Talk:Virtue signalling

Pejorative

Re the previous edit and restore, I do think we need to say something making clear that this term is used (at least outside any academic context) as a pejorative. It seems to be used in a context in which the writer seeks to re-label the motivations of others. Personally, it appears to me to be an alt-right sneer that seeks to dismiss what others might regard to be compassion, and while I don't think my opinions are a valid basis for anything, its certainly clear, at face value, that this is a label imposed by one party on another party, somewhere on the axis of bad faith and hypocrisy. It's not, as far as I can see, something people say about themselves. 'I'm going to virtue signal about the poor this afternoon', etc. Certainly, this is not an objective term. Bluehotel (talk) 08:35, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

I think the article as a whole covers this issue well. e.g. Paragraph 2 "Since 2015, the term has been most conspicuously used by commentators to criticize what they regard as the platitudinous and empty or superficial..." and Paragraph 5 "Zoe Williams has described the phrase as the "sequel insult to champagne socialist"".

The issue is what we should say in the first sentence/paragraph.

I'm not massively impressed with any recent version of the first sentence/paragraph. Maybe we should just remove it and start with "The term "virtue signalling" was first used in signalling theory, to describe any behavior that could be used to signal virtue..."

I know we normally like to start with a declarative "X is blah" statement, rather than "The term X is blah". But I think that is hard for this term.

Yaris678 (talk) 14:04, 6 January 2017 (UTC)

I have removed the first paragraph, as described above. There was a bit of editing back and forth about the content of it, but it isn't improving. On reflection, I think it is better to start with the least fluffy use of the term - which is in the context of signalling theory. Everything after that, in the current content, explains the other uses better than the old first paragraph. Yaris678 (talk) 18:57, 23 January 2017 (UTC)

@Yaris678: Your removals violate the general notability guidelines in that you've removed the usage of the phrase that has the most significant coverage (WP:SIGCOV). This article would not exist on its own if it only detailed the "piety" meaning. The "pejorative" meaning is why this article exists. You also removed examples which are cited and help readers to understand when this phrase is used. As such, I'm reverting. -- Netoholic @ 19:42, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

I don't think this article is now right. I don't think editors should seek to create entities by reference to a few usages in opinion pieces. By all means describe how a term is used, but to say that virtue signalling IS what is said, IMO amounts to an original research synthesis. Bluehotel (talk) 21:28, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Bluehotel, you keep putting the cart before the horse. Nobody classifies what they themselves are doing as "virtue signalling" The term is only ever used as a pejorative term by another party in response to whatever the first party has said or done. Whether or not what is being said or done has merit or is worthy of dismissal is subjective, but the only promotion of a viewpoint in the context of this article is the person making the statement "x is virtue signalling". Mighty Antar (talk) 22:41, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

I liken it to the term racism - very often, people that are racist do not classify themselves as such. Calling someone a 'racist' is done, as you say "by another party in response to whatever the first party has said or done". That does not make it any less valid a topic. -- Netoholic @ 03:16, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

The flaw in your argument is that there is no uncertainty as to whether racism exists, either in terms of RS or human behavior. Virtue signalling is an expression which a handful of individuals have deployed in order to belittle, stigmatize and hence discourage behaviors that might otherwise be characterized as social concern, compassion or simply kindness. There is no objective evidence that such a phenomenon even exists, and I don't believe Wikipedia has any duty to try to create one. Hence saying what virtue signalling IS - the way it is here - strips it of its usage and asserts it as an entity. In my view. Bluehotel (talk) 06:51, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

In my example of a person who doesn't consider themselves to be racist, yet is called a racist by someone else - that situation is no longer objective. We have several articles about subjective topics on wikipedia, yet these topics themselves objectively exist and can be defined. We, of course, should not be swaying this article into making a firm judgment about which behaviors are true virtue signalling, but we can give generalized examples which are cited. We can cite specific notable accusations of virtue signalling (if such exist). This is because it is objective knowledge that the claims have been made, but not fact that the claims are true. Likewise, on the general topic, it is objective that the phrase is being used, but not objective that its being used appropriate in any/all circumstances. -- Netoholic @ 09:52, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Based on the above discussion, it looks like there is no consensus for the definition in this version of the article. Indeed, three of for four editors seem happy to remove the first paragraph and subsequent bullet points, giving this version. Yaris678 (talk) 11:39, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

How about improve, not remove? Imagine someone out there that hears this phrase being bandied about. They google, and come here. Doesn't the expanded version with bullet points convey the definition far better than the neutered version, which would confuse the average reader since it defines it in the context of piety rather than the conventional meaning? -- Netoholic @ 16:22, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

The expanded version will tell them how the term is used by some people, but it will give the false impression that this is the definition of the term.

There has been plenty of opportunity to improve it, but if anything it has got worse. If you can improve it, please do. I can't see a way to make this way of starting the article satisfactory. Where content is disputed the onus is on those who want to include it.

Yaris678 (talk) 16:45, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

For such a short, new article it already has plenty of citations which satisfy this requirement. The article covers several definitions of the phrase. I don't see how your concern is valid. Even those that oppose the inclusion of the "pejorative" meaning are acknowledging that very meaning in the way they are stating their opposition here. Added: If you think the existing citations are inadequate, then I suggest you nominate this article for deletion. Without the pejorative meaning, this article would not and should not exist. -- Netoholic @ 17:28, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

No one is questioning the existing references. Indeed, three of three of the four are used in the article that has the contentious definition removed. No one is questioning whether it is used as a pejorative and that this should be mentioned in the article. The question is whether this should be used in the definition of the term. If the pejorative meaning was the only meaning of the term, we could start the article with something like "Virtue signalling is an insult, frequently use to characterise an opponents behaviour as primarily existing to enhance their standing within a social group." Fortunately, the term existed before it was co-opted as an insult, so we can give it's proper definition first.

Also, have you read WP:ONUS?

Yaris678 (talk) 18:45, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

I think a historical description of its usage would be fine. I think killing the first paragraph probably did that, but there may be other ways.Bluehotel (talk) 19:06, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Common meanings are given preference in the lead. Obscure/historical meanings are typically given later in the article. That's the structure we already have. I'll also point out that current first line is intentionally vague and general enough to cover both the pejorative and piety meanings. Its an inclusive compromise. -- Netoholic @ 19:19, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

It really isn't an inclusive compromise. It takes something contentious and states it as fact. Yaris678 (talk) 12:34, 26 January 2017 (UTC)

I don't understand how the definition of the phrase is contentious. Certainly applying the term to specific persons or actions may be, but the term has a meaning. I say again - if you insist on removing this meaning, then please instead nominate this article for deletion because without the definition, then this article should not exist. -- Netoholic @ 05:04, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

The article without the contentious definition still says what the meaning of the word is, just without swallowing a world view along the way. I don't see what any of this has to do with AfD... Other than, perhaps, without the academic meaning of the phrase, it would be a WP:NEOLOGISM. Adding a reference to the The Sun makes it look more contentious, not less. Yaris678 (talk) 09:58, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

The Sun article is a secondary source for the primary source Oxford Dictionary which has seen fit to define this phrase as “the action or practice of publicly expressing opinion or sentiments intended to demonstrate one’s good character or the moral correctness of one’s position on a particular issue.” Your edits to the lead have removed this basic meaning and devalued this article. Added:Your current form essentially defines the phrase with itself - "the term virtue signalling was first used in signalling theory, to describe any behavior that could be used to signal virtue" - which is low-quality work. -- Netoholic @ 21:21, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

Hi Netoholic. Thank you for building on my version. I think the article is getting pretty good now. Yaris678 (talk) 10:57, 29 January 2017 (UTC)

Al Cowens date is not 2004

References, including a newspaper, have wrongly accredited the date of a post by Al Cowens using the term Virtue Signalling -- another editor pointed out if you go to the archive of the post, the 2004 date is when Cowens entered that forum not the date of the post. As a video is linked to the tuba incident, and that video is from at least 2014 or 2015 the Cowens post has to be from that time. Therefor as his post is not the first usage of the term outside of signalling theory it loses any notability and as such it should be deleted, which has been done. --Wowaconia (talk) 20:16, 25 March 2017 (UTC)

Why I added a "Notability" tag

This term "virtue signalling" seems to exist almost entirely within the rightwing blogosphere, and it is used to try to dismiss anyone on the left who makes disparaging remark about rightwingers. (I did see that Ann Coulter used it once to attack her fellow conservatives, but insofar as one can derive any meaning from anything she says, she seemed to be attacking some ill-defined set of conservatives for not being conservative enough.)

"Virtue signalling" is a pejorative phrase which doesn't seem to mean anything specific, and (as the examples in the wikipedia article clearly demonstrate) it has no currency outside one small subculture. That is why I thought it wasn't notable enough to have its own wikipedia article.

Timothy Horrigan (talk) 14:26, 31 May 2017 (UTC)

Hi Timothy,

There is definitely an issue with how the term is used, but I don't think deleting the article is necessarily the best response.

As the article makes clear, the term originated in an obscure academic field, and has since been adopted by a small number of loud-mouthed people for their own purposes.

If the term was only used in an obscure academic field, or only used by a small number of loud-mouthed people for their own purposes, it might not be worth an article. The fact that is is both makes it interesting.

On the face of it, the topic is notable since there are a large number of independent sources discussing the term. However, we should be careful not present the views of the small number of loud-mouthed people as facts.

In my view, it is disappointing that no sources point out that these loud-mouthed people are highly prone to virtue signalling themselves. The only difference being that the virtues they wish to signal are different.

I agree that the vast majority of non-academic sources are all either reflecting the same narrow POV, or else commenting on the terms use by people with that narrow POV and unaware of the true, academic meaning of the term. I think that makes it hard to make an NPOV article, but I think it is worth trying.

Yaris678 (talk) 09:23, 2 June 2017 (UTC)

Potential new source

This source, looks like it covers the topic well. It is described as a blog, but it is from the respectable Adam Smith Institute, so I think we can call it reliable. Yaris678 (talk) 21:00, 6 June 2017 (UTC)

Should we cut down the "Wider use" section?

OK. I have added in the above source, which I think makes clear some of the issues with the common use of the term. Perhaps the biggest issue with the article now is the size of the "Wider use" section. Given that this wider use is mostly silly, maybe we just need a few examples.

I think we need to get across that it was used before Bartholemew but he popularised it, and give an idea of the ways it has been used. We don't need it to be nearly as big as it is.

Yaris678 (talk) 17:25, 7 June 2017 (UTC)

A bit more history on the "Wider use" section:

• The version from February has no sub-sections and essentially four paragraphs:
  • A short paragraph, with a quote, on LessWrong
  • One paragraph on James Bartholemew
  • One bullet-pointed list of things that sometimes get called virtue signalling
  • One paragraph on the reception the term has received
• This was expanded significantly by User:Wowaconia into a section with eight subsections:
  • Al Cowens
  • LessWrong
  • PJ Media
  • James Bartholomew
  • Ann Coulter
  • VDARE
  • Further citations
  • Reception
• An IP added the reception of the term by Will Black.
• The Al Cowens mention was removed. See also Talk:Virtue signalling#Al Cowens date is not 2004.
• The mention of Will Black was tweaked by User:BurritoBazooka and then removed by User:Grayfell, who said that the source (an opinion piece for HuffPo, written by Black) was not reliable.
• I added the reception of the term with Sam Bowman.
• User:Magnolia677 reduced the LessWrong section to a short sentence and removed the PJ Media section.

Because we are talking about a fairly recent usage of the term (as opposed the the original academic usage) I don't think we are going to find a reliable secondary source that summarises the different strands on opinion on this. This is why we are reduced to citing authors for their own opinion. Doing this is OK up to a point - see WP:RSOPINION. We need to be careful not to just be a massive collection of everything everyone had said about the term... but I am not sure what the best way is to decide what to include and what not to include. I would be very interested to hear what other editors think.

One option would be to say that the non-academic use of the term is WP:NEO and we shouldn't have an article on it at all. I think that is too extreme, given that the modern usage has had quite a bit of coverage in reliable sources.

I think part of the reason it is tricky is that James Bartholomew popularised the term, and so obviously deserves a mention... but we can't just leave it to what he said. For a start, he has claimed to have invented the term, which is incorrect. Furthermore, many people have written about issues with the way the term has been used by him... so which ones do we include? Others have embraced the term, so how do we show this, without it appearing that Wikipedia itself had embraced the term?

Opinions please!

Yaris678 (talk) 13:42, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

Information laying out the historical development of the term being brought into popular usage should not be deleted as its on-topic, notable and sourced.

If the length is an issue than the article can be split into two pages one for its use within signalling theory and the other for its popular usage. Most readers will encounter the phrase in popular usage and its use in signalling theory informs upon the popular meaning, rather than vice versa. I do not think there is a need to split the article at this time.

"Mostly silly" is a subjective claim, if there is some violation of Wikipedia standards please lay that out.

The article lays out how the term went from in-group/scholastic to wide/popular and had its meaning altered as that occurred, which I would argue is valuable for the reader.

Perhaps the issue is the sub-header "Wider use" it could be changed to "Popular use". --Wowaconia (talk) 15:27, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

Personally, I don't think "Popular use" is a better name for the section than "Wider use", but I am happy to hear other opinions on that.

I used the phrase "mostly silly" to describe the way the term was used by various people, not the way the article is written. I don't claim any violation of any Wikipedia standards and it wasn't me that reduced or removed sections of the text.

Also, I am not saying that the page is currently "just be a massive collection of everything everyone had said about the term". Some things have been included and some excluded, as you would expect. However, different people will have different ideas about what should and shouldn't be included. I think the most important thing is to come up with some standards for inclusion. This will hopefully reduce the arguments about individual cases. For example, I think the following things count in favour of a source being used:

• The source using the term "virtue signalling" earlier than most other sources (e.g. LessWrong)
• The source discussing the meaning of the term, rather than just using it.
• The person giving an opinion is notable enough to have a Wikipedia article.

If a notable person uses the term after James Bartholemew, but doesn't actually discuss the meaning of the term, then I think they deserve at most very brief mention as in "X used the term when discussing Y.[Source]"

I realise the above is just my opinion. I would like to know what other people think. Do people agree it would be good to have some standards for inclusion? What do people think of the specific standards I have set out above?

Yaris678 (talk) 09:38, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

I would put forward that the "Wider Use" segment would ideally have a sub-segment focused on the history of how the term's usage and definition got changed and taken into the popular media, and then another sub-segment of the most notable uses of the term (with notability being defined by news coverage or by the person using the term). As far as I can determine the history part seems complete as is. --Wowaconia (talk) 19:16, 16 July 2017 (UTC)

How is the Wider Use section not self-evidently too long and repetitive? Neither the accuracy nor the POV are cause for concern, but the section is a slog when it should be a brisk stroll. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.24.41.103 (talk) 09:51, 18 July 2017 (UTC)

I have removed most of this content. For simplicity, I will start a new section on this below. Grayfell (talk) 22:08, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

LessWrong segment notability

Both the blog LessWrong and the author Eliezer Yudkowsky are notable enough to have Wikipedia articles. Wikipedia allows blogs to be quoted if the citation is made to cite what was written in the blog. --Wowaconia (talk) 15:33, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

Misleading use of source articles

Examples and quotations from Sam Bowman's article "Stop Saying Virtue Signalling" are being used to argue for the validity of the concept. This is misleading because, as the title describes, Bowman is not arguing in favour the existence of the concept. Rather, his article is about the different concept known as "signalling" which, as Bowman states in the article, "means exactly the opposite of what virtue signalling means".

Any use of this article as a citation for a pro-virtue signalling argument has no credibility and only serves to mislead the reader.[1]

— Preceding unsigned comment added by The Historian1 (talk • contribs) 03:01, 30 September 2017 (UTC)

The content has been removed from the lede completely, which I support. If this opinion piece is ambiguous, all the more reason to rely on reliable, independent sources to summarize for us, instead of asking editors to interpret sources ourselves. I have started a discussion on this problem below. Grayfell (talk) 22:16, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

The part that you deleted was in the segment of this article that spoke about the academic use of the term signaling which the author, Same Bowman of the cited article supports, to quote his piece: "The term signalling does not mean the same thing as 'saying' or 'showing off' when it is used by economists or biologists. Signalling means credibly giving information that is difficult to prove just by saying it. For example, banks used to have very grand buildings. Any bank could claim to be safe, but only a bank that had lots of money could afford a grand office. Education is a classic example of signalling. It’s difficult to show to a potential employer that you’re smart and hard working, but only smart and hard working people can get a good university degree (in theory). Good university degrees might be partially about signalling ability to potential employers. That’s what signalling is. It’s a very useful concept."

Here we see he supports the original academic usage.

He takes umbrage at its new usage: "It means exactly the opposite of what virtue signalling means – it’s credible and honest." He defines "virtue signaling" in his article as a concept popularized by Bartholemew, "It has become popular to describe certain behaviour as ‘virtue signalling’. By this people mean, in the words of James Bartholemew (who helped to popularize the term, and who I like very much in every other respect), writing or saying things 'to indicate that they are virtuous'."

So citing Bowman to help explain the original and academic usage to differentiate from the newer pejorative usage makes sense and is not at odds with his thinking or his article. --Wowaconia (talk) 15:19, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

This is far too subjective. If you have reliable independent sources which support In the late 2000s the term began to be appropriated on internet forums and social media away from its academic meaning and turned into a pejorative you need to include it. That you are personally making this claim in Wikipedia's voice is not acceptable. Even if you are correct, it's still original research, and it's still not acceptable. Including a bunch of primary sources to support this conclusion is still original research, and is entirely undue, as well. Grayfell (talk) 20:53, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

Original research

I've gutted a lot of content from this article, because I believe it was original research. Examples of usage must be supported as significant by reliable, independent sources, otherwise this is attempting to use Wikipedia to display research on the history of the term. This isn't the place to publish research, or to attempt to figure out which primary sources are significant and which are not. This is fundamental to Wikipedia's philosophy and goals, per WP:OR and WP:NOT.

The section on the LessWrong posts were especially poor. Citing an anonymous comment on a blog is completely unacceptable here. This is not even close to being a reliable source, and would absolutely need an independent source for multiple reasons. This hypothetical source would need to explain the significance of the comment, and this context would need to be included in the Wikipedia article.

The other sections had similar major issues, as well.

The article absolutely must summarize reliable, independent sources in a neutral way. Opinions, especially the opinions of non-experts, should only be used as a supplement to these reliable sources. This is not a good place to try and tease-out the origins of the term, or when it started being used as a pejorative. We must, instead, rely on reliable sources to do that work for us. Grayfell (talk) 22:12, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

The posting of the LessWrong info marks it as an incident in time, this is verifiable that the incident took place at a time. The Wikipedia standard on original research is "The phrase 'original research' (OR) is used on Wikipedia to refer to material—such as facts, allegations, and ideas—for which no reliable, published sources exist." The information on the LessWrong usage merely reports the usage and does not advocate any facts, allegations, or ideas. The inclusion here is not endorsing anything rather it reports that the beginning of a change in word usage. Yes, its in an internet forum but Wikipedia does not ban such social media when quoted to present the authors view as that of the authors. See WP:SOCIALMEDIA, therefore one can include President Trumps tweets that Climate Change is a hoax in an article showing his opinion, but not as a reliable source in an article discussing the process of Climate Change. The segment is clearly marked as how the phrase went from its academic meaning to a pejorative.-Wowaconia (talk) 15:07, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

@Wowaconia: Being an incident in time is not automatically noteworthy, and is absolutely not sufficient justification for inclusion. If you want to talk about Trump and climate change, do so elsewhere, based on context provided by reliable, independent sources. The same standard applies here.

SOCIALMEDIA only applies tangentially here. A LessWrong post would only be usable as a source about the LessWrong poster. This article isn't about LessWrong, though, it's about virtue signaling. We would first need a reliable source to explain why the anonymous LessWrong poster's opinion is significant, such as being the first documented use for a specific meaning, or similar. Making such a claim without a source is original research.

This source is not reliable for statements of fact, so it's only usable as an opinion. It is properly attributed, but that's not the only concern here. We need to be able to explain, based on reliable sources why this opinion is being included at all. No sources currently included accomplish this for the LessWrong post.

If this is supposed to document the history of the term, it's absolutely OR, because it's a WP:PRIMARY source being used to imply (even if it doesn't explicitly say) a specific conclusion which isn't made by any source. If it's merely being used as an example of usage, than it's completely undue and utterly unreliable. We cannot and should not document every usage of a term we find, and we especially shouldn't include lengthy direct quotes of such usage without a very good reason.

In either case it has to go, and much of the rest of this content is also unacceptable for many other reasons. Grayfell (talk) 20:45, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

How was this term 'appropriated', exactly?

Right now the article says that the term was first used in academia, and then 'appropriated' to attack the left. The article then lists criticisms of the usage. This seems to be an attempt at poisoning the well when it comes to a phrase that is used by the authors' ideological opponents.

First of all, wikipedia is not a place for political debates, and so I don't think it's appropriate to spend this much time talking about how the term is 'bad'. Secondly, the attempt to claim that it was originally an academic term which was appropriated by the right seems to be entirely false. I have checked the sources on this page and see nothing to indicate that this term comes from academia. All I see is the book which mentions the term exactly once as a synonym for charismatic signalling and then never discusses it as a separate concept. Costly signalling is of course a real academic concept but seems to be unrelated to the actual use of this term.

For the sake of accuracy and neutrality, I suggest that we remove all references to academic use and reduce criticisms to maybe one line about how the phrase has recently come under attack. Aside from that, all that's relevant is the meaning of the term itself (opening paragraph is fine) and its origin (Less Wrong or internet blogs in general).

If anybody does not want me to make these changes, please explain why below.

Grobtak(talk) 22:57, 2 October 2017 (ECT)