Talk:Lynching

Does lynching necessarily involve hanging?

The definition given in the article emphasizes vigilantism - extrajudicial killing. Yet many of the comments in this discussion thread seem to imply that extrajudicial executions other than hanging are not lynchings. Can someone explain to me why, for example, the killing if Ahmaud Arbery is not a lynching? 38.80.148.5 (talk) 03:51, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Lynching doesn't imply hanging, but still most murders are not called lynchings. The question is, do reliable sources call it a lynching ? --Rsk6400 (talk) 07:09, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Gold rush

@Horse Eye's Back: Why do you say that the source clearly focuses on lynching ? From what I see in the description at Amazon's, the source is about transporting racial hierarchies from the South to the West. That's not the only problem I have with the recent addition. I also fear it's in the wrong place (Mexican victims are mentioned several paragraphs later), and given the number of lynching victims it seems too long (i.e. WP:UNDUE) in relation with the thousands of African-American victims. Finally, both orthography ("minors") and the reference should be corrected. --Rsk6400 (talk) 16:49, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

I've read the source, I must also note that I find your denial of those lynchings ("during the Gold rush, one might expect common murder.") offensive and I suggest that most would agree. Please retract it. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:52, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

I learned from the quote that DolyaIskrina provided and from the source that I added that those murders were lynchings. But I don't see how my edit summary might offend anyone. If I say that a murder doesn't qualify as lynching, but still qualifies as murder, how should that be insulting to the victim's memory ? Rsk6400 (talk) 08:26, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

If you say that the Holocaust was mass murder but not a genocide is that insulting anyone's memory? Lynching denial and genocide denial are in the same camp. You also had no basis to do that on, you were challenging a reliable source with apparently no inherent knowledge of your own and no source of your own. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:19, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

@DolyaIskrina: Thanks for providing the quote. Since the "Cite" templates have a chapter parametre expecting the chapter's title, maybe you could provide the title. I added the chapter number to the minutes parametre, which is surely not correct. I removed the part about the rate, since it was not clear (rate per year / per capita and year ? Only counting Mexican / Chilean miners or counting all Mexicans / Chileans living in California ?), and I also changed the order, giving priority to the lynchings of abolitionists, since e.g. Elijah Lovejoy was lynched in 1837. --Rsk6400 (talk) 08:25, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

Ok. The name of chapter 3 is "The West". The Cite AV template is kicking back an error. I don't think it's meant for audio books. I'll let you figure all that out. I'm surprised there isn't an audio book template, but an audio book is really just a book with the only difference being a time instead of a page. DolyaIskrina (talk) 16:13, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

Hi Generalrelative

Okay @Generalrelative: please tell me what's wrong with this source. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 17:39, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Short answer: Wikipedia is based on WP:SECONDARY sources. Generalrelative (talk) 17:45, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

@Generalrelative: I get the sense that you came up with that answer after you undid the revision, based on the lack of reason given. Especially since WP:SECONDARY is explicitly not about studies. If you scroll up very slightly you will see a section that explicitly classifies reliable sources as such things as: "Peer-reviewed journals, Books published by university presses, University-level textbooks." My source is in fact a Secondary Source. It is a study conducted upon primary sources. I think you are using the rules to enforce your POV. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 18:10, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Given that we appear to be discussing a secondary source I'd like to hear the long answer. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:19, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I'd really like to hear it too. Especially as statistics about Lynchings are freely available, and he is suddenly saying this is controversial? What part is controversial, @Generalrelative:? It seems like they are engaging in disruptive editing for unspecified reasons to me. There's nothing controversial about what I've written, and you can see a similar distribution of races and genders on the List of lynching victims in the United States. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 18:25, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

@TiggyTheTerrible: Please don't refer to me as "he". Thanks, Generalrelative (talk) 18:29, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Not for this data, which was compiled by the authors. Here's what the source states:

When combined with the new Tolnay-Beck data (Beck 2015), we record 4,467 total victims of lynching from 1883 to 1941. Of these victims, 4,027 were men, 99 were women, and 341 were unknown gender (although likely male); 3,265 were black, 1,082 were white, 71 were Mexican or of Mexican descent, 38 were American Indian, 10 were Chinese, and 1 was Japanese.

And here's TiggyTheTerrible's close paraphrase:

From 1883 to 1941 there were roughly 4,467 victims of lynching. Of these, 4,027 were male, and 99 female. 341 were of unknown gender, but are assumed likely male. Roughly 3,265 were black, 1,082 were white, 71 were Mexican or of Mexican descent, 38 were American Indian, 10 were Chinese, and one was Japanese.

Note also that such close paraphrasing is also prohibited. Generalrelative (talk) 18:28, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Compiling other sources is inherently secondary... Although I do share your concerns about close paraphrasing. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:29, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Is it? My understanding is that what makes a source secondary is commenting on data compiled by others. Generalrelative (talk) 18:31, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

What Horse Eye's Back says, yes. Synthesizing data is already secondary (an act of interpretation), which is why we won't allow it here. Sure, it needs to be rewritten, maybe--but then, WP:LIMITED might well apply here. "Roughly", BTW, that's not OK here: the source didn't indicate any kind of "roughness". Drmies (talk) 18:33, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I can rephrase it, or add it as a full quote if needed. But since @Generalrelative: rejected it in that exact form, I'm not sure how they can make that argument here. General, as a side note, I am sorry if I referred to you as 'he'. I have been trying to refer to everyone as they, but I may have slipped. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 18:36, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, TiggyTheTerrible. I appreciate the effort. Generalrelative (talk) 18:44, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I'll defer to your judgment, Drmies. I've been frustrated with TiggyTheTerrible's persistent attempts to insert male victimhood into a number of articles recently, so I may have jumped the gun in this instance. If you agree that this edit on its own conforms with policy I suppose it should stay. I'll go ahead and self-revert. Generalrelative (talk) 18:43, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Tiggy, I'm fine with either a rephrase or a direct quote; whatever looks more elegant. As far as I'm concerned your source is fine: it's secondary, BTW it's published in a peer-reviewed journal. The map that is linked in the article is very interesting; lots of articles still need to be written. Robert Wilson, Montgomery, Alabama, 1896... Generalrelative, obviously I can't comment on the editor's career or habits; I haven't looked at them. But yes, the source is acceptable here. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 18:45, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Thank you @Drmies: How about: "From 1883 to 1941 there were found to be 4,467 victims of lynching. Of these, 4,027 were male, and 99 female. 341 were of unknown gender, but are assumed to be likely male. In terms of ethnicity; 3,265 were black, 1,082 were white, 71 were Mexican or of Mexican descent, 38 were American Indian, ten were Chinese, and one was Japanese." If the map from the article is interesting, would it be reasonable to add it? I didn't realise we could do that, if so. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 18:47, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Sure, that looks fine to me, but I didn't do a deep dive because LIMITED offers leeway (oddly enough it allows the opposite of leeway, in a way...). You can scrap "found to be", as far as I'm concerned, since that only adds a passive phrase. As for the map, I think that would be a very appropriate link--the current section (see my last edit in the article) is pretty bad, just a dump. But it might fit better in Lynching in the United States, an article with problems, and with a different but also problematic EL section. Drmies (talk) 18:52, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Thank you @Drmies:. I'll get right on that. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 19:02, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I think you are right about the image being better on that page, though I've just taken a look at the wiki rules on images on commons and I'm not sure I'm allowed to upload it. Is there a procedure for adding cited images like this? Or am I fine just putting it on commons? Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 19:12, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure if I follow you, Tiggy--it's an interactive map, not an image, and I'm suggesting putting the link in the EL section. Like, "Interactive map of lynchings in the United States, 1883-1941" or something like that. Drmies (talk) 19:30, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Oh! I'm sorry lol. I'll go do that. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 19:50, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Breaking up the article by region

I've been thinking that you guys are right that this thing is fairly painful to read and navigate. I think that copying relevent info over to regional versions of the page and then linking them from this one would be a good idea. I think most of these will already have a page, like America, but if not it shouldn't be too difficult to make a bunch of new pages. Leaving just two lines of basic overall numbers for each region on this page might be a good idea, that way you can scroll down it and get an overview - then click to each page for the details on the subject. What do you guys think? Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 23:26, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

Well. I had a go at porting it across. Please take a look at the Lynching in the United States page to see what you think. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 19:15, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

No, sorry. I totally agree that the article was too long and unwieldy. But: The longer version had at least the advantage that the fact that lynching played a central role in maintaining White supremacy in the U.S. South was mentioned. Lynchings didn't "happen", they were often consciously incited by members of the White élite, something that many people in the U.S. have never forgotten. --Rsk6400 (talk) 19:38, 26 January 2022 (UTC)

I restored the text and then removed some of what I thought least relevant. But I admit that the rest is still too long. --Rsk6400 (talk) 08:21, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: Uh, I'm not sure I follow your explanation. We have a separate article on Lynchings in the United States. I'm not clear at all on why the general Lynchings page needs a whopping 2000 word essay about the same topic planted in the middle of it. Did you drop part of the article into your response by mistake? I'm very confused by it. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 18:11, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

Few people click on links. So, moving content to a different article and then link it has the effect that few people read that content. That's why I think the most important statements should still be kept in this article. And the political context of most lynchings that targeted African Americans was White supremacy. That's extremely important, even today you cannot understand U.S. politics without knowing the horribly racist history. The other thing is WP:BALASP: E.g. the section on India covers some 20 lynchings, the U.S. section covers more than 4000. So the U.S. section has to be longer than the India section. As you may have seen from my last edits, I also want to reduce the U.S. section. I won't oppose further reducing it, but I believe some core content should be kept. --Rsk6400 (talk) 19:16, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

I appreciate that there's a lot of context to get over, but the article itself is already heavily about the American perspective and the USA section itself is waaay too long. Isn't there some way we could condense that a little? It seems like it's trying to give the entire history, but it's fairly random about the bits it picks. Or, at least, the original version was. I've seriously no idea what the section about Californian federal law was doing in there, for example. If we could maybe chop that down by half, at least, I think that would be a fairly major improvement. I mean, it looks like a fairly 'in brief' thing now - but it's seriously about 1/3 of the length of the article, and there are other countries too. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 19:28, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

I agree. Rsk6400 (talk) 07:18, 28 January 2022 (UTC)

To be honest, I think the more stuff that's there, the less likely people are to read the main page as well as they'll think it's just a retred. I think we really should just move 90% of it. Tiggy The Terrible (talk) 21:34, 28 January 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Further_reading#Reliable

@Rsk6400: Editors most frequently choose high-quality reliable sources. However, other sources may be appropriate, including: historically important publications; creative works or primary sources discussed extensively in the article; and seminal, but now outdated, scientific papers. When such sources are listed, the relevance of the work should be explained by a brief annotation.

Given a historical subject, Wikipedia should not shy away from naming even the most vile of sources, since it gives the reader a good impression of the thinking at the time. Removing a contemprary source from the NAACP on the topic of lynching is just unproductive. Include an annotation if you want, but don't whitewash and don't sugarcoat it. Also do not confuse policy with an essay Kleuske (talk) 12:42, 29 January 2022 (UTC)

@Kleuske: Before everything else: Can you please explain your edit summary, Don't lie in edit summaries. Thanks. To me, it looks like a personal attack. Rsk6400 (talk) 12:54, 29 January 2022 (UTC)

Before anything else, can you please keep this discussion on topic? Thanks. Kleuske (talk) 12:57, 29 January 2022 (UTC)