Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard

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Two branches of the same tree: OW-JP-AH and WCE-WRD/WCD

Operation World, Joshua Project and Asia Harvest

Asia Harvest (https://www.asiaharvest.org/) is an American Christian missionary organisation focusing on Asia and especially on China. They produce extremely detailed (and overestimated) fantasy statistics about Christians for each one of the smallest administrative divisions of the country.

Let's take, for example, the purported 2020 statistics for Shanghai (https://www.asiaharvest.org/christians-in-china-stats/shanghai). As you can see, they extrapolate absolute numbers on the basis of the very same percentage values for the total population numbers of most of the districts, and then the resulting numbers are divided according to the various statistical subcategories. Amongst the numbers in the tens of subcategories, they cite sources for only three of them, and they are some journals (probably missionary journals) dated to 1990, 1991 and 1992, while the general data are presented as being dated to 2020. The source for some of the totals is, otherwise, Operation World (https://operationworld.org/), "the definitive volume of prayer information about the world", associated with the Joshua Project, which is already classified as unreliable in the WP:RSP list.

I propose that Asia Harvest and Operation World be added to the Joshua Project entry in the WP:RSP list. Besides, on the Wikipedia article about Operation World it is written that the subject is related to the World Christian Encyclopedia, the predecessor of what is now published as the World Christian Database and World Religion Database, themselves thoroughly discussed in 2018 and 2022-2023, and listed in WP:RSP. Æo (talk) 18:09, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

I ping Erp who raised doubts about the extreme precision of WCD/WRD data in the abovementioned 2022-2023 discussion, since the same argument applies to this case. Æo (talk) 18:16, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Besides, on the Wikipedia article about Operation World it is written that the subject is related to the World Christian Encyclopedia, the predecessor of what is now published as the World Christian Database and World Religion Database, themselves thoroughly discussed in 2018 and 2022-2023

The meaning of this point is somewhat lost on me. According to the close of the linked 2023 discussion, There is no consensus to deprecate these sources (bolding added). If consider Asia Harvest or Operation World is/are affiliated with/comparable to the WCE as a source, that would suggest not deprecating them, but instead merely advising editors to use them with prudence while favoring, where available, stronger, more certainly reliable sources. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 18:43, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

They are clearly not the very same as the WRD/WCD (which is nonetheless questionable, and this is why it is in the perennial sources' list and the closing statement also says that there is rough consensus to attribute it and prefer better sources), at least according to what I have been able to find, although they cross-reference to each other (it is unclear to what extent). Asia Harvest and Operation World are on the other hand directly related to the Joshua Project, which is classifed as unreliable in the perennial sources' list: The Joshua Project is an ethnological database created to support Christian missions. It is considered to be generally unreliable due to the lack of any academic recognition or an adequate editorial process. The Joshua Project provides a list of sources from which they gather their data, many of which are related evangelical groups and they too should not be used for ethnological data as they are questionable sources.. Æo (talk) 19:41, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Addendum:

• In The Ethos of Operation World we can read the following statement: We pray that these statistics and prayer points present a reasonably balanced account of what God is doing in our world and of the challenges facing us as we press on to complete the Great Commission. Apart from Operation World, only the World Christian Database/World Religions Database shares our ambition (folly?) in attempting so massive a task as compiling a comprehensive body of data relating to the world’s religions, denominations, and churches, as well as to the progress of the Great Commission.. Here, Operation World and the WRD/WCD are clearly defined as confessional, evangelical entities working together for the "progress of the Great Commission", which is unclear whether it refers to the doctrinal concept or to the American fellowship of evangelical groups which disbanded in 2020.
• In this paper by the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, some of whose members are also the editors of the WRD/WCD, on pp. 16-17 the methodologies of the latter are compared to those of Operation World.

Æo (talk) 20:16, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Apologies for this, but you seem to be saying two different things simultaneously. First you say that They are clearly not the very same (bolding added); then you say they are clearly defined as confessional, evangelical entities working together (bolding added). Are they together, or are they not; and in either case, why is that a reason for depreciation of Asia Harvest (which is the source I thought was under discussion).

In any case, it is not so clear to this reader as it is to you. The Ethos statement does not seem like evidence of organizational collaboration. Rather, it reads as an observation that they share a field of study: both are attempts at compiling a comprehensive body of data relating to the world’s religions, denominations, and churches. To use another example, both Michael Burlingame and Ronald White shared the ambition (folly?) in attempting so massive a task as narrating the life of Abraham Lincoln in single-volume biographies. But they were not collaborators.

As for the "Christianity in its Global Context, 1970–2020" document, the comparison drawn is moreover a contrast, pointing out how Operation World's definitions of "evangelical" inflate their numbers compared to the World Christian Database.

Finally, simply as a note, you emphasize connections between GCTS faculty and the World Christian Database but have left out how World Christian Database is published by Brill, an academic publisher that employs editorial and peer review. (Likewise, World Christian Encyclopedia was published by Oxford University Press, also an academic publisher that employs editorial and peer review.) That, plus their relative contemporaneity (as both were published in the twenty-first century) instills a great deal of confidence in WCD and WCE as sources.

In any case, this has been a digression. The posted discussion at hand pertains to Asia Harvest and Operation World, which have different publishers and different traits. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 21:45, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

It is ascertained that WCE and OW originated as two branches of the same tree, and that they maintain some connections, as hinted to in the statement above about the "Great Commission" and underlined especially in the sentence in that paper Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background which I have quoted below (17:04, January 2 addendum): There has been a long history of close collaboration and mutual sharing of information among Operation World ... and the World Christian Encyclopedia. This is what I meant, and I am still investigating to find further, clearer evidences. Besides, AH and OW appear to be related as well, given that the few references showed by AH are mostly to OW statistics, and in turn OW is clearly connected to the Joshua Project (they are authored/edited by the same person, Patrick Johnstone), which is acknowledged to be a completely unreliable source.

Amongst the many discussions about the JP, read this 2008 one, which was particularly animated (and which highlights that already back then there were strange waves of spamming of this type of sources, as I myself noticed more recently); some quotes: [JP is] a very aggressive evangelistic project. ... Linking or even mentioning this project on this kind of scale should be considered as fundamentalist Christian spam. (Jeroenvrp); All links to the Joshua Project should be deleted immediately and without question. The information on the site is often original research and totally incorrect. It is not a reliable source at all. The fact that someone can't find alternative information on Google is no excuse: get out of your chair and head to a library. (Caniago); Here is another example which illustrates the sort of disinformation they are spreading. They invented a whole range sub-ethnic groups of the Javanese ethnic group, yet there are no published academic sources (in books or peer reviewed papers) which mention these sub-ethnic groups at all. There are a plethora of other examples of their disinformation if you compare their website against reliable sources. (Caniago); The project site is not an academic source. ... The Joshua Project has an religious agenda. Anyone should agree on that. This is very clear on the site and not even that, it is also very offensive. Not only for people of these ethnic groups, but for anyone who condemn these kind of aggressive evangelisation practices. I even find it very scary how they present the data (e.g. see the column "Progress Scale"). It's like: "evangelism meets the Borg". ... The data on the Joshua Project is unreliable, like others before me have proved. ... Information from the English Wikipedia is easily translated to other Wikipedia projects. Although people who translate should double check these kind of sources, unfortunately sources like the Joshua Project are spreading like a virus to those other projects. That's why I am here now, because I noticed the Joshua Project was listed as a source on the Dutch Wikipedia and learned that they came from here. So know your responsibility! ... To conclude this: I am not accusing individual Wikipedians for "fundamentalist Christian spamming". No, what I mean that on a larger scale it's "fundamentalist Christian spamming". (Jeroenvrp); There are no cases where there Josuha project is the best source of data. A bunch of evangelical missionaries are the last people who can be trusted to present non-biased reliable ethnic data; the examples we have given proven the case. (Caniago).

Regarding the fact that some of the sources we are discussing here (WCE and its successors) have been published by renowned publishing houses, this does not make them reliable. This was already pointed out in the 2022-2023 discussion. The "peer review" and "editorial process" is very often carried out by people belonging to the very same agenda and organisations (those American evangelical organisations). Take for instance the paper Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background that I quoted below: it was written by D. A. Miller, peer reviewed/edited/co-authored by Patrick Johnstone of the WEC International, and published on the Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion founded by Rodney Stark (known for his publications which were very supportive of Christianity); the journal's editorial board includes Massimo Introvigne, whose CESNUR and related publications are themselves currently listed as unreliable in the WP:RSP list (and I personally consider CESNUR, or at least some of its publications, as much more reliable than the sources we are discussing here). Regarding the fact, and the problem, that the WCE and its successors have been published as seemingly academic resources, there are some further considerations expressed in a recent critical essay which I will cite and quote in a separate section below (cf. #World Christian Encyclopedia and World Religion Database/World Christian Database). Æo (talk) 00:06, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

I would agree that CESNUR and its related publications are more reliable than the assessment listed on Wikipedia's current Perennial Sources page would suggest. I think the generally unreliable characterization is inaccurate and that the academic field of religious studies has a much more favorable impression of CESNUR than Wikipedia's Perennial Sources page does.

Patrick Johnstone was not a peer reviewer of "Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background: A Global Census". Blind peer review means the reviewer is anonymous. Johnstone and Duane Miller are listed co-authors of the paper. The two peer reviewers would have been two other scholars whose identities neither of us know.

Your impression that renowned publishing houses like Brill and Oxford University Press are somehow being subverted by a conspiracy of Evangelical authors who defy the consensus of the field of religious demography stretches this editor's credulity. The peer review process is more robust than that.

That information is shared between World and WCE does not necessarily make one unreliable merely because the other is. Different sources can use the same raw data to arrive at different conclusions, such as how WCE and Operation World arrive at quite different total numbers, projections, etc.

In any case, I think that an earlier comment in this discussion from Erp rings true: for this particular discussion, we should concentrate on whether Asia Harvest and/or Operation World are reliable. There is not a consensus between us about WCE or WCD or WRD. Maybe there can yet be a consensus between us about Asia Harvest and Operation World. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 00:49, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes. I agree with P-Makoto: "Your impression that renowned publishing houses like Brill and Oxford University Press are somehow being subverted by a conspiracy of Evangelical authors who defy the consensus of the field of religious demography stretches this editor's credulity. The peer review process is more robust than that." There is no evidence that the process is somehow compromised and is just speculation. Borders on conspiracy theory actually. In fact they show divergence of data too per already quoted differences in numbers in the sources. They are not equivalent or the same. I also agree that we should concentrate on whether Asia Harvest and/or Operation World are reliable. Ramos1990 (talk) 01:12, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

P-Makoto, I never wrote about "a conspiracy of Evangelical authors who defy the consensus" and are trying to subvert academic publishers. Apart from this, you wrote that the Ethos statement does not seem like evidence of organizational collaboration, but the statement in the Miller & Johnstone paper clearly tells us about a long history of close collaboration and mutual sharing of information. Also re-read Erp's comment below, with an excerpt from the Operation World book (2010 edition, p. 25) telling us that ... the Joshua Project List, the World Christian Encyclopedia and a handful of other resources are at the heart of this information, which is both fuel for prayer and data for mission strategy, and on that page the discourse of the author is general, about the shared project in which OW, the JP and the WCE are all actors. In my opinion, there is enough evidence to affirm that the WCE and the OW, and their affiliated projects, are still closely related. The discussion about the WCE and its successors, however, continues below (cf. #World Christian Encyclopedia and World Religion Database/World Christian Database). Æo (talk) 18:39, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Regarding P-Makoto, I never wrote about:

You wrote that Regarding the fact that some of the sources we are discussing here (WCE and its successors) have been published by renowned publishing houses, this does not make them reliable. This was already pointed out in the 2022-2023 discussion. The "peer review" and "editorial process" is very often carried out by people belonging to the very same agenda and organisations (those American evangelical organisations) (bolding added). P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 19:11, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

The next question is the reliability of "Operation World", multiple editions by Patrick Johnstone and Jason Mandryk with the latest being the 7th edition, published 2010, plus a web site. It is explicitly a prayer guide and does not seem to be peer reviewed. I note in reference to the Joshua Project that Operation World's website states: "The Joshua Project is our default site for people group information." https://operationworld.org/prayer-resources/helpful-resources/ Looking at the google preview of the book has "...Joshua Project List, the World Christian Encyclopedia and a handful of other resources are at the heart of this information" Given the dependence of "Operation World" on Joshua Project a "Generally unreliable source" and lack of peer review for the work itself, I would say Operation World must also be listed as "Generally unreliable source". Erp (talk) 20:13, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree, and the WRD/WCD should be re-assessed as well, given its connection with Asia Harvest/Operation World. In Darrell L. Bock (2013), The Cape Town Commitment: A Confession of Faith, A Call to Action: Bibliographic Resources, p. 32, we read: These two books come from the same stable. While up to the mid-1990s the databases behind Operation World and the World Christian Encyclopedia were virtually identical, they began to diverge in the 1990s, partly because Operation World took a more generous definition of the word 'evangelical'. In 2010, World Christian Encyclopedia said there were 300 million evangelicals worldwide, whereas Operation World said there were 550 million.... On the same page, the World Religion Database/World Christian Database and the Atlas of Global Christianity are identified as the continuations of the World Christian Encyclopedia, while The Future of Global Christianity is identified as built on the database of Operation World. Other minor publications associated with them (listed on the same page) are: World Christian Trends – AD 30-2200, World Churches Handbook, Global Religious Trends 2010 to 2020, Megatrends and the Persecuted Church, Global Restrictions on Religion, Global Pentecostalism, The New Faces of Christianity, The Next Christendom, Barna Updates (https://www.barna.org), and Global Mapping International (https://www.gmi.org). Ultimately, they are all affiliated with the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization, the same who launched the 10/40 window concept. Æo (talk) 21:17, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

The assessment of the World Religion Database and World Christianity Database strikes me as a separate question. If they are re-assessed, I would encourage re-assessing them "upward" rather than "downward". The source you cite, Cape Town Commitment, even identifies how the two sources are different: Operate World took a more generous definition of the word 'evangelical'. In 2010, World Christian Encyclopedia said there were 300 million evangelicals worldwide, whereas Operation World said there were 550 million. You speak of WCE/WRD/WCDs' connection with Asia Harvest/Operation World; however, what seems to be demonstrated is their disconnection; if Operation World and Asia Harvest are overstating, WRD/WCD/WCE apparently are holding back in comparison. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 01:23, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think that the WRD/WCD should be re-assessed "upwards"; their problems, which are still different from those of the AH/OW discussed here, were pointed out and thoroughly discussed with extensive quotes from critical sources in the specific 2022-2023 discussion. AH/OW and WCD/WRD are ultimately two branches of the same tree, dedicated to "the progress of the Great Commission" (cf. above), and this does not mean that if one of the two branches is unreliable the other is reliable, and vice versa. Both of them have problems, albeit differentiated. Æo (talk) 01:48, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

There appears to not be consensus between us. The specified 2022-2023 discussion also had extensive references from laudatory sources which reviewed the Encyclopedia positively. I developed an impression that the listing of WRD/WCD/WCE as "additional considerations" may have been excessive and not the right call.

But that would be a discussion different from that of the present one about Asia Harvest. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 03:19, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

I think we should concentrate on whether Asia Harvest and/or Operation World are reliable. Given that Operation World depends on the already listed as generally unreliable, Joshua Project, and Asia Harvest depends on Operation World that both should also be listed as generally unreliable. In addition neither seem to be peer reviewed. Does anyone disagree? Erp (talk) 03:38, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Before leaping to "Generally Unreliable", may I ask whether "Additional Considerations" would be appropriate, and if you do not think so, why not?

I would note that peer review, while a gold standard, is not Wikipedia's only standard. Many sources subject only to editorial review and not peer review (newspapers, magazines, nonfiction books published with non-academic but still reputable presses) are accepted on Wikipedia, so the lack of peer review is not itself necessarily a point against. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 06:19, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

P-Makoto, True. Your observations are accurate with respect to the additional comments you have brought up. Indeed the jump to generally unreliable is why the RFC for WRD/WCD/WCE failed depreciation petty badly across the board. The academic sources did not support such a claim. Context matters to what Asia Harvest is being used on. Also numbers on China are hard to pin down. All polls are estimates for that. Ramos1990 (talk) 08:20, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree with Erp that AH/OW should be classified as "generally unreliable" given the precedent represented by the related Joshua Project. The latter was the subject of eleven discussions on this noticeboard, and it was decidedly assessed as unreliable; just read how editors commented here and here, for instance: ...some argue based on the idea that they wouldn't have any reason to give inaccurate figures. This isn't a useful argument. There's also strong opposition to using them as a source. According to their list of data sources, a solid majority of their sources are just other evangelical groups... They shouldn't be ranked beside census counts as equivalent... They should be considered unusable due to a lack of verifiable methodology and recognition for statistical or academic contribution, even when setting aside all questions of advocacy and bias. (Elaqueate); We have no idea where they get their data, it's not part of their primary mission, and there's no significant penalty to them for errors, so I see no reason to consider them as a reliable source for population statistics. (Mangoe); I looked at the source, and I believe you. It's a hobby site by three random religious enthusiasts. Certainly not a reliable source for population data. (Alsee). Regarding the use of non-academic sources ("newspapers, magazines, nonfiction books published with non-academic but still reputable presses"), P-Makoto, yes, I think they should be eschewed and I always try to eschew them when I contribute to Wikipedia. Besides, other considerations apply in this specific case, given that we are dealing with a field of information, statistics, for which there are official censuses and statistical institutions which provide "hard data" — i.e. precise numerical results which constitute "facts" subject to minimal interpretation —, and even in the case we need "soft data" — i.e. unofficial and not always accurate data —, there are still impartial and reliable survey agencies to rely upon. In said field of information, we do not need WP:SPECULATIONs produced by organisations with blatant agendas of evangelism, proselytism or propaganda through unclear methodologies (in our case the methodologies are declared, indeed: word of mouth from priests, pastors and other church staff). Æo (talk) 14:08, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Addendum: Here other users expressed other clear evaluations of the quality of the JP: Religious advocacy group, cites unreliable data sources. (PaleoNeonate); Publishes false or fabricated information, and should be deprecated. You cannot trust any of that website's claimed population numbers for ethnic groups even to an order of magnitude. (anonymous IP); Very obviously unreliable. Attempting to use it as a source is absurd. (Tayi Arajakate). The use of the Joshua Project on Wikipedia even caused the creation of an article about a non-existing ethnic group: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jawa Pesisir Lor. Æo (talk) 15:06, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Regarding the use of non-academic sources ("newspapers, magazines, nonfiction books published with non-academic but still reputable presses"), P-Makoto, yes, I think they should be eschewed and I always try to eschew them when I contribute to Wikipedia.

As individual editors, we all I suppose have the option to hold ourselves to higher standards than Wikipedia's; however, it is not consensus to, as a project, eschew newspapers, magazines, and nonfiction books published with non-academic but still reputable presses for being such. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 21:29, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Looking at https://www.asiaharvest.org/christians-in-china-stats/china Multiple sources, I initially thought the TSPM and CPA figures were accurate since they are possibly official government sources (these are registered and recognized churches) except notes 3 and 4 indicate that the registered protestant number is from a 2010 survey that found 23 million registered protestants and that the numbers were adjusted to include non-adults and presumably the decade since. The number has been adjusted to 39,776,275 for 2020. In addition the table apparently took the 2010 Operation World figures of 86,910,600 protestants in 2010 (unregistered House Church and TSPM) and apparently projected forward to 2020 and got 109,650,630 (split between the 39,776,275 registered and 69,874,355 unregistered (note the increasing specificity during the data manipulation). I decided to look at what might be the overall source "2020, Hattaway, The China Chronicles, no page number given" which seems to be a 7 book series "The China Chronicles" by Paul Hattaway and published, by as far as I can see, "Asia Harvest" an organization Hattaway co-founded with his wife. I'm guessing he or his organization is also responsible for this table published on their website. Both count as self-published and not at all peer reviewed. They might accurately cite other sources. Erp (talk) 19:37, 1 January 2024 (UTC)

Here we can read that the book Operation China by Paul Hattaway has <...a foreword by Patrick Johnstone, author of the best-selling Operation World, who "I have relied much on the information in 'Operation China' during compilation of the section on China for the latest edition of 'Operation World'. May this unique book go a long way to focus prayer on the need for the gospel among these peoples.'>. Patrick Johnstone is mentioned in your comment above (20:13, January 1). AH and OW are definitely related. Æo (talk) 02:00, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

I found 54+ references to "Asia Harvest" in Wikipedia. A lot have to do with descriptions of people/languages where Asia Harvest in turn is citing another source (I suspect the "Encyclopedic Dictionary of Chinese Linguistics" for at least some which is a 1991 work in Chinese [Zhongguo yu yan xue da ci dian 中国语言学大辞典]). My guess is that Asia Harvest was used by wiki editors because it has translated some of the information into English. I suspect editors would be better off for a comprehensive work relying on Ethnologue (which has some faults but is generally accepted by scholars) though it does require a subscription. Glottolog is also useful especially for references to works on a language (less so for numbers of speakers).

Operation World is also cited (oddly enough mostly in articles about Baháʼí such as Baháʼí_Faith_in_Nigeria) which has "Estimates of membership vary widely - a 2001 estimate by Operation World showed 1000 Baháʼís in 2001 while the Association of Religion Data Archives (relying on World Christian Encyclopedia) estimated some 38,172 Baháʼís." Another source had about 15,000 in 2000 (Lee, Anthony A. (2011). The Baha'i faith in Africa: establishing a new religious movement, 1952-1962. Studies of religion in Africa. Leiden ; Boston: Brill. ISBN 978-90-04-22600-5., page 107, itself citing an unpublished article). I'm inclined to go with the peer reviewed book. Erp (talk) 05:05, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Duane Miller's Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background: A Global Census (n.b. edited by Patrick Johnstone, WEC International), questioned on this noticeboard in 2017, was built on Operation World and Joshua Project data. On pp. 3-4 we find further details about their parent organisations (as of 2015) and author: The results of this massive, multidecade data collection effort were eventually made available in the form of the religious data on the Operation World website, which is hosted by Global Mapping International, and the ethnolinguistic data on the interactive website of the Joshua Project, for which Johnstone was a senior editor. Therefore additional details on the sources of our information can be found at the website of the Joshua Project, which is currently managed by the U.S. Center for World Missions.. If my understanding is correct, based on our previous findings, Johnstone was ultimately behind both Operation World and the Joshua Project. Æo (talk) 16:23, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Addendum: Let's keep this secondary, as suggested above, but on the same p. 3 we read: There has been a long history of close collaboration and mutual sharing of information among Operation World, the Summer Institute of Linguistics, and the World Christian Encyclopedia.. Æo (talk) 17:04, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

The Miller and Johnstone source clearly supports that Operation World is a reliable source by the way. Ramos1990 (talk) 20:08, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Johnstone is the editor/author of the OW and JP themselves. Therefore, that paper is a completely unreliable source. Besides, in the 2017 discussion one of the commentators correctly pointed out that the study misused the word "census" (which has a very precise meaning) in its title, misleading readers to think that the statistics presented were really from a census, when they were not: The author declares that he has published "a global census": the problem is that a census is "an official enumeration of the population, with details as to age, sex, occupation, etc.". So no, it's clearly not a census of any kind. Far from that. (AlessandroDe). Æo (talk) 19:46, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Heartily disagree, you can't point to a walled garden as evidence of reliability. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 05:27, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed with AEo and Erp, these publications should really just be grouped together in one GUNREL entry here. They're all interdependent and interrelated using the same evangelical propagandizing. JoelleJay (talk) 22:08, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@JoelleJay: I agree that they should be grouped as a single WP:GUNREL entry. Would you also support a deprecation? I decided to open this discussion since a few days ago I noticed that the OW-JP, through AH, is still being spammed throughout various articles without attention to its problematic nature and classification as unreliable in the perennial sources' list. This has been ongoing since the 2000s, unfortunately, and even on other Wikipedias, as the user Jeroenvrp from the Dutch Wikipedia complained in the comment quoted above from 2008: unfortunately sources like the Joshua Project are spreading like a virus. This is why I think that, perhaps, it is time for the further step of deprecation.

Also, what is your opinion about the related World Christian Encyclopedia and World Religion Database/World Christian Database discussed below? Æo (talk) 01:43, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Grouping all three together under a single GUNREL entry seems straightforward enough, its a compact ecosystem and all of them are generally unreliable. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:42, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

• I think it is worthwhile to open a new RfC for the deprecation of the OW-JP-AH datasets. Back in 2021, Alaexis, who opened that year's RfC, which resulted in the classification of the JP as "unreliable", complained that it was still being used. Things have not changed since; just take a look at these September 2023 additions (of OW-JP data via AH), complete with a map (and this is not the only case).--Æo (talk) 21:06, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

RfC: OW-JP-AH

The #Operation World, Joshua Project and Asia Harvest are databases of religion demographics related to the Christian missionary movement. OW and the JP are both edited by the Christian missionary Patrick Johnstone, while AH, which reproduces OW-JP statistics for Asia and China, is edited by the Christian missionary Paul Hattaway. The JP has been the subject of more than ten discussions on this noticeboard, with almost all comments finding it completely unreliable. The latest discussion with RfC in 2021 decided its inclusion in the perennial sources' list as a generally unreliable source. Despite this, it is still widely used throughout Wikipedia (cf. 1), and its associated projects OW and AH are also widely used (cf. 3, 4), and this was already a matter of complaint in the previous discussions.

Should the JP, and its associated projects OW and AH, be WP:DEPRECATED? Answer yes or no.

Æo (talk) 17:30, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

---

• Yes, it's time to deprecate them. The JP was categorised as unreliable in the perennial sources' list with a 2021 RfC, after more than ten discussions on this noticeboard in which comments were almost universally unanimous on the serious unreliability of the source. Despite its classification as unreliable, it, and its related projects OW and AH, continue to be used uncritically in various Wikipedia articles.--Æo (talk) 17:37, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, unreliable sources, frequently discussed. 2A02:1810:BC3A:D800:A050:6C5A:A34E:91A2 (talk) 11:30, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

• Bad RfC -- also, it seems like from the timestamps that it's been snuck in through the back of an existing RfC thread. SamuelRiv (talk) 20:02, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

World Christian Encyclopedia and World Religion Database/World Christian Database

Our latest discussion about the World Christian Encyclopedia and its successors, the World Religion Database and World Christian Database, currently also presenting their statistics through the platform of the Association of Religion Data Archives, was in late 2022-early 2023. As demonstrated in the section above (see comments 20:13, 1 January by Erp; 20:16, 1 January addendum by Æo; 17:04, 2 January addendum by Æo; 18:39, 3 January by Æo), the WCE and its successors have some connection and/or collaborate and share information with Patrick Johnstone's Operation World and Joshua Project and their network (incl. Paul Hattaway's Asia Harvest, et al.), and ultimately the WCE and OW branched out around the mid 1990s from the same statistical database, and they all seem to be affiliated with the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization (see comment 21:17, 1 January by Æo).

A new critical essay about the WCE and its successors, which adds to those already mentioned in the foregoing 2022-2023 discussion, was published right last year: Adam Stewart's Problematizing the Statistical Study of Global Pentecostalism: An Evaluation of David B. Barrett's Research Methodology, in Michael Wilkinson & Jörg Haustein's The Pentecostal World (Routledge, 2023, pp. 457-471). It criticises the methodologies of David B. Barrett, a Welsh Anglican priest and the creator of the WCE, which were used to compile the WCE itself. Todd M. Johnson and Gina A. Zurlo, who are also mentioned in the essay and are the theorists and directors of "Global Christianity" studies at the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, are otherwise the continuators of the WCE in the form of the WRD/WCD.

Within the essay, the author elaborates: <... what I call the “Pentecostal growth paradigm,” initially promulgated by David B. Barrett, and now ubiquitous within the field of Pentecostal studies, as well as four common critiques of the paradigm ... the complicated typology conceptualized by Barrett in the first edition of the World Christian Encyclopedia in order to classify and measure Pentecostals around the world ... the – very limited – information that Barrett provides regarding the data collection techniques that he used to gather the data contained in the first edition of the World Christian Encyclopedia ... the construct validity threats contained within Barrett’s typology of Pentecostalism and data collection techniques, which, I argue, provide sufficient evidence to substantiate previous claims that the Pentecostal growth paradigm lacks the methodological rigor required to provide valid research results ...> (p. 457).

Other quotes:

• pp. 457-458: Stewart explains that some Christian authors have pushed for: <... a trend of steadily increasing estimates of global Pentecostal adherence ranging anywhere from 250 to 694 million ... The genealogy of this authorial ritual can be traced back to David B. Barrett’s original attempt to enumerate all of the various forms of global Christianity published in the first edition of the World Christian Encyclopedia in 1982, which, he argued, revealed the substantial numerical growth of Pentecostalism between 1968 and 1981. This is confirmed by Johnson who writes that “virtually all estimates for the number of Pentecostals in the world are related to Barrett’s initial detailed work”. Barrett persisted in this project for another two decades, which was continued by his closest academic successors, namely, Todd M. Johnson and, more recently, Gina A. Zurlo, who continue to record the ostensibly boundless growth of Pentecostalism around the world, a perspective which I refer to here as the Pentecostal growth paradigm ...>;
• p. 458: He explains that such a paradigm was adopted and fueled by church leaders: <... who flaunted estimates of Pentecostal growth in an attempt to legitimate their particular religious organizations, proselytistic efforts, beliefs, and/or practices. Non-Pentecostal scholars of Pentecostalism, of course, also played no small role in reifying the Pentecostal growth paradigm. Estimates of the dramatic numerical growth of Pentecostalism served “to legitimate their work among their disciplinary peers who largely understood Pentecostalism as either a social compensatory mechanism for the poor, uneducated, and oppressed or – from the opposite perspective – an oppressive form of cultural imperialism that homogenizes vulnerable poor and uneducated global populations” ...>, and explains that <Some scholars of Pentecostalism – even when sometimes citing the continually ballooning estimates of global Pentecostalism themselves – are critical of the Pentecostal growth paradigm, and, especially, of Barrett’s contribution to this discourse. In my review of the academic literature, I detect four common critiques of the Pentecostal growth paradigm. First are concerns that Barrett’s early research methodology might not have been sufficiently sophisticated to provide valid results. Second is the charge that Barrett’s use of the three waves metaphor carries an ahistorical, Americentric, and teleological bias ... Third, is a more specific critique closely related to the more general second critique, which asserts that, although the increasing prevalence of Pentecostal adherence around the world is not seriously debated by scholars of Pentecostalism, a significant portion of increasing Pentecostal growth estimates are the result of definitional sprawl rather than an increase in the actual number of adherents ...>;
• p. 459: He cites, amongst others: <Allan Anderson, who has characterized Barrett’s estimates of global Pentecostalism as, variously, “wild guesses,” “debatable,” “inaccurate or inflated,” “considerably inflated,” “wildly speculative” “controversial and undoubtedly inflated,” “inflated wild guesses,” and “statistical speculations” ...>;
• p. 463: <Barrett’s description of the data collection techniques that he used in order to gather the data contained in the frst edition of the World Christian Encyclopedia was incredibly short – just two paragraphs ... Another notable characteristic of the data collection techniques employed by Barrett is a very liberal approach to estimation. He wrote, for instance, “The word ‘approximately’ is the operative word in this survey; absolute precision and accuracy are not to be expected, nor in fact are they necessary for practical working purposes. This means that although the tables and other statistics may help readers who want specific individual figures, they are mainly designed to give the general-order picture set in the total national and global context. To this end, where detailed local statistics compiled from grass-roots sources have not been available or were incomplete, the tables supply general-order estimates provided by persons familiar with the local statistical situation.” Barrett even admits to extrapolating estimates of the total national populations of those Christian organizations that largely recorded only either child (e.g., Catholics who mainly record baptized infants) or adult (e.g., Baptists who mainly record confessing adults) adherents. He explained, “the missing figure … has been estimated and added either by the churches themselves or the editors.” Barrett explained, for instance, that he estimated the total number of Catholic adherents within a country “by multiplying total affiliated Catholics (baptized plus catechumens) by the national figure for the percentage of the population over 14 years old”.>;
• p. 464: Stewart comments that: <... his [Barrett's] cavalier approach to data collection and estimation raise significant red flags regarding the validity of his work.>;
• p. 467: <The presence of significant monomethod bias represents a catastrophic failure of Barrett’s research design, which, as a result, does not meet the minimum standards of valid social scientific research. In addition to this more fundamental construct validity threat, the first edition of the World Christian Encyclopedia also contains evidence of five other threats to construct validity relating to data collection techniques, namely, reactivity to the experimental situation, experimenter expectancies, attention and contact with participants, cues of the experimental situation, and timing of measurement.>;
• p. 468, Stewart concludes: Unfortunately, the research methodology employed by Barrett – specifically his typology of Pentecostalism and data collection techniques – was simply too flawed in order to provide valid social scientific research results that can be trusted and longitudinally or geographically compared. My analysis confirms Anderson’s claim that, “Scholars should no longer assume that there are some 600 million pentecostals in the world without further qualification”>.

I have also found further older papers containing negative critiques of the WCE and its successors:

• Marta Reynal-Querol & José G. Montalvo's A Theory of Religious Conflict and its Effect on Growth (Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, 2000). On p. 10 we read: <For the sake of comparison we also collected data directly from the World Christian Encyclopedia (WCE) using its division of groups. This data set has the advantage of being a time series, providing information for 1970, 1975 and 1980. However, as we pointed out before, this source has several shortcomings. ... Comparing to the other source of information we realize the data is biased towards Christian religion. ... The distribution of religious groups between 1970 and 1980 does not change in many countries. There are only about seventeen countries that present change in proportions. But those changes occur in countries where there is double practice and they usually imply an increase in the percentage of Christians ... Because of these reasons we take the data coming from the WCE with a lot of caution.>.
• Andrew McKinnon's "Christians, Muslims and Traditional Worshippers in Nigeria: Estimating the Relative Proportions from Eleven Nationally Representative Social Surveys", Review of Religious Research, 63(2): 303-315 (Sage, 2021). In it we read: <... those assessments that make use of multiple sources of data, such as the World Christian Database (WCD), have not tended to make their calculations publicly transparent, nor clarified how they have squared the differences between contrasting indicators.>; <Figures in the most recent edition of The World Christian Encyclopedia (Johnson and Zurlo 2020) draw on figures assembled and updated as part of the World Christian Database (WCD) ... None of the particular calculations are provided, nor is there any accounting for methodological decisions in any particular case; neither transparency nor replicability are in evidence, which makes social scientific evaluation of how they reached their conclusions impossible.>; <... they also note that the Database does seem to overestimate the Christian identification, and expressed concern about what appears to be uncritical acceptance of figures provided by religious groups of their membership. With reference to one denomination in Nigeria McKinnon (2020) has recently found evidence that supports the criticisms offered by Hsu et al (2008). WCD estimates for Anglican identification in Nigeria were found to be dramatically over-estimated due to The Church of Nigeria's un-evidenced membership claims.>

--Æo (talk) 18:48, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

I see that Wilkinson & Haustein argue there are meaningful flaws in the methodology of Barrett and WCE. This criticism in a reliable source of the demographic methodology and technique is the first indication to me that there is substantial reason to be cautious about using these sources. (I remain unconvinced that the socioreligious affiliations of certain authors and editors is as much reason for alarm as you have seemed to imply.)

With Wilkinson & Haustein's detailed criticism focusing on Pentecostal demographics, would we say that additional considerations must be taken when citing WCE for specifically Pentecostal demographics?

For now, I will pause my earlier musing that WCE/WRD/WCD could be re-assessed to "Generally reliable" and would consent to them being left listed as "Additional considerations". I would suggest the description in the table be changed to emphasize that the reason for such an assessment is that reliable sources have criticized the sources on methodological grounds and that the demographic conclusions require "further qualification". P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 10:25, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Context matters here.

These databases are global debases from academic publishers and they provide useful data that others simply do not have. All major undertakings like this will have some methodological issues and no survey or census is immune to it. No survey or census is definitive on religion. All provide pieces of the puzzle. Two examples one on another global demographic attempt and another on a country:

Actual estimates on the "atheism" demographics show how multiple surveys do not agree on the numbers or method per each country or globally. There are many reasons why this would be the case - countries vary in understanding of religion and diverse methods each one contains. For example you would think that determining atheist rates is easy (yes/no) but its more complicated. Zuckerman's study (Cambridge Companion to Atheism) [1] states "Determining what percentage of a given society believes in God – or doesn’t -- is fraught with methodological hurdles. First: low response rates; most people do not respond to surveys, and response rates of lower than 50% cannot be generalized to the wider society. Secondly: non-random samples. If the sample is not randomly selected – i.e., every member of the given population has an equal chance of being chosen -- it is non-generalizable. Third: adverse political/cultural climates. In totalitarian countries where atheism is governmentally promulgated and risks are present for citizens viewed as disloyal, individuals will be reluctant to admit that they do believe in God. Conversely, in societies where religion is enforced by the government and risks are present for citizens viewed as non-believers, individuals will be reluctant to admit that they don’t believe in Allah, regardless of whether anonymity is “guaranteed.” Even in democratic societies without governmental coercion, individuals often feel that it is necessary to say that are religious, simply because such a response is socially desirable or culturally appropriate."

At the end he had to sift through a grip of surveys his estimate ranges from 500 million 750 million atheists worldwide from this paper. Pretty wide range. His country by country ranges are complex in p. 15-17 using numerous databases. WCE and even Operation World are used in a few without issues by Zuckerman.

Even the census data can show wide divergence with other surveys in other countries like Britain. Voas and Bruce (2004) "Research note: The 2001 census and christian identification in Britain" [2] state "Results from the 2001 population census suggest that nearly 72% of people in England and Wales may be identified as Christian. This figure is substantially higher than the proportion found by the British Social Attitudes survey and other national studies. It is also higher than the broad estimates of the size of the ‘Christian community’ previously produced by the Christian Research Association, the leading source of religious statistics in the UK (Brierley, 2003:2.2)." And even note issues with census data collection ”Another problem seems more serious. Unlike opinion polls which ask questions directly of respondents, census forms are generally completed by one individual on behalf of the entire household. There is no rule about who should take responsibility, but typically it is the head of household or at least a senior member of it."

On the WCE, The Andrew McKinnon's source does state The editors of the World Christian Encyclopedia provide reasonable methodological reflections on the different sources upon which scholars may draw in order to estimate the different religious populations of the world, as well as some of the issues that crop up as one tries to reconcile sources that disagree (Johnson and Zurlo 2020: 897–914)."

And the Marta Reynal-Querol & José G. Montalvo source does say ”For the sake of comparison we also collected data directly from the World Christian Enciclopedia (WCE) using its division of groups. This data set has the advantage of being a time series, providing information for 1970, 1975 and 1980.”

Other sources like Hsu et al. 2008 deal with methodology directly and state [3] state "Scholars have raised questions about the WCD's estimates categories, and potential bias, but the data have not yet been systematically assessed. We test the reliability of the WCD by comparing its religious composition estimates to four other data sources (World Values Survey, Pew Global Assessment Project,CIA World Factbook, and the U.S. Department of State), finding that estimates are highly correlated....Religious composition estimates in the WCD are generally plausible and consistent with other data sets."

For WRD "Given the limitations of censuses, including incomplete and irregular global coverage, potential political bias swaying the findings and the absences of many religious groups from censuses, any religious demographic analysis must consult multiple sources.[4] They state their sources which include census and surveys as well and say they are transparent to the scholarly community p. 1. Ramos1990 (talk) 15:05, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Ramos,

Regarding your claim that these databases are global debases from academic publishers and they provide useful data that others simply do not have: this is simply false; there are statistics produced by national censuses, national statistical institutes, and independent reliable survey organisations. Regarding your claim that no survey or census is definitive on religion: censuses are official countings of the characteristics of the whole population of a country, and in the case they have any shortcomings there are other surveys produced by national statistical organisations or independent reliable survey organisations. "Independent reliable" organisations necessarily means non-confessional, non-missionary, non-evangelistic, while "survey" organisations necessarily means that they actually conduct polls among populations. The WCE/WRD/WCD, given the evidence, is neither the first, nor the second thing.

Regarding Zuckerman's study of worldwide atheism, I do not understand what it has to do with the case being discussed here: Zuckerman does not claim that his study is a census, and in any case I would not use it in Wikipedia articles in place of census statistics. Regarding Voas & Bruce's research, I also don't understand what it has to do with our case: statistics from the British Social Attitudes Survey and the Christian Research Association have never been given precedence either in Wikipedia or elsewhere over census statistics. I think that the 2001 British census finding that 72% of the population identified themselves as Christian was correct, and in any case their number has shrunken to 59% by the 2011 census, and to 46% by the 2021 census; I trust that these are the correct proportions of self-identifying Christians within the British population in the three census periods.

Regarding your excerpt from McKinnon's paper, it continues with the sentence that I already quoted above: None of the particular calculations are provided, nor is there any accounting for methodological decisions in any particular case; neither transparency nor replicability are in evidence, which makes social scientific evaluation of how they reached their conclusions impossible..

Regarding your excerpt from Reynal-Querol & Montalvo's paper, it continues with the following conclusions, also already partially quoted above: However, as we pointed out before, this source has several shortcomings. First, and probably the most important, the data does not consider the possibility of double practice, very common in Sub Saharan Africa and Latin America countries. Comparing to the other source of information we realize the data is biased towards Christian religion. A clear example is the case of Kenya in which the distribution of religions is considered to be similar to Spain or Italy. The distribution of religious groups between 1970 and 1980 does not change in many countries. There are only about seventeen countries that present change in proportions. But those changes occur in countries where there is double practice and they usually imply an increase in the percentage of Christians and a reduction in the size of animist followers. Because of these reasons we take the data coming from the WCE with a lot of caution..

Regarding Hsu et al., their full paper can be read here, it was already widely quoted in the 2022-2023 discussion and it is mostly critical of the WCE/WRD/WCD. I hope it is not necessary to repeat the same findings already explained in the 2022-2023 discussion. However, your quote is missing the following parts: ... however, the WCD does have higher estimates of percent Christian within countries. ... we find that WCD estimates of American Christian groups are generally higher than those based on surveys and denominational statistics. ... the WCD counts tiny religious minorities, classifies some Muslim groups within the neoreligionist and ethnoreligionist categories, and has higher numbers of nonreligious. (p. 680); the conclusions about correlation with other datasets: ... the WCD tends to overestimate percent Christian relative to the other data sets. Scatterplots show that the majority of the points lie above the y - x line, indicating the WCD estimate for percent Christian within countries is generally higher than the other estimates. Although the bias is slight, it is consistent, and consequently, the WCD estimates a higher ratio of Christians in the world. (p. 684); and the final conclusions: We find some evidence for the three main criticisms directed at the WCD regarding estimation, ambiguous religious categories, and bias. The WCD consistently gives a higher estimate for percent Christian in comparison to other cross-national data sets. ... We also found evidence of overestimation when we compared WCD data on American denominational adherence to American survey data such as ARIS, due in part to inclusion of children, and perhaps also to uncritical acceptance of estimates from religious institutions. ... we find the WCD likely underestimates percent Muslim in former Communist countries and countries with popular syncretistic and traditional religions. ... Data on percent nonreligious are not highly correlated among the five data sets..

Regarding the WRD's own methodology paper, it is a self-published source (n.b. Brian J. Grim is another member of the Gordon-Conwell team) and it is quite simply false that they use census statistics; their data definitely do not correspond to the statistics provided by censuses. This is obvious and anyone can demonstrate it, given that census statistics are public and accessible to anyone. Stewart's paper (p. 463) also mentions census statistics dated 1900 to the 1970s, which are obviously obsolete, and some improbable unpublished data from “unprocessed” or “incomplete” national censuses. Æo (talk) 17:00, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Addendum: We must also remember and underline another important, critical point, which is that WCE/WRD/WCD data are speculative projections (WP:CRYSTAL) ranging from 1900 to 2050, not even survey outcomes, actually. Æo (talk) 17:28, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

P-Makoto, I would agree with your proposal to add that "reliable sources have criticized the sources on methodological grounds and that the demographic conclusions require further qualification" to the description in the table.

I would not restrict the scope of the source to Pentecostalism alone, however, owing to the fuzzy definition of Pentecostalism itself (cf. Stewart) and to the fact that its alleged 600+ million adherents, purported by the sources being discussed here, add a lot to the overall number of Protestants and Christians worldwide, and also owing to the fact that (cf. Stewart; Reynal-Querol & Montalvo; McKinnon) this demographic "athorial ritual" (as Stewart calls it) apparently originated among Anglicans and also involves the overestimation, and often self-overestimation, of the populations of other Christian denominations, including Anglicans themselves and Catholics, and therefore of Christians as a whole.

I would also agree with your proposal that the source be kept in the "additional considerations" category; otherwise, if other users think it would be more appropriate to downgrade it to the "generally unreliable" or even "deprecated" category (given the continuous spam campaigns of which they are, and will likely continue to be, the subject), I would agree with them. Æo (talk) 18:02, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

I would not agree with downgrading the sources under discussion to "Generally unreliable" or "Deprecated". I have proposed neither, and I oppose both.

You would not restrict the scope of the source to Pentecostalism. But why then does the author make Pentecostalism and the "Pentecostal growth paradigm" the scope of the argument? I would be more comfortable being cautious about how far we extrapolate those conclusions.

To clarify, I do not mean to simply add "reliable sources have criticized the sources on methodological grounds and that the demographic conclusions require further qualification" to the description in the table. Rather, I would propose replacing the present description in the table with such a sentence. The current description of editors considering the source WP:PARTISAN etc. is based on editor assessments, rather than reliable secondary sources. There is not consensus on whether or not the sources are partisan. But perhaps there can be consensus that a reliable source has said that the projections require further qualification and have methodological flaws. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 21:22, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

P-Makoto,

I agree the depreciation is unreasonable. But I certainly would question the Petacostal paper when Hsu et al. 2008 [5] clearly does an actual wider assessment and concludes "To address the criticisms mentioned above, we compare the religious composition estimates in the WCD to four other cross-national data sets on religious composition (two survey-based data sets and two government-sponsored data sets): the World Values Survey (WVS), the Pew Global Attitudes Project (Pew), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the U.S. State Department (State Department). In our analysis, we find support for some of the criticisms made by reviewers, but on the whole we find that WCD estimates are generally consistent with other data sets. The WCD is highly correlated with the other data sets, estimates for percent Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu; however, the WCD does have higher estimates of percent Christian within countries." and "In sum, we find that the WCD religious composition data are highly correlated with other sources that offer cross-national religious composition estimates. For cross-national studies, the WCD may be more useful than other sources of data because of the inclusion of the largest number of countries, different time periods, and information on all, even small, religious groups.”

Additionally, Hsu 2008 also explicitly says "We ran correlations of the five data sets with each other on the percentage of adherents to the major world religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism) as well as the nonreligious (Table 2). The WCD is highly correlated with the other four data sets, with most correlations near 0.90, which suggests that its data for percent Christian, percent Muslim, percent Buddhist, and percent Hindu are generally reliable.

Also I think that there are methodological issues with other sources like census data as is exemplified with Britain. Many countries do not even have religion questions on the census either. But no one tries to depreciate those sources. It seems too much to require more from WCE than other sources when the evidence shows it is reliable and consistent with other databases on the whole.

I think removing partisan and leaving the wording as is for in text attribution makes more sense for middle ground on the table.

Also these databases are respected by diversity of scholars and authoritative sources such as scholars of Islam (e.g. The Oxford Handbook of Politics in Muslim Societies (2022)), scholars of nonreligion / irreligion (e.g. Annual Review of the Sociology of Religion: Volume 7 (2016)), The Cambridge Companion to Atheism (2007)), Pew Research Center's uses it in own methodology and database (see Pew's methodology, The Palgrave Handbook of Islam in Africa (2020)) and also Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies (2022), Oxford Handbook of the Economics of Religion (2011), The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Europe (2022)

- Woodberry, Robert D. (2010). "World Religion Database: Impressive - but Improvable" [6] - "Despite these criticisms, we can appreciate the editors’ achievement in applying a relatively consistent methodology across the world. Furthermore, the WRD estimates are highly correlated with other cross-national estimates of religious distribution, a conclusion supported by an article by Becky Hsu and others." and also "Still, despite my criticisms, I will eagerly use these data in my research. I do not know of any better data available on such a broad scale and am amazed at the editors’ ability to provide even tentative estimates of religious distribution by province and people group."

- Brierley, Peter. (2010). "World Religion Database: Detail Beyond Belief!" [7] - "The WRD is a truly remarkable resource for researchers, Christian workers, church leaders, religious academics, and any others wanting to see how the various religions of the world impact both the global and the local scenes. It is always easy to criticize any grand compilation of statistical material by looking at the detail in one particular corner and declaring, "That number doesn't seem right." The sheer scope of this database, however, is incredible, and the fact that it exists and can be extended even further and updated as time goes forward in the framework of a respected university deserves huge applause for those responsible for it. Praise where praise is due, even if I am about to critique it."

If it is good for demographers it certainly good for Wikipedia. Ramos1990 (talk) 22:08, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

@Ramos1990 Those are old sources. Have you evidence the situation is the same 13 or more years later? Doug Weller talk 15:29, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Hi. Well, not sure if you looked at the Handbooks I linked, but some are from the 2020s. For example here is an extract of an authoritative source The Palgrave Handbook of Islam in Africa (2020):"The 2010 Pew Report is notable in terms of its comprehensive research design. Pew utilizes demographic sources from the World Religion Database as well as extensive survey data for nineteen African states. This mixed methods design of both quantitative and qualitative sources is important because it provides a substantive way to ground truth our understanding of religious affiliations and attitudes. Published demographic data alone on religion is usually drawn from censuses which can be fraught with design problems, but Pew utilizes field tested, empirical observations." Ramos1990 (talk) 18:58, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Do you realise that that book is discussing the Pew Research Center, and that the WRD is just mentioned in a note about the sources upon which the Pew builds its estimates? The book is neither citing the WRD directly nor discussing it. And the Pew's own criteria about its use of WRD data have already been quoted in my <19:44, 6 January> comment below. Æo (talk) 21:14, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

It does not need to. It merely incudes it as part of its positive assessment of the quantitative (WRD) and qualitative (survey data) combination. It certainly does not support your view at all (that is its worthless and useless). Pew's methodology page does not either. Ramos1990 (talk) 21:27, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

P-Makoto,

In my opinion the outcome of the previous community consensus should not be altered, and Firefangledfeather's closing summary should be kept, with its reference to WP:PARTISAN, or WP:BIASED, and WP:CRYSTAL, and just altered to add your new sentence, possibly also adding Stewart's conclusion that the source lacks the methodological rigor required to provide valid research results, and a reference to the fact that these results systematically overestimate Christianity (as found by all the critical papers quoted above) and underestimate other religions (as found by Hsu et al.). Regarding WP:BIASED, I think that it is important to keep it because in my view it is quite clear that the source is biased; for me, the relationship that it has with the OW-JP, its origins as a Christian missionary project, the fact that it is edited by the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (which, by the way, is itself directly related to Billy Graham and his Lausanne Movement), are all indicators of a clear bias, and in any case, this is clearly stated by Reynal-Querol & Montalvo where they wrote we realize the data is biased towards Christian religion.

Moreover, in his essay, p. 459, Stewart further explains that Barrett directly addresses and emphatically rejects what he calls the “folly of triumphalism” ... Despite this assurance, Barrett’s occupation as a missionary, stated belief that all of the world would be evangelized by the end of the twentieth century, and, not least of all, his development of a “theology of Christian enumeration” that explains the purpose of his work as helping “the followers of Christ to discern at what points to commit their resources in order to implement their commission” serve to make this, probably, the least debatable criticism ... The particular strength of this last critique might also possibly explain why, in his recent dismissal of the critiques commonly levied against Barrett’s work, Johnson [of the GCTS] elects not to address the accusation of triumphalism..

The previous quote adds to both the problem of non-neutrality, bias, of the source and to the question of the scope of the source. In his own words, Barrett theorised a "theology of Christian enumeration", not of Pentecostal enumeration. Furthermore, Stewart on p. 460 is clear when he writes that: To describe Barrett’s enumeration of Pentecostals – let alone of Christians as a whole – in the first edition of the World Christian Encyclopedia as confusing would be a drastic understatement. Guiding the entire work is Barrett’s conceptualization of Christianity ...; and again on p. 466: Barrett's ... collection techniques in order to enumerate Pentecostals and other Christians around the world. Therefore, Barret's project affects Christianity as a whole, and not merely Pentecostalism. Stewart clept it "Pentecostal growth paradigm" apparently because such a paradigm was ... adopted and more widely disseminated by Pentecostal clergy and scholars – mostly in the Global North ... (p. 458). This is probably a reference to the OW and its affiliated networks; I remind that the book Operation World (2010, p. 25) declares that ... the World Christian Encyclopedia and a handful of other resources are at the heart of this information ....

Of course you have not proposed to classify the source as "generally unreliable" or "deprecated", I did not mean that, but I would propose it if any other users agreed, since this would help stem the ongoing spam of this source throughout Wikipedia (which has continued despite its addition to the perennial sources' list last year). Æo (talk) 00:08, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Considering the discussion here, which is very quite long, I concur with the original 2022-2023 consensus against depreciation of these sources. They are definitely used by academic researchers and the sources presented do verify that they are good for use in Wikipedia. Robert D. Woodberry's confirmation of Hsu findings of general reliability across 4 datasets are certainly notable here as multiple sources converge on overall reliability. Keeping in mind that there are many problems with all sources including census data (WRD methodology states that only about half of the world's censuses even ask about religion and that this is declining further) certainly means that many other sources need to be used by default. This is verifiable in the US, which has nothing on religion for so many decades. And numerous other nations have removed such questions for privacy and expense reasons.

I do see room for BOTH (World Christian Encyclopedia and World Religion Database/World Christian Database) and numerous other databases to be used on Wikipedia. After all, these are all just estimates at the end and the Pentecostal and Atheism examples here exhibit the need to use multiple sources to make some sense of adherents (upper and lower estimates). I will say that polls, surveys, etc also fail to predict verifiable things like political elections [8] so I can only imagine the difficulty in religion demographics.

I think a good median on the perennial table is to keep the wording as is minus "The methodology of these sources has been questioned as WP:PARTISAN and WP:CRYSTAL." since these pass on comparison with multiple other datasets. Twice with this noticeboard by the same proposer AEO. The wording would sound neutral, very basic, inclusive, and not too specific. "Preference" does not mean "removal" or "prohibited". It allows coexistence of sources. Thus I think this is reasonable. desmay (talk) 01:28, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

After all, these are all just estimates – No, there are precise statistics from censuses and national surveys, possibly integrated by other good-quality statistics from independent neutral survey organisations, for most countries. We do not need speculative projections from non-neutral organisations of Christian evangelism. But this has already been widely discussed. The WCE/WRD/WCD are regularly spammed on Wikipedia and this causes a lot of nuisance for editors in the field of religion statistics like me, Erp and others (see here, here, etc.).

... polls, surveys, etc also fail to predict verifiable things like political elections so I can only imagine the difficulty in religion demographics – Actually, I think that a cultural identifier such as religion is much more verifiable and measurable than fleeting opinions such as political votes.

Twice with this noticeboard by the same proposer AEO – I did not open the 2022-2023 discussion myself, and, in any case, what is the problem? I also opened a discussion about WP:STATISTA last year, which resulted in its categorisation as WP:GUNREL. I read a lot, I noticed that the WCE/WRD/WCD were still being spammed throughout Wikipedia, I found new evidence of their problematic nature (the new papers presented in this discussion), and therefore I decided to open this new discussion. Æo (talk) 02:14, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Taking in what has been said so far, at this time, for WRD/WCD/WCE, I am inclined to support user desmay's recommendations. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 05:17, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Me too. I think it is a balanced recommendation. Ramos1990 (talk) 05:40, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I have to partially correct what I expressed in my <00:08, 5 January> previous comment, given that the clause with a reference to WP:PARTISAN and WP:CRYSTAL was not present in Firefangledfeather's original closing summary, but was added by Folly Mox when they created the entry in the perennial sources' list. Yet, the new evidence (Stewart et al.) introduced with the present discussion fully justifies Folly Mox's addition, and I continue to support P-Makoto's original proposal to add a further sentence as expressed in her <10:25, 4 January> comment, and my own proposal of further additions and of category re-assessment as expressed in my <00:08, 5 January> comment, rather than desmay's proposal to return to the original closing summary. Æo (talk) 15:52, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I placed the entry at the RSP table because I had to do some citation repair regarding these sources, I think at List of religious populations. I've found that most places these are cited in articles seem to be infoboxes and tables, which don't lend themselves easily to additional explanations about methodology etc. My sample may not reflect the total citation population.

The words I used in the entry at RSP (the only one I've ever added) were probably intended to be a summary of the close of the lengthy enormous discussion. I have no objection to the wording being changed if I've misconstrued the conversation or the close. I'm not sure if I see Firefangledfeathers bluelinked above, so courtesy ping in case they have input. Folly Mox (talk) 18:55, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I continue to support P-Makoto's original proposal to add a further sentence

I believe this misrepresentation is accidental on Æo's part, but it is a misrepresentation of me. It was never my original proposal to add a sentence. It was my proposal that the description in the table be changed (bolding added), which I later clarified to replacing the present description in the table (bolding addeed). Any proposal which merely adds a sentence about a reliable source identifying methodological flaws while retaining the reference to WP:PARTISAN and WP:CRYSTAL would be contrary to my original position in this discussion. Such a proposal originates from someone other than myself; I suppose it would be best described as Æo's proposal, inspired by an inadvertent misunderstanding of my proposal.

Additionally, my current position (as I expressed in this diff), is support of desmay's proposal: keep the wording as is minus "The methodology of these sources has been questioned as WP:PARTISAN and WP:CRYSTAL."

I think the reference to WP:PARTISAN and WP:CRYSTAL in the table as it exists is not a consensus assessment by editors. See statements in the above discussion from myself, desmay, and Ramos1990 for examples of editor expressing consideration of the WRD, WCD, and WCE to be academically valid.

It is also not consensus that the sources are unquestionable; Æo and Erp have made clear their impression of the sources as unreliable.

"Additional considersations" seems to be an appropriate assessment, inasmuch as there is not consensus for "Generally reliable" or "Generally unreliable". P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 21:11, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Agree that the close of the RFC by Firefalgledfeathers did not include partisan and crystal phrase. Since Folly Mox is ok with restoring the close wording. We can remove that phrase. Ramos1990 (talk) 21:36, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Let's not rush things. The discussion has only been open for a few days, and few people have taken part in it as of today. Moreover, Folly Mox has written that they would have no objection to the wording being changed if they had misconstrued the conversation or the close. And I think they have not misconstrued the essence of the 2022-2023 conversation. Æo (talk) 22:29, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Folly Mox: "The words I used in the entry at RSP (the only one I've ever added) were probably intended to be a summary of the close of the lengthy enormous discussion." and pinged closer Firefalgledfeathers. Ramos1990 (talk) 00:55, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

P-Makoto,

Apologies. I originally misunderstood your use of the word "change" as implying a change by addition and not by replacement, but your clarification in your <21:22, 4 January> comment was already very clear. What I meant with my previous message is that I would support the addition of the clause formulated in your original proposal, together with other critical considerations, to the current description formulated by Folly Mox, keeping the latter as it is. Also notice that other users took part, and expressed their opinions, in the 2022-2023 discussion.

I opened the present discussion to provide further evidence, from new critical essays, about the questionability of the sources under discussion; let's focus on the merits of the new evidence provided, rather than on quibbles about the current description in the perennial sources' list. Æo (talk) 22:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I have considered the new evidence presented. Seeing the new evidence presented prompted my earlier expressed decision to withdraw my suggestion to re-assess WRD/WCD/WCE as "Generally reliable" to instead support their assessment as "Additional considerations" (see my comment containing For now, I will pause my earlier musing that WCE/WRD/WCD could be re-assessed to "Generally reliable" and would consent to them being left listed as "Additional considerations". P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 04:52, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I would suggest:

There is no consensus on the reliability of these data sources. Rough consensus developed that the sources should be used with in-text attribution and to prefer the use of stronger sources. Some editors questioned their methodology and consider them to be partisan.

The order and tone matches many other "no consensus" RSP listings. The partisan issue was discussed more thoroughly than the point about their projections, but I wouldn't strenuously fight against including a short mention of the latter. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 01:53, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

User:Firefangledfeathers, I am not sure this captures everything form both sides because multiple editors are also not convinced of partisan and multiple editors think the methodology is appropriate and consistent with multiple databases (sources and quotes for those provided too). Even in the original RFC you closed, the same thing happened (most said "No" to depreciation 10 vs 5). Ramos1990 (talk) 02:25, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

As you look through RSP, you don't see a lot of "... but others disagreed". I think we just briefly state the most impactful concern, so that it's considered in future discussions when evaluating the source. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 02:28, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

On second thought, I'd support including a brief statement about one strength of the sources. The one that stands out the most to me in the prior discussion is that these data sources are so commonly cited by high-quality sources. Something like:

There is no consensus on the reliability of these data sources. Rough consensus developed that the sources should be used with in-text attribution and to prefer the use of stronger sources. Some editors noted that data from these sources is commonly used by high-quality publications, while others questioned their methodology and consider them to be partisan.

Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 02:38, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for that! I support this balanced version. It captures both sides and the sources that were used in this discussion and the RFC you closed. Ramos1990 (talk) 02:45, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time to hear out some thoughts on this, and to reword the description. This version has improvement that I appreciate. I am inclined to suggest rephrasing "commonly used by high quality publications" to instead say "numerous high-quality publications"? It's a subtle difference, but there are high quality publications in topics unrelated to religious demographics that don't use these sources, so to say a source is commonly cited in high quality publications feels not quite on the mark. Saying that editors have noted that they are used in numerous high-quality publications, that seems fair and demonstrably true. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 04:49, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Works for me. Not looking to make this change too soon, so you (and any others) should feel free to suggest changes or propose alternatives. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 04:52, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

P-Makoto, works for me too. Ramos1990 (talk) 06:19, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

@Firefangledfeathers: I continue the discussion, with an alternative proposal, further below. Æo (talk) 19:46, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm leaning in agreement with AEo here, that the summary by FFF should be retained and editors cautioned about using these as sources. The issues over methodology are compounded by the real concern of religious advocacy/promotion/bias raised by Stewart and others. I'm also of the opinion that the very limited use of WRD by Pew Research is rather telling: they opt to cite it (as one among several databases) only in circumstances where basically no census/survey or granular data exist, rather than incorporating WRD reports into all of their estimates. JoelleJay (talk) 22:00, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Pew uses WRD for 57 countries at least. That is a good chunk. Considering that they use "large scale demographic surveys" for 43 countries, and "general population surveys" for 42 countries, it is quite useful to complete the picture for their global estimates. Ramos1990 (talk) 22:20, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Look at which countries though... It is a rather limited use. I would not lean on Pew to establish reliability for this source, I'd find someone who actually endorses it. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 04:47, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Fair enough. I have multiple academic sources in purple and stuff like recent Handbooks above on it. Ramos1990 (talk) 06:24, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

But those 57 countries comprise only 5% of the population covered. JoelleJay (talk) 18:47, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Religious demography is about studying different countries and the beliefs of the people there. I am sure you will agree that each country is a different culture with diverse beliefs and histories and that these people matter - no matter how much on a global scale they are. Approximately 4.6 billion people live in ten countries, representing around 57% of the world's population [9]. I don't think that looking at only 10 out of 232 countries are representative of the cultures of the the remaining 222. China and India alone are 38% of the world population (~3 billion). Besides if you you calculate 5% out 8 billion, its 400,000,000 people from 57 nations with diverse cultures, histories, and beliefs. That is substantial and researchers do not just throw their hands up and ignore them. Most of nonreligion research focuses in Western nonreligious populations (Europe (12%), North America (5%)), but the overwhelming majority of the nonreligious are in Asia and in particular China alone (76%) from Pew. I don't think North America should be ignored just because it is 5% of the global nonreligious population. Ramos1990 (talk) 20:17, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

It's 5% of the population because for that 5% Pew couldn't find any other sources besides WRD and some other databases. If WRD was being treated as completely reliable by Pew they would incorporate WRD data into the other 95% of their estimates. JoelleJay (talk) 23:27, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Pew does not go by % people. It goes by Countries (25% of their countries used WRD, whereas large surveys (18%), general surveys (18%), and census (38%)). Good coverage. Each country has different understanding of religion and instruments of measure are diverse. You can read Pew's methodology to see that they say they used multiple quantitative and multiple qualitative sources for each country. Its inevitable because all sources are limited. Pew says "variation in methods among censuses and surveys (including sampling, question wording, response categories and period of data collection) can lead to variation in results". So adjustments need to be made (e.g. one source may have some data and but another source may have the missing data, but needs a third source to refine everything). In general there are 3 broad categories for religion (belief, belonging, and behavior). Some sources may have affiliation data, but not belief, or they may have belief data, but low sampling or poor wording. To keep it short, see Zuckerman in purple text, where he shows examples of massive hurdles to get a usable count on the number of atheists in any given country. Sometimes researches use more math to standardize (weighted or non-weighted). In any case, WRD is a database and it collects sources and is just one tool, among others, that researchers of every stripe do use. You can see the WRD methodology. It is available, not hidden. Also it used on continental Europe [10] by others. Hope this helps. Ramos1990 (talk) 01:41, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

In the methodology you linked previously, Pew says Together, censuses or surveys provided estimates for 175 countries representing 95% of the world’s population. In the remaining 57 countries, representing 5% of the world’s population, the primary sources for the religious-composition estimates include population registers and institutional membership statistics reported in the World Religion Database and other sources. JoelleJay (talk) 03:44, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Pew breaks it down further "Censuses were the primary source for Pew Forum religious composition estimates in 90 countries, which together cover 45% of all people in the world. Large-scale demographic surveys were the primary sources for an additional 43 countries, representing 12% of the global population. General population surveys were the primary source of data for an additional 42 countries, representing 37% of the global population." With 57 countries for WRD, they covered more countries than large scale demographic surveys (43 countries), and general population surveys (42 countries). Population wise, large scale demographic surveys (43 countries) was 12% of the global population, which is very comparable to WRD. Of course % of people covered is irrelevant because each country has different practices and beliefs, histories (religious beliefs from China and India do not reflect most of the world despite them being 38% of the global population.) It would be odd to dismiss 57 countries out of 232, 43 countries out of 232, 42 countries out of 232, or 90 out of 232. They also state "Pew Forum researchers acquired and analyzed religious composition information from about 2,500 data sources, including censuses, demographic surveys, general population surveys and other studies – the largest project of its kind to date." Though I can see where you are coming from, I am afraid the view that there should be 1 magical super source that applies to all 232 countries is not quite possible. They had more than 10 times 232 sources analyzed and mathematically adjusted to come up with their final product for just 232 countries. Ramos1990 (talk) 05:57, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I am in agreement with the proposal put forth by Firefangledfeathers and P-Makoto. It is neutral and on point. desmay (talk) 14:23, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

In her comments, Ramos quoted the abstract from Brierley's World Religion Database: Detail Beyond Belief! (2010) emphasising the author's seemingly positive evaluation of the source. However, reading through the essay one finds that in the conclusions the author points out that: ... This illustrates the dilemma for the compilers of the WCE and WRD. The Church of England may claim 26 million people, roughly the number living in the UK who have been baptized in the church either as infants or adults. The WRD treats this as their official source. However, not all of these now regard themselves as belonging to the Church of England and so did not tick the "Christian" box on the census form. Result? The WRD puts the Christian percent as 81 percent, the census as 72 percent, with the difference virtually entirely in the group of people who have left (as other research has shown). Which source should the WRD trust or use? This is their statistical nightmare, and the WRD in this instance opts for denominational information and does not judge between the two (though perhaps it should). This perhaps explains why some highly erudite commentators, such as Philip Jenkins, whose books on the world Christian scene have been so powerful and helpful, criticize the numbers in the WCE (and doubtless will those found in the WRD). Jenkins sometimes uses the CIA data instead, but there is no guarantee that that is more reliable.. This was written in 2010 with the data from the 2001 British census in mind; fourteen years later, things have not changed: compare WRD UK 2020 data with the 2021 UK census data.
The strength of the database, according to Brierley, merely consists in its unprecedented ... attempt on a worldwide basis to compile numbers for the different religions in a broadly compatible manner for each country.. Moreover, Brierley also concludes that: ... Christian and religious commentators have no option but to use it, despite hang-ups on definitions and individual numbers. ... These figures are not just for academic reflection and analysis but for strategic use and application. "Strategic use and application" refers to Christian mission, since Brierly is a Christian minister and/or missionary himself.
Ramos also quoted from Woodberry's World Religion Database: Impressive—but Improvable (2010); on the first page of the paper (unfortunately, I can't access the full text) we read: ... the editors seem to have constructed their estimates of religious distribution primarily from surveys of denominations and missionaries, not from censuses or representative surveys of individuals. Denominations, however, typically overestimate the number of members they have, and liturgical (and state-sponsored) denominations generally count anyone who has ever been baptized as a member—even infant baptisms of people who no longer claim Christian identity or attend church..
There is also another paper of the same series, Arles' World Religion Database: Realities and Concerns (2010), but I can't access its full text.
Brierley's, Woodberry's and Arles' papers were all published on the International Bulletin of Missionary Research, and Brierley, Arles and probably Woodberry as well, are/were Christian ministers and/or missionaries, and therefore I think it is important to underline that these papers belong to the Christian missionary environment to which the WCE/WRD/WCD itself belongs. Such papers are missionary sources which recommend the use of another missionary source, highlighting its strength as an unprecedented attempt to quantify the world's religious populations, while at the same time criticising its flaws. Other "high-quality publications" might be uncritical in their use of the WCE/WRD/WCD, and indeed essays like those of Brierley, Woodberry, Arles, and also Hsu et al., Stewart, and the others already discussed, were published precisely to warn against the uncritical use of such sources.
Liedhegener & Odermatt's Religious Affiliation in Europe (2013), already quoted in the 2022-2023 discussion, pointed out that (p. 9) the WCE/WRD/WCD ... is not an unproblematic source, because its data, gathered originally from the World Christian Encyclopedia, result mostly from country reports prepared by American missionaries. Therefore, a systematic bias of its data in favor of Christianity is a major, although controversial point of criticism..
As pointed out by JoelleJay hereabove, the Pew Research Center itself is very cautious in its use of WCE/WRD/WCD data, also considering that Pew mostly bases its studies on its own (real) surveys. On p. 53 of Pew's The Global Religious Landscape (2010) we read about their criteria for their use of WRD data: In cases where censuses and surveys lacked sufficient detail on minority groups, the estimates also drew on estimates provided by the World Religion Database, which takes into account other sources of information on religious affiliation, including statistical reports from religious groups themselves..
Folly Mox, in their <18:55, 5 January> comment, correctly warned that the WCE/WRD/WCD are still widely cited throughout Wikipedia in a great number of articles, mostly in infoboxes and tables and without further explanation about their nature, methodology and probable bias. This has been going on for years: many articles still uncritically report WCE/WRD/WCD data referenced to the ARDA or Gordon-Conwell websites; many of them are articles about countries and the data are reproduced directly in the country infobox, passed off as 2020 data despite the fact that they are speculative projections. Therefore, I think that it would be important that WP:CRYSTAL be mentioned in the description in the perennial sources' list.
That being said, my proposal for the description in the perennial sources' list is the following one:

There is no consensus on the reliability of these sources of data about religious populations, and concerns have been raised that they may be WP:BIASED and that they are WP:SPECULATIVE projections. Rough consensus developed that the sources should be used with in-text attribution and to prefer the use of stronger sources (e.g. censuses and national surveys). While these data sources have been used in some high-quality publications, others have questioned their methodology and consider them to be partisan, and especially prone to an overestimation of Christianity.

Æo (talk) 19:44, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

The RFC that Æo opened on this in 2022-2023 already had all of this commentary and MORE, and after all of that Firefangledfeathers was able to come up with a balanced closure wording to take into consideration ALL sides. I would say that Firefangledfeathers proposed wording, and P-Makoto's adjustment, is certainly very balanced and NPOV again and to the point. We should go with that as Firefangledfeathers is an uninvolved editor.

I also would just like to note that AEO seems to be an aggressive POV pusher against WCE/WRD/WCD sources. Seems to have an obsession to get these removed from wikipedia at any cost. To the point that he opened the 2022-2023 RFC and attempted to close it himself after the results were not in his favor (10 "No" vs 4 "Yes" - his count) with such biased wording emphasizing his view point and the minority and ignoring the majorities views (see here [11]). I thought that this opening and closing was unethical (conflict of interest) and requested an involved editor (see here [12]), which turned out to be Firefangledfeathers. His closure was much more balanced and at least took into consideration everyone's views (majority and minoirty) (see here [13]). As such, I do not trust AEO's POV pushing biased wording.

Based on this, I trust the uninvolved editor Firefangledfeathers balanced NPOV wording and P-Makoto's adjustment.

Addendum: Plus all of these quibbles were taken into account in Hsu 2008 - the only source to empirically assess these databases with 4 others: the World Values Survey (WVS), the Pew Global Attitudes Project (Pew), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the U.S. State Department (State Department) and found "The WCD is highly correlated with the other four data sets, with most correlations near 0.90, which suggests that its data for percent Christian, percent Muslim, percent Buddhist, and percent Hindu are generally reliable". Also about half or less of all countries in the world even ask about religion at all in any census. With inconsistent wording and on voluntary basis too. You have to use other sources by default to compensate. Ramos1990 (talk) 21:14, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Actually, the only quote in my comment above that I have recovered from the 2022-2023 discussion is the quote from Liedhegener & Odermatt. Brierley's and Woodberry's texts were not quoted directly back then, except for their abstracts, and therefore my argument above provides new evidence and perspectives. Everything else in your message constitutes an ad hominem WP:PA (and I already forgave you for last year's identical one). What I have written hereabove is just my proposal building upon Firefangledfeather's one, takes into consideration all the views which have been expressed by both critical essays and editors in our discussions, and in any case I am not going to close the discussion myself. Æo (talk) 21:28, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Addendum regarding your addendum with the quote from Hsu et al. and the consideration about census data: the WVS is not a survey specifically about religion, and it is a survey of relatively small samples (of few thousands in about 100 countries); the CIA and the US SD are not survey organisations, they collect data from some other sources (cf. Brierley himself where he states that it is not guaranteed that the CIA website is reliable); the Pew's own views are quoted in my comment above. You have to use other sources by default to compensate — yes, there is plenty of neutral statistical sources to fill gaps where we don't have data from censuses and surveys from national statistical organisations, and therefore we don't need the WCE/WRD/WCD or any other sources produced by Christian missionaries. Æo (talk) 22:04, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I also noticed the following recently. The ARDA page for the Republic of the Congo https://www.thearda.com/world-religion/national-profiles?u=58c#IRFDEMOG has the WRD estimates as Christians making up 89.32% of the population and then breaks the Christians down as unaffiliated 9.97%, Orthodox 0.01%, Catholic 61.62%, Protestants 11.42%, and Independents 10.87%. Unfortunately adding the subdivisions up yields 93.89% which is considerably more than 89.32%. Also 89.32% fits better with the figures for other religions so it is the 93.89% that is wrong probably at least in part by overestimating the percentage of Catholics (other sources claim Catholics at 32% or 55% [taken from the State Department religious freedom report https://www.state.gov/reports/2021-report-on-international-religious-freedom/republic-of-the-congo/ which also states which 2012 government sources it got the figures from [a census and a survey]). The 2022 State department report had 47.3% Catholic and used a 2010 Pew Research Center report. The WRD database itself, which I have access to, lists 89.32% as Christian. Finding the subcategories took some work but it shows that the Christian subdivisions overlap (i.e., some people are counted in two or more Christian groups though not which groups overlap, my guess is many of those who were baptized Catholic and became something else later are counted in both which would explain why the Catholic figure is so high). However this is a guess because nowhere I can find does WRD describe their methodology (And ARDA dropped the overlap category). The list of what I assume is the sources for WRD for the Congo includes the 1960 and 2007 censuses and a 2005 survey but not apparently the 2012 government census and survey. A check on Angola also shows the double counted category missing on the ARDA listing of WRD results though it does show in the actual WRD database; however, most wiki editors do not have access to the latter. Note stuff like simple pie charts require no overlap in their data. This is even when assuming the WRD data is otherwise good data which I don't. So one can make a pie chart for the Congo using WRD data for the major religious categories (Christian, Muslim,...) but not one trying to show Catholic, Protestants, etc as well because the numbers will add up to more than 100%. Erp (talk) 01:12, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Hey Erp. Hope you are doing well! Glad you were able to use WRD data on the Religion in Republic of Congo page. Yep, that is demography. Did you see Voas and Bruce (2004) "Research note: The 2001 census and christian identification in Britain" [14]? According to them, the British census may have overestimated Christians (71.7%) vs a common British Social Attitudes survey (54.2%). Aren't they all British who took both? Why the difference? The way a question is asked, the way a person interprets and responds play a role in differences we see in the numbers. Its more complicated with sub-divisions like denominations like "Catholic" or "Pentecostal". So I expect the variation on "Catholic" you mentioned (61.62%, 47.3%, 32%, 55%). Makes sense. With all of these numbers, it is best to let experts do the calculations than us wikieditors. They know how to use these databases better than us. In particular, sociologists of religion. Ramos1990 (talk) 03:31, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I used it in the Congo article only because the previous editor used it and I didn't want to make too radical a change in one step. First show that the WRD data is inconsistent with itself so drop the Christian subdivisions which at least removes the inconsistencies. Then look for better sources. I'm not sure there is any really authoritative source in this case so it might be better to remove the pie chart (pie charts look nice but they lend the patina of authoritativeness which may be misleading) and discuss the different sources in the article (note some editors use multiple pie charts but that clutters up the article).

And yes how the questions are asked will affect the answers and how the survey or census is done (only resident citizens, all residents, only those with land lines...). However, the WRD isn't doing surveys or taking a census instead it is more a meta study using multiple sources (surveys, censuses, self-reported numbers, other projections) then projecting. My objections to it are several. First, it isn't clear what its sources are. The actual WRD data has a section called "Survey List" which I'm assuming is the list of sources; I have noticed in some cases that later sources than those on the list exist. Second, nothing describes the methodology it is using for a particular country; how is it calculating the projections when did it last update the projections (one can take a stab by looking at the latest item in the "Survey List" for when it likely last updated). Third there is no indication of how accurate they feel they are. Every percentage is to 4 significant digits (or counts to the individual person even when the sources aren't that precise, such as 386 people practicing Chinese Folk Religions and 237 Buddhists in the Republic of the Congo but no Daoists or Confucionists) even when that level of precision is impossible given the sources (projections should not become more precise then the sources). Another fault though common to many other sources is little account for religious syncretism such as in countries like Japan where many practice both Buddhism and Shintoism. Less important there are the oddities of definitions which make them seem not exactly neutral (for instance Confucianists have to be non-Chinese which might explain how they only get 1.8 million Confucianists in China). On another note given the use of the World Religion Database in Wikipedia for better or for worst, it is high time it had its own article complete with critiques from reliable sources so the reader can have some chance of evaluating it. Erp (talk) 16:06, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't know what the standard is in social science but in my field metastudy results should be reproducible by others, not shrouded in methodological mystery. That's another big knock on the WRD. JoelleJay (talk) 18:55, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

@Erp,

The problems you have encountered regarding the "double counting" and "inconsistent estimates" in WCE/WRD/WCD data are addressed in some of the papers we have discussed. For instance, in Hsu et al.: p. 688, analysing WCE/WRD/WCD data about US Christians: The WCD reports the total adherent count within Christian denominations and movements is 226 million, of whom 20 million are estimated to be doubly affiliated, leaving 206 million unique adherents. An additional 46 million claim to be Christians but are not affiliated with a church, for a total of 252 million affiliated and unaffiliated Christians. The 2005 Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches’ tabulation of official church membership is 163 million. In contrast to the WCD, the Yearbook does not count members of independent churches or adjust for doubly affiliated adherents. This difference of 43–63 million adherents between the Yearbook and the WCD warrants further examination. ... The WCD adjusts for “doubly counted” adherents, who may be on multiple membership lists, when aggregating up from denomination level statistics to religious blocks and total religious adherents. However, we do not know how the WCD derives its estimate of 20 million doubly counted U.S. adherents. Current WCD estimates of American Christian populations are generally higher than those based on survey evidence and denominational statistics. The WCD estimate of the total Christian population does not sufficiently reflect the recent downward trend in the percentage of Americans professing Christian identity in surveys.; pp. 689-691, analysing inconsistent estimates of Christians in other countries: We find two major groups of countries with inconsistent estimates: African countries with religious syncretism or a history of social disorder, and formerly Communist countries. ... African countries with very inconsistent estimates for percent Christian (Angola, Burundi, Congo-Brazzaville, Cote d’Ivoire, Gabon, Ghana, Zambia, and Zimbabwe) have some populations that mix religious practices. ... For India, which others have cited as problematic, the WCD has a higher estimate for percent Christian than the other data sets ... the difference comes from Christian believers in high and low castes identifying themselves as Hindu for various reasons, ... and the existence of “isolated radio believers” who do not affiliate with particular denominations. The WCE does not explain how it estimates the number of isolated radio believers, presumably a particularly difficult population to measure.. Æo (talk) 14:56, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Further criticism of the WRD is expressed in the following paper:

• Christopher Claassen & Richard Traunmüller's "Improving and Validating Survey Estimates of Religious Demography Using Bayesian Multilevel Models and Poststratification", Sociological Methods & Research, XX(X): 1-34 (Sage, 2018). On p. 4, we read: A number of data collection projects have arisen to meet this demand, including the World Religion Database ... Although the scope and comprehensiveness of these databases are admirable, and while they provide perhaps the only source of data for some regions and periods of time, there are nevertheless a number of limitations with their estimates. ... Although these databases rightly respect the adage that some data are preferable to none at all, we have no way of ascertaining the degree of uncertainty attached to any particular estimate because none are provided. Without uncertainty estimates, analysts are led to treat census measures and expert opinions as equally valid. Second, the methods used to adjust sample survey data, combine data, and obtain estimates when no data are available are less than fully transparent. Adjusting, combining, interpolating, and extrapolating data require modeling. Yet neither the assumptions underlying the model nor the exact methods for doing so are fully specified. In addition, the uncertainty induced by modeling is again ignored.. --Æo (talk) 21:12, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

RfC: WCE-WRD/WCD

The #World Christian Encyclopedia and World Religion Database/World Christian Database are currently used in many Wikipedia articles (cf. 1, 2, 3, 4) to cite statistics on religion demography, and finding a consensus on the reliability of these sources in the discussion above has been difficult. Foregoing discussions on the same sources include one in 2018 and one in 2022-2023 (with RfC).

In this request for comment, it is possible to:

• Option 0: Express a comment without choosing any specific option on the reliability of the sources.
• Assess the reliability of the sources by choosing from one of the following options:
  • Option 1: Generally reliable
  • Option 2: Additional considerations
  • Option 3: Generally unreliable
  • Option 4: Deprecate

Æo (talk) 18:06, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

---

• Option 3: There is abundant evidence, especially since the publication of Stewart's 2023 critical essay, but also in previous critical essays, that these are problematic, biased sources originating from a Christian missionary environment, and they have been questioned on methodological grounds. Moreover, the data they produce are based on speculative projection. Secondary sources that recommend their use often come from the same environment, and these secondary sources express some negative criticism themselves. Secondary sources that actually use them tend to be either outdated or uncritical in ther use, often merely citing them in footnotes and/or in lists of multiple sources.--Æo (talk) 18:21, 10 January 2024 (UTC)
• Bad RfC. Even if somewhere there's an unresolved discussion of the use of a cite, that still would not justify a 4-way template with options including a blanket ban. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 18:44, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Peter Gulutzan: What do you suggest as an alternative to the four options? Æo (talk) 18:54, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  "[Name of source] has been used in [reference to Wikipedia article] for a cite of [fact], and attempts to resolve on [name of talk page thread] have failed, please comment here." Peter Gulutzan (talk) 19:06, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  Well, both are possible. I am going to integrate the two formats. I think it is important to clearly assess the reliability of these sources, and in any case, as the rule says, "consensus is assessed based on the weight of policy-based arguments". These are not votes and the closer will judge based on the merit of all the comments here, in the discussion above, and in the previous threads as well. Æo (talk) 19:37, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  This is the standard format of RFCs on this noticeboard. The inclusion of an option shouldn't be seen as any kind of endorsement for that option. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:57, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

I doubt that anyone has authority to declare what is "the standard". Peter Gulutzan (talk) 16:44, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2. Regarding World Christian Encyclopedia (1st and 2nd ed., Oxford University Press, 1982, 2001; 3rd ed., Edinburgh University Press, 2019), World Christian Database (Brill, 2007, updated quarterly), and World Religion Database (Brill, 2007, updated quarterly): When I first saw it brought up on this board, I was inclined to encourage reassessing the sources as "Generally reliable". They are published with highly reputable university presses and have been improved across multiple editions and updates. However, after seeing the conversation between Ramos1990 and Æo, I concluded that these sources' current assessment as "Additional considerations" is fairest. Scholarly assessments of the sources evidently vary, with different perspectives about the extent to which the estimations and assessments can be depended on. As such, it makes sense to attribute these sources' projections and surveys and to be mindful of countervailing sources. However, I am not persuaded these sources should be considered "Generally unreliable". I recognize that Æo in their characterizes these sources as "originating from a Christian missionary environment". From what I have seen, that understates how the sources have emerged from an academic religious studies environment. Oxford University Press, Edinburgh University Press, and Brill don't publish just anybody, and that the editors, authors, and demographers involved met those academic standards remains meaningful. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 20:18, 10 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 1, Bad RFC, WP:FORUMSHOP These sources were assessed last year with the majority not supporting the same RFC poster Æo using the same arguments. I believe this may be WP:FORUMSHOP. He even tried to close the RFC himself with his own views highlighted over the majority.
  In any case, these databases come from academic publishers (Oxford University Press, Edinburgh University Press, Brill). And have been independently empirically assessed too, taking into account any criticisms, with 4 other common databases in demography (the World Values Survey (WVS), the Pew Global Attitudes Project (Pew), the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the U.S. State Department (State Department)) and found to be generally reliable and highly correlated (very comparable) with correlation of .9 (note: a correlation of 1 would mean perfect correlation which never happens among demographic datasets) Becky Hsu et al :"We ran correlations of the five data sets with each other on the percentage of adherents to the major world religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism) as well as the nonreligious (Table 2). The WCD is highly correlated with the other four data sets, with most correlations near 0.90, which suggests that its data for percent Christian, percent Muslim, percent Buddhist, and percent Hindu are generally reliable". Furthermore, they note that "on the whole we find that WCD estimates are generally consistent with other data sets. The WCD is highly correlated with the other data sets, estimates for percent Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu" and even give a positive overall recommendation "In sum, we find that the WCD religious composition data are highly correlated with other sources that offer cross-national religious composition estimates. For cross-national studies, the WCD may be more useful than other sources of data because of the inclusion of the largest number of countries, different time periods, and information on all, even small, religious groups.”
  No sources have been presented showing the opposite on such a multiple global datasets scale. And the WRD methodology is available: "fully transparent to the scholarly community...based on best social science and demographic practices." It has census, surveys, polls too.
  Furthermore, these sources are notable for their data being commonly commonly used by high-quality publications. They are respected by a diversity of scholars and authoritative sources such as scholars of Islam (e.g. The Oxford Handbook of Politics in Muslim Societies (2022)), scholars of nonreligion / irreligion (e.g. Annual Review of the Sociology of Religion: Volume 7 (2016)), The Cambridge Companion to Atheism (2007)), Pew Research Center's uses it in own methodology and database (see Pew's methodology, The Palgrave Handbook of Islam in Africa (2020)) and also Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies (2022), Oxford Handbook of the Economics of Religion (2011), The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Europe (2022).
  If it is good enough for independent demographers, Oxford University handbooks, Cambridge University handbooks, Palgrave Handbooks, Pew, Sociology of Religion, it certainly good enough for Wikipedia. Ramos1990 (talk) 21:58, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

I respond to Ramos' argument, which I find to be misleading and which once again relies upon personal attack, in the #Additional commentary below. Æo (talk) 20:53, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 1 I was originally between option 1 and 2, but after looking at some points further, I looked around and found additional high quality sources that use WRD/WCDWCE data without any issues. For example, Oxford Handbook of Religion and Europe [15] pages 793–798 uses the databases to summarize European demographics overall. I also found the same thing for summarizing demographics of Asia overall in Oxford Handbook of Christianity in Asia [16] at the very end pages 598–605. Two continents is quite good from my simple search. I think that the Becky Hsu paper on comparing WRD/WCD/WCE with 4 other secular databases with global statistics provides as good test of reliability for any given source. I was surprised such an empirical test was even done for any database at all. A .9 correlation is like an A grade for a student in school. That sociologist Robert Woodberry acknowledged Hsu's general conclusion of high correlation is a good second opinion by an expert, which is as good as it gets for global demography because demography is full of imperfections. I see no good reason for not seeing them as generally reliable at this point. Oxford, Cambridge, Pew and other unquestioned sources don't seem to either. I will lean on their expertise. After all, if WRD/WCD/WCE were unreliable, they would not even be used by them (Oxford handbooks are "Authoritative and state-of-the-art surveys of current thinking and research, from leading international figures in the discipline." [17]) The few clear criticisms I saw were minor and not significant enough compared to the positives and they were mostly Wikipedian opinions, not scholarly assessments. Pentecostalism is an informal denomination and it is hard to even get clear numbers for denominations across countries. Phil Zuckerman's struggle with atheism shows that censuses and surveys, may not be able to capture all religious groups evenly across countries and so any complaints about WRD/WCD/WCE seem to just be problems faced by demography in general, and not unique to WRD/WCD/WCE. I find it odd that the same editor opening this RFC is the same editor that opened the 2022 RFC with seeming repeat intent to depreciate again (WP:RSP entry). desmay (talk) 01:32, 11 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3 I'm mostly going on methodological grounds and also because in my last deep dive (from the previous discussion) I found very few peer reviewed articles using the WRD as a source that were not connected with the project itself (e.g., authored by someone in WRD). Even Pew uses it only when no other sources exist. Where we know it does correlate, other better sources exist which they are probably using. One article mostly on Pew though it also applies to WRD (Birdsall, Judd; Beaman, Lori (2020-07-02). "Faith in Numbers: Can we Trust Quantitative Data on Religious Affiliation and Religious Freedom?" (PDF). The Review of Faith & International Affairs. 18 (3): 60–68. doi:10.1080/15570274.2020.1795401. ISSN 1557-0274. Retrieved 2024-01-12. notes that "Numbers are not neutral. Behind any quantification of religion or FoRB there are a range of qualitative assumptions and decisions as to what constitutes religion, religiosity, a restriction on religious belief or practice, or a social hostility involving religion. It’s both an art and a science" and goes on to state "Pay close attention to what an organization is actually measuring and use the correct terminology when citing its data. As we have seen, religious “identification” is not synonymous with faith, belief, practice, or even formal affiliation" (page 6 of the pdf). Pew almost always gives us the methodology for their figures; WRD just presents the data but not what type of religiosity they are estimating (formal affiliation, self-identification, practicing). We should also be upfront that in some cases precise numbers just aren't there so, for instance, not use a pie chart which privileges one source well above others when no source is great. (As an aside I just looked at the WRD info on the United Kingdom, I suspect it would come to a shock to many in Scotland and Northern Ireland that the UK's state religion is Anglican [it is the state religion only of England].)

Erp (talk) 02:48, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Deep dive. Looking at an article that is comparing the WRD/WCD and several other sources (note WRD and WCD overlap on who is running them, in particular Todd Johnson) (McKinnon, Andrew (2020). "Demography of Anglicans in Sub-Saharan Africa: Estimating the Population of Anglicans in Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda". Journal of Anglican Studies. 18 (1): 42–60. doi:10.1017/S1740355320000170. ISSN 1740-3553. Retrieved 2024-01-14., btw the article goes into depth about why the numbers can vary including why censuses and surveys can vary). Broadly they match other info until they hit Nigeria. "Relative to any of the other cases we have considered here, WCD estimates differ most dramatically from any of the four surveys in terms of the proportion of Anglicans in Nigeria. The WCD estimates a dramatic proportional increase in Anglicans in the 45 years leading up to 2015, from 5.2 per cent to 12.1 per cent. The highest proportion of Anglicans on any of the surveys is found in the R5 Afrobarometer survey, where Anglicans comprise 5.3 per cent of a nationally representative sample". The author continued "The WCD has arrived at its estimate for the proportion of Anglicans in 2015 by taking the last reported figures provided by the Church of Nigeria (Anglican) itself to the WCD.... In correspondence with the author, Todd Johnson of WCD has noted that, collectively, the churches and denominations of Nigeria claim 25 million more members than the best estimate of the Christian population would allow". After evaluating all the information the author concludes that there is at least 4.94 million self-identified Anglicans in Nigeria and no more than 11.74 million (the Church of Nigeria claims 18 million). BTW the ARDA report of the WRD figures (https://www.thearda.com/world-religion/national-profiles?u=166c#RELADH) which most Wiki editors likely use does not include or mention the subtraction (under the guise of multiple affiliations) that WRD uses in its own database to make the various percentages add up; the WRD total percentage of Christians is 46.18% but adding up the WRD subtotals as reported by ARDA yields 56.29%. Erp (talk) 05:11, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 1 per Ramos1990 who makes a compelling argument. Nemov (talk) 14:54, 12 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3 or at least 2. Like Erp, I am concerned with the methodology used in compiling these databases, particularly the opacity in what questions are even being asked of respondents. Pew uses WCD and other databases for only 5% of the population. That that 5% is divided into a larger number of countries than the percentages allocated to surveys etc. is about as meaningful as the observation that Trump won 2,497 counties while Biden "only" won 477. The only utility would be when discussing religious representation in the particular 57 countries that Pew used "a database" for, but in those cases we have a better source in Pew itself, which has secondarily filtered and interpreted these data. Perhaps professional demographers can extract the substantive information from WRD, but given how uneven it is in reliability and all the special considerations that one must make for given groups, we should treat it as essentially a primary source. JoelleJay (talk) 04:24, 13 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 1: Demography of religion is very sophisticated and imperfect. If it were a simple matter, or if there was a one-source solution, there wouldn't be as much debate among sociologists/demographers on religion (adherents and belief are not the same and hard to capture), and certainly not the thousands of sources that Pew needs to use to estimate religion in 232 nations. The sources in the RFC are used in quite a good number of tertiary sources from experts and reliable publishers of high-quality resources. For Wikipedia's purposes, we go by what reliable sources like these use, not if a source can solve what so many sociologists/demographers of religion have been unable to solve and continue to debate about, the number of adherents. Sociology of religion is full of debates on the estimated numbers of religious adherents. ---1990'sguy (talk) 02:38, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2: I'm fine with keeping it at option 2 but being more explicit about how it can be used. The methodology is really unclear, it is also unclear whether some numbers are predictions for the future. That the data is a lot of the time cited to ARDA instead of the real source doesn't help. WCD should never replace census data, reliable polling data or reliable membership statistics (e.g. Germany). It should not be used in religion/country articles that have better sources, the approach Pew takes essentially. If we add those other sources then I think it would violate WP:NOTSTATS and WP:UNDUE to also add the WCD. In religion/country articles where there are no better sources, it can be used but only with attribution and a disclaimer that they generally overestimate the number of christians. In the best case scenario, also an explanation of their methodology (this will be difficult). If it is used in infoboxes there should be a note with the same information. The data should not be put in a pie chart because people are far more likely to mistake it for census data or polling data (with conventional 3% error margins). --2A02:1810:BC3A:D800:A050:6C5A:A34E:91A2 (talk) 11:23, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
• I'm surprised by some comments here. For instance, "The sources in the RFC are used in quite a good number of tertiary sources from experts and reliable publishers of high-quality resources"--well, that may be so, but if the argument against is "a lot of academic studies are highly critical of the source and the organization funding them is biased" and the argument for is "there are scholars that use it", then these two are not on equal footing, and it seems obvious to me that we should value those that actually studied this and other databases higher than those that simply use it/them. No, I don't find Ramos's argument compelling here, because (besides all the other problems) they are simply explaining who uses it--"If it is good enough for independent demographers..." But that, while not invalid, is simply not as strong as the counterargument, and I think the last thing we should do here on Wikipedia is use data that is published by biased organizations and questioned by scholars. So I'm actually going to go with 4: deprecate, because of its problematic source, rather than 3. Drmies (talk) 16:55, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
• A request for the closer: there have been some instances of at least borderline WP:CANVASSING and there are allegations that more may have occurred, potentially off-wiki. I'd recommend adhering especially to WP:NOTAVOTE when assessing consensus. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 21:14, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2: It may be usable depending on context. Path2space (talk) 18:52, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 1 per Ramos1990 and Desmay. It's trusted by extremely high-quality sources, and that means it's good enough to be used on Wikipedia. - GretLomborg (talk) 07:09, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

Additional commentary

Ramos' argument is opened by an ad hominem WP:PA (in which she falsely accuses me of WP:FORUMSHOPPING, manipulates the facts of the 2022-2023 discussion as she already tried to do in January 2023 and on 6 January 2024 in the discussion above, and accuses me of using the same arguments whilst I have presented plenty of new evidence, starting from Stewart's 2023 essay), which would be enough to make her argument fallacious. Then, she builds upon a few lines, already reiterated again and again in the discussion above, excerpted from the 2008 Hsu et al. paper which, however, is overall mostly critical of the source under discussion. Regarding the CIA and the US SD, they are not statistical institutes, and they collect statistics about religions from other sources, often from the WCE/WRD/WCD itself (e.g. US SD 2022 India report)! The Pew's very restrictive criteria in its use of WCE/WRD/WCD data have been thoroughly explained by JoelleJay and by myself in the discussion above, and once again by Erp in her comment hereabove. Then, Ramos continues by stating that no sources have been presented showing the opposite on such a multiple global datasets scale, which is misleading: various scholarly sources presented (even Hsu et al. itself!) found a systematic overestimation of Christianity and underestimation of other categories in WCE/WRD/WCD data, and various other problems, but Ramos chooses to completely ignore all the critical problems highlighted by such scholarly sources. Anne-Marie Kool's Revisiting Mission in, to and from Europe through Contemporary Image Formation (2016), another essay which is highly critical of the source under discussion, already quoted in the 2022-2023 discussion, warns that: widespread caution is raised with regard to the accuracy of the figures and not to engage in statistical analysis with the data. Æo (talk) 20:51, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Questions of forum shopping or any other editor behaviour should be taken elsewhere, equally editors comments should be centered on sources not each other. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 21:59, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Not sure about Kool. She is not a demographer and she even says on the sources, "I have taken them for as authoritative in my teaching and research during the last two decades." The Becky Hsu et al. source was not a source I found. It was Æo that cited it in the 2022 discussion and tired to use it as a main source against reliability. But after I read it, I noticed that it said the opposite and even included Christian data in the list of generally reliable data (see my blue text for quote). She is explicit on this. Furthermore, Table 2 has correlations on Christians among the 4 data sets and WCD correlates with the 4 datasets better (.9188, .9251, .9581, .9346 - all above .9 correlation) than how the other 4 datasets correlate with each other (.9146, .8979, .9365, .8468, .8538, .9408 - some are below .9 correlation). On overestimating, it is not unique [18]. Plus I found another authoritative source explicitly saying "A scholarly analysis of the World Christian Database was conducted by sociologists at Princeton University in 2008, confirming its reliability. See Hsu et al., 2008." (Bloomsbury Handbook to Study Christians (2019)) and in p. 23 acknowledges that these are "the best scholarly resource we have for documenting religious affiliation in the world today". For Pew, see my responses above. WRD is the second most used primary source after censuses, by country. Population size wise, WRD usage was comparable to large scale demographic surveys (12% of the population) - but Pew used 2,500 sources overall so it was never one source per country. Seeing that China and India alone account for 38% of the world population and all of Europe is only 7% of the global population, objections based on population size are not convincing not carry any weight. Pew goes by # of countries instead. See Palgrave handbook link for more info. Pew would simply not use WRD if it was so unreliable. Period. Numerous other authoritative sources that are commissioned specifically to leading experts in their fields (Oxford handbooks, Cambridge handbooks, etc) easily use these. Net positive, all things considered. Hope this helps. Ramos1990 (talk) 01:21, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

You continue to manipulate facts, potentially misleading readers and commentators, probably expecting them not to read the essays and the past discussions. The full paragraph of Kool (2016) in which the line you excerpted is contained is the following (underlined: your excerpt): It might well be that the great quantity of details easily silenced possible critical voices. It is peculiar that hardly any serious critical interaction and discussion of the underlying methodology of the Atlas has taken place, neither of its two data providing predecessors (footnote 65: Except for a not very convincing study: BECKY HSU et al.). The data are simply taken for granted, as I have taken them for as authoritative in my teaching and research during the last two decades.. It is a statement of repentance for having used the highly problematic WCE/WRD/WCD data in her past works.

Similarly, Hsu et al. (2008) itself (n.b. my links are always to the full paper, while Ramos' ones are always to the paper's abstract only), from which you continue to quote a few selected and decontextualised lines, is actually very critical of the sources under discussion, and I provided relevant quotes from it in the 2022-2023 discussion and others in the discussion above. It is also true that Hsu et al. is from the mid 2000s, and age matters in this case (as Doug Weller correctly pointed out in the discussion above), and therefore the excerpt you keep quoting about "high correlation" may have been true for the data of the 2000s, but no longer be true for the data of the 2010s and 2020s.

The full paragraph of Hsu et al. from which your excerpt is taken is the following (underlined: your excerpt; highlighted: critical parts): We ran correlations of the five data sets with each other on the percentage of adherents to the major world religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism) as well as the nonreligious (Table 2). The WCD is highly correlated with the other four data sets, with most correlations near 0.90, which suggests that its data for percent Christian, percent Muslim, percent Buddhist, and percent Hindu are generally reliable. However, the other data sets often do not have information for all countries, so the correlations only represent the countries where other data sets record percentages for those religious categories. Most notably, the nonreligious data are not highly correlated between most of the data sets. While all of the data sets have mostly complete data for percent Christian and percent Muslim, data on percent Buddhist, percent Hindu, and percent nonreligious are incomplete in various data sets. The nonreligious category has few observations in State Department and CIA data and is best represented in the WCD, WVS, and Pew. The estimates for Hindus and Buddhists are especially problematic in the CIA data. Figure 1 shows that the WCD tends to overestimate percent Christian relative to the other data sets. Scatterplots show that the majority of the points lie above the y - x line, indicating the WCD estimate for percent Christian within countries is generally higher than the other estimates. Although the bias is slight, it is consistent, and consequently, the WCD estimates a higher ratio of Christians in the world. This suggests that while the percentage Christian estimates are closely related among the data sets, the tendency is for them to be slightly higher in the WCD.

Regarding the handbooks that you keep citing, they are not written by statisticians and demographers and are not essays about statistics/demography and its methodologies. They are just "handbooks" that uncritically use the WCE/WRD/WCD among many other sources. Æo (talk) 19:38, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Key word in Hsu - "Slight". Nowhere does she say significant, nor does she isolate Christians away from the list of "generally reliable". Table 2 shows WCD had higher correlation (greater than .9) with all 4 datasets than the other 4 datasets with each other (some were below .9) on Christians as well. High correlation verifies general reliability. Overestimates/underestimates occur all the time in demography because all sources are limited. Example on census overestimating Christians too [19] and also some censuses like Soviet or Albanian censuses underestimated Christians. If WRD was as unreliable as you keep saying, high quality publications obviously would not use them even on Christianity at all, and yet they do. Among other recent ones I cited above (in my vote), here is one someone else found on summarizing Christianity in Asia [20] (btw Asia is ~60% of global population). These publications use experts in demography. Neither you or I are experts. I will leave it here. Ramos1990 (talk) 20:23, 13 January 2024 (UTC)

Hsu, whom in any case wrote although the bias is slight, it is consistent, and consequently, the WCD estimates a higher ratio of Christians, is not the only one to have found such an overestimation; almost all the other papers cited have highlighted it. For instance, Liedhegener & Odermatt found a systematic bias of its data in favor of Christianity. It is "systematic" and "consistent" throughout all countries, which means that even if the percentage of overestimation for each country were low (e.g. 3%), the overall result on the world population would be significant. The evidence suggests that in some cases the percentage of overestimation is very high: e.g. Australia WRD 2020 ~57%, cfr. Australia Census 2021 ~44% — overestimation of 13%; Canada WRD 2020 ~63%, cfr. Canada Census 2021 ~53% — overestimation of 10%; Czechia WRD 2020 ~35%, cfr. Czechia Census 2021 ~12% — overestimation of 23%; Hungary WRD 2020 ~87%, cfr. Hungary Census 2021 ~42% — overestimation of 45%; Isle of Man WRD 2020 ~84%, cfr. Isle of Man Census 2021 ~55% — overestimation of 29%; and there are many other examples. Æo (talk) 23:00, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Your analysis: WRD vs census, is not reliable or convincing. Liedhegener & Odermatt themselves use at least a dozen sources from different time periods and adjust censuses to get their numbers for Europe. They use aggregate analysis, not single source basis (i.e. they do not just use census and that's it). Plus they admit that the quality of census can be problematic and are variable. "Even recent censuses pose sometimes serious, probably unsolvable problems to statistics on religious affiliation at a subnational or regional level. Micro censuses especially share to a certain extent the problems of survey research because the number of respondents is higher, but still restricted. The latest Swiss census is an example of the limitations to producing reliable regional, not to mention local, statistics on religious affiliation. But even traditional population censuses may cause problems which also affect regional comparisons. The British census of 2001 may illustrate this. Its results on religious affiliation where not only restricted by a missing distinction between the major Christian traditions. Moreover, the questionnaire differed substantially between England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland." Some census are good for sure, but obviously not all the time. Plus less than half the countries around the world even ask about religion in their censuses. And the ones that do are inconsistently worded country by country. That means half the world is missing such data by default. Liedhegener & Odermatt themselves admit "Moreover, for Europe as a whole, as for important European countries such as France and Great Britain, it is currently impossible to give reliable figures on the religious affiliation of its population." Britain has census data on religion by the way, so what happened there is interesting. Also they do say that "For Europe the SMRE data show that the WCD provides plausible data for a number of countries, but not for all." Definitely different than your analysis above. This is an interesting admission and find it interesting that they incorporated WCD to their SMRE, it means it is indeed a valuable demographical database for SMRE. And OMG they even acknowledge historical significance as former "international “gold standard” of comparative statistics on religious affiliation, the World Christian Database". Understandable with other global datasets available than in the past. Anyways, this is not unique, "To illustrate this: The two well-known international surveys EVS and ESS use a two-stage process of questioning. In comparison to other sources this technique leads frequently to much higher results on the proportion of persons with no religious affiliation. In addition, due to different wording, the ESS produces even higher figures in this category than the EVS." Each source is limited obviously. They even say "Statistics on religious affiliation in France are a prominent example. It depends on the data you choose to either name France a catholic country or to declare it to be a highly secularized nation. However, comparing the different data on France collected by the SMRE, it becomes clear that it is virtually impossible to come up with reliable figures for this Western European country today." I like their admission that secularized countries "are countries with a lack of data or with contradicting data".

Religious demography is just a mess and not as simple as you make it seem. That is why I keep on saying that experts should be doing this stiff, not wikieditors. I rest on the experts from Oxford, Pew, Cambridge, etc on what sources are used and acceptable. Ramos1990 (talk) 00:31, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

What is the reliability of Mondoweiss?

What is the reliability of Mondoweiss?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

WP:RSP has 8 discussions on Mondoweiss, but not an RfC I can see. It is cited somewhat frequently in the Israel-Palestine conflict topic area. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 07:31, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Survey (Mondoweiss)

• Option 4 I’m starting this RfC because since the October 7th attacks on Israel, Mondoweiss pushes extremism and disinformation. Like WP:COUNTERPUNCH or WP:UNZ, it has published extremist opinion pieces; in this case acclaiming attacks on Israeli civilians (typically considered to be war crimes). In terms of disinformation, the main propaganda narrative Monodoweiss pushes is that there is no evidence that Palestinians raped Israelis on October 7th. [21] [22][23][24]

According to The BBC, NBC news, The New York Times, AP news, The Washington Post, and Human Rights Watch, mass rapes were committed by Palestinians against Israeli civilians on October 7th. The consensus of all reliable sources is that this happened, and that there is verifiable evidence to show this. Mondoweiss is the outlier here with rape denialism against the vast majority of overwhelming sources. This is typical historical negationism; these are disingenuous claims that there is 'no evidence' for well-documented atrocities akin to Holocaust denial tactics.

Mondoweiss also published extremist opinion pieces glorifying the acts of terrorism on October 7th. Counterpunch, Unz, and the Electronic Intifada [25] were declared unreliable for similar reasons, so I believe this is fair game to criticize the source on. This also provides the 'why' as to Mondoweiss' denialism of atrocities in the ongoing war. So I’ll just grab a few choice quotes from opinion pieces to show my point.

• From the moment those fighters flew in on paramotors, disrupting the parallel reality that was this music festival, they accomplished something profound (one must wonder what it felt like for these fighters to see a party just outside where they have been trapped under a suffocating blockade). in reference to the Re'im music festival massacre. [26]
• In some ways, then, we can see the attack on the festival as the most violent of anti-colonial refusals — a refusal to let the children of a nation that ethnically cleansed one’s family party on that stolen land in peace. It violently reasserts that this land is stolen and that it can only be returned to its rightful owners through bloodshed. [27]
• Nothing can hide the determination and courage of those young people who returned to their land on October 7.[28]
• They have failed to mention that those targeted were, are, colonizers, settlers, the primary agents, actors, impellers of the colonization and genocide of Palestine. They have failed to mention that the resistance targets colonial settlements, established atop ethnically cleansed and razed Palestinian villages; it targets colonial settlers that live in stolen Palestinian houses, on stolen Palestinian land, urinate on our corpses and dance on our graves. They have failed to highlight that the term “Settler-Colonialism” is not without reason, and that a colonizer is a colonizer, in uniform or out.[29]
• The inhuman and annihilating excess of organized state force, whose untold destructive powers are now unfolding in total violence on the helpless people of Gaza, can never be morally equated with even the most atrocious acts of the colonized committed in the hope of liberation from an unbearable colonial regime. Any demand that the colonized desist from the use of armed force, a right in any case guaranteed to them under international law, becomes arrant hypocrisy in the face of the technical storm inflicted by state powers. [30]

To summarize, Mondoweiss is extremist and encourages hatred/terrorist attacks against Israelis. It argues that the killing and raping of civilians is not only justified, but actively heroic if done to advance Palestinian interests. Any of these opinion pieces, if posted by an editor on Wikipedia, would probably result in an indefinite block for racism per WP:NONAZIS. We can and should ban racist publications as sources as they have a tendency to fabricate information to fit their viewpoints. Mondoweiss proves this by publishing disinformation about the well-evidenced mass rapes committed on October 7th and repeatedly alleging that there is no evidence for these war crimes. Using it as a source would be giving credence to WP:FRINGE viewpoints. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 07:31, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't have time to go through all your evidence so I picked the first link, read it entirely, followed through to the Hebrew links and used machine translation to verify that Mondoweiss is indeed correct. At no point did I find the article said what you claimed it did ("pushes is that there is no evidence that Palestinians raped Israelis on October 7th"). Instead, it cast doubt on the rape of one particular victim: Gal Abdush. Their reporting is corroborated by Channel 13 (Israel) quoting that Abdush's brother-in-law says "No one knows if it [rape] happened". VR _talk 16:48, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Gal Abdush is the woman in the black dress filmed with her groin covered in blood. Virtually every reliable news outlet agrees that the video shows evidence of rape. Mondoweiss, which admits it has not seen the video, says the video proves nothing. Do you want me to post the video here? You can find it on Yandex in a few seconds. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 17:30, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

No, Mondoweiss article doesn't say "the video proves nothing". It says, "The newspaper did not link to the video but released a distant, indistinct image from it that revealed nothing". This is the image from the NYT article (article reproduced here). Indeed the image is quite unclear.VR _talk 20:41, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Vice regent: The last line of the Mondoweiss article is that In the end, it appears that the New York Times manipulated a working-class Mizrahi family in the service of Israeli hasbara in order to score a journalistic achievement, which in reality is nothing more than a repetition of fake news and government propaganda. Calling a piece "fake news and government propaganda" is pretty clear that Mondoweiss is calling the New York Times article bullshit. I would imagine they wouldn't call the New York Times "fake news" if they thought the video was credible.

Mondoweiss bases this on two things: that the video of Gal Abdush is not available to them, and so the only evidence are Abdush's relatives who dispute that this video shows she was raped.

A high-res video is result two on Bing for "woman who was raped and burned to death". I'd recommend not clicking through to the video unless you really want to verify that, but Mondoweiss didn't bother to look for the video and so I don't think their first point holds water. They say that Abdush's brother-in-law + relatives don't believe/have doubts that Abdush was raped, but this is all meaningless hearsay. What matters to the Gal Abdush story is whether or not Mondoweiss bothered to find the video evidence which can be trivially found on a major search engine. That is what the New York Times based their reporting on, and Mondoweiss' media analysis falls flat.

This would be like trying to refute theories about the JFK Assassination by looking at social media posts of people that have seen the Zapruder film instead of bothering to watch it oneself. It is the job of a secondary source to review the primary source and analyze it, not delegate that responsibility to relatives of the family member (who may not want to acknowledge that someone was raped) on social media. A source that doesn't (e.g. Mondoweiss) is not a reliable source. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 02:15, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

I searched the video and found it on bing, and 1) its not the same video referenced by NYT (the NYT video screenshot is taken from a distance and has poor resolution) 2) the video I found is of a corpse, there is no evidence of rape (but then again I'm not an expert in these things).

And blaming a source for omissions is a standard not required of RS. Its clear NYT omitted thoroughly interviewing Abdush's family members, does that make NYT unreliable? RS sources are expected to be accurate, not comprehensive. VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 05:30, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3, though would not oppose Option 4. Even in its news articles Mondoweiss has published false and misleading information, and when we consider its lean towards antisemitism it is not a source we can rely on.

For example, it has stuck to the narrative that Israel is responsible for the al-Ahli explosion. This is most obvious in opinion articles but it also occurs in news articles. They have explicitly stated that Israel is responsible in:

1. Do not dismiss the Gaza genocide allegations from November 19. It makes the indisputably false claim that Israeli claims as to complete Palestinian culpability have been largely debunked.
2. ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 39: Health official says Israel ‘sentencing Al-Shifa hospital to death’ as doctors dig mass grave from November 14
3. ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 15: Gaza aid trickles in amid uninterrupted airstrikes, West Bank arrests continue from October 21
4. etc

They have also implied it in a number of other articles, such as by referring to the explosion as a "bombing" and by linking to an article from the immediate aftermath of the explosion which is headlined "Massacre: Israel kills over 500 Palestinians in Gaza hospital attack" and describes an airstrike as being the cause.

1. Activists hold Israel responsible for drive-by-shooting at homes of detained demonstrators in Umm al-Fahm from December 13
2. Israel’s criminalization of Palestinian protest from November 23
3. ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 36: Al-Shifa hospital at epicenter of Gaza fighting as fleeing civilians are killed by Israeli strikes from November 11
4. etc

Their falsehoods aren't limited to that topic; they also present them on others, such as the tunnels beneath Al-Shifa. For example, in ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 46: Israeli tanks besiege Indonesian Hospital as bombardment of Gaza continues from November 21, Mondoweiss says The claims [that Hamas has tunnels underneath the Indonesian Hospital] mirror previous allegations Israel made about Al-Shifa Hospital that it has yet to provide concrete evidence of. This is false; on November 19 independent media had confirmed that tunnels existed beneath Al-Shifa.

Elsewhere, they misrepresent their own sources. For example, in Western media’s reference to the ‘Hamas-run’ Health Ministry is another dehumanizing tactic enabling Israel’s genocide they say that Reuters says that three Al-Shifa employees were abducted; what Reuters actually says is that three are missing.

In addition, I have concerns about antisemitism at Mondoweiss. For example, in "‘Atlantic’ rebrands new editor, Jeffrey Goldberg, leaving Israel, Jews, and Iraq off his resume" Philip Weiss, who is the founder and co-editor of the website, makes the problematic statement The word Jew made no appearance in the Atlantic announcement; while most of the piece is acceptable criticism of a new editor, with this line it swerves directly into antisemitism by suggesting that ones status as a Jew is relevant to ones position as the editor-in-chief of a major news organization - see Antisemitic trope#Controlling the media. Reliable sources have also documented this, such as in this Atlantic article. BilledMammal (talk) 09:10, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Exploring the source more generally, I find:

First, they widely use deprecated sources; see #Discussion (Mondoweiss) for details.

Second, I've found additional evidence of them misrepresenting their sources, going beyond their sources, and even making basic errors with their sources.

Misrepresenting sources:

1. In "Sadness and anger as 4 Jewish victims of Paris attack are buried in Jerusalem" they claim that The bodies of the deceased were interred in a Jerusalem commemoration after an invitation to host the burial was extended to relatives of the slain by the Israeli Foreign Ministry, which later sought payment from families of $13,000 each for the ceremonies. The source they link says something very different; that the Hevra Kadisha burial society demanded Tuesday that the families of four Jewish men killed in a Paris terror attack and buried in Jerusalem each pay NIS 50,000 ($12,500) for their burials.
2. In "How the Taliban chased the West out of Afghanistan", they attribute the statement They tried to stuff another part of the money into a helicopter, but not all of it fit. And some of the money was left lying on the tarmac to Reuters; Reuters is careful to avoid saying so in its own voice and instead attributes it to a Russian spokesman.
3. In the same article, they cite an ODI report to say that Surveys regularly found Afghans saying that they believed corruption levels were lower in Taliban areas. However, the source makes no such claim; the source doesn't even include a survey regarding corruption.
4. In "Israel’s national airline El Al is an intelligence front for the Shin Bet" they claim that Israel uses its airlines as an intelligence front, in which Israeli security services work for the airlines as undercover employees. As evidence for this, they cite an undercover investigation conducted by Aljazeera. In doing so, they make a significant misrepresentation of the source, which discusses no undercover investigation, and avoids saying in its own voice that the airline is used as a front, instead attributing that claim to specific individuals and leaked South African cables.
5. In "Palestinians bid farewell to journalist Khalid Amayreh". It claims that he urged the Palestinian people to reject the two state solution. However, in the source provided he makes no such claim; instead, he reports that Palestinians consider it to be dead.

Going beyond their sources:

1. In "Arms, oil and Iran – Israel’s role in Nagorno-Karabakh" they say Around 75,000 ethnic Armenians fled their homes in Nagorno-Karabakh – more than half of the population. The source they use, DW, provides that number - but attributes it to a Artsakh spokesperson and does not put it in their own voice.

Making errors with their sources:

1. In "Gulf crisis could push Hamas closer to Iran, or cause it to fold under the Palestinian Authority" they say Moreover, Qatar has paid the salaries of 40,000 Hamas employees in 2016, a bill that totaled $20 million and required careful coordination between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. What their source says is that Sheikh Tamim bin Hamd al-Thani will pay $31,030,752 for the July salaries of Gaza’s public sector employees - these are significant errors, getting both the period and the value significantly wrong.
2. In the same article, they say Last week Egypt gave 220,000 gallons of fuel to Gaza’s power plant, raising daily electrical supplies to eight hours, up from four the week before. Their source states the opposite; Despite the plant's partial resumption, residents will continue to receive four hours of electricity followed by about 14 hours off.
3. In Netanyahu bolsters Sudan’s military leaders in attempt to save normalization they claim that 72% of Sudanese oppose normalization; the figure their source gives is 68%. It's a minor mistake, and in a more reputable organization would be something we could safely ignore, but it's another piece on the pile of evidence against Mondoweiss. I misread their source BilledMammal (talk) 13:19, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Third, they have defended deprecated sources such as Russia Today and The Electronic Intifada:

1. They defend RT in a number of articles; in "The Russiagate farce" they go beyond defending it and present the claim that Russia influenced the 2016 election as conspiracy theory.
2. In "A salute to ‘Electronic Intifada’", they describe EI as a source that continues telling indispensable truths.

Fourth, they have published misinformation:

1. In "Palestinian Authority blocks dozens of websites critical of Abbas government". This source claims that QNN is an independent news source with no political affiliation. This is false; it is affiliated with Hamas (The Guardian, Al Jazeera, JNS, US State Department, VOA, ToI, etc). Bizarrely, they originally got this correct; they issued a "correction" to say that their initial statement that QNN was affiliated with Hamas was incorrect.
2. In Inside the “Wasps’ Nest”: the rise of the Jenin Brigade they claimed that Israeli attacks killed 51 people. The actual figures for the conflict is 49 killed overall, with 30 killed by Israel. See also Al Monitor.

This is not a source I am familiar with, so most of the issues I could identify were when they were contradicted by their own sources. I suspect an editor better versed in this source and the topics it writes on would find far more falsehoods.

I still prefer Option 3, but given all this I would support Option 4 as a second choice. BilledMammal (talk) 05:02, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

An overall problem with this approach is treating as "sources" what are merely links. They refer to other coverage, but that's not to say it's the sole basis of their reportage. And in any case, many of these are either cases of semantics, cherrypicked/selective quotation, or not errors at all, e.g.:

2. The Afghanistan article: I don't think it's necessarily a misrepresentation; you've quoted selectively. MW also sources the information to the Russian embassy in Afghanistan: When he fled the country, press secretary of the Russian embassy in Kabul Nikita Ishchenko told RIA Novosti, his people drove four cars filled with money to the airfield. “They tried to stuff another part of the money into a helicopter, but not all of it fit. And some of the money was left lying on the tarmac,” according to a Reuters report. It's clear they're quoting Reuters' coverage of Ischenko's remarks.

3. The report you link says (p. 17): "most [Afghans] pointed to government interference and corruption and occupation of and theft from clinics by Afghan security forces and militias as being more problematic than Taliban interventions." The fact that this came from interviews rather than "surveys" is semantic ("survey" also means To investigate the opinions, experiences, etc., of people by asking them questions which is what that report was about)

5. The Khaled Amayreh article: MW says Amayreh urged Palestinians to refuse its [the two-state solution's] false promise. In the AJ article, Amayreh says: There is just no time left for a Palestinian state. How can a state be a viable proposition when it has no control over its borders, when there is a military occupation, and when towns are cut off from each other by a system of roads and checkpoints? The two seem entirely consistent.

"Going beyond their sources": this is just a case of MW willing to say in its own voice what another source decided to attribute. It's inclined to believe the official from Nagorno-Karabakh, no different from how Israeli sources frequently parrot IDF talking points without attribution.

"Making errors with their sources"

2. The "Gulf Crisis" article: the BBC article was published four days prior to the MW article, and it's linked for the "220,000 gallons" point (not the hours of power point). An engineer interviewed by BBC stated his hope that the remaining two generators could be made "operational before the festival of Eid al-Fitr", which, in 2017, began on June 25 (the day before the MW article was published).

3. The 72% figure comes from Figure 27 of the linked article. You might have gotten it confused with Figure 26, "Attitudes towards the Palestinian cause". There was no error, minor or otherwise.

Regarding the attempt to tether MW to deprecated sources, I don't think that's compelling reasoning. As you concede below, this is only grounds for Option 3 or 4 in the context of the other evidence [you] have presented, which is amenable to various interpretations.

"Published Misinformation":

1. None of the sources you provide explain exactly how QNN is "affiliated with" Hamas; is it "affiliated" in the same way the Health Ministry is "controlled by" Hamas?

2. The Russiagate piece is presented as "Media Analysis" which is different from its News section; it has the cadence of an op-ed. I doubt this could be cited for statements of fact even if it was published in an RS, per WP:RSEDITORIAL.

So this alleged evidence is not particularly damning in any case. WillowCity^(talk) 12:40, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

First, you're right about Sudan; I have struck that, thank you for the correction.

Second, you've only addressed about half the issues I raised. Even if you were right about all of them that still leaves too much to allow us to consider this source reliable - it is relevant to point out here that these are just the tip of the iceberg; I found them in only a couple of hours.

However, you weren't right about all of them; half of the issues you raised could go either way, but the other half your argument is very weak (eg, arguing that Mondoweiss is right and everyone else is wrong), or I have found additional sources to disprove your interpretation.

Specific responses
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Misrepresenting sources 2. I can see how you can interpret it that way, but the sentence structure leads me to believe that it is attributed to Reuters. Reasonable minds could differ. 3. It's not only that there wasn't a survey; its that that source doesn't support the claim. It makes no statement about the level of corruption in Taliban areas, and it makes no comparison in their beliefs as to the level of corruption. 5. He's not urging anything there, in my view, he's stating his own view. Going beyond their sources: Then the correct thing to do is source the official directly. Making errors with their sources 2. Possible, but I felt it was unlikely, so I looked into it. Reliable sources from around the same time as the Mondoweiss article also gives four hours; New Arab, Al Jazeera. 3. Fair point, I misread; I've struck that line. Defended deprecated sources 2. Their articles explicitly labeled "news" also tend to have the cadence of an op-ed. I don't consider this distinction a defense. Published Misinformation 1. Your point seems to be "Mondoweiss is right, every other reliable source is wrong"; that isn't a good argument.

As you concede below, this is only grounds for Option 3 or 4 "in the context of the other evidence [you] have presented", which is amenable to various interpretations.

I don't think you understood what I was saying there. If this source was otherwise impeccable, the reliance on deprecated sources would still be enough to make a valid argument for Option 3 or Option 4, but it would be possible to argue for Option 2 - and as you implicitly concede, this source about is far from impeccable as you can get. BilledMammal (talk) 13:19, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2. Mondoweiss is primarily a publisher of op-eds. Since there is no evidence that Mondoweiss interferes with what its authors write, the reliability of each article depends on the author only. Our rules for citing opinions are perfectly adequate for dealing with it. If the author is a subject-area expert, there is no reason to exclude him/her from citation. We cite op-eds in the Israeli press which are no less biased on average. The concern being expressed here is not really about reliability; note how the two comments before this one quite openly emphasise that articles in Mondoweiss don't follow a pro-Israel line. Zero^talk 11:53, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  note how the two comments before this one quite openly emphasise that articles in Mondoweiss don't follow a pro-Israel line Unless you consider "not antisemitic" to be equivalent to "pro-Israel", I don’t think that’s a fair assessment of my comment. BilledMammal (talk) 12:17, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  It's true that I ignored the weakest part of your argument, which quotes out of context and avoids mentioning that Philip Weiss is Jewish. Zero^talk 12:35, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

While not disagreeing with parts of your vote,

avoids mentioning that Philip Weiss is Jewish

The idea that being Jewish automatically precludes one from holding antisemitic views is a false one. The Kip 23:14, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

What about Wall Street Journal, which published an editorial "Islamophobia isn't real", calling Islamophobia "normal human reaction to terror"? Even RS sometimes (unfortunately) give space to prejudice. VR _talk 04:32, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

That’s not an editorial; it’s an opinion piece. Opinion pieces shouldn’t be used as a source for facts, and WSJ publishing bad opinion pieces is irrelevant to the reliability of this outlet. BobFromBrockley (talk) 09:40, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2: Per the above, it is only a host, so IT may not (technically) be an RS, the stuff its hosts might be. Slatersteven (talk) 13:38, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  FYI, that’s inaccurate; it publishes op-eds, but it also publishes its own news stories, such as most of the articles I linked in my !vote. BilledMammal (talk) 13:40, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  Technicaly my comment still takes that into account, it is not an RS what it hosts (hosts, not publishes) maybe. Slatersteven (talk) 13:42, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  If I have understood you correctly, you are saying Option 2 for the opinion articles it hosts (ie, consider self published with reliability dependent on the author), Option 3 for everything else? BilledMammal (talk) 13:44, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  So it can be treated as a WP:SPS? Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 19:10, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 but also wouldn't be opposed to option 4. The alleged falsehoods, at least to me, seem to be more based out of strong POV rather than outright fabrication (ex. multiple Palestinian and/or human-rights groups still blame Israel for the hospital explosion as well, and claim that the sources (mainly western intelligence/media) attributing blame to PIJ are inherently biased against Palestinians). The op-eds are also subject to author reliability on a case-by-case basis. As a result, deprecation seems a tad strong of a response.

All of that said, however, and while I understand WP:BIAS doesn't inherently make a source unreliable, the opinions expressed in the above pieces (primarily, the glorification of terrorism) and Mondoweiss' willingness to publish them strikes me as WP:FRINGE and make me heavily question the reliability of their own content and its usefulness as a proper info source on Wikipedia. The heavy usage of especially inflammatory rhetoric ("a colonizer is a colonizer, in uniform or out," "[the land] can only be returned to its rightful owners through bloodshed.") backs this up; as the nom stated, an normal editor expressing these views would more than likely find themselves the recipient of a WP:HATESPEECH complaint. Considering its in-practice status as Philip Weiss' personal blog, the news pieces seemingly amount to a WP:SPS as well, which further decreases any possible reliability. Finally, the limited overlap with Ron Unz (as described below) doesn't exactly fill me with confidence. The Kip 23:14, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Reading the perennial sources list, this overall seems like a pretty similar situation to Counterpunch; effectively an SPS with little oversight of opinion pieces, and some entries promoting extremist content. That one is currently listed as WP:GUNREL. The Kip 23:50, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

And further, as noted below; like the recently-deprecated Electronic Intifada and The Cradle, it appears Mondoweiss also has considerable reliance on multiple deprecated sources, especially Al Mayadeen and RT, as well as hosting articles from Max Blumenthal of The Grayzone. This makes me a bit more sympathetic towards deprecation. The Kip 01:53, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree, those are highly concerning FortunateSons (talk) 11:50, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2 They primarily produce opinion pieces and the poorly articulated arguments above for deprecation seem to come down to bias arguments because of opinionated statements and not issues of actual falsehoods being produced as news. BilledMammal's is especially egregious in this regard, trying to use articles saying that Israel has some responsibility in events prior to and after October 7th (which is a longstanding topic of consideration in both the news and more academic settings) as some sort of negative factor, when it is not.

Then using the 500 dead argument, which the entirety of the news media got wrong (largely because the original health ministry reporting in Arabic said 500 casualties and the first breaking news reporters in English of that mistranslated it as 500 killed, an unfortunate case of inter-lingual telephone and why breaking news pieces should be sparingly utilized). Then BilledMammal tries to use the discussion about tunnels under Al-Shifa, which are again a matter of quite public debate, especially considering the tunnels we know Israel themselves built under there in the 1980's.

Lastly, the piece about the Atlantic is quite clearly focusing on how the Atlantic editor is extremely biased toward Israel (and promotion of lies helping start the Iraq war) and uses that bias on Israel and their cultural identity as a reason to point out said person's unreliability. Now, the article may possibly be making a very oblique reference to the nonsense conspiracy about Jewish people owning the world, but that is very unclear from just a single line like that and the article itself just seems to put that in context of the editor's massive Israel propaganda supporting in the past, including in their own book publication. So, again, the Mondoweiss article seems biased against Israel and such information, but I'm seeing no evidence of anything outside of opinions being made, because it's an opinion-publishing site. Meaning that what matters is who is making said opinion in regards to WP:RS policy. Silverseren^C 00:01, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

trying to use articles saying that Israel has some responsibility in events prior to and after October 7th Can you clarify where you got that impression, because that's not my argument?

Regarding the specifics, I also did not use the "500 dead" argument; the closest I came is noting that they continued to refer to a "Breaking News" article that uses that figure months after it stopped being breaking news - although, I would note that we normally consider failing to correct inaccuracies when the inaccuracies are identified evidence of unreliability.

Finally, the existence of militant tunnels under al-Shifa is no longer a matter of debate - specifics of them are, such as whether they housed a command and control center and whether they connected to the hospital wards - but their existence was confirmed by reliable sources two days prior to the publishing of the article where Mondoweiss claimed Israel had presented no concrete evidence that they existed. BilledMammal (talk) 01:20, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Most news articles didn't correct the figure across all media, though some did flip flop across multiple different claims afterwards as statements by both the IDF and Hamas were debunked back and forth (such as the IDF originally using the video of a missile from a year prior). Nothing about the hospital blast is a negative for a specific source, because everyone got it both wrong on numbers and no one still knows who exactly is responsible, particularly after the New York Times investigation showing the missile came from the direction of Israel and not the opposite direction as originally claimed.

The usage of the tunnels is very much a matter of debate. As noted, the tunnels already existed, made by Israel in the 1980's. Whether they were at all used in a militant manner remains up for debate and is still debated in the media. Especially since those tunnels in question aren't connected to the hospital complex, but to a separate set of buildings nearby. The Washington Post continues to point out the lack of actual evidence presented by the IDF in an article from December 21st, a full month after the Mondoweiss one.

So, again, you're not bringing up anything of actual falsehoods, but open points of debate in the media in general, which only present Mondoweiss as being biased against Israel by their articles. Silverseren^C 01:39, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Even if you want to argue that it's reasonable to argue that Israel is the culprit despite reliable sources being in consensus that this is extremely improbable, Mondoweiss goes beyond doing that. Specifically, they claim that the evidence of complete Palestinian culpability has been largely debunked - that, at the very least, is indisputable false.

Regarding the tunnels, you're right that the usage is very much a matter of debate - but Mondoweiss' claim was not about the usage but the existence. BilledMammal (talk) 01:45, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2. The nom raises what are essentially accusations of bias, but this does not address reliability. Essentially, a variation of "WP:IDONTLIKEIT (so it should never be used as a source for anything, ever)". The fact that some coverage may be distasteful to certain sensibilities does not make the source as a whole unreliable. It is hard to see this as anything other than an attempt to stifle or deprecate sources that depart from a preferred POV. In-text attribution is likely appropriate to address concerns regarding bias (as has been the community's conclusion in numerous prior discussions). Advocates for deprecation should familiarize themselves with what WP:RS actually requires. WillowCity^(talk) 02:55, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  With all due respect, while the original complaint has elements of IDLI, I feel as if though the nominator has since raised genuine concerns of fabrication/exaggeration in responses to Silverseren, and more importantly, as elaborated below in response to my own question, a worrisome degree of overlap with a wide variety of already-GUNREL and/or deprecated sources. This latter issue played a significant role in why Electronic Intifada and The Cradle were recently deprecated, and I would encourage you to take this into account.

  Also, regarding the sentence beginning with "It is hard to see..." I recommend you reword or strike so as not to violate WP:ASPERSIONS. Remember to WP:AGF. The Kip 03:24, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Did you actually read through nom's evidence? If so, please respond to my comment under theirs. VR _talk 16:51, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Your comment you're referencing under my !vote starts with I don't have time to go through all your evidence, so I'm not sure what the point of accusing other people of not having read the evidence is. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 17:33, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  I think The Kip may have confused me with the nom, given I was the one who had the discussion with Silverseren and replied them them below. BilledMammal (talk) 02:43, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  That would be it, my bad. The Kip 04:00, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2 for NPOV sake, and because bias complaints like this would knock out basically all sources in the I/P area (as is well known, for example, one large German news publisher requires its European employees to take an editorial stand on Israel). All sources have bias, all sources are wrong sometimes, and all sources fail in their job from time-to-time. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:24, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2. What I'm seeing in the OP's diffs can be addressed by Wikipedia's policies for op-eds/opinion pieces, rather than by total blacklisting or deprecation. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:08, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Unfortunately, the same isn't true for the pile of diffs that I have provided; most of those are labeled "news", and they have considerable inaccuracies - they are also the result of only a couple of hours of research, I have no doubt that are more detailed search would reveal far more. BilledMammal (talk) 16:37, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2 Listed on RSP as NoCon after a bunch of discussions. Walls of text notwithstanding, this RFC appears out of the blue, rather than being referenced to some particular usage or ongoing discussion? Has MW been cited on WP for something alleged as fabrication? Biased certainly but that is not a reason to deprecate and deprecation should usually follow GU first. Its another of those news sites that mixes opinions with news so attribution will usually be necessary.Selfstudier (talk) 16:42, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  I thought now was a good time. We haven't had an RfC about this yet and it's cited heavily in the topic area, so I'd rather get consensus before I start ripping citations to it out of BLPs/articles. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 17:18, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3. The website used to be essentially a blog, first a personal one and then a group one, and older articles should be judged through that frame. In more recent years, it has professionalised to some extent. It now includes content it calls "News", most of which is summarised from other sources (both reliable and unreliable, including deprecated sources) but with some original content. The latter may be occasionally useful with attribution, but I'd say if this is the only source it's not reliable enough to use alone and if there are other sources why use this one. Then there is content it calls "Opinion", and on the whole I'd say the fact it's published at this outlet is an indicator that it is not likely to be sufficiently of note for us to include it per due weight. However, some contributors are more significant (e.g. Mitchell Plitnick is a fairly significant voice that often publishes there. BobFromBrockley (talk) 18:53, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 4 while a few articles may indeed covered by “just” WP:Biased and/or a concerning proximity to Hate Speech, the regular presentation of things that are WP:Fringe at best and intentional misinformation at worst is worthy of depreciation, particularly in combination with the frequent use of sources that are depreciated by Wikipedia really does not help either. I am uncertain whether it can really by fully considered WP:SPS by someone who isn’t a subject-matter expert, but if it really is, that would just be the a secondary problem. In addition, based on some of the past statements linked, a use for BLP or politicised situations within the fog or war would be very reckless at best. While the concern regarding a lack of pro-Palestinian RS brought up by some is understandable, there are definitely better and more reliable sources that have the desired political leaning without the habitual misinformation.FortunateSons (talk) 01:51, 9 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3. I'm against deprecation which should be an exceptional measure reserved for sources regularly publishing deliberate falsehoods. My !vote is mostly due to the list of errors from u:BilledMammal's comment above (most of these errors are in news rather than opinion pieces). If they had been meticulous with their reporting, we could've lived with their extreme bias and other issues, but they aren't, and I'd rather not have to recheck their sourcing each time their articles are used. The association with and financing by Ron Unz doesn't help either. Alaexis_¿question? 12:58, 9 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2. I've read through the evidence, thought on this for a while, and this is where I land. I had no previous familiarity with this site, FWIW. I'm seeing evidence that a lot of Mondoweiss's content is verging on advocacy, and that a lot of their Op-Eds contain views are widely considered unacceptable and/or that contain factually inaccurate information. I'm not seeing evidence of their publishing, as news, information known to be inaccurate at the time; and that's really what we need if we're looking at deprecation. Their Op-Eds might be dreadful, but that's true of any number of news organizations, and has never been considered enough to deprecate; opinion pieces should just be treated as such, that is, unreliable for factual information and only usable at all if the author is considered a subject expert. Vanamonde93 (talk) 20:49, 10 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2 A lot of different accusations have been made about the source. I have not looked at every reference but will comment on a few:

On its coverage of sexual violence by Hamas:

"In terms of disinformation, the main propaganda narrative Monodoweiss pushes is that there is no evidence that Palestinians raped Israelis on October 7th" - The first source provided is an account of how the family of Gal Abdush reacted to the NYT story about her. It includes links to her families responses which cast doubt on the NYT story. Editor VR has responded appropriately to this first article. The Mondoweiss story "CNN report claiming sexual violence on October 7 relied on non-credible witnesses, some with undisclosed ties to Israeli govt" was given as an example of Mondoweiss “cast[ing] doubt on the allegations of sexual violence” committed by Hamas. The Mondoweiss article examines the evidence cited in a CNN article about the violence. There is nothing wrong with a news source doing that type of journalism. At the end, Mondoweiss states "The analysis presented here is not meant to deny the possibility that sexual violence against women may have occurred on October 7. It is about fair reporting and about ensuring that there is sufficient and reliable evidence to support these serious allegations". Since then The Intercept has revealed that CNN runs its stories about the conflict past the IDF censor prior to publication so Mondoweiss’ scepticism about the CNN article may have been well founded.[31]

On Mondoweiss' treatment of the al-Ahli hospital explosion.

Our own article on the explosion provides no definitive apportionment of responsibility. The Mondoweiss source links to articles in NYT, Forensic Architecture and Channel 4 news which cast doubt on Israel’s evidence that Hamas was responsible.

Attempted bootstrapping of Mondoweiss based on the deprecation of sources such as RT and Electronic Intifada.

One of the cited articles does not defend RT as claimed. It says: "No doubt both Russia Insider and Russia Today are trying to make the US look bad and presumably, Kirby might be right in saying RT reporters don’t go after the Russian government when it bombs civilians" and "No doubt Russia Today is a slanted news source ...". Afaict Mondoweiss does not say Russiagate is a conspiracy theory. It may have implied that the NYT’s claim that Russia used an “adorable puppies” page on Facebook as part of its scheme was a "fringe conspiracy theory". Where do we stand on the “adorable puppies” story? 

On misinformation published by Mondoweiss.

The Mondoweiss story "Inside the “Wasps’ Nest”: the rise of the Jenin Brigade" was cited as an example. It is difficult to know whether the figure of 51 Palestinian killed by Israel is accurate. Our own article on this, Timeline of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict in 2022, quotes the UN, OCHA Protection of Civilians Report as saying that Israel killed 41 Palestinians in the period 2 August to 15 August 2022. So the Mondoweiss figure is in the right area. Burrobert (talk) 14:14, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

On Mondoweiss' treatment of the al-Ahli hospital explosion:

The most significant issue with Mondoweiss' treatment of this is that they say that Israeli claims as to complete Palestinian culpability have been largely debunked. This is a falsehood; indeed, the opposite is true.

Attempted bootstrapping of Mondoweiss based on the deprecation of sources such as RT and Electronic Intifada:

While you mention EI in the lead of that paragraph, you make no mention of it in the paragraph - even if you're correct about RT, that means they are still considering a deprecated source with significant issues to be a bastion of truth.

As for RT, I believe you are incorrect. Looking at the totality of the article they appear to be downplaying the issues with that source, and they do present Russian interference in the US election as pseudoscience and analogous to creationism:

Like all forms of pseudoscience, Russiagate is an endlessly flexible theory. Whatever truth there might be in any of the claims, the reporting resembles the material I read as a child in some of the less rational UFO literature, or, to use another analogy, the opportunistic and incoherent arguments put out by creationists.

On misinformation published by Mondoweiss:

You're comparing apples to oranges there. The 2022 Gaza–Israel clashes took place between 5 and 7 of August, and took place in Gaza. The figures the OCHA provide cover both Gaza and the West Bank, for the period between 2 and 15 August. Even beyond that, your argument is somewhat bizarre; you're arguing that a source that provides significantly lower figures is evidence that there isn't a problem with the provisioning of these higher figures. BilledMammal (talk) 20:27, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

This RfC is becoming hard to read, because of the long discussions under many of the votes. I will post my response in the Discussion section. Burrobert (talk) 07:43, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Continuing from Burrobert's examples, BilledMammal also wrote "They make frequent reference to Al Mayadeen", with four examples. Note first that there is nothing at all wrong with referring to Al Mayadeen with attribution and mainstream news sources do that all the time. Here is a random selection from the Washington Post: [32] [33] [34]. Looking at BM's examples, the third doesn't mention Al Mayadeen at all(?), and the other three use correct attribution. The second and fourth one even use "allegedly" in respect to Al Mayadeen's claim. The fourth one was an Al Mayadeen scoop: the 2017 Hamas charter before Hamas published it. MW cite a confirmation from Hamas, and the charter does match what Hamas published later. So, contrary to what BilledMammal claims, these examples show MW in a good light. Zero^talk 03:24, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

  Having read through this once again, I'm actually very concerned about the users who made the first claim Burrobert highlights above. I have not examined the totality of their coverage, but that example appears to be egregious source misrepresentation, and is the sort of thing we sanction people for at AE. Vanamonde93 (talk) 20:09, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  MondoWeiss, according to its search engine, has referred to Al-Mayadeen 97 times, 77 in news pieces. I've looked through the first three or four pages of hits (about 30 articles), and on the whole I agree with Zero/Burrobert's take: almost all of the uses are appropriate, and would not look out of place in a more mainstream news outlet. (Typical examples:[35][36][37].) However, with two exceptions from my sample, there is no attempt at identifying that Al-Mayadeen might be partisan (e.g. you'd expect "Hezbollah-linked TV station" or similar, as is the case in just one 2018 article). Frequently, you get a formulation like "An analyst on Lebanese Mayadeen television reported that---"[38], as if it's a neutral source, which in my view is unprofessional and slightly dangerous. But this in itself is not a reason to downgrade the source. (Other reasons raised in this conversation are though.) BobFromBrockley (talk) 15:15, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Vanamonde93: If by users who made the first claim Burrobert highlighted above, you mean me, the person who made the first claim that Mondoweiss casted doubt on evidence of rape, my comment represented the sources accurately. Mondoweiss said about the NY Times in the first source that Although claiming its story proves that “the attacks against women were not isolated events but part of a broader pattern of gender-based violence on Oct. 7” the veracity of the New York Times story was undermined almost as soon as it was published [39] In other words, Mondoweiss didn't just say that Gal Abdush wasn't raped, they also said that there is not a broader pattern of gender-based violence on October 7th, and Mondoweiss' proof of this is that the family of one victim didn't believe she was raped. Except the YNet News interview (cited by Mondoweiss to mean the opposite of what it says) with Gal Abdush's mother and brother has them both acknowledging she was raped. [40] I would say Mondoweiss is the group pushing falsehoods here. Another source I provided has the headline Despite lack of evidence, allegations of Hamas ‘mass rape’ are fueling Israeli genocide in Gaza [41], in other words Monodoweiss pushes that there is no evidence that Palestinians raped Israelis on October 7th, so I don't see how I manipulated the source. Finally, for the CNN source Mondoweiss claims that CNN’s failure to adhere to professional and ethical standards of responsible journalism also raises questions regarding CNN’s possible complicity with a political campaign orchestrated by the Israeli Prime Minister’s office to perpetuate unverified claims of mass rape, and a larger effort to dehumanize Palestinians in order to justify the ongoing genocidal campaign in Gaza. In other words, CNN is complicit with Israeli propaganda, and the claims of mass rape are "unverified". This is despite CNN's reporting being WP:USEDBYOTHERS such as the New York Times, Washington Post, etc. I think it's fair to say that Mondoweiss dismisses claims of mass rape as being Zionist agitprop, and I don't see how I engaged in source manipulation if that's what you're accusing me of.

  The other claims Burrobert says they refuted aren't mine so I won't comment further on them. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 20:02, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

  I'm not going to get deep into the weeds here; suffice to say that you need to not conflate opinion pieces and journalistic ones (the second quote you provide is from a opinion piece) and in the first case, it is fairly clear to a neutral observer that MW is challenging that story by NYT, and not the broader narrative. Whether they challenged the broader narrative elsewhere I don't know, and don't particularly care; what I am seeing is evidence of a lack of nuance and care in reading, typically brought about by a battleground attitude. Vanamonde93 (talk) 21:06, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

  I've read the particular story [42] by the New York Times since I have a subscription. Gal Abdush is presented as a single example to introduce the story in the piece. The story then segues into: And The Times interviewed several soldiers and volunteer medics who together described finding more than 30 bodies of women and girls in and around the rave site and in two kibbutzim in a similar state as Ms. Abdush’s — legs spread, clothes torn off, signs of abuse in their genital areas. which leads into graphic descriptions of rape/sexual violence of several women who are not Gal Abdush. Mondoweiss' central point of contention is whether or not Hamas fighters engaged in systematic rape and sexual violence against Israeli women (this is the exact phrasing Mondoweiss used), and I think it is clear that they did.

  While Mondoweiss says a lot of true things in their story, such as the brother-in-law denying that Gal Abdush was raped, those things do not address the vast majority of evidence in the New York Times piece, such as other eyewitness testimony about the rapes from Sapir the 6 different locations the mass rapes occurred in, or Raz Cohen. It also says There is currently no trace of the video on the internet, which is patently false is it can be found with a simple web search. A Bing search for "woman who was raped and burned to death" has "hamas-massacre.net" as the second result with shows another very high-definition video of the dead body from the article. The reason why the New York Times only posted the low-resolution still image is because they cannot show a half-naked woman who has been raped & burned to death on their website for the same reason I can't directly post the link on Wikipedia. But the NY Times does mention the video in their article, and Mondoweiss is wrong on that front. Mondoweiss' finishes off the piece by then looking at a bunch of alleged social media posts from relatives and saying that because relatives may have seen the video and don't think it means rape, then the video isn't evidence of rape. In my opinion, this disproves nothing. It's Mondoweiss using hearsay instead of looking at the video to reach a conclusion themselves. It's trivial to find in a search engine in a few minutes, so I don't know why they didn't do it.

  The reason why I am getting into the weeds is because you're an admin active at WP:AE accusing me in an RfC of committing source manipulation and adding that my comment would be sanctionable there. But I think it's pretty clear that I'm saying that Mondoweiss didn't bother to look for the Gal Abdush video and their evidence refuting it is weak. And even if we believe them 100% that the video isn't proof of anything whatsoever, Mondoweiss didn't analyze the entire rest of the piece featuring other interviews + other examples of mass rape. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 01:55, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2 per Zero (and my own comments scattered throughout this section).VR _talk 15:30, 11 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 4 as thoroughly delineated in Chess's comments at the outset. Using this partisan propaganda outlet as a reliable source is contrary to our standards. Coretheapple (talk) 20:21, 14 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3 It is useless to cite it. Not a strong source. Its orientations and who stands behind it are known. Sakiv (talk) 20:56, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  Could you explain why it’s not 4 with this explanation? Otherwise, I agree FortunateSons (talk) 21:03, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

  This editor has been topic-banned. Zero^talk 09:36, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 1 or 2 I think they are decent muckrakers. To give an example, the other day Yedioth Ahronoth, the leading Israeli daily, published an investigative report, authored by Ronen Bergman and Yoav Zitun, concluding that Israeli Defense Forces had essentially applied the Hannibal Directive on October 7 – a controversial doctrine that authorises the Israeli military to kill Israeli hostages along with hostage takers. According to Bergman and Zitun's report, it is unknown how many hostages were killed by the Israeli military on October 7, but the number appears to be substantial: in Ynet, the paper's online portal, Zitun said last month: Casualties fell as a result of friendly fire on October 7, but the IDF believes that beyond the operational investigations of the events, it would not be morally sound to investigate these incidents due to the immense and complex quantity of them that took place in the kibbutzim and southern Israeli communities due to the challenging situations the soldiers were in at the time. For much of the current conflict in the Middle East, you had to struggle pretty hard to find any reporting on such matters in leading Western media outlets. My point here is that what you were able to read in Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel's leading daily, last week, and in Middle East Eye last month, you could have read in Mondoweiss three months ago: A growing number of reports indicate Israeli forces responsible for Israeli civilian and military deaths following October 7 attack. The English-language mainstream media pretty much refused to address how many Israelis were killed by Israeli friendly fire on Oct. 7, until very recently: New York Times Dec. 27, Haaretz Jan. 8, Associated Press Jan. 11. In conclusion, I think Mondoweiss is part of the spectrum we should cover. It is a serious site – it's not the Daily Mail publishing clickbait – and we should bear in mind that all our sources are occasionally wrong: mainstream Western sources (and Western politicians) repeated outright and inflammatory falsehoods for months. I'd rather have a broader range of opinion, including the odd mistaken view (which in any event can be balanced by others), than a situation where the truth is shut out. --Andreas JN466 15:16, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

  No, it is not correct that you could have read the same stuff in Mondoweiss three months ago. The Mondoweiss piece you cite is a "thumb-sucker." Pure speculation, and it is anonymous and largely based on Israeli media. It is unheard-of for a reliable source (by Wikipedia standards) to use anonymous "reporting." Even if Mondoweiss had been permitted to be used as a reliable source at the time of publication, I doubt very much that a speculative, anonymous report would have passed muster here. That is little more than a blog item and anonymous blogs are not reliable sources. We should be striving for the highest quality sources given the sensitivity of the I/P articles, and not lowering our standards so as to use blogs with an overt ideological agenda. Coretheapple (talk) 15:37, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 2 They're definitely biased but I don't think there's much evidence presented here that they're unreliable for facts in their news content. Loki (talk) 17:54, 15 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 4 Indisputably a propaganda website, and we do not use propaganda websites as sourcing. In blogs such as this, the line between fact and fancy is thin, and their trafficking in fringe conspiracy theories bears this out. We don't use Mintnews for the same reason. The example above concerning the "Hannibal Directive" works against using Mondoweiss. The facts are unclear to this day, and reputable sources have dealt with that aspect of 10/7 responsibly. To no surprise, given its agenda (minimizing 10/7 and attacking Israel) it made a mention of the Hannibal Directive in speculative fashion earlier than reliable sources. This is an encyclopedia not a tabloid. We don't rush into print when the Daily Mirror or NY Post splatters something on Page One and likewise, especially in a controversial topic, it behooves us to utilize high quality sources for extraordinary claims, not anonymous speculation in a blog with an extreme agenda. Figureofnine (talk • contribs) 14:31, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

How accurate is a statement like "we do not use propaganda websites as sourcing" I wonder? Sean.hoyland - talk 14:46, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

There's no question that we (the royal we, not you and me) use all kinds of crap as sourcing, and that assumes there is any sourcing at all. I recently spent considerable time and energy to obtain removal of an article on a mythical "crime family" that existed only in the imagination of the now-vanished editor who created it. There was sourcing, but none of it supported the existence of the subject of the article. I then found that that there was an entire template listing articles "related" to that mythical crime famiiy. More time down the drain. So sure, propaganda is used. Blogs are used. Coretheapple (talk) 17:03, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

We're not supposed to and this is a good first step. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 00:35, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure "we're not supposed to" is actually the case. The RfC:_China Daily case suggests that even when a source is operated by a Central Propaganda Department, there is wiggle room, a case by case approach to usage. Sean.hoyland - talk 04:15, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

That proves my point. We use outright propaganda, in much the same way as we tell our readers about "crime families" that don't exist (and we do so for many years). If Wikipedia existed during the 1930s, we might have used Der Stürmer or the Völkischer Beobachter. Hopefully we try not to have articles about nonexistent crime families, and likewise hopefully too we can strive for a higher standard of sourcing for contentious topics going forward, not using propaganda organs even if they do provide articles that aren't lies or spin on occasion. Coretheapple (talk) 16:19, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree with the comparison of Mondoweiss to Der Stürmer and Völkischer Beobachter, but we would only be relying on those outlets in your counterfactual as Nazi Germany used the threat of force to make people publicly support those publications. Unlike Baidu Baike, Wikipedia does not have to take propaganda at face-value. Being hosted in the United States gives the WMF a right to delegate that authority to its userbase. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 05:41, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 4 as per the topic starter. Using propaganda outlets is not a proper approach as it may mislead readers of Wikipedia. With regards, Oleg Y. (talk) 00:26, 18 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2 as far as I can see their news is generally reliable and I think their media analysis is especially useful even if it can sometimes be a bit off. The opinion pieces wouldn't be allowed in Wikipedia anyway. If some news appears - well I won't say exceptional because both sides have committed exceptional strocities - lets say debateable I'd say a second source which uses a reasonably independent first source would be enough to allow it. Anyway always attribute if used on its own. NadVolum (talk) 21:18, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2. Mondoweiss is an important outlet for whatever news does not find its way into sources we regard as reliable because mainstream which, in the I/P area, means The New York Times, Haaretz, The Times of Israel, Ynet, Jerusalem Post etc., that is sources that systematically represent the standard Israeli narrative and underplay, when not ignoring or downcasing information from the Palestinian side. The reportage of the last four has been highly emotional, and times gung-ho, in its victimism (understandable, but the 93,000 deaths and casualties in Gaza are an abstraction, not a matter of in each case individual lives, as is, again understandably, the case in Israeli reportage). The point is, to what degree are we, by systematically deprecating a source like Mondoweiss, which provides a dissenting and, yes, Jewish perspective on Israel to a diasporic constituency and a general global readership, privileging the dominant Western narrative? Back in 1937, Sir Ronald Storrs in his classic Orientations wrote about the failure of the large Arab majority to have their views represented:

The Arab of Palestine therefore feels himself under an overwhelming inferiority in the presentation of his case to the conscience of the world. He is aware that he has not the ability, the organization, least of all the material resources or the audience for effective propaganda. . . . Against the scientifically controlled publicity of the two major continents he has about as much chance as had the Dervishes before Kitchener's machine guns at Omdurman'. (pp421-422)

i.e. 48 dead vs 12,000 Arabs. Things haven't changed much since Storr's day. Deprecation is to be avoided if only because it allows the lazy to repudiate very good reportage (Jonathan Ofir's use of what Hebrew newspapers write, for example).Nishidani (talk) 07:28, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Mondoweiss is an important outlet for whatever news does not find its way into sources we regard as reliable because mainstream... that is sources that systematically represent the standard Israeli narrative and underplay, when not ignoring or downcasing information from the Palestinian side. I want to strongly dispute the idea we need to use weak fringe sources because mainstream sources are pro-Israel. We have plenty of mainstream Western sources which have excellent I/P cover and do not represent the "standard Israeli narrative" (I'm thinking of Bethan McKernan in The Guardian, Wafaa Shurafa's reporting in The Independent, Clarissa Ward for CNN, for example); we have some strong regional media outlets (e.g. a recent RfC re-affirmed al-Jazeera as a reliable source); and editors can use independent sources such as +972 or Forensic Architecture for some of the detail that the bigger platforms might miss. In short, there's no reason to relax our standards simply because the NYT coverage is inadequate. BobFromBrockley (talk) 15:23, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

I also note that Jonathan Ofir's pieces are all labelled opinion, so even if we go with option 2 or 3 we'd need a very strong reason to think his opinion is noteworthy in our articles. I note he has also published in GlobalResearch[43] which doesn't give me confidence. Yes, some opinion in MW might on occasion be noteworthy so we should avoid deprecation, but this isn't the best example. BobFromBrockley (talk) 15:31, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Disruptive !vote and offtopic follow-up. Further behavioral concerns can be brought to WP:AE or WP:ANI. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 00:44, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Option 1: (Personal attack removed) --Te og kaker (talk) 21:47, 22 January 2024 (UTC) Hey, could we please keep this civil and assume good faith? FortunateSons (talk) 22:06, 22 January 2024 (UTC) A more polite rephrasing of that would be good, I think. Selfstudier (talk) 22:44, 22 January 2024 (UTC) It seems questionable to directly accuse me of being a propagandist, especially with a derogatory term (wikt:hasbara) linked to my perceived ethnicity/nationality. Unz says Hasbara is a multi-billion dollar, tightly-coordinated Jewish campaign carried out by several Israeli government ministries and engaged in internationally by hundreds of Jewish organisations whose sole purpose is to silence criticism of anything Jewish and to promote a positive image of Israel abroad. [44] I'd appreciate it if the above !voter can clarify whether or not I'm being accused of being part of an international Jewish conspiracy to shape public opinion. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 23:29, 22 January 2024 (UTC) Let's not let this get out of hand. Te og kaker didn't mention names and only stated their concerns about "The issue here seems to be..." WP:AAGF - IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 23:34, 22 January 2024 (UTC) Well, Hasbara is a common antisemitic talking point/dog whistle when it comes to discussions on I/P, so I believe the question is acceptable, even if it is pointed. Citing a source that shows an antisemitic use is reasonable in this case, particularly if another reader may be unaware of the context. I could (and consciously didn’t) ask the same thing, but that was my attempt at letting them retract their statement as I commented first, and others can choose to engage with content that a reasonable person can perceive to be offensive in a variety of ways and remain within the scope of Wikipedia policy. FortunateSons (talk) 23:51, 22 January 2024 (UTC) WP:ASPERSIONS, WP:AGF - IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 23:59, 22 January 2024 (UTC) According to the page on casting aspersions you linked, An editor must not accuse another of misbehavior without evidence, especially when the accusations are repeated or severe. This especially applies to accusations of being paid by a company to promote a point of view (i.e., a shill) or similar associations and using that to attack or cast doubt over the editor in content disputes. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 00:05, 23 January 2024 (UTC) This feels like an argument rather than a productive discussion. It is clear that @FortunateSons and @Chess are casting apersions against @Te og kaker suggesting they may be motivated by anti-Jewish racism without evidence. It is less clear whether or not @Te og kaker is casting aspersions with the concerns they have raised. Another user mentioned similar concerns saying "what I am seeing is evidence of a lack of nuance and care in reading, typically brought about by a battleground attitude." and mentioning "egregious source misrepresentation, [...] the sort of thing we sanction people for at AE." I myself have similar concerns about this. - IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 00:16, 23 January 2024 (UTC) Aspersions require the accusations to be “without evidence”. This is not the case here. If you disagree, feel free to take the appropriate measures. FortunateSons (talk) 00:23, 23 January 2024 (UTC) And what evidence do you have to suggest that @Te og kaker is an antisemite? An incredible thing to suggest. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 00:28, 23 January 2024 (UTC) Me and others have elaborated above and below, and as the issue is resolved, I don’t believe that continuing this conversation is productive. FortunateSons (talk) 00:35, 23 January 2024 (UTC) The issue of the aspersions cast on @Te og kaker has not been resolved. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 00:39, 23 January 2024 (UTC) Also I don't know why this "Unz" definition of hasbara is being presented. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 23:41, 22 January 2024 (UTC) I have redacted the attack on other editors. I assume this !vote will be given the weight any !vote that does not address the source is generally granted. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 00:14, 23 January 2024 (UTC) I don't agree that was a personal attack and I don't believe it should have been redacted. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 00:17, 23 January 2024 (UTC) Calling those who believe that a source is not reliable Israeli propagandists is clearly an attack. They didn't state their concerns, they directly attacked other editors. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 00:28, 23 January 2024 (UTC) Thank you! FortunateSons (talk) 00:23, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 4 per above, particularly BilledMammal etc. JM (talk) 01:59, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2 I don't think there's much evidence presented here that they're unreliable for facts in their news content. per Loki and amalysis above by Burrobert and comments by VR. Additional general obsevation about coverage of sexual violence, both on and off WP. People are speaking as though either all the alleged sexual violence is either wholly true (regardless of how improbable and/or uncorroborated), and to approach the topic with a measure of caution and scepticism is somehow inherently despicable, rather than being the proper job of journalism, or all of it is wholly false. Very little forensic analysis has occurred and it will probably be some time before the true extent of such violence is known. Accusations of sexual violence are commonplace in the early days of conflicts, ocassionally, though not often, they turn out to have been understated. Pincrete (talk) 06:59, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2 - zero basis for deprecating or even listing it as generally unreliable, not liking a significant viewpoint does not somehow make it less significant, and Mondoweiss frequently publishes significant viewpoints. Not liking a stance on any topic, be it Syria or Israel and Palestine, has nothing to do with reliability. And thats whats been presented here, individual articles that individual editors object to for whatever reason. That is emphatically not a reason to deprecate. nableezy - 20:33, 26 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2: As a site that principally hosts opinions, the usual provisions apply. Otherwise, no strong evidence has been provided that the site seriously misleads or plays loose with the facts in non-opinion material; instead, the emphasis of the case brought against it is one of bias and spin, which has limited bearing on reliability. Iskandar323 (talk) 08:30, 27 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2 - Mondoweiss is biased, but I did not see significant evidentiary support for the proposition presented here that MW are unreliable for facts in their news reporting. I think Mondoweiss is usable, depending on context. Ijon Tichy (talk) 22:09, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

Discussion (Mondoweiss)

• With the caveat that I've never read Mondoweiss in my life; the vast majority of links I'm seeing above are to opinion pieces, already covered by WP:OPED. Is there evidence that Mondoweiss's journalistic pieces contain misinformation? Vanamonde93 (talk) 07:40, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Vanamonde93: These opinion pieces are cited in talk pages in the topic area to support claims about the conflict. [45] [46] [47] [48] They are also cited in multiple articles. [49] [50] [51] [52] Ditto for their "media analysis" pieces. [53] WP:RSEDITORIAL is a guideline and you can say that it should cover this, but in practice it has and does not. An WP:RSP entry would make it clearer. How would you feel about deprecating their opinion pieces? Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 08:09, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  More examples of their opinion pieces being cited in Wikipedia articles. [54] [55] [56] [57] [58] These are all 2023. I can find more if you'd like. I think 'media analysis' should also be deprecated if that is a workable compromise. I think we should be explicitly deprecating Mondoweiss opinions in order to prevent their improper use in articles. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 08:21, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  I'm not opposed to adding an RSP entry about their opinion pieces assuming there is sufficient discussion here, but what would that achieve? Bad sources that are marked as such at RSP are frequently used in talk page discussion and in articles, and deprecation won't stop that, only blacklisting would. I don't yet see evidence of the need to deprecate media analysis pieces. The one you link [59] appears to be based on an opinion piece in Haaretz; certainly it shares a POV with that opinion piece. Are we talking about deprecating Haaretz too? I assume not; we just treat their OpEds with caution as well. Vanamonde93 (talk) 08:23, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  It would achieve a blanket rule that Mondoweiss opinion pieces are bad and make them easier to remove in a very contentious topic area. I don't think we should treat Mondoweiss OpEds with caution, I think they're so extreme and contain enough disinformation that we should be blanket discouraging them from articles. Sort of like how WP:COUNTERPUNCH had to be explicitly declared as unreliable despite exclusively being a vehicle for opinion pieces, as it was heavily used in this topic area as a source. [60] Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 08:39, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  “The one you link” is a little confusing here as Chess linked multiple examples and I can’t actually see where this one is cited on WP. But this particular example is a good example of why a MondoWeiss opinion piece (blog post) is rarely due. It’s Philip Weiss’ personal take on an op Ed published in Ha’aretz. Why would we cite this fringe person’s opinion rather than the more noteworthy Ha’aretz op Ed? Designation as generally unreliable wouldn’t stop that, of course, but it would create a red flag that would lead to it being replaced or removed more quickly. BobFromBrockley (talk) 08:33, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  I’m opposed to deprecating their opinion content. I think there could be times when opinion there might be due (eg if by a notable commentator or received secondary attention). Designation as generally unreliable is sufficient signal that opinion there can be presumed not to be due, while allowing for exceptions. BobFromBrockley (talk) 08:21, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

  Their efforts to cast doubt on the allegations of sexual violence extends beyond their opinion articles; for example, CNN report claiming sexual violence on October 7 relied on non-credible witnesses, some with undisclosed ties to Israeli govt BilledMammal (talk) 09:21, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Wanted to share something I found while researching this. Mondoweiss has received grants from Ron Unz. This comes from a conservative think-tank but I checked one of the 990 forms and Mondoweiss is indeed there. Of course he's a well known Holocaust denier whose Unz Review has been deprecated. Interestingly, Mondoweiss stopped disclosing their donors lately [61]. Alaexis_¿question? 10:54, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

That same 990 shows a $10,000 donation to the Wikimedia Foundation. The UNZ Foundation was dissolved in 2017 and Mondoweiss did not receive money from it in that year or since. Zero^talk 13:27, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

The Wikimedia Foundation to my knowledge has not acclaimed the killing of Jewish people. Mondoweiss on the other hand shares that with Unz, so it's a more plausible they've been financially influenced by neo-Nazis. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 19:09, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Speculation. Selfstudier (talk) 19:11, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Both Mondoweiss and neo-Nazis agree that murdering Jewish people in Israeli is OK. They have a lot more in common. Weiss has also cited Unz News before, [62] including noted Holocaust denier Philip Giraldi to say that Jews control the United States. [63] [64] Weiss is a fan of Unz on a personal level as well and published opinion pieces supporting him after the big donation. [65] Columnists such as John Mearsheimer have published in both Mondoweiss and Unz. [66] [67] People in this discussion are going to bring up that Philip Weiss is Jewish, but so is Ron Unz. That didn't stop Unz from creating a news site with columnists like Andrew Anglin denying the Holocaust and it doesn't mean Philip Weiss' site can't be part of the same antisemitic network as well. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 20:21, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Putting Mondoweiss and neo-Nazis in the same basket is really quite disgraceful. But anyway this is just a distraction. Do we investigate the writings of the editor of the NYT to decide whether the NYT is a reliable source? Zero^talk 07:06, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

The editor of the NYT also has considerably less power over what the paper doesn’t and publish as opposed to Philip Weiss and his personal blog. This also again leads into (in my opinion) one of two genuine issues here that present an argument for GUNREL, rather than just bias - Mondoweiss is in many ways a WP:SPS, rather than a proper media outlet.

The other issue is its considerable overlap with other GUNREL and deprecated sources, but BilledMammal’s entry below elaborates further on that. The Kip 08:54, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

You have no evidence that Weiss changes the content of articles that Mondoweiss publishes, except those he writes himself. He probably chooses which articles to publish, but that concerns bias and not reliability. The bottom line is that authors are responsible for what they write and there is nothing written so far to challenge that. Zero^talk 12:22, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, your position is to treat it like we treat WP:COUNTERPUNCH? BilledMammal (talk) 16:01, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Chess mentions John Mearsheimer, as a 'columnist', and not the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago, as if that were proof of their remarkable theories about Mondoweiss. Good grief. His name is proof of the quality of many contributions to Mondoweiss.Nishidani (talk) 07:52, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago is a lot longer than columnist, so I didn't feel like using his full title (I'm not his student so I don't have to use honorifics). Anyways, R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor Mearsheimer is also as of January 4th, 2024, OK with having his content published in Unz. [68] Either he's not selective of where he allows his content to be published or he likes to publish in anti-Semitic outlets. Both of these possibilities count against Mondoweiss. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 05:54, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Thats a reprint from his substack. Please dont make such insinuations about living people, it is both factually wrong and against our BLP policy. nableezy - 18:14, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

The article says at the bottom (Republished from Substack by permission of author or representative). In other words, he gave his permission to be published in Unz. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 20:21, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Or he didnt and he just allows articles on his substack to republished by anybody who wants to. nableezy - 20:31, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

If he just allows articles on his substack to republished by anybody who wants to, then that's identical to what I said, which is: either he's not selective of where he allows his content to be published or he likes to publish in anti-Semitic outlets. It's one or both of the two. If it's the first one (as you say), then his name being in Mondoweiss is not proof of the quality of Mondoweiss. If it's the second (which I will concede is less likely), it's more evidence of Mondoweiss' bias.

Either way, this isn't a BLP violation as I provided inline citations to all of the claims I'm making, unless you don't believe Unz is anti-Semitic. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 02:05, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

Except the fact that he wrote the column for Mondoweiss and they did not simply republish something he wrote elsewhere. Mearsheimer has never written anything for Unz, despite the characterization above that he has published work for both Mondoweiss and Unz. No, he has not, Unz has reprinted material he wrote and published elsewhere, whereas he actually has written for Mondoweiss. nableezy - 05:27, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

I can't, as a desultory reader of one or two pieces a day in Mondoweiss for nearly two decades, find anything vaguely supporting this absurd attempt to pass it off as some anti-semitic, holocaust-denying, pro-Nazi pastiche. Unbelievable. have you any idea of the contrarian vigour of Jewish and Israeli thinkers, journalists and others?Nishidani (talk) 08:28, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

• I suppose this is somewhat covered with the above information on Unz, but one thing I do have a question about: one of the key things that led to the recent deprecations of The Electronic Intifada and The Cradle, which covered the same topic area as Mondoweiss, was their overlap with/reliance on other already-deprecated sources, such as RT, Sputnik, The Grayzone, Al Mayadeen, and others. Is there any similar overlap between Mondoweiss and other deprecated sites? The Kip 23:26, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

  It seems they do.

  They cite Electronic Intifada regularly, in both news and opinion articles (eg. 1, 2) and in 2021 published this salute to ‘Electronic Intifada’, where they described their activities as "truth telling".

  References to the Grayzone are less frequent but they do still happen (eg. 1). They also share a number of authors with that site, including Dan Cohen (Mondoweiss profile, Grayzone profile), Hamzah Raza (Mondoweiss profile, Grayzone profile), and Max Blumenthal himself (Mondoweiss profile).

  They make frequent reference to Al Mayadeen (eg. 1, 2, 3, 4)

  They republish works, both in whole and in part, from Counterpunch under their "News" header (eg. 1, 2, 3)

  They make frequent reference to Press TV (eg. 1, 2, 3)

  They make frequently make use of Russia Today, including through extensive excerpts, and have defended the source (eg. 1, 2, 3)

  Effectively, it seems if we have a deprecated source that aligns with their bias, they have almost certainly have a connection to it; for example, it seems they also use Telesur and The Unz Review - this last one is particularly relevant, given the evidence Alaexis presented above them receiving donations. I wasn't able to check for Sputnik or The Cradle, as both of those terms returned too many irrelevant results when searching for them.

  I will note that I haven't checked the accuracy of the claims they are using these sources for - but I don't think that's overly important as relying on extremely problematic sources is a huge red flag. BilledMammal (talk) 01:05, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Well, that’s rather concerning. The Kip 01:49, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  I agree, that reliance is highly concerning. FortunateSons (talk) 16:13, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  I don't see how this calls for deprecation. I really dislike this daisy-chaining approach. This doesn't seem like grounds to deprecate the source as a whole; rather, an editor could simply go to the MW source that's cited, see if it relies on/cites to a deprecated source, and then, if so, use that as a basis to remove individually-offending pieces. We're all grown-ups here who shouldn't be afraid of a little legwork. WillowCity^(talk) 18:21, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Part of being a reliable source is knowing how to identify sources which peddle misinformation; if you’re unable to do so then that raises serious questions about your own reliability, as it suggests that the editorial process behind all your articles, including those that don’t explicitly rely on such sources, is flawed.

  On it’s own, perhaps this wouldn’t be enough to justify Option 3 or Option 4 - reasonable minds could differ - but when we consider it in the context of the other evidence I have presented, of Mondoweiss misrepresenting sources and peddling misinformation, it is. BilledMammal (talk) 02:08, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  Are you saying unreliable sources or deprecated sources are false 100% of the time? Of course not. So could Mondoweiss not be citing Press TV etc when these sources are true and not citing them when these sources are not? VR _talk 07:04, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  How do you know when a deprecated source, a source that peddles misinformation, is presenting factual information? BilledMammal (talk) 08:07, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  RS regularly cite Press TV: BBC News[69][70], CNN[71][72] (in both these examples, CNN bases the entire article based on Press TV reporting) VR _talk 15:27, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

  It could be, but I don’t think it is here. Citing something critically can be done well, but based on the size of the org and what is linked here as well as the regular reliance on only one or two unreliable sources, it doesn’t appear to be good enough at determining truthfulness to be considered even close to reliable. FortunateSons (talk) 16:11, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Below are my responses to a post made under my vote above:

• Al-Ahli Arab Hospital explosion: An editor has said that it is “indisputably false” that evidence of complete Palestinian culpability for for Al-Ahli Arab Hospital explosion has been largely debunked. Since the meaning of the claim is unclear I will stick to what Mondoweiss says in its article published on 9 November. “The New York Times has shown how Israel’s supposed evidence did not add up, and so have Forensic Architecture and Channel 4 News”. So its article is pointing out that, as at 9 November, reliable sources had dismissed the evidence provided by Israel that the explosion was the result of a Palestinian missile. It was a reasonable position to hold.
• Use of Deprecated sources by Mondoweiss: One of the arguments used by editors against Mondoweiss has been that it uses deprecated sources such as RT. I looked at one reference provided by these editors and found that the article was in fact dismissive of RT, saying "No doubt both Russia Insider and Russia Today are trying to make the US look bad and presumably, Kirby might be right in saying RT reporters don’t go after the Russian government when it bombs civilians" and "No doubt Russia Today is a slanted news source …”. In a follow up, an editor said “in the article [Mondoweiss] appear to be downplaying the issues with [RT]”. Since the editor did not provide an example of this, I can’t respond. The editor also said Mondoweiss “present[s] Russian interference in the US election as pseudoscience and analogous to creationism”. Firstly, this appears to have nothing to do with RT. Secondly, some quite respectable sources have expressed scepticism of the arguments about used by Russiagaters. Thirdly, Mondoweiss does not say that Russiagate does not exist (“Whatever truth there might be in any of the claims”). Its criticism is of the reporting and “the opportunistic and  incoherent arguments” made regarding it.
• Counting the number of Palestinians killed by Israel in 2022: An editor took issue with Mondoweiss’ statement that “The Israeli onslaught on Gaza … took the lives of 51 Palestinians”. The article was published on 8 November 2022. To refute the figure the editor used sources dated 13 August and 24 August 2022. Given that the Mondoweiss article supports its statement by linking to an article dated 9 October, the figure of 51 refers to casualties from August onwards and so articles published in August cannot be used to disprove the figure. Burrobert (talk) 07:51, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Just a point about Mondoweiss's reportage on rapes. The core issue these pieces reflect critically on is the extremely diffuse meme, from day 1, that Hamas made mass rape one of the orders of the day to their militants. I have no reason to doubt many such cases exist, but scrupulous reportage would note that many of the early accounts are extremely confusing and contradictory. On wikipedia we have accepted that Hamas engaged in deliberate mass rape, that is the accepted narrative. But, and this is not by any means to be read as some attempt to exculpate Hamas from the terroristic killings they enacted that day, the invasion consisted apparently of trained Hamas operatives given specific plans, and a very large number of Gazans who exploited the destruction of the separation barrier, many of whom also ran amok. And, at least one Israeli eyewitness (whose account is still confused) states that Hamas militants did not undertake the rape he saw (Technical accounts tell us the core Hamas groups were supposed to have retired back to their tunnels by 10:30 am, within 4 hours).

"And that's it, and we hid in the bush for 9 hours bush with terrorists around us. These terrorists were not from the Nukhba unit [Hamas' elite force]. They were Gazans, civilians, with knives, axes, I don't think they had firearms, but there were many terrorists around us who did have firearms," he (Raz Cohen) said. Nir (Shoko) Cohen, 'He pulled out a knife, stabbed her, continued to rape her a bit more, and then he let her go' Ynet 17 January 2024

News outlets like Mondoweiss rightly highlight anomalies, contradictions (trauma militates against accuracy, naturally) in the major narrative set in concrete by the mainstream. That is not denialism. It is simple professionalism, allowing their contributors to clarify that much of what we are told is (as it is to me) confusing, despite the unanimity.Nishidani (talk) 10:04, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Reliability of news reporting

Since a few editors have noted that many of the examples come from opinion pieces, I've looked specifically at news published by MW. They have reporters on the ground in Gaza and in Israel, and I'm sure that most of what they write is true (however that's also the case for RT). The problem is their news also read like a blog rather than a normal news source. In particular they are prone to making rather extreme statements in their news articles too. Here are some examples, I don't think this is something we'd want to add to Wikipedia based on MW

• all Zionist parties ... can be proud of ... converting Israel to a Full-Dictatorship [73].
• There is apparently intensification of fascist persecutions against critical voices in Israel [74]

They write that Mondoweiss editors select content for the site on the basis of our shared commitment to news professionalism as well as justice for Palestinians. This is more fitting for an advocacy organisation rather than a media outlet. Alaexis_¿question? 13:24, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

• The full quote is When the last Netanyahu – Ben-Gvir government was established, they proudly labeled themselves a Full-Right government. Now, with full public unity between all Zionist parties for the destruction of Gaza, they can be proud of a much bigger achievement, converting Israel to a Full-Dictatorship.
• The second quote is an editor's comment explaining why the author of an article requested that their name not be published. Using the term "fascism" is provocative, but reliable outlets have published stories about the backlash against those outside Israel who have criticised Israel's actions. Some have termed it McCarthyism.[75] [76][77] The relationship between McCarthyism and Fascism has been remarked upon.[78][79] The Intercept has published articles about censorship/crackdown within Israel. It reported that there are "eight subjects the media are forbidden from reporting on in Israel". Also, "Since Israel’s war on Hamas started, more than 6,500 news items were either completely censored or partially censored by the Israeli government". Full censorship is not required because "People self-censor, people do not even try to report the stories they know won’t get through ... And that is really showing right now in how little regular Israelis are seeing in the press about what is happening in Gaza to Palestinians".[80] In November last year the Israeli Chief Military Censor "issued a complaint with senior IDF officers that sources close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have exerted extraordinary pressure on him to prevent publication of various events in the media".[81]
• The support for "justice for Palestinians'" is admirable and an indication of the outlet's bias, which editors would take into account when assessing its articles. A similar bias exists for Jewish outlets. For example, The Forward states that it "acquires and publishes informative, enlightening content that expresses its enduring commitments to social justice, Yiddish and Jewish culture, and the welfare of the Jewish people worldwide ".[82] Another admirable sentiment. The Times of Israel says "We aim for the site to serve as a platform for constructive debate regarding the challenges facing Israel, the region and the Jewish people.[83] Nothing wrong with that attitude, just a bias that editors would assess when using the outlet. Burrobert (talk) 15:32, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  Re the first item, this is the full quote indeed, but my concern was with the characterisation of Israel as a dictatorship. This is a pretty extraordinary claim, as fascist dictatorships are not usually known for allowing courts to strike down the dictator's powers [84]. Of all criticism levied at Israel (human rights violations, apartheid, etc), this is pretty rare. I'm not sure whether they mean it as a rhetorical device or as a serious characterisation - but that's precisely the problem as reliable sources usually don't use such language without really strong evidence or attribution. And it's their reliability that we're discussing. Re the third point, fair enough. Alaexis_¿question? 19:28, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

  @Burrobert, you're right that many reliable sources focus on a certain region or topic and it's perfectly okay. The issue here is that MW only focus on one aspect of justice for Palestinians. Having looked at dozens of their news articles I haven't seen any criticism of Hamas and the criticism of PA, when it does appear, is mostly about their collaboration with Israel. Alaexis_¿question? 09:53, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  I agree with Burrobert’s third bullet point here. Partisan sources can be reliable. But the first two bullet points affirm the key issue Alaexis was raising: that items tagged as “news” are (at least sometimes) in fact opinion pieces. As a minimum, what we should take from that is that the site should be treated as opinion site and not routinely used as a source for facts. BobFromBrockley (talk) 08:41, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

What is interesting is that "news" and "opinion" are intermixed. For example, "Tracing my queer consciousness from Palestine to the US, and back again" is labeled as "news" but it is quite self-evidently nothing of the sort. I think at the very least we need to treat the entire site as opinion pieces. BilledMammal (talk) 16:32, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Alaexis: plenty of news reporting is often biased and mixed with opinions. For example, Israeli newspapers (including Times of Israel) have been casually calling "terrorist" any Palestinian who acts violently (sometimes even said Palestinian is not affiliated with any group[85]). That's obviously POV language we wouldn't use on wikipedia per WP:TERRORIST. This is in contrast to more professional news organizations, like BBC News, which explain that using such words implies taking sides in a conflict. VR _talk 17:03, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I have very little faith in their editorial review which go beyond WP:BIAS and regularly WP:Fringe. At best, they really shouldn’t be used for anything related to BLP, Russia and Israel, at worst (and IMO this part is most likely) a full depreciation may be in order. FortunateSons (talk) 16:08, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Addition, as brought up above: even insofar as the source is not generally depreciated, anything that comes from an anonymous contributor should absolutely not be used. As there is a history of at least highly questionable reporting and intentional or unintentional failures in the editorial process (discussed at length above), a lack of ability to identify the contributor would make any further considerations effectively impossible. FortunateSons (talk) 15:58, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Regarding "fascist persecutions" of critical voices in Isreael, The Observer, which functions as the Sunday edition of The Guardian, reported the following story a couple of days ago:

• "‘It is a time of witch hunts in Israel’: teacher held in solitary confinement for posting concern about Gaza deaths – Meir Baruchin, who was fired and jailed for criticising the military, says that many who agree with him are afraid to go public"
• Quote: "An unlikely charge of intent to commit treason landed Meir Baruchin, a grey-haired, softly spoken history and civics teacher, in the solitary confinement wing of Jerusalem’s notorious “Russian Compound” prison in early November. The evidence compiled by police who handcuffed him, then drove to his apartment and ransacked it as he watched, was a series of Facebook posts he’d made, mourning the civilians killed in Gaza, criticising the Israeli military, and warning against wars of revenge."
• Needless to say, the man was also fired from his job.

Andreas JN466 09:16, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

If The Observer is used as a source, at that time we can deal with their reliability, and whether they meet the high standards that we should strive for in contentious topic areas.. Mondoweiss is the topic of this discussion. Coretheapple (talk) 15:11, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

I think the point is not to challenge the reliability of The Observer but to assert that Mondoweiss's claim of "fascist persecutions" isn't as implausible as the OP made it sound. Loki (talk) 15:38, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed; that's the takeaway I got. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:25, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

But note the Observer doesn’t use the word “fascist”; it presents the facts. An opinion piece might then argue that this is “fascist”, but a serious news organisation wouldn’t casually use that word in its own voice in a report. The MW report is labelled news, and the content of it appears factual, but MW add an editorial caveat at the start, using “fascist” in their own voice, blurring the news/opinion distinction. This is a reflection on their editorial judgment, that undermines any potential news value in the content they publish from Palestine, and why they should be seen as an opinion blog not a news source. BobFromBrockley (talk) 09:07, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

The word "fascist" wasn't actually used in the Mondoweiss article. It was part of an editorial note explaining why the author of that piece wished to remain anonymous.

As for The Observer, they called it a "witch hunt" in their article. Either way, you are talking about someone getting a knock on the door and being fired from their job for criticizing their government on Facebook. Andreas JN466 22:00, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, as I said, MW add an editorial caveat at the start, using “fascist” in their own voice, blurring the news/opinion distinction. This reflects on the editorial quality.

no, The Observer didn’t call it a witch hunt. They quoted somebody calling it a witch-hunt: they reported factually. (And of course the gap between “witch hunt” and “fascist” is huge.) BobFromBrockley (talk) 05:12, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

It's a long established principle here (see WP:BIASED) that the tone of a source and whether it's reliable for facts are two totally separate things. I agree that Mondoweiss is a biased source, but that doesn't mean it's unreliable for facts. That its factual reporting seems to match with that of mainstream sources except that its wording is more stridently anti-Israel seems to exactly confirm my vote above: Option 2 because it's strongly biased but there's no evidence that it's unreliable for facts. Loki (talk) 23:43, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor

I'm not confident in the reliability and neutrality of Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, a self-proclaimed "independent, nonprofit organization that advocates for the human rights of all persons across Europe and the MENA region, particularly those who live under occupation, in the throes of war or political unrest and/ or have been displaced due to persecution or armed conflict" which is currently used in ~100 articles, most of them related to the 2023 Israel–Hamas war (Special:LinkSearch/euromedmonitor.org). Their website is an odd mixture of Op-Eds, infographic posters, press releases, and articles, all of which riddled with inflammatory wording. Their about page says they are "inspired by the people's will to rebel against tyranny and oppression that swept through the Arab region in 2011 and continues to percolate everywhere". The press releases do not seem to be corroborated by reliable sources; there's one article I found that only exists in the Arabic version (most of their releases are in both English and Arabic), which I could only otherwise find in palinfo.com and Middle East Eye who are of the same condition. DatGuy^Talk_Contribs 15:02, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

the reliability and neutrality We can assess reliability, no sources are neutral ie all are biased to some degree, unless the assertion is that the bias is so severe as to make a source unusable. It's an NGO, so should be attributed for its opinions, is there actual evidence of unreliability? Selfstudier (talk) 15:10, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

no sources are neutral ie all are biased to some degree – sure, but there's a reason WP:RSPANI is not treated the same as the New York Times. As for the reliability, as said previously their releases are not corroborated by any newspapers of record. With the most recent article, for example, searching "Al-Rashid Street 11 January" only returns the EuroMed page, a Middle East Eye article, and two other (Yahoo and palinfo) citing the Monitor with no independent reporting. The articles are clearly sourced from the same person but each alleges it to be independent reporting: the Euro-Med article states the quotes from multiple distinct individuals, which are very close paraphrasings to the Middle East Eye article, were told [to] the Euro-Med Monitor team while the Middle East Eye says eyewitnesses have told Middle East Eye. DatGuy^Talk_Contribs 15:37, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

there's a reason WP:RSPANI is not treated the same as the New York Times As I said, the NGO should be attributed for its opinions, not treated as if those were facts. If the only evidence of unreliability is your own OR, that's not evidence.Selfstudier (talk) 15:48, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

So, there a multiple potential resolutions here:

1. Best case: Wikipedia:Biased and Wikipedia:RSEDITORIAL, and should therefore be marked as such when required and only used insofar as they comply with the restrictions and policies set forth above.

2. Worst Case (which is possible, but requires some further elaboration): the source is unreliable and may even be the subject to depreciation in the future if it continues to be an issue.

In this case, I would most likely consider it to be unreliable (at least with a cursory overview). Exceptions can be made in cases of subject-matter experts and Wikipedia:Aboutself.

I would strongly recommend against using it for anything related to the Israel-Palestine conflict, anything related to BLP and in cases where there is insufficient corroboration from reliable sources. FortunateSons (talk) 16:48, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

No evidence there either. Selfstudier (talk) 16:53, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

@Selfstudier I elaborated on some of the issues of bias and reliability below, does that answer your question or is something else missing? FortunateSons (talk) 17:21, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Also, there a two pretty concerning affiliations, so the reliability of sourcing from them should be very carefully considered.

Per their (and other) wiki pages:

A. We Are Not Numbers

Cooperations with individuals who

1. have a history of writing for less than reliable sources, such as Ben Norton, whose name redirects to The Grayzone, which is depreciated (WP:Grayzone)

2. Individuals with a history of potential antisemitism and other questionable public statements, such as Susan Abulhawa, who was also in support of the terrorist attacks on 10.07.

B. Founder Ramy Abdu

According to his Wiki Page, he „ was the assistant director and Palestine Office Manager for Council for European Palestinian Relations. According to the Independent, it is „a Belgian non-profit organisation that lobbies on behalf of the Hamas-led Gaza Government“ FortunateSons (talk) 17:15, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

OR and still no evidence. Selfstudier (talk) 17:25, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Is it possible that you are misunderstanding Wikipedia:No original research? It is generally not applied in the way you are doing right now, and this style of providing evidence on this noticeboard is generally done like that, which you can see in most discussions linked on the perennial sources. Additionally, the evidence for all relevant claims is cited on their Wikipedia pages, and I provided a direct link when quoting. FortunateSons (talk) 17:31, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Where is the evidence of unreliability (ie not just vague connections to other things)? Selfstudier (talk) 17:32, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

There are issues with the quality of reporting (as shown above by @DatGuy) as well as repeated platforming of people with fringe views which may be considered criminal in some countries (as shown by me).

There are beyond any any reasonable doubt issues with bias and editorials, where I have cited the relevant policy (you seem to agree, based on your comment from 15:48, 17 January 2024 (UTC)).

Insofar as I can find citations by other sources, it is often cited side by side with other unreliable sources, such as [1], [2], [3](citations from same sources that cite Electronic Intifada, and therefore have a different or lower standard than Wikipedia).

There is also some overlap regarding the authors and other associated people with depreciated publications, such as [1] and the people I named above (under We are not numbers).

Could you elaborate if (and why) you consider them reliable? FortunateSons (talk) 18:07, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Please read WP:OR, where it very clearly states in the first paragraphsection "this policy does not apply to talk pages and other pages which evaluate article content and sources, such as deletion discussions or policy noticeboards." DatGuy^Talk_Contribs 18:07, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Still looking for evidence, I will step back and let others comment. Selfstudier (talk) 18:09, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Much as I agree that an association with Grayzone would be an indicator of reliability, there is no such association here. We Are Not Numbers was sponsored or founded by this NGO but I am not sure it was operated by it. More importantly, the only link is =Ben Norton, who was a mentor for that project (according to Mondoweiss) some time in 2015. Grayzone only launched (as a blog hosted by Alternet) at the very end of that year. In 2015, Norton was just a young blogger. (He got a job with Salon.com in October 2015, and, like Grayzone editor Max Blumenthal, only flipped its politics to pro-Russian conspiracy theories after Blumenthal's trip to Russia in December 2015. Before this point, Norton and Blumenthal were normal left-wing journalists.)[86][87] BobFromBrockley (talk) 17:02, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Op-eds, per policy, should be attributed to authors. But I'm not seeing some sort of systematic unreliability that would justify deprecation. If anything, seeing other news sources quote and cite the EMHR seems like it would indicate that its reporting is regarded as sufficiently reliable to cite with attribution. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 18:26, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, that was poorly phrased by me: the three linked sources are primarily activists, not actually news.

I had a hard time finding reliable sources with non-significant bias citing them; if you can find well-established reliable sources without a high degree of bias regularly citing them and not citing other sources depreciated by us, I would be likely be in agreement with you. Are there any? FortunateSons (talk) 18:59, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Context: The reliability of Middle East Eye is controversial (as visible when searching on the noticeboard ,though I do not know enough to make an accurate judgement without taking a significant amount of time to research, so take this with a few dozen grains of sand).

However, they have cited depreciated sources such as RFC: Electronic Intifada [1] [2] [3] and have some overlap regarding their contributors [1] [2][3] FortunateSons (talk) 19:22, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

In addition to the above, considering the chairman of this organization was assistant director for a Hamas-affiliated organization (see here) and tweeted his elation about the Oct 7 genocidal massacre of Israeli civilians, I would say that this organization should not be given credibility in the Israel-Palestine topic area, at the very least. JM (talk) 22:02, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, and I would strongly encourage not using them for BLP and anyone who is Jewish/Israeli either. This degree of fringe views should also not be used when other sources stating the same ‘facts’ are unusable due to depreciation. FortunateSons (talk) 22:09, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Just to add to u:JM's comment, he also called the October 7-8 clashes in Ofakim amazing (مذهل) [88]. This doesn't inspire confidence in this source. Alaexis_¿question? 22:10, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

What is needed is evidence of bad reporting, not brickbats about the poliics of the person who set up the organization. Is the original poster asserting that the story about people waiting for food trucks being shot at by an Israeli tank and quadcopters is false? Or are there other stories which are false that they've published as fact? NadVolum (talk) 23:50, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Hey, here are a few issues (sorry, I don’t really have the time to sort those, and don’t want to provide them unattributed (see below)):

1. Euromed claims used for (ex post) highly questionable reporting [1]. I couldn’t find a retraction/clarification, but I might have missed it.

2. Accusations (as far as I can tell, still current regarding the spread of misinformation [2] [3](Warning: (highly) biased sources not to be cited without attribution and other measures in compliance with policy)

I am happy to discuss the details, but I believe the accusation to be both not new and not unsubstantiated. Do you disagree? FortunateSons (talk) 00:21, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

What falsehoods are reported as facts there? Both sides put forward false stories about the blast at the hospital, a rocket that Israel said wa from Hamas aimed at Israel was later analysed by the New York Times as a rocked fired by Israel but fell some distance away. It's almost certain it was a Hamas rocket that fell at the hospital but the Israelis wanted a quick believable denial. Why would you take an allegation by one sde as meaning the other is telling falsehoods? The best we can do is just say what each side said with attribution, and they attributed their story. Lots of newspapers got that wrong. Perhaps we can get some actual evidence one way or the other. I don't see the truth of a story about a particular family being killed would stay hidden very long. Is it so unbelievable when they shot some of the captives holding a white flag and shouting in Hebrew? NadVolum (talk) 01:31, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Sure, I can look for some other specific things:

1. This is a pretty concerning statement (but ‘just’ on their twitter, so I hope no reasonable person would use it as a source)

2. This, which appears to be inaccurate and has been considered blood libel by the ADL; this information was repeated (without any further proof) by some media with the same bias and is likely to be misinformation. FortunateSons (talk) 02:07, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Oh, and their view on the Al-Shifa Medical Complex is at least very different from more reliable sources FortunateSons (talk) 02:11, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

If you'd read up on the Israeli cemeteries of numbers you'd know that the statement about finding anything out in the present media glare is hogwash. We don't even know what's happened to the militants killed in the original atrocity. That together with them refusing access by the Red Cross and them having done it before should explain why allegations of organ harvesting are rife, what do you expect if they don't give bodies back and don't let outside observers in?

As to the hospital what would you expect in a hospital that treated some militants that were armed when they came in? And what would you expect in a command centre? The BBC article said what they were shown, it didn't say it was anywhere near convincing evidence and others have said it wasn't. One would expect a decent sized meeting room with refreshments and big table and a place to stick maps on the wall - and access to the tunnel system. As to perhaps having a command centre underneath instead all they have shown is a passageway under a corner of the hospital which they exposed by digging down deep with an excavator. NadVolum (talk) 10:21, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

WaPo seems to disagree; regarding use of the hospital, there is general agreement regarding some military use, and more reliable sources are arguing for at least some command infrastructure. There are also Videos of hostages and armed men inside, so there is certainly cooperation between Hamas and the staff (which is explainable, but not really an indication of “no military use”)

I agree that the current situation leads to unsubstantiated rumours, but that is not reliable according to the standards of Wikipedia, right?

A general distrust of “established” media (first sentence, if I understood it correctly) is also not a good argument for using this source. FortunateSons (talk) 12:12, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

@FortunateSons Really? How is their view different from that of the Washington Post? The Post said, The rooms connected to the tunnel network discovered by IDF troops showed no immediate evidence of military use by Hamas. None of the five hospital buildings identified by Hagari appeared to be connected to the tunnel network. There is no evidence that the tunnels could be accessed from inside hospital wards. And they said: That raises critical questions, legal and humanitarian experts say, about whether the civilian harm caused by Israel’s military operations against the hospital — encircling, besieging and ultimately raiding the facility and the tunnel beneath it — were proportionate to the assessed threat. See also earlier the New York Times report demolishing another part of the Israeli narrative. Andreas JN466 13:53, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Sure, but they said before “In a new statement released today, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor called for an independent international investigation into Israel’s absurd claims that Palestinian groups were using Al-Shifa Medical Complex and other hospitals in the Gaza Strip for military purposes.” The extent is controversial, use (at this point) really isn’t within most reliable sources. FortunateSons (talk) 19:10, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Israeli claims of a Hamas "command center" at al-Shifa were debunked by many RS, read the relevant article.Selfstudier (talk) 13:32, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Except that isn’t the sources claim FortunateSons (talk) 13:41, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Israel and its supporters have consistently tried to portray Hamas use of al-Shifa as justification for attacking a hospital. Anyone contesting the Israeli narrative is far more likely to be on the right side of this than the wrong. Selfstudier (talk) 13:48, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

The video discussed in the first tweet was also covered by France24 CarmenEsparzaAmoux (talk) 18:25, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

• Use it with attribution, as should be done for all NGOs and non-profits (and all government bodies in addition). Everything else in this discussion just seems like people trying to push their personal POV against the source because it says things they dislike. Silverseren^C 01:34, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

  +1. Andreas JN466 14:10, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Off-topic bickering. --JBL (talk) 22:02, 19 January 2024 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The leader of the organization expressing elation for Hamas' Oct 7 genocidal massacre is quite much more than "saying things someone dislikes". If Wikipedia cites such an organization as a source, it might as well start citing The Daily Stormer and delete WP:NONAZIS. JM (talk) 03:21, 18 January 2024 (UTC) When was that elation shown, prior to the scale of attacks on civilians becoming apparent or in the early hours when this was not clear? The source is fine to use with attribution just as sources which support the ongoing genocide in Gaza can be used with attribution.Boynamedsue (talk) 09:11, 19 January 2024 (UTC) The characterization of Israel's war against Hamas as an "ongoing genocide in Gaza" is controversial, contested, and contentious in the global public, unsupported by RS and therefore not an article on Wikipedia as far as I know, and can come off as POV-pushing, so you should avoid stating it as fact in a CTOP. Regardless, it was tweeted at 14:44 UTC, by which time if I recall correctly it was apparent what was occurring. He also left the tweet up and to my knowledge has never issued an apology. JM (talk) 09:22, 19 January 2024 (UTC) A somewhat ironic comment given you used the word "genocidal" in your above comment to describe the mass murder by Hamas on October the 8th. As far as I am aware this is even more controversial, as no charges of genocide have been brought against the group. Perhaps it is you who should be more circumspect in your language?--Boynamedsue (talk) 09:50, 19 January 2024 (UTC) Not ironic at all when Hamas has declared its genocidal intentions and Oct 7 easily meets the definition of genocidal massacre. I don't think it's a good idea at all for anyone to equate Oct 7 with the invasion of Gaza. So no, I feel no need to be more "circumspect in my language", and your failure to acknowledge that you shouldn't have said what you did is not a great look. JM (talk) 18:57, 19 January 2024 (UTC) Your personal opinions as to what constitute genocide are not relevant. Israel has been taken to the ICJ, which Hamas can't be because its not a state. If Israel recognized the ICC, it could take members of Hamas to the ICC alleging genocide. Selfstudier (talk) 19:02, 19 January 2024 (UTC) I am well aware that my personal opinions on the definition of genocide are not relevant. Neither are anyone else's. That's why I don't think editors should be going around stating as fact that Israel is committing genocide, because Wikipedia doesn't have an article on this alleged genocide, it has an article on genocide allegations, and the reason for that is because RS do not support calling it a genocide. When it comes to Oct 7, where we know that the goal was to kill as many Jews as possible and we know that civilians and children were targeted, I fail to see how this falls short of the definition of genocidal massacre, which has a lower bar than genocide, which I am not calling it here. JM (talk) 19:15, 19 January 2024 (UTC) Yes, it is clear you really want to argue that Hamas committed genocide, this is why you used the word "genocidal" in an attempt to spark an argument about the topic. I foolishly rose to the bait. There are plenty of places you can go for that argument, but drop it here.--Boynamedsue (talk) 19:46, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Let's just say I'm not particularly enthralled about Netenyahu talking about Amalek or the laws restricting free speech. On the same basis we should be deprecating every Israeli publication as well. Who could have thought the friendship song was acceptable? But this noticeboard is about whether sources are actually reliable, not about who might have some influence over them or even about whether they like what they say. So could people stop diverting it by going on about irrelevancies thanks? NadVolum (talk) 11:37, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Not at all. Netanyahu isn't the editor in chief of all Israeli newspapers. Alaexis_¿question? 21:52, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Example of an exceptional claim not supported by other sources

Their modus operandi makes it hard to conclusively prove that they are unreliable, however there are many cases of them publishing exceptional claims not supported by reliable sources. Consider this article. They write After failing to find any evidence of a military presence in [Al-Shifa hospital], the Israeli soldiers went crazy and deliberately carried out a series of executions, eliminating and directly shooting a number of the wounded in cold blood

This is an exceptional claim, and to my knowledge no reliable source has confirmed it. Alaexis_¿question? 08:43, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

I have stopped thinking of atrocities by either side in this as exceptional. However I wouldn't use stories like that which didn't have some confirmation by a second source that wasn't just quoting the first. And attribute everything. NadVolum (talk) 10:33, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Sure, but this a regular pattern for them. Accusations of crime, no evidence, then being repeated by media with the same political leaning. And as far as I can tell, they do not retract statements even when they are either proven to be false or when no further evidence can be presented. (See above) FortunateSons (talk) 12:14, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

The same can be said about many other sources sympathetic to the Israeli side. I have lost count of the number of press stories on Hamas atrocities that were later debunked – by Israeli sources (with the vast majority of American and British outlets not having posted corrections to this day). If we wanted to ban all those sources, there'd be almost nothing left. Happy to give examples. Andreas JN466 14:15, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Then feel free to give them. Although this is what the UN has reported. JM (talk) 20:07, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Recent example. "In an interview on a right-wing Israeli news channel, a senior IDF commander describes two events that he says he witnessed while battling Hamas on October 7, involving murdered babies and the murder of a Holocaust survivor – which never occurred, Kibbutz Be'eri said". Haaretz.

Many more such stories in an earlier piece by Haaretz.

The 12-year-old girl now believed to have been killed by Israeli tank fire in Be'eri along with a dozen other hostages is still being described as having been "burned alive by Hamas" in the JC.

And so it goes. Andreas JN466 22:21, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

I had a look at the BBC site about this Al-Shifa: What we know about Israel's raid on Gaza's main hospital reports a journalist and the director there saying the IDF were in complete control and no shots were fired. It then goes on to say the IDF went checking the hospital they engaged a number of Hamas members and killed them. This could well be the same story. By the way the same story says "But unless Israel has more to reveal, the military's controversial operation inside the hospital did not net a major arsenal of weapons, reports the BBC's Orla Guerin in Jerusalem." which would correspond to the bit about failing to find evidence. NadVolum (talk) 10:46, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Just so we’re clear on that, militants without uniforms inside the hospital are (potentially unlawful) combatants and therefore military targets, right? So there is not direct collaboration of their statements by the BBC, and the BBC has a very different statement from a more reliable source? FortunateSons (talk) 12:17, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

If you read the BBC report you'll see about all men being ordered out of the hospital - but some were left in their beds inside because of being injured or sick. An unknown is how many remained even so who weren't in bed but it said the IDF were in complete control. Is there a requirement for uniforms to be worn while sick in bed? NadVolum (talk) 13:25, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

No, but they weren’t wearing uniforms inside the hospital in the recent past, so I strongly doubt they started once wearing a uniform increases their likelihood of dying FortunateSons (talk) 13:35, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

By the way what is this more reliable source than the BBC you mention? NadVolum (talk) 13:32, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

That was sarcasm, but it’s hard to tell in writing, so that’s on me, sorry FortunateSons (talk) 13:36, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

That does not confirm the story but it certainly makes it a lot more possible. NadVolum (talk) 10:51, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Just to clarify that many of the claims about this source emanate from here ie NGO monitor, whose worth can be judged from their article.Selfstudier (talk) 13:01, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I described them as a highly biased source above and separately sourced any evidence. But you are right to also add it here, in case someone does not read the whole thread FortunateSons (talk) 13:25, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the ie is for. Those are opposites rather than the same. NadVolum (talk) 13:47, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

This was a discussion about the sources of ‘my’ side, not yours, don’t worry :) FortunateSons (talk) 13:52, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Oh I understand now, thanks. NadVolum (talk) 14:15, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

You’re welcome FortunateSons (talk) 14:18, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Here is the Wikipedia article for Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor like the one you gave for NGO monitor. I don't know if they have a similar attack page for NGO monitor! NadVolum (talk) 13:52, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

In the matter of "field executions", a preliminary file covering the period November and December 2023 submitted by Euromed to UN rapporteurs does not appear to mention the al-Shifa claim so that would appear moot at this point. Note that the BBC reported on 19 November that WHO described the scene at al-Shifa as a "death zone" so it seems understandable in the circumstances that witnesses may well have said unverifiable things to Euromed.Selfstudier (talk) 14:01, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

I guess they think there's no point including ones where they don't have much chance of some decent evidence. NadVolum (talk) 14:18, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

What I would still like to know is if there are any edits to articles supported by Euromed cites that are actually disputed? Selfstudier (talk) 14:57, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

This is a good question. OP mentioned that EMHRM is cited in a smattering of articles, but which edits are under dispute? Context is important, including the context of the claim it supports. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:22, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Rightly removed by @Selfstudier due to violation of the I/P arb rules, summarised and reposted by me (including specific source):

On Jan 13 EuroMedHRM retweeted Maha Hussaini saying "Over 800,000 Palestinians who didn't evacuate Gaza City & the northern areas". This number is in complete contradiction to all western media that says most people in the Gaza Strip have moved to the south. EuroMedHRM's retweet casts doubt on the reliability of their other figures, seeing that their source verification or interpretation is lacking. (Source from cited wiki article, which contradicts the statement)

They also published manipulative or misguiding titles or numbers, like "100,000 Palestinians killed, missing or wounded", grouping it together to get a larger number (clickbait at best, intentionally misguiding at worst) FortunateSons (talk) 22:55, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

At this point I'm definitely not seeing that this source is any better than "Electronic Intifada" which was just downgraded to "deprecated" if I recall correctly. I don't see why this should be treated with any higher regard than that. JM (talk) 22:57, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I think I agree. FortunateSons (talk) 23:35, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

Electronic Interfada was deprecated because it went in for denial of the rapes committed by militants in the October 7 attack, when the evidence is pretty clear. You equate that with having some titles that look like clickbait and retweeting something with a stupid mistake when talking about something else? Most of the newspapers around the world would be deprecated on that basis. NadVolum (talk) 00:26, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Well, the founder and current chairman Ramy Abdu allegedly “retweeted a post denying that Hamas sexually assaulted Israeli women on October 7th, referring to this as “a fabricated lie.” “(Highly biased source) and said this, to be contested by this article from Reuters. Second (but potentially biased) source. So no, not through their official account as far as I can tell, but yes regarding the people who most likely have editorial control. FortunateSons (talk) 00:52, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Could we stick to the actual stories put out by the organisation thanks. This is the reliable source noticeboard, not the I think some evil person might influence it noticeboard. NadVolum (talk) 01:16, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Not all stories are attributable to individuals, and the founder and current chairman is certainly a person with significant sway unless shown otherwise, which is a factor when establishing reliability. We have discussed specific content above, I am just responding to what you specifically asked about. FortunateSons (talk) 01:29, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

So apparently no cites on WP in dispute and all there is is twitter and some insubstantial claims. This is an NGO in good standing at the UN that regularly submits reports there, no reason to go beyond a 2 here. Selfstudier (talk) 12:13, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think any alleged good standing at the UN trumps their various false claims, exaggerations, failures to issue corrections, and the clearly partisan nature of their leadership as presented by FortunateSons and others. JM (talk) 19:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

I'd consider it plausible that having good standing at the United Nations could mean that some users' assessments of EMHRM may be taking what amount to occasional missteps and over-extrapolating them into a characterization of the entire source, inadvertently making mountains out of molehills. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 19:20, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Submitting reports isn't the same as being in good standing. Alaexis_¿question? 20:24, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

• As in the discussion of Mondoweiss, we find ourselves confronted with a publication that has an agenda, and which is not shy about exhibiting it as indicated in the article cited by Alaexis. We seem to sometimes have a fascination with "breaking news" in the I/P articles, rather than remembering that there is WP:NODEADLINE and we can wait for multipe sources of established reliability rather than flouncing on ahead with extraordinary claims, using "tabloid" sources that make no bones about what side they're on and in fact flaunt it. This publication, like Mondoweiss, should not be used in controversial subject areas. Editors anxious to publish its claims, no matter how outlandish, should wait until those claims are made by reliable sources. We do not have to be in a rush to publish anything. On the contrary, we should be patient. This is an encyclopedia not a newspaper. Capitulating to a desire for unseemly haste will make our readers conclude that Wikipedia has the same agenda as some of the POV-pushing sources editors are anxious to use.Let's not fall into that trap. Coretheapple (talk) 16:23, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

  Looking at the Mondoweiss thread further up on this page, I don't think there's yet a consensus for deprecating it for controversial subject areas. Several editors have articulated reasonable justifications for citing it, perhaps with attribution, as with EMHRM. In any case, that is a conversation for a different thread.

  It's possible that capitulating to a desire to exclude sources could make some readers conclude that Wikipedia has an agenda explicitly opposed to certain perspectives. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 19:27, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Euro-Med has not gone in for full blown unedited passing on of anti semitic stuff like Mondoweiss. I think it is quite interesting how Mondoweiss is actually run by jews as far as I know. If they can believe the rape denial business then they really are pissed off about and think the worst of Israel! so what are we to think is exceptional? I've given up wondering if an atrocity there is exceptional but I'm happy enough with needing two reasonably independent sources. NadVolum (talk) 19:44, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

"run by jews"'? Coretheapple (talk) 17:25, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think the ethnoreligious background of people who run or edit these publications is worth making claims or implications about or trying to dissect. In determining reliability, we focus on the content of sources. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 21:28, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Also using a lower case "J" in "Jew" is considered a slur. I trust it was unintentional. Coretheapple (talk) 21:57, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

It hadn't occurred to me that being called an american or a christian could be taken as slurs. I'm sorry I offended anyone. I was not determining reliability by whether Jews ran it. NadVolum (talk) 22:51, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Actually going back and reading the links in the Mondoweiss discussion more carefully it looks to me like the news and media analysis parts are generally reasonable. The opinion ones would be excluded from Wikipedia anyway as opinion. In fact the media analysis part is I think especially useful, though for Wikipedia's purposes it is easy to dismiss most of that like othe media analysis sources because they disagree with the majority. I have come across so many things in the mainstream media which deliberately ignore important points to push a point of view or spin their phrasing. So I think I'll go there and register a 2. NadVolum (talk) 21:09, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

• If this is original reporting, then it is reasonable not to find such claims in other sources. Keep in mind that other sources like Doctors without Borders[89][90] have also made claims of Israel deliberately shooting people at Shifa hospital.VR _{(Please ping on reply)} 09:14, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

  Not at all. Media outlets don't only publish their own reporters. Organisations like Human Rights Watch are quoted all the time by various outlets.

  As to the Hill piece, it's from November 11, so a few days before the November 15 raid. EMHRM were quite specific: they claimed that Israeli soldiers were shooting a number of the wounded in cold blood. your second article was published on December 1 but I don't see any mention of shooting wounded patients in Al-Shifa there either. Alaexis_¿question? 17:49, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

  It is worth mentioning that Israel (and Bahrain) have repeatedly delayed the granting of Special Consultative Status to Euromed. These also happen to be two countries frequently critiqued by Euromed. Israel did this three times in 2023. Selfstudier (talk) 18:14, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

What does seem well established though is that shortly thereafter the IDF removed a large number of bodies from Al Shifa hospital. Many were takem from the morgue or dug up. What is concerning in the light of that is I can see no report of them taking away any live patients. NadVolum (talk) 21:24, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I don't see it in the MSF report you linked and so I can't understand your argument. Alaexis_¿question? 10:23, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I did not link to the MSF report, I think you've misplaced your reply. Here is what the IDF had to say about the removal of bodies [91]. If there were numerous dead bodies of militants at the hospital one would expect a few live militant patients at the start, if the IDF was interested enough to take away the dead bodies of militants you'd expect them to be interested in taking away any live militants who were patients as well. The live people who were reported as being taken away were the director and some staff. NadVolum (talk) 13:07, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. I'm sure you realise that there are several assumptions in your reasoning and even if we believe Abu Salmiya that the IDF took out bodies from the hospital, this doesn't support in any way EMHRM's statement that Israeli soldiers were shooting a number of the wounded in cold blood. So my concern that no one has reported on this potentially very significant story remains valid. Alaexis_¿question? 19:49, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Said "concern" says nothing about reliability unless you can prove the negative. It just means we would not use the source unless we had some other sources as well. That would apply to all controversial claims, regardless who made them. Selfstudier (talk) 19:53, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I wasn't saying to stick in the story if there wasn't confirmation from a second source. Quite the opposite. What I was saying is it is not extraordinary and it is not evidence that Euro-Med HR was unreliable, in fact there is some actual evidence that it might have happened. However there is so much propaganda from both sides I'd be very careful about taking anyones words at face value. NadVolum (talk) 20:31, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Off-topic discussion Alaexis¿question? 17:40, 20 January 2024 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I know it is very silly but I actually feel more sorry about the Israeli jews than the Palestinians. I think the charge of genocide is well founded with intent and action - and they went through the holocaust. Their leaders have brought them down to this over decades and the west in particular has supported them. It will be a terrible stain and ammmunition for antisemites for years to come. NadVolum (talk) 11:16, 20 January 2024 (UTC) Worse – such a massacre will have reduced to nil the relative safety of Israeli citizens for many years. Revenge is an extremely powerful motivator for crime, and we see it consistently in ethnic conflicts, with the revenge game often continuing for generations. While getting killed in fair battle in one thing, if your children were murdered in cold blood by soldiers wearing one country's flags, then you'll only wait for an opportunity. Sad state of affairs. — kashmīrī TALK 17:02, 20 January 2024 (UTC) Let's stay on topic, K? Selfstudier (talk) 17:16, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Article on source now at AfD

See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor (2nd nomination). BilledMammal (talk) 05:20, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

There is a proper place for discussing concerns with this notification or AfD, and it isn't RSN.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
This looks like canvassing. See nomination for deletion a couple years ago by the same editor, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor. Selfstudier (talk) 11:42, 21 January 2024 (UTC) Whatever failings the AfD nom may have, a neutrally worded post to a noticeboard where a discussion of the source is happening is hardly canvassing. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:17, 21 January 2024 (UTC) Surely the usability of a source and the quality/worthiness of its page on Wikipedia are unrelated? This is not a noticeboard about pages about sources, but about the reliability of sources. This would reek of an attempt to hail a sympathetic crowd for an AfD even were it not the case that the AfD was the second serving by the same editor (not dropping the stick). Iskandar323 (talk) 20:28, 21 January 2024 (UTC) Except the crowd here is not sympathetic. If it were, the source would have already been deprecated. JM (talk) 08:18, 22 January 2024 (UTC) I don't see that the editors here are sympathetic to BilledMammal opinion of the source, and as you have said reliability and notability are separate things. I would AGF that editors wouldn't support the deletion of the article because they believe it's unreliable for verification purposes. By this argument we wouldn't have an article for the Daily Mail. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:33, 22 January 2024 (UTC) I couldn't begin to explain the motives for anyone trying to get a page on a notable organisation deleted (again) - you'd have to ask. But feels pointy. Iskandar323 (talk) 16:23, 22 January 2024 (UTC) As per my previous comment, whatever failings the AfD nomination has doesn't make the comment here canvassing. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:54, 22 January 2024 (UTC) even were it not the case that the AfD was the second serving by the same editor (not dropping the stick). Opening a second AFD three years after a previous one closed as "no consensus" is not dropping the stick? On a topic where we have no sources that contribute to notability? - the closest we have to date is an article from NGO Monitor, and the same editor that presented that source as evidence of notability just voted to deprecate that source. If you think I'm being disruptive with this nomination, take it to WP:AE. Otherwise, stop casting WP:ASPERSIONS. BilledMammal (talk) 00:02, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Yoga Journal as a Reliable Source

Hi! I am writing to solicit input on the reliability of Yoga Journal. Yoga Journal is a publication focused on Yoga as exercise. Majority of the yoga asana articles on wikipedia reference YJ. From the first 20 asanas on the List of asanas, 18/20 cite Yoga Journal. From my research, YJ appears to be a reliable source because -

1. Wikipedia:REPUTABLE - Yoga journal is a national digital magazine with 1.3MM+ readers. YJ was initially founded by Rama Jyoti Vernon and Judith Hanson Lasater, a leading reputable yoga instructor and author of many related books. Today, there is a community of editors, experienced in different aspects of yoga, contributing to the magazine.
2. Wikipedia:RSP - If pop culture & lifestyle magazines such as Entertainment Weekly, People, and Vogue are considered reliable, then YJ would fall into a similar realm of reliability.
3. Wikipedia:RSCONTEXT - When used to describe an asana or provide generic information in compliance with Wikipedia:MEDRS, YJ should be reliable.

I recently had a brief discussion with an editor who questioned the reliability of YJ stating it was promotional. I wanted to post here to get thoughts from more people.

Thanks! Whitestar12 (talk) 01:38, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure my objection would be that it's promotional so much as it publishes stuff like "A Complete Guide to the Full Moons of 2024, Including What They Mean for You". I'm also seeing articles making medical claims which again we shouldn't be using. But for basic descriptions of yoga poses I'm not immediately seeing any problem with using it. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 09:47, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

• Might be okay for cautious use to describe some of the in-universe stuff that goes on (Goat yoga[92] anyone?), but for any kind of heavier-weight claim (e.g. about health effects) WP:FRIND would be a consideration and WP:MEDRS would be required, which this magazine certainly isn't. Bon courage (talk) 10:01, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

  YJ obviously can't be used for medical claims. On yoga asanas (postures) and on the ethical and professional conduct of yoga schools and teachers, it is authoritative, having from its foundation shouldered the responsibility of reporting accurately, of providing leadership, and of holding people to account. As such it is yoga's journal of record. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:20, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  Except it doesn't seem to hold itself to account for the unethical torrent of nonsense and quackery it publishes. So it's basically reliable only for what people like to say to each other within the WP:FRINGE world of yoga. Bon courage (talk) 07:35, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  Thank you for stating your position. However, I think you are confusing yoga-as-philosophy-or-religion with yoga as exercise, consisting mainly of asanas (yoga poses), which is YJ's specialty. There is nothing remotely fringey about exercise, and YJ is widely considered an authoritative source on modern asanas, as it is not tied to any particular yoga school or style of yoga as exercise. From the start, YJ had scholarly yoga teachers like Judith Hanson Lasater in senior editorial roles, and she served as the (main) editor for many years, just one example of YJ's high standards. There is no doubt that YJ is also a glossy commercial magazine with the usual fluff, but even recently it has boldly championed moving away from the "young, fit, white, slim, affluent and female" depiction of yoga practitioners, so it still has standards: even if, like the rest of us humans, it has to work hard at that. All the best, Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:12, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  Not really, if "yoga as exercise" is promoted for things like unblocking chakras to treat health conditions.[93] then the exercise is just a tad more than "remotely fringey". In fact, looking some more, it seems this magazine is so deep into woo-woo, and so unconnected from reality, I doubt anything it says can be taken as reliable. If RS means we are looking for publications with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, is that really a publications that has stuff that:

  • uncritically relays somebody's "cure" for breast cancer which includes "integrated plant-based nutrition, Chinese Medicine, Ayurveda, Homeopathy, Kundalini Yoga, and meditation" (while rejecting mainstream treatment).[94]
  • treats astrology as real.[95]
  • says yoga can be used to "reset your electromagnetic field" and boost your aura.[96]

  I mean come on, this is just bollocks. This is the sort of source we should be blacklisting. Bon courage (talk) 09:54, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  Wikipedia's policies of neutrality of course mean mainspace articles don't adopt the views of religious yoga in Wikipedia's own voice, but calling beliefs bollocks and saying this makes Yoga Journal the sort of source we should be blacklisting comes across as taking the matter further than necessary or quite appropriate. All sorts of reliable periodicals publish astrological content; the Washington Post still has horoscopes, at least in its website version. And claims about something like aura pertain to the spiritual side of yoga that some practitioners participate in and seems to me no more a strike against the periodical overall than recognizing that some contributors to academic journals like Fides et Historia or the Journal of Ecclesiastical History have religious beliefs that Wikipedia wouldn't express in its own voice, like the literal resurrection of Jesus or a God-breathed Bible. As for medical claims, those are covered by WP:MEDRS, and quackery appears in other reliable periodicals too (like the New York Times' on-again-off-again tendency to defy medical consensus on trans affirming medical care). Singling out Yoga Journal as needing blacklisting seems off the mark. Parsing reliability and contextually citing sources is part of contributing on Wikipedia. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 10:21, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  Religious people can believe whatever stories they want within their sealed systems. But as soon as that obtrudes into the real worlds of cancer, electromagnetism, or the influence of celestial bodies then we call bollocks. So, pain during intercourse is not caused by a "blocked chakra" as YJ suggests.[97] Also, note that auras are pseudoscientific, as Wikipedia notes at Aura (paranormal). That this magazine does not demarcate between fiction and reality is a bad sign. Why is it trustable for anything? Bon courage (talk) 10:29, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  ? It is obvious that a publication can be reliable for some things and not for others. This is particularly obvious in the exercise/nutrition/health nexus, which is full of both pseudoscientific health nonsense and rather straightforward non-health factual questions. E.g. it is obvious that a publication that is not up to the MEDRS standard could be used to source a sentence like "Yoga is thought to have originated in India in the 5th century BCE" or for reporting on names of modern conventional poses. --JBL (talk) 17:27, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  Interesting points. Bon courage The intent is for YJ to be used in compliance with Wikipedia:MEDRS, which means not to make claims. And I believe this is how it is currently being used on asana pages. If we are 'blacklisting' articles in the manner you suggested, then I think Vogue, People, and some of the sources marked as 'generally acceptable' under Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources would be up for debate. Whitestar12 (talk) 20:19, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

As ever, Context is important. It may depend on which claims an editor attempts to support using citations to Yoga Journal. For example, descriptions of yoga poses seems fine. Medical claims of course fall under WP:MEDRS. But you seem primarily interested in the poses, which are a matter of relatively straightforwardly describing Yoga exercises. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 10:12, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Well, it's outside the remit of this NB, but the question then is: why should Wikipedia be talking about "yoga poses" if they receive no attention from reputable sources outside the fringe milieu of yoga? In any case, given the above, why should this publication be trusted for anything? The magazine seems to lack a reality filter. Bon courage (talk) 10:22, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

The word "yoga" can be used both to refer to obviously fringe religious nonsense (exceptional claims about the nature of the universe that would require unusually strong sourcing) with a small number of adherents and to an extremely common family of exercise regimens practiced by tens of millions of people in the US (and presumably other places). Some of your comments seem to be heavily conflating these two things, and that is not conducive to making good determinations about what WP articles about yoga should cover or what sources are appropriate. --JBL (talk) 17:31, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

That something's practised by "tens of millions of people in the US" is not really a counter to it being "obviously fringe religious nonsense", now is it. Bon courage (talk) 17:40, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

It is really hard to see how excising "with a small number of adherents" from the first phrase you quoted could be part of a good-faith exercise in finding consensus. --JBL (talk) 19:10, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Not at all, I think you miss my point that popularity does not mean non-fringeiness. Bon courage (talk) 20:08, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I cannot see how to parse "not at all" as a response to the comment immediately preceding it. I have not missed your point; since you do not seem interested in catching mine, this will be my last response to you in this discussion. --JBL (talk) 20:48, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Yoga as exercise is deeply connected to "wellness culture" pseudoscience/alternative medicine, see [98] [99] [100] [101]. They fundamentally aren't extricable like you're claiming them to be. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:51, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree with the first sentence and disagee with the second sentence. The factual questions "what are the most common yoga poses in modern practice?", "what physical activity is denoted by the phrase 'mountain pose'?", and "what evidence is there for the continuity of practice of particular yoga poses?", for example, are completely extricable from any wellness culture nonsense, and answerable using sources that would obviously not be acceptable for answering questions like "is 'my chakras are out of alignment' a meaningful phrase?" and "which parts of the practice of yoga have validatable health benefits?" Doubtless there is a gray area (when is there ever not?), but the fact that a magazine publishes some ridiculous things does not mean that one cannot use the non-ridiculous parts for unexceptional claims. --JBL (talk) 19:19, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm inclined toward JBL's perspective on this. Comments objecting to Yoga Journal as a source for yoga poses seem to resort to hostile (unnecessarily so, I think) characterizations of religious aspects of yoga out of context rather than recognizing that OP asked about the context of describing yoga exercise. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 20:28, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Correct, exactly. P-Makoto (she/her) I think context is certainly important to your point - Wikipedia:MEDRS must be adhered to. Whitestar12 (talk) 20:23, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes. The journal is deeply serious in its coverage of yoga poses and other yoga-as-exercise topics. When it describes how to perform a pose or a sequence of poses (with vinyasas), it is careful, accurate, authoritative, and extremely well illustrated. Chiswick Chap (talk) 21:37, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

The claim that they are "a publication focused on Yoga as exercise" doesn't withstand scrutiny, if that were true then there wouldn't be major sections of this publication on foundations, (by which they mean philosophy) meditation, lifestyle, and astrology. The focus appears to be on Yoga as lifestyle... Not on Yoga as exercise as the OP so loosely claimed. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 06:41, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Can't we just treat this like we would any other niche trade magazine? Like, Cat Fancy or somesuch? I wouldn't use Cat Fancy to source veterinary claims, but if I wanted to know what cat enthusiasts believed, I could do worse. And I'm sure there are some wacky articles in Cat Fancy that ought not to be used as a sole source for some claim or other. jps (talk) 16:03, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, exactly. --JBL (talk) 19:27, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Hear hear. Importantly, a pop or trade magazine is not an academic source, so it is not an RS for statements like (as suggested above) "Yoga is thought to have originated in India in the 5th century BCE", or on Yoga (philosophy) per anything but popular/common philosophy (which has little to do with yoga to begin with, hence why it requires expert sources), or on historical (pre-modern) yoga poses and meditations (that is, unless an article therein is written by an actual historian/expert of such things). SamuelRiv (talk) 17:03, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. Just as Cat Fancy can source a lot of information about cat-related events, products, and care practices but isn't the best source for information for veterinary health, so too can Yoga Journal source information about yoga stances, teachers, exercise, etc. but isn't the source Wikipedia should cite for medical claims. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 05:39, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

Is NGO Monitor a reliable (but obviously not unbiased) source regarding statements about NGOs and the BLP associated with them?

There are (mostly old) discussion before, but the source came up in the Discussion on this noticeboard about Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor and was characterised as biased (which, in my opinion, is accurate). I would like to incorporate some of them into the article on the org, insofar as that is appropriate. I believe that it can be used, where necessary with an attribution, as it is generally considered reliable enough to be cited by significant parts of MSM, many of the involved people are subject matter experts and they generally cite specific sources and examples. Does anyone disagree? FortunateSons (talk) 00:28, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Per reliable academic sources, I would consider NGO Monitor an unreliable source for statements about NGOs and associated BLPs. Multiple sources published through academic presses and periodicals characterize NGO Monitor's assessments as politically motivated, lacking full editorial independence, not conducting sufficient investigation to substantiate their claims, at times reporting inaccuracies, and having a pattern of singling out groups with perceived political differences rather than focusing on the substance of the alleged problems.

• Michael Edwards, foreword to NGO Accountability: Politics, Principles and Innovations, eds. Lisa Jordan and Peter van Tuijl (Routledge, 2006): Examples of such attacks include the NGO Watch project at the American Enterprise Institute, the Rushford Report in Washington DC and the NGO Monitor in Jerusalem, all of which single out liberal or progressive groups for criticism while ignoring the same problems, if that is what they are, among NGOs allied with conservative views. It is no accident that hostility to NGO involvement in global governance forms a key element of neoconservative thinking in the US. Stronger NGO accountability mechanisms won't do away with politically motivated attacks like these, but they would surely help to expose them for what they are. (viii, bolding added)
• Joel Peters, "Israel", in The European Union and the Arab Spring: Promoting Democracy and Human Rights in the Middle East, ed. Joel Peters (Lexington Books, 2012), 77–92: In recent years a number of right-wing groups in Israel, most notably Im Tirtzu and NGO Monitor, have launched high-profile campaigns with the aim of delegitimizing the activities of Israeli civil society and human rights organizations, especially those that advocate the rights of Arab citizens in Israel and/or address the question of Israeli violations of human rights in the Occupied Territories. (86, bolding added)
• Yasmeen Abu-Laban and Abigail B. Bakan, "After 9/11: Canada, the Israel/Palestine Conflict, and the Surveillance of Public Discourse", Canadian Journal of Law and Society 27, no. 3 (December 2012): 319–339: NGO Monitor has been characterized by Israeli academics as "right wing", as well as selective in its focus on NGOs; in particular, it ostensibly looks at NGOs concerned with human rights but fails to seriously investigate the activities of NGOs that support illegal activities in the occupied West Bank. (333, bolding added)
  • Abu-Laban and Bakan in particular identify NGO Monitor's propensity for inaccuracy in its descriptions of the basic planks of other NGOs, such as claiming Canadian ecumenical organization KAIROS supports BDS when at the time it explicitly did not encourage boycotting Israeli products: while NGO Monitor claims that KAIROS is a "primary supporter of the anti-Israel divestment movement", KAIROS denies it. In fact, in its "FAQs" online, KAIROS states that its position since first discussed in 2005 is that "KAIROS does not recommend a general boycott of Israeli goods for a number of reasons. (335, bolding added)
• Sara Kalm, Lisa Strömbom, and Anders Uhlin, "Civil Society Democratising Global Governance? Potentials and Limitations of 'Counter-Democracy'", Global Society 33, no. 4 (2019): 499–519: However, in all its reports, the NGOs that are criticised for being biased and partial have a perspective of promoting Palestinian human rights and/or taking a critical stance toward Israeli Government policies vis-à-vis Palestinians. Thus, the NGO Monitor appears to be promoting pro-Israel views regarding the conflict in a partisan way. Therefore, the organisation cannot be claimed to express universalist views, as it promotes a highly parochial perspective, mainly promoting Israeli interests. [...] Although the organisation claims to be independent—there has been accusations about strong ties between Gerald Steinberg, who is the founder of NGO Monitor, and powerful actors in the Israeli Government. [...] In terms of independence, there seems to be strong evidence pointing to that NGO Monitor might be less independent than it claims and indeed tied to strong political interests and actors. (516–517, bolding added)
• Ron Dudai, "Entryism, Mimicry and Victimhood Work: The Adoption of Human Rights Discourse by Right-wing Groups in Israel", International Journal of Human Rights 21, no. 7 (2017): 866–888: The goal of such pro-state entryism can be demonstrated most powerfully by NGO Monitor's recent practice of submitting 'shadow reports' to the UN human rights system. Shadow reports are among the most common and important tools of human rights NGOs: while governments submit their formal reports to UN human rights monitoring bodies, obviously seeking to portray a positive image, the practice of shadow reporting allows human rights NGOs to bring to the attention of these bodies independent and less flattering information and interpretation. Israel's human rights NGOs often make use of this tool. NGO Monitor's shadow reports however contain nothing but positive information about Israel, not seeking in any way to question Israel's formal submissions. In effect, they provide shadowing not to the state’s reports but to those of the other NGOs. (871, bolding added)

Assessments such as these from academic sources lead me to conclude that NGO Monitor is not a reliable source for statements about NGOs and associated BLPs. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 01:34, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Could you elaborate on the claims regarding unreliability? Their bias is pretty clear, but as far as I can tell, there is no higher frequency of errors than with many newspapers considered reliable.

As this is an activist org (such as the one discussed above), it is obviously not fully independent, but many newspapers aren’t either, and as far as I can tell, there is no sign of a higher degree of bias than shown by many other comparable orgs.

By my cursory reading, there were historically some instances of poor reporting, but not beyond the usual level for comparable org, and not beyond what was shown for EMHRM, which appear to be acceptable with attribution?

Im pretty new, so it’s possible I missed something, but a (high) degree of bias is not a direct hindrance to being an RS, right? FortunateSons (talk) 01:46, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

While sources having some biases isn't necessarily out of the ordinary, the overall impression I get from academic sources is that NGO Monitor is not only particularly biased (rather than just somewhat biased) but moreover lacks independence from the topic it often reports on (by which I don't just mean it's founded by Israelis, but moreover Kalm, Strömbom, and Uhlin's analysis which finds compelling the connections between NGO Monitor and the institutional Israeli government) and is prone to mischaracterizing organizations. While every editor has a right to make a cursory reading of a source/sourcebase, I'm inclined to base my position on these academic assessments made by trained scholars with a lot more experience in the subject area than me. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 02:23, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

In terms of independence, there seems to be strong evidence pointing to that NGO Monitor might be less independent than it claims and indeed tied to strong political interests and actors. is (as far as I can tell) not entirely untrue, but it refers to Steinberg being a man who, at least for a period of time since its founding, was closely affiliated with the Prime Minister’s Office. Source (from the other end of the political spectrum). This sounds biased (which isn’t in question), but I don’t think it’s more unusual than many other political organisations are. As much as the “revolving door” personally annoys me, it is also the norm, and a venn diagramm of consultants, professors and activists would have more overlap than I like, but it is also a fact of life. Is there a more specific issue that I missed? FortunateSons (talk) 02:41, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I think these assessments from trained academics, published in peer-reviewed publications, carry more weight than the personal, lay assessments you or I are capable of. I continue to consider NGO Monitor unreliable for statements about NGOs and affiliated BLPs. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 20:33, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Political scientists and journalists argue about the independence of biased sources all the times, which is a normal (and good) part of scientific discourse. It is considered reliable enough that others, including AP and other major publications, cite it, so such an (in this case, very reasonable) argument towards authority does generally hold water in both directions, so I investigated their claim.

In this specific case, Kalm, Strömbom, and Uhlin base their analyses on two sources: „ Although the organisation claims to be independent—there has been accusations about strong ties between Gerald Steinberg, who is the founder of NGO Monitor, and powerful actors in the Israeli Government”. It cites a guardian article, which does not contain any of the relevant keywords and concerns another group, and „Mandy Turner, “Creating a Counterhegemonic Praxis: Jewish-Israeli Activists and the Challenge to Zionism”, Conflict, Security and Development, Vol. 15, No. 5 (2015), pp. 549–574“, which in Footnote 119 links what I have cited above as proof regarding the lack of independence: Yossi Gurvitz and Noam Roatem, ‘What is NGO Monitor’s Connection to the Israeli Government?’. +972 Webzine, 29 April 2014. Available at: http://972mag.com/what-is-ngo-monitors-connection-to-the-israeli-government/90239/[Accessed 23 July 2015]. Based on their writing, it appears to be their political reporting, which I would consider accurate but biased unless proven otherwise (left wing mag, good reporters). However, that does not appear to be significant enough unless we are willing to discount a very long list of orgs, certainly after the time frame where that relationship terminates (otherwise, we would have to depreciate every article written by a current or former politicial consultant, staffer etc.).

If this is the case, I would genuinely appreciate if you re-assessed your view regarding the source; if (which is quite possible) I missed something, I would greatly appreciate if you took the time to correct me. :) FortunateSons (talk) 21:12, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

By way of aside, Kalm, Strömbom, and Uhlin's citation of the Guardian article doesn't strike me as strangely as it apparently strikes you. It's about another group, yes, but the point of the citation is to place their assessment of NGO Monitor in the context of an existing literature about Israeli institutional actors redefin[ing] what was once seen as tolerable, but albeit bitterly contested, dissent – the reports and critiques of Israel's human rights organisations – as a form of intolerable and existentially threatening delegitimisation. Kalm, Strömbom, and Uhlin's Global Society article is, I would remind, a secondary source which incorporates the three authors' own research and expertise as observers of organizations like NGO Monitor. If they were writing a Wikipedia article, we would expect every claim to be summarizing a verifiable source; but they didn't write a Wikipedia article. They, as academic researchers, have the training to synthesize literature from other writers with their observations to make the kinds of analytical claims that go beyond what a Wikipedia article would say in Wikipedia's own voice.

In any case, my view is based not only any one isolated example from the published literature on NGO Monitor but on the impression I get from the balance of academic sources. I respect your interest in my perspective on this. At the same time, I'd appreciate it if you accept that you haven't convinced me to change my mind. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 21:43, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

The guardian citation is fine, I just wanted to clarify that it is not directly related to the question at hand.

I understand that you disagree and trust their assessment, and appreciate the good faith discussion, even if I believe that the researchers view does not diminish the reliability of the source and therefore chose to respectfully disagree with you. Thank you for taking the time. FortunateSons (talk) 22:01, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

@FortunateSons, what exactly would you like to add to the article about the EMHRM based on the NGO Monitor? In general, I would suggest to use less biased sources. If some information is only reported by the NGO Monitor, it might not be WP:DUE.

A bias doesn't mean they are unreliable. The quotes above mostly confirm their partisanship and only one mentions an inaccuracy, so it's hard to understand whether it's a one-off or systematic problem. Alaexis_¿question? 12:58, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree that they are biased. The article linked to questionable reporting about things like organ theft and statements by associated people that one can reasonably argue are antisemitic under modern definitions of antisemitism. I would have added them, probably as „NGO Monitor, (a Jerusalem-based NGO), argued that X was Y.“ You can find examples of the discussed things above in the discussion on EMHRM, if you are interested in writing them yourself :)FortunateSons (talk) 21:30, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I am happy to discuss the DUE weight of statements later, but as long as this is ongoing, I am not really interested in pre-writing and sourcing a statement that I might not even be able to include on the talk page. FortunateSons (talk) 21:32, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

It certainly has come up before. If one puts "NGO Monitor" into the search box at the top of this page for the archives you'll find a whole load of them. I've only gone through a few but they were very dismissive overall. One comment I saw said calling it reliable is like saying Electronic Intifada was reliable - and that has been deprecated. Perhaps someone else can go through the lot and get an overall opinion about reliabiliy. I definitely think its very biased views mean its opinions should be assigned little or no weight. NadVolum (talk) 01:43, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, their bias is clear in my opinion, and pretty undisputed as far as I can tell; they are right-wing and Zionist (in the literal sense of the word). However, considering the debate we just had on EMHRM, I would think that they should be in the same category; they both have bias and some questionable statements, but NGO Monitor is cited by RS and should therefore be considered equal or better (but obviously attribution is still required). FortunateSons (talk) 01:50, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Putting a respectable NGO and NGO monitor in the same basket? Don't think so. Monitor is a trash operation spewing out endless Israeli propaganda, one merely has to look at the complete crap they wrote in respect of 6 NGOs declared illegal by Israel and for which Israel was widely condemned. Extreme bias makes the source unusable. I would accept the equally biased views of its founder as a source because they theoretically qualify as an expert and at least then we have a name attached to an opinion, can form a judgement of it. Selfstudier (talk) 13:19, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

With all due respect, that isn’t really an objective argument. Bias is not really an argument if it doesn’t interfere with the facts, and they are right wing, but not fringe beyond what many left wing sources are. If you agree that the creator is a subject matter expert and that they are regularly quoted by RS, I don’t think that one can really disagree with being biased but reliable unless you can show a pattern of poor reporting beyond bias. FortunateSons (talk) 13:59, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I just did, read the linked article. And it is not just bias, it is extreme bias (which is a reason to question reliability, if not deprecate). I don't understand the last sentence. To reiterate I accept the creator as an SPS and afaics, NGO monitor is a good candidate for deprecation, since we have had many discussions, I think converting this one into a formal RFC might be the way to go here. Selfstudier (talk) 14:09, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

And it is not just bias, it is extreme bias (which is a reason to question reliability, if not deprecate).

With all due respect to you, I seem to recall you coming to a different conclusion regarding EI and Mondoweiss despite their bias being extreme as well. As someone who’s been in favor of GUNREL/deprecating biased sources on either side of the conflict, the least I can ask for is logical consistency. The Kip 15:10, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

There is a key difference. NGO Monitor's output is written by NGO Monitor. Mondoweiss' output is written by the authors of its articles, some of whom are respected experts. I'm not in favor of citing Mondoweiss editorials (for facts, especially), but the articles it publishes should be judged on the expertise of their authors. So actually I am completely consistent. Zero^talk 01:58, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Which is a different issue entirely than the predictability of output that you cited below. Yes, Mondoweiss primarily publishes op-eds from individual authors; however, just like NGOM’s content, those op-eds have an extremely predictable bias to them.

I’m simply tired of users’ opinions/votes on sources developing entirely from what side of the conflict said source backs, and this applies to sources and users on either side. If a source overly favors one side of the conflict it’s probably not reliable, this shouldn’t be hard. When a user supports downgrading one source because of bias but opposes doing so for a biased source in the opposite side, I have the right to question if general bias (versus the user’s opinion) is the real concern.

And before I myself am inevitably accused of favoring one side, you can see that I’ve voted for GUNREL below after voting for GUNREL/deprecate on the Palestinian-biased EI/The Cradle/Mondoweiss while advising against using the Israeli-biased i24 and JNS as reliable sources in two non-RfC discussions. Again, it’s not hard. The Kip 16:17, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

I see no reason to use them. They are more akin to one of those think tanks employed to say global warming isn't happening and it is too late to do anythng about it and it is good for agriculture and it is a Chinese plot. NadVolum (talk) 13:30, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

That isn’t really true. You can disagree with their claims, but the statements are generally fact-based FortunateSons (talk) 13:55, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Actually it's a good description. They can only be called fact-based if the facts always point in exactly the same direction. A source with entirely predictable output is worthless. Zero^talk 14:24, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

With all due respect, I seem to recall you coming to a different conclusion regarding Mondoweiss despite their outcomes being rather predictable as well. The Kip 15:10, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

The tobacco industry and suchlike tried to avoid outright falsehooda too. Have a look at NGO Monitor on Amnesty International [102], Medicis Sans Frontieres [103], the ICJ [104]. Does factual really cover them? NadVolum (talk) 22:17, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Could you clarify which of the statements is false? They provide links their sources, and while they obviously cover things in a way that is in line with their bias, I can’t find anything where they have claimed something to be true which isn’t in the 3 links you provided. Their interpretation is obviously their own and biased (which is the reason that policy requires that such claims be attributed), but I can’t find anything that goes beyond biased into falsehoods. If they have a pattern of blatant misinformation like most depreciated sources do, it should be easy to find, right? FortunateSons (talk) 22:41, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

So do you think "Amnesty disproportionately singles out Israel for condemnation, focusing solely on the conflict with the Palestinians, misrepresenting the complexity of the conflict, and ignoring more severe human rights violations in the region." is a reasonable statement like any investigative journalist might make? Or its bias is just something that can be ignored? Or how about "In practice, however, MSF consistently abuses its status as a humanitarian organization to launch venomous anti-Israel political campaigns." or "ICJ is active in lobbying the United Nations promoting false, distorted, and unverifiable allegations against Israel."? NadVolum (talk) 23:52, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I think it’s complicated, but I certainly disapprove of the way it is being said.

stricken for being off topic

In this case, I believe the answer for this issue to be fully covered by the policies of Wikipedia: we attribute claims to biased sources, don’t use our own voice in controversial cases, and make a reasonable effort to verify information when it appears to be fishy.

After all, we (as in all Editors) figured out religious disputes, military conflicts, and complex ethical debate. I think we can trust each other to differentiate between posturing and a specific claim being made about an NGO, don’t you? FortunateSons (talk) 00:18, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

It's not complicated; it's complete crap and a joke source. "ICJ is active in lobbying the United Nations promoting false, distorted, and unverifiable allegations against Israel." - just laughable. Iskandar323 (talk) 17:47, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Oh, and regarding „unverifiable allegations“: that may be my personal frustration, but all sides are currently doing that this and I find it highly annoying when doing research. The people (even scientists and journalists) stating assumptions as facts when talking about topics in the fog of war (unless someone secretly works for an intelligence agency with a very high clearance, in which case, go right ahead) are the bane of my existence. FortunateSons (talk) 00:32, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

NGO Monitor is cited by RS. Is it? I'm looking now and (excluding unreliable sources such as Electronic Intifada and Israel Hayom) this is what I see:

• extensive citations in Jerusalem Post[105][106][107][108] and a couple in

Jewish News Syndicate[109][110][111]

• Ha'aretz noting one of its employees was banned from editing Wikipedia in 2013[112]
• a 2014 controversy during which the Washington Post reported that AP had not cited in for several years,[113] after a former AP reporter claimed there was a ban on using it there[114] (but note David Bernstein of Volokh Conspiracy did describe them as a usable source in WaPo in response.[115]
• A 2016 op ed in Al-Jazeera attacking them for bias and misrepresentation[116]
• +972 ridiculing it[117][118]
• rival op eds in a Canadian Jewish outlet[119]
• a 2018 news article in EUObserver that starts "Former Israeli diplomats have accused NGO Monitor, a right-wing pressure group, of sowing misinformation that undermined EU efforts on conflict resolution."
• a 2021 op ed in the NYT that describes "a campaign, spearheaded by the Israeli government (with support from groups like NGO Monitor and UK Lawyers for Israel, which pursue these Palestinian groups in court and have been accused by advocacy groups of disseminating disinformation), targeting civil society organizations that monitor and resist Israeli human rights violations, including the continuing expansion of illegal settlements."[120]

In conclusion, two right-wing RSs use them; lots of others see them as unreliable. I'd say we could mention their opinion when secondary usage in e.g. Jerusalem Post shows it's noteworthy; otherwise avoid. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:06, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

It's a biased source that needs to be used with care, if at all, as its use could easily be WP:UNDUE due to its partisan nature. Hemiauchenia (talk) 14:01, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

That seems reasonable, thank you FortunateSons (talk) 14:09, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

• As per my prior opinions re: EI, the Cradle, JNS, etc, I’d personally avoid using any outright biased sources with regards to anything in the I-P CTOP are regardless of “reliability,” and in that case that includes NGO Monitor. If it absolutely needs to be used, don’t do so without attribution. The Kip 15:10, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  I would personally only use it for background on individuals and orgs with controversial views, and not generally use them for notability as such and breaking news.

  However, they are ‚useful‘ (if you get over the language) when it comes to statements made and reports published, as even very questionable statements and reports are often ignored due to the sheer quantity of content in the digital age. FortunateSons (talk) 22:06, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  I think "background on individuals with controversial views" would be the worst possible use, as BLP material requires extra high quality sourcing and this is the opposite of that. BobFromBrockley (talk) 15:38, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

  That makes sense. Insofar as the source is reliable (which is the question at hand), I would argue that verifiable claims (such as public statements or statements made online) would be acceptable, right? FortunateSons (talk) 15:45, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

• It gets tricky, though, doesn't it? Plenty of clearly high-quality sources on I-P issues (including some of the most commonly cited ones, like Al-Jazeera and The Jerusalem Post) have what could reasonably be described as outright biases. It's not uncommon for sources closest to the conflict and which, therefore, produce some of the best coverage, to also have outright biases. Ultimately what matters is their reliability - whether that bias is sufficient to harm their reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. To me, the most alarming thing here is the fact that they claim more independence than they actually have - if true, that is a fundamental falsehood that makes them hard to use as a source. For outrageously slanted sources there are also WP:DUE issues - when a source's coverage is too slanted, then what it covers or doesn't cover has less significance, making it likely to be undue; and even when they cover factual things, their opinion about what is important carries little weight for our content decisions. "Source that always without question advocates X is advocating X in this particular context as well" is just not something that is generally going to be due without a secondary source - we wouldn't end every article with Carthago delenda est just because we have a cite to Cato the Elder connecting it to the topic. --Aquillion (talk) 23:05, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

  Thank you for your response! Yeah, it’s pretty complicated. There was a pretty long discussion above, that I believe can be summarised as „we are not sure“ when it comes to questions of independence. I believe to have found the original source by following the citations and consider it mostly harmless, but my counterpart in the discussion made excellent points and provided good sourcing, so I think it’s still up in the air.

  Regarding WP:DUE, I agree that it is pretty complicated and will (as I/P does) lead to long discussions on talk pages. However, some of the most „outstanding“ claims, such as (in the thread on EMHRM) a chairman of an NGO allegedly downplaying sexual assaults is probably DUE at least a sentence.

  Would you consider them reliable (but biased, as you said) unless there is convincing evidence that they are not independent? FortunateSons (talk) 23:38, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

Not necessarily. The default for sources is that they're unknown, leaning towards unreliable. A lot of people above have fixated on the question of whether their bias renders them unreliable, which misses the more basic question - what reasons do we have to think that they are reliable? I mentioned Al-Jazeera and The Jerusalem Post, say; while they're biased, there's massive amounts of high-quality WP:USEBYOTHERS and secondary coverage indicating that they have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Where's the corresponding reputation here? I feel that this is a common problem when discussing sources that are known for their bias and nothing else - people get derailed into the fact that WP:BIASED isn't automatically disqualifying and miss the fact that it allows sources that otherwise have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy to be used despite their bias. If the only thing the source is known for is its bias, and nobody has written anything positive about it at all, then it's unreliable because it lacks the reputation that RS requires. (And beyond that the WP:DUE issue remains, so I probably would avoid citing it in any place where it's the only source, especially for anything WP:EXCEPTIONAL - which is probably the only situations people are likely to want to cite it anyway.) So if you want to argue it is reliable, I would search for at least some positive coverage or WP:USEBYOTHERS to counterbalance the obviously-negative coverage above; even if the sources above don't outright say it's unreliable (and therefore wouldn't be disqualifying if it clearly had a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy otherwise), a source where the only available coverage is negative is not a reliable source. --Aquillion (talk) 05:12, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

If I understood you correctly, you are looking for cases where a reliable sources cited them or their spokespeople? With a quick search, I have found:

AP (1) AP (2) AP (3), also NYT (1) NYT (2), and BBC (1) BBC (2) and also others [1] [2]. Is that enough, or should I look for more? FortunateSons (talk) 15:40, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

From this list, the Reuters piece uses it as a source for facts (giving its claims similar status to the NGOs it's attacking such as B'Tselem).[121] The BBC and AP examples, however, are all of it (or its spokespeople) being used as a source of opinion, suggesting its opinion is occasionally noteworthy, but not that it is reliable for facts. I can't see the WaPo and NYT examples behind the paywalls, but can I ask what they are using it for, facts or opinion? My take-home is that we might want to include its opinion via RSs, but that we don't have much reason to use it as a reliable source for facts. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:22, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time. The links below are without paywall, and are IMO.:

NYT (1) mostly opinion related to the value of another NGOs actions

NYT (2) is Kind of both, but also a statement regarding causality, so I would say its partial

WaPo ascribing motives to others, 70% opinion, 30% statement of fact.

(Assessments are my own, please feel free to verify.) What do you think? FortunateSons (talk) 17:10, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

It's an overtly biased pressure group in favour of Israel. I don't see evidence they're not independent, but they're still pretty clearly on one side of the conflict. They're not a news organization and like Amnesty International, their claims should be covered by other sources to assess if they have WP:DUE weight. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 06:05, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Have we got an example of page of NGO Monitor we might possibly use as a citation on Wikipedia? NadVolum (talk) 12:09, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

I would absolutely avoid NGO Monitor. It's not just biased and partisan; it's an attack dog dishonestly posing as a neutral monitor. It regularly distorts material it quotes. I don't think it's the case (as suggested above) that it's used as a source by mainstream sources - it might be used as a source by right-wing tabloidy media such as Fox News or the Daily Mail, but I don't recall it being seen as a source of facts by serious outlets. BobFromBrockley (talk) 15:42, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

I made a short list of citations by RS above FortunateSons (talk) 15:47, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Oh sorry I missed that. I'll look now. I just did a systematic search of Google News and found two RSs using it and several others criticising it, pasted above. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:07, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. Could you check whether to include the ones I found as well? FortunateSons (talk) 16:45, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

My opinion of NGO monitor is strongly influenced by the way that the organization has manipulated Wikipedia using paid staffers. In particular one staffer who had no qualms about making COI claims against a target of Gerald Steinberg [122] while failing to disclose his own, much worse, COI. [123]. And then, to make it worse, lying about it. He utilized an elaborate strategy to pad WP articles with NGO monitor talking points.(clearly described by Nomoskedasticity in “additional comments” [124]). It was disgusting. I can’t think why anyone would consider an organization who would stoop this kind of underhand behaviour a reliable source. “A reputation for fact-checking and accuracy”? No, we have direct evidence of exactly the opposite. Slp1 (talk) 00:45, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

What is the reliability of NGO Monitor?

What is the reliability of NGO Monitor?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

RFCbefore is above, there have been several discussions in the past.Selfstudier (talk) 16:00, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

!votes

Option 3 but only because we shouldn't deprecate right off the bat. It is clear from the above discussion that this source is not at all reliable for facts. Selfstudier (talk) 16:15, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Option 3 per my contribution to the discussion above, describing it as an attack dog dishonestly posing as a neutral monitor and noting that it its opinions are occasionally quoted by RSs meaning its views might sometimes be noteworthy, that the Jerusalem Post and some other outlets have used it as a source for facts, but that other sources explicitly call it unreliable. BobFromBrockley (talk) 16:25, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Option 2 per my contributions above. Made by a subject-matter expert and cited by RS such as NYT, AP, Reuters etc., but also has a right-wing bias and shouldn’t be used without attribution. For BLP, claims regarding facts should not be used unless a source/link is explicitly provided. FortunateSons (talk) 16:33, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 NGO Monitor is a partisan activist organisation that masquerades itself as a neutral monitor. It's only usable for their own opinions, but even then it would very likely be WP:UNDUE. Hemiauchenia (talk) 17:54, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 4 This is a propaganda outlet and nothing more. I can't see that it is to be used a source for anything. --Te og kaker (talk) 21:29, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 4 "ICJ is active in lobbying the United Nations promoting false, distorted, and unverifiable allegations against Israel."? I don't see how one could use any page in it for a citation. NadVolum (talk) 23:45, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2 per FortunateSons. JM (talk) 01:50, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3, and I only don't !vote for 4 because the trend of deprecation has been to the detriment of the project. This organization began as a one-man outfit for publishing lies and evolved into a multi-person outfit for publishing lies. Nothing positive can be said about it. Zero^talk 08:33, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

You dwfinitely make a point okay. I would not have deprecated the Daily Mail or the Sun, I think I'll stick with deprecation here though. NadVolum (talk) 10:02, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 per my votes on EI, Mondoweiss, etc. GUNREL’ing unreliable sources on a CTOP shouldn’t be difficult, but certain groups of users seem only interested in doing so to sources that disagree with their perspective. The Kip 16:08, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 2 FortunateSons' statement is reasonable. use with attribution, caution in biographical articles. ValarianB (talk) 16:14, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3. Per my contribution in the discussion above, the balance of of reliable academic sources independent of NGO Monitor indicate that the way in which it's partisan and partial results in distorted assessments of the NGOs it purports to monitor and but has led to inaccuracies. I was also very persuaded by user Aquillion's comment in the above discussion about WP:USEBYOTHERS. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 18:39, 23 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3, based on the evidence presented in the discussion above. It's not merely biased, like an editorial publication can be. Its primary purpose is to attack other people and groups, from a frankly extreme PoV. That makes it unusable from a WP:BLP standpoint. The allegations of ties to political actors (P-Makoto's list of academic sources) and allegations of spreading misinformation (BobFromBrockley's review of media outlets) make it worse. Only voting "3" out of respect for the norm of avoiding deprecation as the first step. DFlhb (talk) 19:38, 24 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 4 - the definition of a propaganda outlet, including having had paid employees editing Wikipedia entries to insert NGO-Monitor press releases. When their views are noted by some other reliable outlet then perhaps there is discussion on including them in our articles, but as a source itself? It does not have any noted experts in any field publishing on their webpage, so the comparisons to other sources that do publish such experts is lacking, this is purely a propaganda outlet with no redeeming qualities to use as a source in an encyclopedia. nableezy - 22:29, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

  Just to clarify, could you explain why the founder is not considered an expert? FortunateSons (talk) 22:43, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

  Oh, and the Wiki Page includes a list of people, I can’t find a current list but I think some of them can be considered legal experts etc. Can you find a current link? FortunateSons (talk) 22:47, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 per P-Makoto and DFlhb. Unknown-Tree🌲? (talk) 00:50, 28 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 4. While I am also reluctant to go straight to deprecating a source in most cases, Slp1's comment above proving that NGO Monitor has attempted to manipulate Wikipedia should be enough to get them put on the spam blacklist. I also see ample evidence that they are not only unreliable for facts but actually specifically generate misinformation, which IMO is the standard for deprecation. Loki (talk) 05:40, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

OAS Panel of Independent International Experts

In 2018, the Organization of American States set up a Panel of Independent International Experts to analyse the commission of possible of crimes against humanity in Venezuela (press release, executive summary and final report).

Is the report a reliable source to use in the Guarimba article? NoonIcarus (talk) 07:03, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

• Comment More context on the dispute can be seen here: Talk:Guarimba#Tags. The panel was made up of three experts: Santiago Cantón, Irwin Cotler and Manuel Ventura Robles. WMrapids has argued that since Irwin Cotler was a lawyer for opposition leader Leopoldo López, the source might have a conflict of interest and not have due weight. Cotler was also Nelson Mandela's lawyer in the 80s and a Canadian MP. The disputed content can be found at this diff: [125]. --NoonIcarus (talk) 07:10, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

• It's a primary source, so very likely to need attribution if we are talking about anything even vaguely controversial. If there is criticism of the source, it is likely to be WP:DUE as well. Of course, it is impossible for us to say whether it is reliable unless we know the specific claim. Boynamedsue (talk) 15:41, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

It is worth noting that the OAS is not a neutral body, so any claims attributed to it will often need to be presented with counter viewpoints. It made a lot of untrue claims with regards to the Bolivian election of 2020, for example, so care is needed with anything it publishes. Boynamedsue (talk) 15:47, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

I would say this could be used with clear attribution, but I would not use it to source statements in wikivoice. Ostalgia (talk) 22:03, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

• Per WP:USEBYOTHERS, has the Panel's findings been used by other sources? Is there journalistic or academic endorsement or criticism of it? P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 22:06, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Indian Supreme court rulings for archaeological claims regarding Babri Masjid

Is the 1000+ page Indian Supreme Court ruling regarding the Babri Masjid a reliable source for archeological claims made about the site? @Wikidrifterr: is using the ruling to make sweeping statements asserting the conclusions of the Archaeological Survey of India report as fact when these conclusions have been contested by other archaeologists (see [126]). Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:09, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Another paper questioning the ASI report: [127]. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:14, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Sweeping statements made by me and added to the page

1. Archaeological surgery found remains of Hindu spiritual structure (Mentioned clearly in the conclusion section of the official Supreme Court of India ruling)
2. I can provide 30-40 other credible / notable article covering the official ruling

Also I only added facts, if you can not add Supreme Court of India ruling on the page then what can you add

Also It makes one suspicious about your intentions and you have been editing atleast 4-5 different pages. Where you mostly have been removing facts and adding commentary that seems to be politically motivated to cover only one side.

One can also argue that it is vandalism and also bullying since you have been also reverting changes and also have been constantly editing pages without providing edit summary too. Wikidrifterr (talk) 21:19, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Also if you can answer

1. What is more reliable source than an official ruling of Supreme Court of a democracy ?
2. If there exist any commentary as a journal over the internet that disputes the ruling should that be trusted as source / fact ?
3. If there exist any commentary as a journal over the internet that disputes the ruling then I think it should be added to relevant page but without removing the official ruling of Supreme Court of India

It seems that your sole objective here is not present both sides of history but only to provide your preferred side of history without including the other. Which is why you have been constantly editing/removing content several pages and not even providing any “edit descriptions” too. Wikidrifterr (talk) 21:25, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Also there can not be any other archaeological source other than the Archaeological Survey on India which was presented to Supreme Court of a democracy. Since no one else have done any other archaeological survey on the site.

Should we consider the Open Journal blog written by anonymous person on the internet as archaeological proof ? Wikidrifterr (talk) 21:29, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

• The Supreme court ruling is a reliable source for the ruling itself and precisely nothing else. Court rulings do not meet our definition of what reliable sources are for contentious material. Vanamonde93 (talk) 21:29, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks, for purpose of covering history of the page isn’t it important to add what Supreme Court ruled? Wikidrifterr (talk) 21:32, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, but the significance of a legal ruling is generally complex and requires interpretation and analysis to say anything meaningful about. Even just quoting bits of the ruling might inadvertently have WP:OR implications. If the ruling is important, it's going to have WP:SECONDARY coverage, so we can just use that and rely on what they say, what they highlight as important, and so on. --Aquillion (talk) 03:04, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

For more on this see (and help improve) WP:RSLAW. SamuelRiv (talk) 16:51, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The document is a primary source. Since the content it is being cited for presumably isn't within the scope of WP:BLP, which states that such documents cannot be cited for 'assertions about a living person', we could thus use it for statements concerning what the court ruled. Taking a ruling as undisputed fact, if the facts have subsequently been disputed by relevant specialist academic sources would seem on the face of it to be very questionable however. Wikipedia NPOV policy requires that we represent proportionately ... all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic. There is absolutely nothing in Wikipedia policy that states that rulings from the courts of India (or anywhere else) determine which sources are 'reliable', or 'significant' for us. We do that for ourselves. And doing that per policy probably requires going into more detail as to what the court rulings are being cited for, and what other pertinent sources have to say on the subject. AndyTheGrump (talk) 21:39, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

I would agree with AndyTheGrump, it could be used for statements of what the court rules but those rulings have no bearing on Wikipedia. Any article should be based on the best academic sources as decided by Wikipedia policy. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 02:12, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

@Hemiauchenia: As an uninvolved and also ignorant editor about the situation, I wanted to ask: does the ruling include the position of subject matter experts? If archeologists are cited, they could be cited with attribution, but only if it is relevant and proper for the article. However, it is still a primary source, and if the same people are cited by an independent source, then it is a better alternative. --NoonIcarus (talk) 20:27, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

The user pushing the source is indef blocked now, so this is dispute is now mostly irrelevant. The Supreme court ruling references the report, but I assume that it would be better to cite the original ASI report if one could find it. Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:37, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

I understand. In that case, I totally agree with you. Having the original report is better if available. --NoonIcarus (talk) 23:35, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Bing AI chat/Copilot as an LLM tertiary source

Guidelines regarding ChatGPT and LLMs in general; ChatGPT is trained in a vast number of data but there's an obvious limit on how current these data are, plus its tendecy to hallucinate. I believe, however, that different rules must apply for Bing/Copilot and other such chatbots, such as Perplexity, You.com. Here's what I propose for Bing AI/Copilot:

1. Samme terms that apply for WP:LLM also apply on Copilot. Use is discouraged, except certain circumstances (copyediting, summarization, paraphrasing). However, since Copilot is connected to the internet and Bing search, it might be considered a tertiary source of information, that cites its claims with sources.
2. Creative mode, although using GPT-4, is meant for creating original content (that don't need research) and thus it is more prone to hallucinate, even if it actually searches.
3. Precise mode is generally the most accurate; from personal experience I noticed that it makes a much more extensive research than Balanced mode, and takes longer time to generate results. Personally I think this takes some time to review the sources (if it does) and, according to Ars Technica, it actually skips some potentially unsafe results. This is by far the most beneficial mode when it comes to research.
4. Balanced mode is Precise and Creative mode combined and thus less suitable for research than Precise.
5. Being a tertiary source, it can't be used to cited directly to articles, pretty much like Wikipedia and Encyclopaedia Britannica do (both tertiary sources), but its sources might be useful. Yet, human examination is still recommended, as I do recall cases that it recommended unreliable seources. There have been also instances of citing malicious sites.
6. Deep search performs from what it seems more comprehensive research and might have access to more sources. I have yet to try it to be 100% sure.

Please feel free to express your thoughts.Μητσίκας (talk) 13:16, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

RS are based upon having a reputation for accuracy, I doubt any AI has that. Moreover (and arguably) AI texts are SPS (they are written by and published by the AI) as such (per wp:sps) they (not the source they use) have to be recognized experts in the field. Slatersteven (talk) 13:19, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

The fact it's connected to the internet doesn't make it automatically more accurate, a bing search wouldn't be a reliable source and chatbot using those results is no more reliable. If a chatbot manages to be published by other reliable sources that consider the chatbot a reliable source, then maybe it would be time to reconsider. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:40, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

Compared to ChatGPT, it's far more likely to be accurate, as it doesn't have a knowledge cutoff. I don't think reliability has to do about what other rs think, they might be some unknown sources that are reliable. Μητσίκας (talk) 14:24, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

That looks like wp:or do RS say it is more accurate? Slatersteven (talk) 14:51, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

It's original research but it's good advice if you want to do background research on a topic using a large-language model. I've been on Bing GPT for more than a year now and the footnote ability makes it a killer app. It's very good at surfacing content compared to a pure Bing or Google search.

I think the OP is misunderstanding the LLM policy, since using Bing to find better sources to my knowledge is completely in-bounds and is better than pure ChatGPT. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 17:09, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Except WP:USEBYOTHERS is a thing. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 18:16, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

Nobody is questioning using AI tools to assist in off-wiki research for writing, editing, and verifying articles -- we are far past that point. (The discussions on the WP:Village pump (idea lab) are now about generating article content itself with editor oversight.) There's no purpose to invent some guideline text about what should or should not be used as a tool for background research, especially in a time where those tools will be changing extremely quickly. SamuelRiv (talk) 18:07, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

We could not enforce it anyway, how the hell does Wikipedia know where I went (or how I went about) to get sources? All that matters is the sources we actually use in articles, not how we found them. Slatersteven (talk) 18:13, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

History Beat column from the Carmel Pine Cone

Numerous articles auxiliary to Carmel-by-the-Sea have contents fleshed out significant based. An individual known as Neal Hotelling runs that column in a local weekly newspaper called the Carmel Pine Cone. I have concerns that deriving significant amount of information from a one-man column to extensively write contents would be significant due weight issue and if the individual is not a formally recognized, regularly cited historian, they would not qualify as WP:EXPERTSPS. Examples:

• Carmel Highlands, California
• Carmel Art Association, a hyper local art group and the column is used to assert notability of members.
• Pine Inn hyper-local building and uses five different columns from the same columnist's weekly column in the same publication.

Graywalls (talk) 13:32, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

The only linked article with more than one citation to a source authored by Neal Hotelling is the Pine Inn; the rest have only one citation to Hotelling's "History Beat" column, or in the CAA article case a citation used twice. I wouldn't characterize these articles as being "significant[ly] based" on his history column.

As you have raised this question on the reliable sources noticeboard, and as questions about reliability are always to be asked in context, is there some reason you think the cited sources are not reliable for these Wikipedia pages? Has the accuracy of content been in dispute? Hotelling's qualifications seem to come from his professional life. On what one grants is his personal website, he reports having been a business archivist for the Pebble Beach Company, interviewed by CNN and CBS, and appointed a President of the Monterey Heritage Society and 2005 Preservationist of the Year by the Alliance of Monterey Area Preservationists. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 23:44, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

None of those are qualifications which would appear to count on wikipedia, what makes you think they do? Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:33, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

• having been a business archivist: Hotelling has professional experience in a historical profession
• interviewed by CNN and CBS: Hotelling as a historian fulfills WP:USEBYOTHERS
• appointed a President of the Monterey Heritage Society and 2005 Preservationist of the Year by the Alliance of Monterey Area Preservationists: These are honors from two different historical and preservation societies, given to recognize qualified, able practitioners of the historians craft. As someone who has membership in multiple historical societies, I assure you that we don't appoint people president when we think they are unqualified historians; the very opposite.

I am left to ask, why do you think these qualifications don't count? P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:35, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Professional experience is not part of the notability requirement, if you want it to be you will need to get consensus for that. Two loose uses by mass media does not appear to fulfill WP:USEBYOTHERS. Leadership positions in hobbyist organizations don't count towards anything, again if you want them to you need to get consensus for that. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:31, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Neal Hotelling looks like a respectable local historian. He has published books about the area of Carmel/Monterey, written for Carmel Magazine, and he was praised by the Carmel Mission Foundation.[128] His column in the newspaper is definitely not self-published. I would be happy to see his work cited, whether it be in a book, a magazine, or in the newspaper column.

I would worry more about the Carmel Pine Cone editor who has been Paul Miller since 1997. Miller is vindictive and has abandoned journalistic neutrality. Hotelling's column is one of the few journalistic highlights of the Pine Cone. Binksternet (talk) 00:07, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

None of those books appear to have been published by reputable presses. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:30, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

It should be treated as an opinion column therefore treated as if it where self published, however the author does not appear to meet WP:EXPERTSPS so its basically unusable on wikipedia. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:30, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Why should it be treated as an opinion column when it is a history column? P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:30, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

History is the subject but its an opinion column. Thats in general how newspaper columns work. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:31, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

How do we define "reliable" anyways? One way to look at it is factual accuracy, but another way to look at this. Is it a reliable representation of general prevalence of coverage on this matter or is it extra super hyper local intricate details of interest to only a small audience? Graywalls (talk) 19:54, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

A question about the prevalence of coverage on this matter seems to pertain to WP:GNG, which is different from WP:RS. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 20:00, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

To me it builds on the WP:USEBYOTHERS claim. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:16, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Consistency with prevailing general viewpoint pertain to WP:DUE. One could go on about individual ingredient used and their origin, who invented it and who owns the factory of the ingredients about the the wine bottle label, but factual reliability does not mean inclusion of these intricate details reliably represent balanced viewpoint. Graywalls (talk) 00:43, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

RfC: Red Ventures

What is the reliability of sites owned by Red Ventures (excluding specific sites listed below)?

• Option 1: Generally reliable
• Option 2: Additional considerations
• Option 3: Generally unreliable
• Option 4: Deprecate

This proposal came up at a recent discussion of ZDNet [129]. While Red Ventures itself has been infrequently discussed [130] prior to this RfC, sites now owned by it have been frequently discussed in the past, such as CNET, ZDNet, Healthline, and others. For the purposes of keeping this RfC clear due to Red Ventures' enormous reach, this applies to content published by sites during the period of time they were owned by Red Ventures, so pre-acquisition content would be exempt. This RfC also excludes the following sources as they were previously discussed at WP:RSP:

• WP:CNET, WP:MREL since being acquired by Red Ventures in October 2020, unreliable after November 2022
• WP:HEALTHLINE, deprecated
• The Points Guy, blacklisted and split between WP:MREL and WP:GUNREL.

It also excludes sources sold by Red Ventures in 2022 to Fandom as they were identified in the previous discussion as possibly needing an exception due to frequent use/not spending that much time under Red Ventures. Examples include Metacritic, TV Guide, and Gamespot (which are considered generally reliable at WP:RSP and WP:GAMESOURCES). However, this RfC would apply to ZDNet and Lonely Planet as of the time they were acquired by Red Ventures. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 18:15, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

Survey

• Option 3. Publications acquired by Red Ventures have come to WP:RSN and have usually been declared as generally unreliable or below. WP:CNET was declared unreliable in 2022 after Red Ventures began filling with AI-generated content, WP:HEALTHLINE was deprecated as being frequently filled with misinformation, and The Points Guy is blacklisted due to abuse. JPxG observed in this thread that ZDNet currently has an article up on "the best Linux desktops" [131] [132] that has notes from the editor still in the article. In addition, the editor did not identify multiple factual inaccuracies and the article is apparently republished every year with the same URL. [133] ZDNet also publishes articles from StackCommerce about great deals on StackCommerce's website, which are not declared as sponsored content. [134] [135] [136] [137] [138] [139] Other articles are declared as paid content though,[140] which leads me to believe ZDNet is intentionally failing to declare StackCommerce ads as paid content.

This appears to be Red Ventures' modus operandi. They acquire sites with good search engine optimization (SEO) scores, then cut costs by using AI to generate a bunch of content for affiliate marketing on the site. Futurism has identified that Red Ventures uses this strategy across many of their properties such as Bankrate. [141] [142] The Verge also has a good explainer on their editorial process,[143] and adds that Red Ventures pressures journalists at CNet to give better reviews.[144] We shouldn't repeatedly put the onus on editors to prove that Red Ventures ruined a site before we can start removing it; they can easily buy or start another. I think we should look at the common denominator here, which is Red Ventures, and target the problem (a spam network) at its source.

I'll also add that the reason I included so many exceptions in this RfC is because on a pragmatic basis it will be easier to deal with the special cases in the future, rather than now (this avoids a potential WP:TRAINWRECK). It's not because I think all of the exceptions should be treated differently and I don't think this RfC should be seen as closing the door for further discussion on those sources. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 18:15, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

Red Ventures' official policy going forward is also to avoid disclosing AI-generated content.[145] According to the Director of SEO at the company: "Disclosing AI content is like telling the IRS you have a cash-only business," so we can't trust them to disambiguate AI-generated content from non AI-generated content. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 05:07, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 Between the AI-generated and often blantantly inaccurate content, as well as the SEO/sales/marketing-oriented output, and the decisions previously made regarding CNET and The Points Guy, a fairly easy blanket GUNREL. The Kip 19:46, 24 January 2024 (UTC)
• No. I don't think it makes sense to categorize Lonely Planet as unreliable because some other company owned by Red Ventures did something very stupid. I think that this is jumping the gun: it feels like something should be done, and this is something. Frankly, categorizing an entire outlet as unreliable because one writer or one editor craps the bed is an overreaction; doing so because someone at a different outlet owned by the same parent company crapped the bed is medieval. jp×g🗯️ 21:14, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

  @JPxG: It's not just one writer/editor. Lonely Planet also uses AI (their system is called Trill) to generate content for affiliate marketing. [146] [147] Specifically, the system takes images from influencers and generates "bookable content", which Lonely Planet then gets a commission off of. This is very similar to what CNET and The Points Guy do. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 23:18, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

  I should add (I found this while doing more research) that the New York Times did an expose on the AI-generated travel guide industry in August last year. [148] They ran guidebooks through an AI detector and found that the Lonely Planet guides had "next to no chance that they were written by A.I. generators." So, they don't seem to be generating their guidebooks with AI, but they do generate some kind of content with AI. It should also be noticed that according to messages leaked by Futurism, Red Ventures' subsidiaries are encouraged not to disclose AI-generated content. [149] Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 04:59, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 but I'd prefer option 4 if possible. It's high time for it. Enough is enough: if it's owned by Red Ventures, we need to go ahead and identify it as a hard WP:RS fail. :bloodofox: (talk) 01:09, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3 but not opposed to Option 4. Highly questionable and effectively not usable in most cases, particularly if they intend to go forward with not disclosing AI content.FortunateSons (talk) 11:57, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
• No. The RfC's need to outline multiple exceptions is an indication that "owned by Red Ventures" is too slippery of a category. We can have RfCs for individual outlets as they come up. It certainly makes sense to point out Red Venture's pattern in future discussions about sources they purchase, but attempting to target Red Ventures while simultaneously acknowledging that this isn't actually wholly consistent and doesn't apply to some outlets that have been under Red Ventures ownership strikes me as liable to be confusing. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:40, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

  Personally, I think we should deprecate Healthline because I think even if we designate Red Ventures as unreliable, Healthline is health-related and should be considered even less trustworthy. Metacritic has always been algorithmically generated (we're usually citing it for its review aggregation) and the other sources in 2022 got sold off around the time CNET started dropping AI-generated content. I don't think any of their content right now should be considered above generally unreliable, but other editors might feel differently. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 20:56, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

• No. It should be uncontroversial that whatever the pattern of parent comapany's recent acquisitions, sources at RSN-RSP are evaluated individually on their merits. SamuelRiv (talk) 16:47, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

  The problem with this is that the parent company pushes the same editorial policy across the entire organization. It's a network of spammy websites and by the time we designate one they already have another. If we ban BestColleges.com [150] Red Ventures can simply start Thebestschools.org. [151] Or they can just switch to OnlineMBA.com [152] or Nursejournal.org. [153] All of these sites have similar content creation policies (generate SEO-optimized content with AI for affiliate marketing) and they all have the same reliability issues because of it according to Futurism.[154] If we have to have a discussion for every site Red Ventures owns, we'll die a death by a thousand cuts, because they have dozens of sites like those four just in the education sector alone. The content is made by most of the same people and has most of the same problems as they're all owned by the same company that does the same things. We should treat them the same as we do other spam networks that show up to RSN. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 21:21, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

  This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard somebody say on an already-ridiculous noticeboard. Do you seriously think that a media holdings company is creating subsidiary companies for the sole purpose of skirting Wikipedia source deprecations? Is this a joke? jp×g🗯️ 03:31, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

  @JPxG: Maybe I wasn't clear enough and I apologize. Red Ventures' actual concern is Google et al catching on that their content is AI-generated and blocking the site. They're not trying to skirt Wikipedia deprecation, but they start/acquire sites, fill them with garbage, and by the time Google and others catch on, they've moved on. And as a volunteer project we're very far behind the curve.

  It's not that Red Ventures creating subsidiary companies for the sole purpose of skirting Wikipedia source deprecation, it's that by the time we get around to deprecating a source because everyone else has realized its shit, Red Ventures will already have a new thing ready. And this is inherent to the structure of Wikipedia because of how much credence we give to reliable sources judging other reliable sources (e.g. WP:USEBYOTHERS). Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 04:32, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3, Red Ventures has perverted everything under their purview and we don't actually have a requirement that sources are evaluated individually despite multiple editors claiming that we do. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 17:37, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3 Support a blanket ban of all Red Ventures sites, per my comments in previous discussions. But I think a more reasonable cutoff date would be 2022, similar to what we do with CNET. InfiniteNexus (talk) 19:44, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

  If we're blanket banning, maybe it's better to do option 4 to get an edit filter? Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 21:21, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

  I don't know how that would work with a cutoff date (i.e. I don't know if it is possible for an edit filter to detect when an article was published). InfiniteNexus (talk) 16:44, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 per much of the above. JM (talk) 07:58, 26 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3 as per above. Red Ventures poisons everything it touches. Cortador (talk) 21:24, 26 January 2024 (UTC)
• Option 3 They're so bad editore should need to explain why they use a link but I would oppose general deprecation. If some bit seems able to resist the overall fungus growth a RfC can be raised to say it is a more reliable. NadVolum (talk) 22:21, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

• Option 3 per many above. 🌺 Cremastra (talk) 15:25, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Discussion

Let the record reflect that "a permanent and open-ended blank-check deprecation of all websites and companies in whom a majority ownership is owned by this specific firm" is an obscene, authoritarian overreaction that goes far beyond even the most wildly expansive interpretation of what this noticeboard is set up, or within its remit, to do. Deprecation is already not a policy: it's something we made up on the spot to get rid of the Daily Mail in 2017, on the basis that the site had been so bad in so many ways for so many years that we needed to bypass our existing policies for an exigent emergency.

Now, seven years later, we want to set up a system for the indefinite future in which we deprecate dozens of websites, pre-emptively and without any evidence of their doing anything untrustworthy, on the basis that they get bought by a company that at one point owned a different website that had something bad on it? I realize that the stuff that's happened is annoying, and we want to "punish" them in some way, but Wikipedia is not a means for owning the libs or punishing our posting enemies or doing callout posts on venture capital firms. These may be noble goals, but the purpose of Wikipedia is to be an encyclopedia. If we find it "too hard" to individually evaluate entire websites before making blanket bans on their use, well, maybe it is just "too hard" to edit Wikipedia and we need to take a break.

The idea that Red Ventures is going to try to "get around" a deprecation or a "judgment" by making new websites is total fantasy. Media companies, in general, do not exist for the purpose of being listed as reliable by Wikipedia, and they definitely do not exist for the purpose of being listed as reliable by an unofficial club of Wikipedians who maintain a list of what sources are reliable. The idea is risible: what proportion of traffic on a news site comes from people clicking links to that site in the references section of Wikipedia articles? A hundredth of a percent? A tenth of a percent? Do we have some fantasy where the Red Ventures guys see that they've been deprecated on Wikipedia, break into a sobbing fit, and tearfully promise repentance? I don't think they give a hoot -- it's just going to make it even more difficult for editors to write articles. We do not have an "innocent until proven guilty" system for allowing people to link to websites in article citations, and we should not try to create one out of process because we are mad online. jp×g🗯️ 04:29, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

I addressed the idea that this is a mechanism to 'punish' Red Ventures above in another reply, so I won't repeat it here beyond to say that what you're saying is not how I intended my argument to come across. But re: to the idea that this is unprecedented and an overreach, we blanket ban collections of websites that share editorial teams all the time. Dotdash has a special entry at WP:RSP, and so does the WP:EPOCHTIMES as we deprecated all sources owned by that group including NTDTV and Kanzhongguo. We've done the same for WP:RT.COM. In cases where a larger organization enforces the same editorial policy on multiple purportedly independent websites, it's understood that they can be treated as a group as we're ultimately judging sources largely on their editorial policy.

When the stated editorial policy of Red Ventures is to fill websites with AI-generated content regardless of if its reliable, we shouldn't have to care about their convoluted organizational structure. It's the same people running the sites with the same content-creation tooling (their euphemism for AI) on the backend and that consistently combines to create unreliable content. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 04:57, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

The content of our articles should be determined by the quality of the sources that are available to write those articles. I am in favor of noting that the sites mentioned in this RfC should be used with extreme care (and that articles published on them after the implementation of these new editorial policies should be generally avoided). However, I am strongly opposed to preëmptive deprecation of sources that haven't done anything improper. This presumes a whitelist model of sourcing acceptability, which is emphatically not the way that this project has worked for the last twenty-three years.

There is no policy- or guideline- consistent basis for saying "this source is deprecated because we couldn't be arsed to look at it in detail". If we can't be arsed to look at something in detail, why would that RSN discussion matter more than a hypothetical situation in which somebody wanted to use a source in an article and was overruled by it?

The Dotdash entry says that there was no consensus on the company as a whole, and has a very long "notes" section detailing individual discussions (with differing consensi) on each of the sites in question. There is not consensus to give Dotdash a scarlet letter that immediately taints all companies it buys.

Conversely, with the other examples you give (Epoch Times, NTDTV, Kanzhongguo, RT), these are outlets in their own right, that have obvious direct editorial control over their subsidiaries; the subsidiaries being unacceptable for sourcing is obvious from the fact that they don't have any independent existence from the parent, and never did. The thing being proposed here is much more ambitious: we're trying to probe into corporate governance.

To get a little more down to brass tacks: what does it mean for a company to be "owned"? A majority stake? By shares? By class of stock? A majority stake of voting shares? Does owning 40% of a newspaper's stock mean you own the newspaper, if the rest of the ownership is split between different shareholders and none of them have more than 40%? What about the same situation, but your stake is 20%? What distinction do we make between portfolio companies, subsidiaries, and business units? What degree of integration or subordination between levels of executive management has to exist for us to say a company is really just a different company in a hat and trench coat? These aren't really questions that an encyclopedia should be in the business of determining. They should not determine the content of Wikipedia articles. We should judge sources based on whether the sources are good or bad. jp×g🗯️ 17:20, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

First off, I haven't !voted for deprecation for the reasons that you and others have gave. Blanket-banning isn't the right move here. Going by the rule of WP:GUNREL, the standard is Editors show consensus that the source is questionable in most cases. The source may lack an editorial team, have a poor reputation for fact-checking, fail to correct errors, be self-published, or present user-generated content. Saying "most cases" gives us the ability to postpone where to draw the line in the grey area later. Much of your argument is that "deprecation is bad" but that's not what most people have called for at this discussion.

While I can see your point that this isn't analogous to Dotdash, I still believe that this is very similar to RT or the Epoch Times. As you said, the problem is with those outlets that have obvious direct editorial control over their subsidiaries and their lack of independence from the parent group. This is the same situation as Red Ventures; except Red Ventures is managing things at a higher level. Go read the article from Futurism about their policies: [155] They have the same guy (Lance Davis) that is the Vice President of Content for Financial Services for for CNET as well as its sister sites Bankrate and CreditCards.com. According to Red Ventures themselves, "He is responsible for overseeing and reviewing editorial content and is a member of the newsroom," And the editor in charge of their AI-generated content (Cameron Hurta) is the same person for all Red Ventures properties.

Red Ventures is not an organization that owns distinct websites with different editorial teams. While CNET and ZDNet used to be independent tech news websites, they are obviously not anymore. Red Ventures is a highly integrated company that has the same people creating unreliable content on all of their websites. As much as they try to avoid showing that in public, this is a fact that is supported by the consensus of reliable sources. If we're judging sources by whether they're good or bad, Red Ventures is with limited exceptions bad.

And in response to your last point about "brass tacks", you're splitting hairs prior to those issues being a problem. If we discover Red Ventures sites in the future that don't have these issues or don't neatly fit into this discussion, we can easily have another discussion at RSN. But from what I can see, most of their websites have the same issues, and I don't think we should start edge case poisoning the general point of the RfC by dealing with the possibility of a Red Ventures subsidiary having multiple classes of shares before that is shown to exist. Chess (talk) (please mention me on reply) 23:50, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Schoolshooters.info, and quotations from manifestos that are not noted in secondary sources

This relates to this discussion. There's a dispute over whether https://schoolshooters.info/ is a WP:RS, and (presuming we can school shooter manifestos hosted there as WP:PRIMARY sources) whether it is appropriate to take quotes from a manifesto as a primary source in order to illustrate things about the shooter. In this case, I believe that two quotes with no coverage (that I can find) in secondary sources are being pulled out to support the assertion that the perpetrator of the 2015 Umpqua Community College shooting is a Satanist and was motivated by Satanism, something all available secondary sources are extremely cautious about and / or give little weight. There are two other sources that are notionally usable when it comes to this aspect of the topic, a People magazine piece that attributes everything to an unnamed source and says little in its article voice, and an Oregon Live piece that describes the manifesto but places virtually no emphasis on the Satanism aspect; however, neither of these mention the quotes in question. I mention these sources mostly because there's a related WP:HEADLINES issue in that the headline of the Oregon Live places emphasis on that aspect while the body of the article does not. --Aquillion (talk) 14:30, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

schoolshooters.info seems to be self-published by Peter F. Langman, who is apparently an expert on the psychology of school shooters. So it's maybe an WP:EXPERTSPS? That said, it's still a self-published source, and school shootings are a contentious enough topic that I would be really cautious about using self-published sources, no matter how expert the author.

As for quoting from the manifestos of shooters, assuming we are confident of their authenticity then yes, the manifesto is a reliable source for its own text, just as any source is reliable for its own text. WP:DUE is another matter entirely. In the discussion you link to, it looks as though we do have independent sources discussing Mercer's motives, so if those sources don't discuss something which he mentioned in his manifesto then we probably shouldn't either. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 16:52, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

On a basic level the site is self-published and Langman appears to meet the requirements of WP:SPS in that he is an expert who has previously been published by independent reliable sources. Whether certain details are due is beyond the purpose of this board, but I personally I think Caeciliusinhorto-public makes some good points. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 23:02, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Focusing on the purpose of this board, I agree with Caeciliusinhorto-public and ActivelyDisinterested. As Langman has been published on the topic in other reliable sources (including the academic publishers Palgrave Macmillan and Rowman & Littlefield), per WP:EXPERTSPS his website SchoolShooters.info is a reliable source. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 05:06, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

This article seems to go into a lot of intricate detail on seemingly irrelevant aspects of an event which is not that notable. There's uncited stuff in there ten years out of date (i.e. "Kaney is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran with 23 years on the Roseburg Police Department while Spingath is a U.S. Air Force veteran with 16 years on the Roseburg Police Department"). So some WP:DUE questions are raised by the whole thing.

I think that if the only source we have to talk about the blog posts made by some murderer are a tabloid magazine and a copy of the blog post on some guy's random fansite for mass murderers, we don't really need to be writing about them. This is doubly true if the tabloid magazine is just incorrect about what the murderer's blog posts said. jp×g🗯️ 04:34, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

For the sake of clarity, I'll note that calling SchoolShooters.info a random fansite for mass murderers is an egregious mischaracterization. Langman's editorial purpose is explicit and on the site's front page: This site is a compendium of documents relating to a wide range of active shooter incidents in educational settings. The purpose of the site is to help prevent school shootings and to provide insight into the perpetrators of large-scale school violence. The information and materials on this site are relevant for professionals in education, mental health, and law enforcement. This is not a "fansite" for mass murder. I would call it digital social science put together by a trained psychologist interested in providing insight into the phenomenon for other professionals in education, mental health, and law enforcement. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 05:04, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Perhaps we are the fansite. Whatever the intention, this website is being used to write not only an article about the shooting that mentions the guy by name thirty-six times, but also a seven-paragraph article-within-an-article biography of the murderer (including a long quotation specifically about how he thought it was really awesome that you people would make you famous and write mountains of words about how cool you were if you committed mass murder, after which we immediately go back to doing that).

If we have to cite the primary source to correct blatant factual errors in the only secondary source, because the only secondary source is a supermarket tabloid, it casts serious doubt on the notability of the material. jp×g🗯️ 13:42, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Why would you call it "digital social science" when it doesn't appear to be from that field? IMO it seems like regular social science without a reliance on digital tools or data. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:57, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

The format is digital; it's published as a website, rather than as a print book. In the social sciences, "digital" can be used to refer to a project's format/medium, speaking from my experience as having been an employee of a digital social science project. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:13, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

From my experience as an academic thats incorrect... If its format/medium then there hasn't been anything published outside of digital social science in a decade or more. So either the term is completely meaningless or its not being used right by you... Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:25, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

First, I am surprised and confused by your incorrect implication that zero print books or print journals in the social sciences have been published in over a decade. Those remain the primary venues for gold-standard academic publishing in fields of the social sciences and humanities. Expressing a belief that there hasn't been anything published in non-digital formats in a decade or more would suggest a substantial deficit of understanding of the field of academic publishing.

Second, Digital Methods for Social Science: An Interdisciplinary Guide to Research Innovation, eds. Helene Snee, Christine Hine, Yvette Morey, Steven Roberts, and Hayley Watson (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016) states in its introduction that "Our concern is not only with research that explores online phenomena, but also with a broader interest in using digital methods to engage with all aspects of social life" (bolding added).

As the humanities are related to the social sciences, this definition from M. Kirschenbaum's "What Is Digital Humanities and What's It Doing in English departments?' in Defining Digital Humanities: A Reader, eds. Melissa Terras, Julianne Nyhan, and Edward Vanhoutte (Ashgate, 2013) is also useful: "It involves investigation, analysis, synthesis, and presentation of information in electronic form" (bolding added). P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 17:33, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

You appear to be making a straw man of my argument. I must have missed where the author uses digital methods, IMO they appear to be using traditional methods. The conflation of digital social science with the digital humanities because they are "related" isn't worth responding to. You are free to disagree but I think you've pushed a line further than it can go. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 18:55, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Self published by a recognized expert so *usable with attribution* but as you've noted simply hosting a primary document wouldn't add any weight to the content of that primary document meaning that the quote pull and anything based on it is almost certainly undue. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 14:57, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Editing using unreliable sources

A user Arind8 (previously Arind7) is using so many unreliable sources in these articles Homosexuality in India, LGBT rights in India, Marriage in Hinduism, Hinduism and LGBT topics. Timovinga (talk) 02:37, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

This noticeboard is only for discussing the reliability of sources, not user behaviour. For disputes with other users see WP:Dispute resolution. If you have a question about a source and it's use you will need to supply some details. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:43, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

According to user Arind8 tamilculture.com is a reliable source. Your opinion regarding this source would be necessary at Talk:Marriage in Hinduism Timovinga (talk) 17:04, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Another user is using these sources as citations in Hinduism and LGBT topics. Timovinga (talk) 17:09, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

User Arind8 is also using non scholarly sources like these which are not reliable as per guidelines. A 3O would be appreciated. Timovinga (talk) 17:16, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Again, this board is solely for discussing the reliability of sources - if you’re asserting that the sources used are unreliable, you might want to provide a concisive argument. Otherwise, this just seems like a content dispute, which this is the wrong place for. The Kip 17:32, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

It is regarding the reliability of these sources. These sources has been used to discuss history related information. As per WP:HISTRS these sources are not reliable. Timovinga (talk) 19:18, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

These sources are failing WP:HISTRS and have been used in Hinduism and LGBT topics article

• https://time.com/5918808/homophobia-homosexuality-lgbt-asian-values/
• https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/sunday-times/deep-focus/is-it-hindu-to-be-homophobic/articleshow/27387444.cms?from=mdr
• https://www.hinduamerican.org/blog/pride-month-reflections-on-hinduism/
• https://www.hinduwebsite.com/hinduism/hinduism-and-same-sex-marriage.asp
• https://qrius.com/what-do-manusmriti-and-dharmashastra-have-to-say-about-homosexuality/ Timovinga (talk) 04:01, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Some opinions from editors regarding the reliability of these sources are needed, thanks. Timovinga (talk) 04:03, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

The short version of my opinion is that from your edit you are correct to remove these sources. The general ideas of WP:HISTRS sourcing applies when one starts making broad historical connections to the present, even (but especially) if it's culture or philosophy. I'll review the sources individually in the article Talk page. SamuelRiv (talk) 06:29, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Great, thanks- Timovinga (talk) 06:36, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Kirkus and Publisher's Weekly

Are these sources sufficient on their own to establish notability? see Counterparts (novel) and Acrobat (novel) Elinruby (talk) 15:31, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Why "on their own"? Both articles cite other reviews as well. Schazjmd (talk) 15:41, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

I'll also point out that this noticeboard is for asking about the reliability of sources in context. If there are concerns about notability, that seems like a separate question. I will say that Kirkus Reviews and Publishers Weekly are two of the best-known, best-reputed, and most reliable book review magazines around, heeded and regarded by libraries, booksellers, and book-buyers. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 16:11, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

As the editor is considering taking the article creator to ANI, it may be that the question is targeted at these articles in their original states, one of which used only those two sources, perhaps as part of building a complaint against said editor. The sources listed are certainly reliable for their own reviews, which addresses any matter for this board; notability is more of an AFD question, and even there the answer would be probably but even if not, irrelevant, as (as Schazjmd points out) neither article depends solely on those sources. -- Nat Gertler (talk) 18:06, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for helpful background, @NatGertler. The same question basically was recently asked on the talk for WP:NBOOK. Even that casual conversation shows that editors have different views on using only Kirkus/PW, so it's certainly not compelling evidence of anything for an ANI report. Schazjmd (talk) 18:15, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

I'd say they both count towards WP:N, but per definition they're not enough on their own. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:05, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Last I looked this is not ANI, and if i did take Dream Focus there it would be a CIR for their hostile reaction to getting a contentious topics notification, and WP:IDHT about what it is.

Not for using Kirkus, for crying out loud. I did say I was thinking about it and I still am. After 17 years you should know the rules, or at least ask without going ballistic. Now that we have that out of the way, these articles. One of them has 12 reviews on Amazon. I am not certain that Acrobat was actually printed; it hadn't when the film rights were sold. I think these articles are puff pieces, sure.

But the actual question, getting back to a discussion of content rather than what certain editors might want to claim my motives might be, is whether Kirkus et al are enough for notability. I get that they are reliable for their own reviews Elinruby (talk) 19:05, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

PS @Gråbergs Gråa Sång: thank you that is about what I was thinking

As has been pointed out to you repeatedly, your "actual question" is not one for this noticeboard. Your musings about whether a book was printed are irrelevant (a work need not have been released to be notable, and we do have articles on unreleased works) and inaccurate (as some basic research will show.) You seem to be wasting people's time in trying to discredit certain articles. May I suggest that you move on from that topic? -- Nat Gertler (talk) 20:44, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

WP:NBOOK#1 explicitly mentions reviews as sources which count towards notability. My understanding is that Kirkus and Publisher's Weekly are both reputable sources, so I would expect that at AfD editors would count them as evidence of notability. Of course the only way to know how an article would do at AfD for sure would be to nominate it for deletion. (Getting increasingly far from the question of reliable sourcing which this board is really intended for, proposing a merge is always an option if you think that a stand-alone page should not exist but a deletion request would not succeed.) Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:19, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

Ok thanks. That wasn't what I asked, but it's useful information Elinruby (talk) 16:37, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

State Times (2)

Can State Times be considered a reliable outlet for an article. Yotrages (talk) 18:08, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Is there a reason you're asking the exact same question again? You asked the same question in WP:RSN#States Times. Again advertorials are a problem within Indian media (see WP:NEWSORGINDIA) so some caution should be taken with overly promotional articles. Also reliability is about context, it would help if you supplied details of what content you want to add, which article it relates to, and what exact source you want to use. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:25, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

Impactus and Learning Mind

Are Impactus (https://www.impactus.org/) and Learning Mind (https://www.learning-mind.com/) reliable sources? I am using them as citations for Joy for information on the distinction between "happiness" and "joy." Specifically, I am using these pages:

• https://www.learning-mind.com/joy-vs-happiness/
• https://www.impactus.org/articles/find-joy/

Finding citations for benefits of joy was fairly easy. Finding citations for "joy vs. happiness" turned out to be a lot harder.

I searched for "impactus" on Wikipedia and found that Mark Scheifele contains a link to an article titled "Power of Prayer" on Impactus. No other article had a link to that site. Can someone please review Learning Mind and Impactus to see if they are reliable? Thanks. Seckends (talk) 14:35, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

This sounds a lot like content that would fall under WP:MEDRS. The Learning-Mind article was written by Sherrie Hurd, who has an Associates in Marketing (per their about us page[156]. I doubt it's reliable for any physical or psychological benefit. Impactus is a Christian advocacy website[157], again not a good source for such information. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:23, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

Wall of Sound website and possible Promotion

I have a problem with Wall of Sound website at https://wallofsoundau.com

The site appears to be user-generated for WP:PROMOTION and has been used on various wp articles (see search results). I first encountered the website at Amy Shark at diff (see also discussion at Talk:Amy Shark) in October 2020. I was alerted by the user name being very similar to writer of the article at Wall of Sound. I request a discussion as to whether this site should be described as unacceptable and hence removed from Wikipedia articles. shaidar cuebiyar (talk) 05:47, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

I note that the editors you mention has been blocked for spam/promo[158], and the site has been mentioned in a few spam reports, but I'm unsure of the sites reliability. I've left a message on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Music asking for some input from editors in the topic area. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:05, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

NDTV still RS?

Ravish Kumar left NDTV and turns YouTuber. NDTV becomes Godi media and relentlessly broadcasting Ram Mandir Pran Pratishtha. NDTV still reliable? BlackOrchidd (talk) 06:10, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

International Truth and Justice Project

Can the International Truth and Justice Project (ITJP) be considered a reliable source, in topics related to the Sri Lankan Civil War? Cossde (talk) 12:14, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

They're headed[159] by Yasmin Sooka a leading human rights lawyer; previously of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and Frances Harrison; previously of the BBC, Amnesty International and OHCHR. There certainly look reliable, but reliability is about context is there a specific report that is used to source some specific content that this question relates to? -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:46, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

Agree, it's a reliable source for matters related to human rights. Yasmin Sooka's expertise is in the field of human rights. A discussion has been opened up in the Sri Lanka Reconciliation project page which deals with vetting these sources: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Sri Lanka Reconciliation/Sources#International Truth and Justice Project, Sri Lanka Oz346 (talk) 22:57, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

Some concerns I have regarding ITJP are:

• Does ITJP meet WP:RS requirements?
  • Yasmin Sooka, was a member of the Secretary-General's Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka which presents a conflict of interests given the role of the ITJP. Hence Sooka's role in the ITJP can not be taken as the singular reason to cite ITJP as a RS. Does it meet WP:INDEPENDENT? At best ITJP represents a WP:BIASEDSOURCES. Hence can it be used to uses as the sole source to maintain WP:NPOV of an article?
  • ITJP data appears to be highly WP:PRIMARY and has not been verified or confirmed through peer-review.
  • Other RS such as mainstream media and organizations have quoted ITJP in limited forms as with the case with any sources of information, falling short of explicitly citing ITJP as a RS.

Cossde (talk) 02:28, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Let me be clear, I am not questioning Sooka's qualifications, I am sure that it has been verified by the UN Secretary-General. However, given the nature of the work her ITJP does in both data collection and litigation; I quote the following from an ITJP press release:

" The International Truth and Justice Project which she heads has focused on the collection and preservation of evidence pertaining to the final phase of Sri Lanka’s civil war in 2008-9 and post-war torture and sexual violence. It holds one of the most important archives of Sri Lankan testimony covering the last decade (400 case files) meticulously assembled by international human rights investigators, prosecutors and barristers who specialise in sexual violence documentation who have worked in international tribunals and courts. In 2017 the ITJP brought a series of universal jurisdiction cases in Latin America against a Sri Lankan General who was Ambassador there, Jagath Jayasuriya. In 2019 the ITJP assisted eleven torture victims to file a case against Gotabaya Rajapaksa in California under the Torture Victims Protection Act. In 2022, it sent a criminal complaint against Mr Rajapaksa to the Attorney General of Singapore after he fled there briefly, escaping anti-government protests in Sri Lanka calling for his removal as President."

In a similar discussion in this forum the WP:PRIMARY nature of the content and that these have been used by ITJP to execute "universal jurisdiction cases". The use of WP:SECONDARY that have cited ITJP, in my opinion fall under the accepted norms of Wikipedia. Cossde (talk) 03:37, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

World Journal

Is World Journal an RS, especially for BLp claims? Slatersteven (talk) 16:49, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

Meenakshi Jain on the Ayodhya dispute

The Ayodhya dispute currently extensively cites the 2013 Meenakshi Jain book Rama and Ayodhya. However, looking at her Wikipedia bio, she looks like someone who writes from a strongly Hindu nationalist perspective, and therefore someone who would be unreliable for this topic area. Hemiauchenia (talk) 16:54, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

Based on the comments at Meenakshi_Jain#Others, caution seems advisable. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:38, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

The Free Press and Amin Husain

Is this article by The Free Press: https://www.thefp.com/p/nyu-prof-tells-students-hamas-atrocities-untrueu a reliable source? Multiple sources supporting the claim of anit-semenism by Amin Husain on his wikipedia page relied on this source. The claims have been removed due to the reliability of the source being questionable and the article falling under blp. GrayStorm^{Talk Contributions} 23:51, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

I would say no, the Free Press is not a reliable source for this subject. Inaccurate publication from the Free Press has been discovered on other politically charged topics. For an example, see this article from Assigned Media (news site founded by Evan Urquhart, a journalist published by Atlantic, Politico, and Slate) about inaccuracies in a medical journalism piece the Free Press ran and seemingly exercised no editorial oversight over despite other newspapers publishing no corroborating findings (and, often, contradictory findings).

Additionally, the founder of the Free Press, Bari Weiss, cast her publication in contrast to trusted, reliable sources like the New York Times and NPR. In Bari Weiss's words: If you’re someone that used to read the New York Times and listen to NPR in the morning, and now you’re thinking to yourself, ‘I don’t know if I can trust what I hear or read there anymore,’ where do you go? (see same linked article) According to Weiss, she wants such readers to turn to the Free Press. P-Makoto (she/her) (talk) 00:53, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Geek Girl Authority

Is Geek Girl Authority (geekgirlauthority.com) reliable? I mainly edit articles about podcasts and regularly come across the website. It mostly seems like a blog. It has a list of staff [160], but pretty much everyone is a WP:CONTRIBUTOR. None of them have profiles on the website, but Googling the editors shows that both have BAs in Theatre/Performing Arts. I don't see any editorial policies and it doesn't look like they're selective about who they let contribute. In this diff I removed this review from Let's Not Meet: A True Horror Podcast because it claimed that the host of the show was a star wars character, which appears to be completely incorrect. I thought maybe they meant it was the same voice actor, but I can't find anything to back that up. The author of this particular article isn't listed among the staff on the about page. Personally, I think the website is basically a WP:BLOG with a few contributors, but I was curious what others thought. Perhaps articles by the two editors are more reliable? TipsyElephant (talk) 02:47, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

I would say not, unless it can be shown they are recognized experts in tier field. Slatersteven (talk) 13:09, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Can Cureus be trusted enough to be used anywhere?

I came about this[161] when a relative posted it as proof mRNA vaccines are dangerous. A PubPeer extension brought up this[162] User:Bon courage then showed me this.[163] Its Wikipedia article is pretty damning. Here is where we use it.[164] Doug Weller talk 14:12, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

It's non MEDLINE-indexed with a curious 'peer-review' process that probably doesn't count as peer review, and a reputation for being a junk journal. Certainly not WP:MEDRS. Bon courage (talk) 14:17, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

If they wish to rely on "post publication peer review", then we should treat everything they post as we would other pre-prints until external reviews can happen. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 14:55, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

This is odd. Same authors, same argument more or less, but this time published by Sage. Determinants of COVID-19 vaccine-induced myocarditis Doug Weller talk 15:00, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

And this is why MEDRS exists, I wouldn't trust anything authored by Peter A. McCullough. Hemiauchenia (talk) 15:27, 29 January 2024 (UTC)