, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I think that proposal would be an improvement as a summary and I would agree with adding it in. FOARP (talk) 14:12, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

 Done. --Jayron32 14:19, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Latinos

Latinos at 18%?? I think if we remove subjective identities and political correctness most self identifying Latinos would just fit into White and few mixed would be into Black or Hispanic which originally was mixed from the Spanish and Mestizo or other native populations in the Americas but US wise it's just anyone who speaks Spanish as their first language and who even comes from Latin America Nlivataye (talk) 11:08, 10 May 2023 (UTC)