Talk:Barack Obama citizenship conspiracy theories

Where's the beef? <=> Where's the Birth Certificate?

If the group that paid for the bulletin boards claims that Where's the beef? served as the inspiration to the bulletin board, would that not be relevant? Victor Victoria (talk) 05:09, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Again, per my comments on Talk:Where's the beef?, I don't think so. It's giving way too much weight to one fairly trivial aspect of a larger, unrelated issue. If there were some secondary source implying the original advertising campaign was significant to the conspiracy theories, then maybe. That seems really unlikely, though. Grayfell (talk) 05:43, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Additionally, WorldNetDaily is not generally considered a reliable source on Wikipedia. The cited WND article, if used here at all, would be admissible only per WP:SELFPUB, as a source of information about the writer of the piece (Joseph Farah, founder and editor of WND. IMO, if this factlet is to remain anywhere in the article, it needs (IMO) to explicitly mention Joseph Farah — e.g.: According to Joseph Farah, founder and editor of WorldNetDaily, the question "Where's the birth certificate?" is a reference to the 1984 catchphrase "Where's the beef?" And something this verbose clearly does not belong in an image caption; rather, I would suggest it be added to one of the other places in the article where Farah's "Where's the birth certificate?" campaign is already being discussed. — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 06:08, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

World Net Daily need not be a reliable source on anything other than itself. See WP:SELFPUB. Victor Victoria (talk) 06:33, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

And more additionally, Farah doesn't say anywhere in the cited column that his slogan was a reference to, or inspired by, the Wendy's slogan. Only after he gives a two paragraph explanation of why the slogan was chosen does he continue with a reference to "Where's the beef" as an old commercial that was on the tip of people's tongues. 2600:1006:B163:761B:5AD:4287:E314:1B02 (talk) 06:28, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Not quite sure what your point is -- you seem to concur that he does link the two. Victor Victoria (talk) 06:35, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

A one-off joke made by the billboard proponent in a single column, neither mentioned nor referenced by any other source puts this matter far, far into the realm of irrelevant trivia. Tarc (talk) 15:35, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

It certainly would not be the focus of the article, but it does add perspective to the photo of the billboard. Victor Victoria (talk) 16:23, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

If it's not relevant to include in the article, it shouldn't be added as the caption. The caption should be very basic, not adding information not otherwise present in the article. As for including it in the article, I just don't see the relevance especially with no other secondary source bothering to note any. Ravensfire (talk) 16:26, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

I agree with other editors that it shouldn't be included in the article, and certainly not in the caption. --Weazie (talk) 00:22, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

People who were around in 1984 would instantly recognize the connection between "Where's the birth certificate?" and "Where's the Beef?" catchphrase. However, people who either did not live in the United States in 1984, or were not around in 1984 to remember, would not be able to make that connection. Since the connection is confirmed, the association should be made. Although the connection was WP:SELFPUB source, policy allows for its inclusion.

I do recognize that there is an issue with the length of the caption, so I'll have to think about how to overcome that. Victor Victoria (talk) 14:31, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

It doesn't matter if any of us were around in 1984 (I was, for the record), it does not make it any less a bit of a piece of trivia. All the image is there for is to show a piece of advertising funded by the birther crowd; the billboard itself, and the catchphrase it cribs, is not itself the object of critical commentary. Tarc (talk) 14:38, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

I think it is thanks to the 1984 catchphrase that allowed WND to shorten the message on the billboard to just 4 words, w/o even mentioning Obama. Without the catchphrase, they would have had to put something like "Why can't Obama produce a birth certificate?". This is why it's important to mention it in the caption, to help explain the brevity of the billboard. Victor Victoria (talk) 15:08, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

How does it allow the reader to determine it is about Obama? There is no correlation between the two. It was possible to not mention Obama simply because it was an obvious topical reference to what was a very common topic of conversation and news coverage at the time. It makes sense in its own right if you had any awareness of topical politics at the time. Others could have put up a poster saying "Where's the WMD?" and it wouldn't have needed a mention of Bush, or any knowledge of a decades old advert. But this doesn't really matter. The inspiration of the phrase is a trivial side issue. I don't see it really adding anything of value, particularly if a questionable fact. It may only muddy the waters. Does it imply that there is something more in common between the two, other than they both start with "Where's the"? If so, where's the source? If not, why mention it? --Escape Orbit ^(Talk) 15:47, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

In the context of the discussions at that point in time, anyone asking that question outside of being at a driver's license bureau would clearly have been referring to Obama. I had one of the "Where's the beef" t-shirts back when those commercials were airing and I did not immediately make the connection between the billboard and that old add. Honestly, I didn't really make that connection until you started this discussion. In the context of the discussion back then, there were a fair number of conservative commentators who were repeating the question about the birth certificate. Asking "Where's the birth certificate" was parroting those questions and it was not immediately obvious it was inspired by some add campaign back in the 80's. Ravensfire (talk) 16:00, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

A point made by Farah himself;

But some people want to know why I chose this simple slogan to raise this issue. Why not include Obama's name on the billboard?

There are several reasons I chose the message: "Where's the birth certificate?" There is only one birth certificate controversy in the country today - despite the near-total absence of this issue from coverage in the non-WND media. This is a grass-roots issue that resonates around the country, as our own online petition with nearly 400,000 signers suggests.

2600:1006:B149:3FF4:5AD:4287:E314:1B02 (talk) 17:00, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

It's funny how people selectively quote in order to make a point. The above quote is taken from the same reference as the one where Farah clearly says that the "Where's the Beef?" campaign was factored into the decision (in fact, it's two sentences above the sentence about the "Where's the Beef?"). Meaning, while the "Where's the Beef?" slogan was not the sole motivator, it was certainly a motivator. Victor Victoria (talk) 21:12, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Concession

Given that

1. the "Where's the Beef" was only one of the motivating factors for the text of the billboard
2. this article is not about the specific ad campaign (or the billboard in question) but about the broader conspiracy theory
3. During the time that the billboards were up the connections to the Where's the Beef campaign was not widely made

I hereby concede that it does not add value to add a link to the Where's the Beef? article from the caption of the billboard photo (and just for the purpose of full disclosure, it should have no bearing on the outcome of the discussion, I'm the one who took the photo and uploaded it to Wikipedia). Victor Victoria (talk) 21:30, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 7 March 2015

Writer is the one making Bogus claims without basis. 203.218.157.16 (talk) 15:24, 7 March 2015 (UTC)